Quench My Desire

James didn't seek out Mary until the next morning. She was under the tree in the courtyard with the other seventh year Gryffindor and Ravenclaw girls. As she saw James approaching, she tucked a long, dark strand of hair behind her ear and shot him a smile. James pointedly didn't return the smile, he just kept his brow firmly furrowed. He didn't spare a glance at the confusion on her friend's faces: They'd never seen him look so cross before. Mary's face fell.

"Can I speak with you?" James asked, eyes locked on Mary's guilty expression. She nodded, but made no further movement, prompting James to add, "Alone?"

She followed him away from the group of girls, now whispering behind raised hands. They kept walking until they were in a more secluded area of the castle grounds. There were some fifth year Gryffindor boys roughhousing nearby, but that was it. James halted and rounded on Mary, who still bore a perplexed expression.

"Did you kiss Severus?" James asked, his jaw clenched firmly. Mary frowned in confusion. Whatever it was that she was expecting, it certainly hadn't been this.

"James, babe, I already told you. He came onto me, not the other way around," Mary answered, but her face betrayed her. James knew she was lying the moment she bit the inside of her cheek. It was brief but James noticed it.

James screwed his eyes shut and pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. If she insisted on lying, this whole ordeal was going to be a lot more painful.

"I'm only going to ask you one more time. Did you kiss Severus and lie to me about it?" James asked, fists clenched at his sides.

"No," Mary repeated. Her eyes darted away from his.

"You're lying," James snapped, making Mary look back up to him. "I know what he said was true, that you pushed yourself onto him. After all the lying you've done, I think I deserve to hear the truth from you."

This made Mary finally crack. Her face contorted with anger, pulling her smooth lips down into a twisted frown and narrowing her eyes.

"Fine, if it's the truth you want then I'll happily oblige, James. I came onto him, but not because I have some pathetic crush on him or whatever bullshit I fed him," Mary spat. James reeled back.

"Wait, what-," James tried to interject.

"I knew he was going to run straight to you with his tail between his legs. Then all I had to do was convince you that he was the one to blame, and I got you all to myself again," Mary explained, thin arms crossed over her chest as she glared up at James.

"What do you mean?" James asked.

"You spend all your time with Snape," Mary spat out his name like it was a curse word, "and you neglected me. Now that he's finally out of the picture, I've got your full attention again."

"So you thought the only way to get me to yourself again - which is fucked up, might I add - was to cheat on me with one of my best friends? You can't keep me like one of your little pets!" James said in disbelief. Mary's eyes widened.

"But can't you see that I had to do it? I was only trying to help you," Mary tried to reason.

"Trying to help me?" James pried, furrowing his brow.

"Well, yeah." When James still didn't understand what she was talking about, Mary continued. "Oh come on, James. You can't tell me that you haven't noticed the way he looks at you. It's unnatural, and I don't want you being around some queer-"

"Take it back!" James roared. Mary flinched back, James looked around and saw some people watching their fight. James lowered his voice.

"So that's what you think this is about?" James scowled. "Some petty jealousy drove you to do this?"

"James, I was only looking out for you-"

"No, you were only looking out for yourself," James said, eyes averted to the side. Mary reached out to grasp his hand, but James pulled back. He glared at Mary and took a step backwards.

"It's over," James said bluntly.

"W-what? James you can't mean that," Mary stammered, tears welling in her eyes. James didn't know what she expected, honestly, there was no way he was ever going to let this all slide.

"I'm serious. I don't want you around me anymore, and it'll be in your best interest to leave Severus alone too," James scowled. He started to walk away, leaving her standing in the rays of the noon sun.

"So that's it? After everything, you're still going to pick him over me?" Mary shouted after James. He stopped in his tracks and looked over his shoulder.

"What does it look like?" James said with a note of finality. He didn't turn back when Mary screamed after him again.

***

That night found James, Sirius, Remus, and Lily huddled around the fireplace in the Gryffindor common room. Sirius was crumpling individual pieces of paper and throwing them onto the flickering flames. James laid back against the couch and looked up to the roof of the common room. The cheerful, yet hushed voices of his friends wafted through his ears, not really taking any of it in. His mind was too busy mulling over what Mary confessed earlier in the day.

"I'm sure that Marlene said Alice was going to ask Frank out to Hogsmeade this weekend. The poor girl has been waiting years for Frank to make a move on her," Lily said.

"Good for them, I was starting to lose hope that they'd end up together," Sirius chuckled.

