For Lelê ~ EnterUsernameHere394

【In which Lily doesn't listen to what they said...】

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People said that marriage proposals were supposed to be baroque, magical affairs with long, drawn out speeches, platinum rings, and fancy restaurants, and fireworks and all things romantic.

Lily disagreed. In her eyes marriage proposals should be spontaneous and messy with stumbled words, and sincere promises, and tears, and giggles, and about and thousand and one mishaps. With James Potter that was exactly what she got.

Graduation day from Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry; the two of them shared a boat, gliding over the black lake and admiring the way it glittered in the summer sun nostalgically, almost as if it could sense their loss.

"Do you know what we should do?" He had said as they drank in the scene.

"What's that?"

"Why don't we get married?"

And she remembered clear as crystal staring at him in utter shell-shock, her hands over her mouth and her mind and heart whirring and hammering so fast she could hear them humming a symphony.

"Are you asking me to marry you?"

James looked at her long and hard, she could practically feel his gaze tickling her soul, his eyes like the forest in golden hour and his glasses askew on his nose.
"Well... yeah if you want to?"

She didn't know why she was crying so much, her hands still clamped around her mouth she nodded so vigorously she might have broken her neck.
"I want to hear you ask though. Give me a cheesy spiel."

James laughed and carefully repositioned himself on the boat so he was kneeling on one knee in front of her. This had caught the attention of a few of the close by boats who were pointing at them and gasping as if they'd seen the face of god.

"Lily Gwendolyn Evans– the only woman on the planet with an equally as embarrassing middle name as me: you are the best thing to ever happen to me since I was given a broomstick. You make me a better man everyday and yet I'm already perfect," she giggled, taking both his hands as he held them out to her. By this point just about the whole of seventh year were watching them. Alice and Marlene were squealing, grasping onto each other for moral support; Remus and Sirius laughing and rocking their boat with excitement and the rest either watching with curiosity, disgust or fear.

"But despite me being perfect the most perfect thing about me is you. You are the most..." he trailed off, looking for the right words to say, "the most... what's the word? Fuck... –ah! No I've lost it again..."

Lily shook her head, a tear rolling down her cheek, "it's okay. It's okay."

James grinned, squeezing her hands and offering her his emotions through his touch instead.
"You make me forget my words, you distract me from quidditch; you keep me on my toes with that devastating glare of yours; you nearly kill me with your sense of humour as your beauty knocks the breath out of me everyday. Every single day, weather that be when you're in your uniform, ironed shirt, perfectly done tie and braided hair, or at Hogsmede with a crochet jumper and Muggle jeans; or particularly at quidditch matches wearing my jersey. Regardless, you're always beautiful." He chuckled in embarrassment and let his head drop to her lap to hide is pink cheeks.

"Go on. I need more ass-kissing before I make my verdict." Lily smirked, taking his chin and lifting it up slightly, "c'mon!"

He laughed but knelt back up again, "okay... you're always beautiful and you're always funny and smart and vivacious and passionate and there is no other person I'd rather spend the rest of my life with than you. So, Lily Gwendolyn Evans, I'm asking you, on a boat that definitely has a loose screw, in the middle of a lake, on graduation day, at seventeen years old to marry me?"

She smiled brighter than the sun that hung lowly in the sky, lazily casting a golden haze over the lake, late that afternoon.
"Yes. Yes of course I'll marry you, James Potter!"

Near by students cheered and clapped and whooped and hollered as James reached up and hugged his fiancée tightly. And it only got louder when she kissed him, wrapping her arms around his neck and letting go of the sides of the boat. And that was ultimately what causes them to both go toppling (untidily) into the water in a very undignified yet absolutely perfect display and in Lily's memory, it was the only way the day could have ended.

They resurfaced from the water and James pulled her close to him laughing and spluttering, "Mellifluous! That's the word I was looking for!" He cried, shaking his head and sending droplets of water in a fanning motion around him. Lily shook her head and wrapped her arms around him, holding on as tightly as she possible could.

"we're getting married!" He cried.

"We're actually getting married!" She kissed him again, covered in water and absolutely freezing but she didn't mind because nothing could ruin how happy she was in that moment. It was perfect...

People said that planning a wedding was supposed to be taxing and arduous. With lots of disputes, and budgeting, and confusion, and complications, and decorations, and a thousand and one other tedious, frivolous things.

But Lily disagreed. In her opinion planning a wedding was easy because James was easy. According to her, planning their wedding consisted of simple agreements, and big (stupid) ideas that they only half meant, and loud mocking arguments making fun of other couples that let the preparation of a wedding lead to an early divorce.