"Sounds like two other people I know," Lily muttered under her breath. Sirius either didn't hear or completely ignored her jab because he swiftly changed the topic.

"Hey, I saw Mary crying earlier, she was with Charlie. You know, the Hufflepuff chick? I wonder what that was about," Sirius mused. He crumpled a piece of paper into a ball and threw it at Remus' face. "Maybe she finally learnt what those pixies really did to Ovan the Ostentatious. She still takes History of Magic, she should know by now. What do you think, Prongsey?"

No one noticed how silent James had been over the past several minutes. When they refocused their attention to him, they found him in that reclined position, eyes dazed and unseeing.

He roused from his thoughts when Sirius jostled him and murmured a tentative, "James?"

"We broke up, that's probably why she was crying," James answered, finally bringing his gaze back down to meet his friends' shocked faces.

"I mean, that'd do it- ouch! What?" Sirius groaned and shot a glare at Remus, who delivered a sharp hit to his arm in an attempt to shut in him. Sirius rubbed his arm as James sighed.

"What Sirius means is we're sorry to hear that, James. Why?" Remus asked.

"It turns out that Mary tried to cheat on me with Severus, and she made me drive him away so she could have my undivided attention," James explained.

"Undivided attention? You still spent most of your time with us though," Remus said.

"That's what confused me too," James said. He chose to leave out the horrible slur she called Severus, that was clearly one of the main reasons she hated Severus more than James' other friends.

"Wait, does that mean that Snape was telling the truth this whole time?" Sirius asked.

"Yeah, I royally fucked up this time," James moaned as he stared into the fire.

"Bloody hell, Prongs, good luck worming your way out of this one," Sirius said.

"I guess I'll have to sleep on it," James sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "I think I'm going to go to bed, I just need a bit of time alone."

"Whatever you need, James," Remus shot him a sad smile, which James returned before he left his three friends huddled around the fire.

Once he was in the seventh year dormitory, he hastily changed into his nightwear and crawled under his covers. He huffed as he tossed and turned, he couldn't settle his mind enough to sleep. He needed to find Severus tomorrow, but he didn't know what to say yet.

James stewed over it all night and well into the next day. He and Sirius spent their early Saturday afternoon in the Great Hall. It was mostly empty today, so James invested himself into the Marauder's Map he and Sirius had laid out on the Gryffindor table.

"I just added a charm that prevents the map from taking any water damage, can't believe we didn't think of that before," Sirius laughed. James absently laughed with him, but his eyes were scanning the map, looking for that one specific name.

There he was, Severus Snape. His name was unmoving in one of the back rows of the library.

"Hey Padfoot? I've got to head out for a bit. I have some unfinished business in the library," James stated as he gathered his books he had previously strewn across the table.

"What? Don't leave me here alone!" Sirius begged.

"You won't be alone, Moony will be here soon enough," James said. Sirius playfully rolled his eyes before shooing James away.

"Whatever you're doing, make it quick!" Sirius called out after him. James had a sinking feeling that what was going to follow would be anything but quick.

***

As much as Severus liked Lily's company, it was sometimes refreshing to work alone. Here, in between the stacks at the back of the library, Severus felt strangely detached from everything that was going on. Lily was being vague, James still wasn't speaking to him, and his fellow Slytherin housemates had started to become more vocal about their support for You Know Who. They weren't a group Severus wanted to be associated with, not now that his seventh year had been - for the most part - enjoyable.

He sat on the low windowsill, book in his lap and ink pot on the adjacent desk. The spring rays warmed his face pleasantly, he discarded his outer robes so he was left in his grey blazer and black pants.

His peaceful state was disturbed by the sound of approaching footsteps. Whoever was coming clearly wanted to see him, no one else had any reason to come this far back into the library on a weekend. The footsteps stopped when they reached his row. Severus didn't bother looking up from his book. When the person didn't speak, Severus sighed loudly. He had a feeling he knew who it was.

"Bugger off, Avery. I don't feel like helping you with your Charms assignment," Severus drawled as he turned the page with a flourish. The person still made no attempt to speak, clearly it wasn't Avery.

Severus looked up and his stomach flipped. It was James Potter. He looked rather bashful, an expression Severus had never really seen on him before. His golden eyes locked onto Severus' and the corners of his lips turned up in a small smile.

"Hey," James breathed.

"Oh." Severus took in a shaky breath and didn't return the smile. "Hey."

He was wary, James hadn't spoken to him for the past month, so what was this? James cleared his throat and took a step into the row.

"I take it that Avery's been pestering you again?" James asked with a chuckle.