"I'm bored with all this looking in a book and deciding what goes where. Hardly anyone is coming to this bloody wedding anyway!" Lily sighed, recovering from a fit of giggles at James mimicking a middle aged couple that had looked at them like they were crazy when they walked into a bridal shop last week.
"Why don't we just get married now?"

This seemed to make James stop strutting like the Muggle lady they saw in the high street. He turned round open mouthed, floored.
"Like right right now?"

Lily nodded, standing up from her chair, grinning like she was Sirius and just gotten away with the prank of the century.
"Yeah. Right right now. What's stopping us? We can go and get Sirius... and Remus, Peter, Marlene, Alice..."

James had now reached the point of shock. He was barely able to stand still at this point in time, "what if they're busy?"

"We only need one official witness besides whoever's marrying us so technically we only need one person there."

"If we do it without Marlene she'll kill us," James argued, although the look on his face said he was already sold.

"Frankly... I don't care!" Like jumped up and held out her hand to him, bouncing up and down which excitement, "come on! Let's go get married!"

People say that marriage ceremonies should be elegant and sophisticated. With prepared vows, and seated rows of guests, and held in a lavish establishment that was well decorated and filled with well dressed guests.

Lily thought different. In her opinion wedding ceremonies should be just as beautifully messy as proposals, with hearty giggles, and unprepared vows, and empty sitting halls, and no dress code, and shaking hands as the registry is signed.

James was right. The only person to answer the door was Sirius. But he was enough, they only needed one other witness aside from the officiant anyway and Sirius was always going to be the best man no matter when they got married.

They got changed into the only clothes they had to hand that day that would fit the bill. Lily in a silver and white tea dress, James in a white shirt and Sirius in a cream one. Neither wore a tie nor did they bother to tuck in their respective shirts but Lily didn't care. None of them did because Lily and James were getting married and this is how it was supposed to be. And hey, Marlene would probably kill them when she found out but it would be worth it because dammit they couldn't wait another second!

It was hard to know what to say when asked to come up with wedding vows on the spot when you'd only decided to get married twenty minutes before they were in the Ministry city hall.

"James Fleamont Potter. You, are... the type of boy that I never imagined in a million years I would fall in love with. If I told ten year old me that I would be going to wizard school and that I would meet an arrogant, irksome, painfully handsome flirt and that seven years later I would marry him I think I might have ran for the hills! You've..." she sighed, struggling to know exactly how to sum up James Potter and her love for him.
"You've taught me so much. And not just how to play quidditch or how to charm a sparrow into a tea cosy but you've taught me how to love life for what it is and I will be eternally grateful to you for it."

James reached out to her and wiped a tear from her freckled cheek, grinning down at her like she'd never seen him grin before.

When it was James' turn Lily got the impression that he didn't quite know where to start. He stared at her for a moment or two before shaking his head and opening his mouth.
"Look at me," he said, "I've never been able to shut up my whole life and now when it matters most here I am, completely stupefied... okay... Lily, I've been chasing you ever since I was fourteen years old, I've been pissing you off since I was eleven and standing here now I don't think fourteen year old me would have believed it. He'd have been... flabbergasted... I still am now!"

Sirius laughed from behind him, his smile bouncing off the walls. Lily looked over James' shoulder and smiled back.

"I don't think I'll ever get used to the fact that despite everything I've done, everything we've been through that you still chose to love me. You had the whole world to pick from and yet you wanted me. So, I vow to... I vow to always protect you, and always to put you first. And I vow to use every breath I have to make sure that you are happy. And I hope that it's enough because you deserve the world and it's dog, Lily, and I'm just so... so amazingly happy that you chose to settle for me."

'You may kiss the bride' those words sounded like a prayer to her as she jumped into his arms and kissed him hard on the mouth, her insides screaming in excitement and pure bliss. She was in a white and silver tea dress and his shirt was untucked but it didn't really matter because when she felt Sirius join them in the hug she knew that it was real. This wasn't a dream. She really was married to James Potter.

And Marlene was furious that she missed it but she cried with excitement all the same, forgiving them immediately and squeezing them both to death. Remus and Peter nearly fainted and Alice had a meltdown with glee but Lily would be damned if she regretted a thing. She had married James Potter and it was as easy as breathing air.

People said that marriage was supposed to be a huge affair with guests, and dress codes, and decorations, and bands, and dancing and everything organised and in between.

But they were wrong. Lily and James proved them wrong. Because they were married without any of those things and it was blissful and it was bloody sublime and it was everything she'd dreamed of and it was so much more.

It was as easy as oxygen and that was why she loved James Potter. That was why she agreed to be his wife in a boat with a screw loose in the middle of a lake.

Some people might say she had a screw loose. And in this case –just this one case– they were absolutely right.

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