"Yeah," Severus replied uneasily with a small nod. He returned his attention to his book, he didn't know what else to say.

"Man, I'm sorry," James blurted out, "about everything." Severus' head snapped up, this caught his attention. He didn't take his eyes off James as he closed his Astronomy book and placed it on the wooden table next to his ink pot.

James walked to the end of the row and sat at the opposite end of the windowsill. Severus watched as James leaned back against the wooden frame, his already tanned skin seemed to glow more in the light. James' face held a certain element of vulnerability that made Severus feel uneasy.

"I was a dick, and I got jealous," James confessed, "because I was afraid of losing someone I loved."

Severus' chest constricted at James' words.

"I would never come between you and Mary," Severus said in earnest. He was beginning to feel like a broken record.

"Screw her! No, I was afraid of losing you," James professed, his eyes trained on Severus' stunned face. Severus felt blindsided by James' revelation.

"Oh," he breathed. James habitually pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose as he recollected his thoughts.

"I just- before we became friends, I felt like something wasn't right. Like I couldn't be myself, I guess. And with Mary...we are just so different-," James tried to explain.

"Yeah, like she's a huge dick and you're not?" Severus supplied. James beamed at him.

"Yes," James agreed before the two laughed together before they lapsed into another silence. Severus averted his eyes from James' intense gaze.

"And then you and I got in that stupid fight, and we didn't talk," James continued, "And I missed you. I mean, I really missed you." James paused to take in a shaky breath. "And I just want my best friend back."

"I thought Sirius was your best friend," Severus said, coaxing a smile out of James.

"You know what I mean, you git," James teased. The two chuckled again, and Severus looked back into James' eyes again.

"But I missed you too," Severus confessed with a small smile. James' eyes lit up as a weight seemed to lift from his shoulders at his words.

Severus was glad that James finally realised what a snake Mary was. It was torture having to see them together when Severus knew the truth. Lily's words in Potions made sense now: Whatever James was working through had to be his break up, right?

Meanwhile, an idea came to James' mind.

"Let's forehead promise, to never leave each other again," James spoke with a grin. Severus raised an eyebrow and slowly found himself matching James' smile.

"Ok...what is that?" Severus questioned.

"Come here, I'll show you," James said as he began to shift down the windowsill towards Severus' end. Severus quickly copied James until their knees knocked together, they were now in the middle of the sill. Their backs faced the mid-afternoon sun as they turned to face each other.

James leaned forward to press his forehead against Severus'. He wasn't surprised to find the skin there was smooth. Severus waited expectantly for James to explain what they were doing, but it never came.

"That's it," James chuckled. The two laughed softly with each other, they knew how ridiculous they looked. James' tongue darted out to wet his lips. "Is it obvious that I just made this up?" He added in a whisper.

But Severus hardly heard him, he was focused on how close James' lips were to his. The proximity was started to mess with his mind, and Severus noted that he could faintly smell mint. He noticed how quiet James had gone too.

James suddenly shifted, ever so slightly, so their lips were only a fraction apart. Severus slowly began to match his movements, leaning up into James at that same, slow pace. In that moment, Severus realised something.

James Potter was going to kiss him. So why wasn't he reeling back in horror? It suddenly dawned on him: Severus wanted James to kiss him.

Severus' eyes slipped shut as he leaned forward to finally close the gap-

"James! Sirius said you would be here- oh," Remus said as he rounded the corner into their row and stopped dead in his tracks.

"Remus!" James gasped as he and Severus sprung apart like they'd been electrocuted. Severus felt his face start to burn as he avoided looking at either of the other two present. Remus gaped at the pair before regaining his composure.

"Sorry, I-," Remus struggled to find the words.

"Yeah, sorry, what did you want?" James pursed his lips and tried to play off his embarrassment.

"Professor McGonagall's looking for you, she sent me to come get you. Said it was something to do with your recent Transfiguration work," Remus said.

"Right, cheers Moony," James nodded towards his friend. He turned to face Severus, who had retreated to his previous position against the window frame.

"Thanks for hearing me out, I'll see you again soon," James said. He brought his hand up to rest on the back of his neck. Severus gave him a curt nod, neither meeting each other's eyes. James picked up his book bag and disappeared around the corner.

After watching him leave, Remus turned to face Severus. He could feel Remus' shocked eyes on his, but he could hardly focus. His mind was too busy replaying the events that just unfolded.

Severus redirected his attention to the silent Gryffindor. He knew he had a lot of questions to answer, but he was just as confused as Remus.