Chapter Text
Practice had run late; it was nearly midnight by the time James let himself in their tiny flat. It was suspiciously quiet at first, especially since all the lights were still on.
“Are you having fun without me?” he called to the apartment at large.
“James!” Lily’s voice came from the back room, quickly followed by the girl herself. She was hanging onto Sirius—James wasn’t sure if she was drunk enough to make the support necessary, but she definitely wasn’t sober. He dropped his keys into the bowl by the door and turned back to greet his girl and boyfriend.
“We had lots of fun without you,” Sirius informed him with a smug peck on the lips.
“You stayed home on a Friday night and drank wine,” James replied.
“That’s not all we did,” Lily put her arms around James’s neck and stood on her toes to give him an enthusiastic kiss. James wasn’t sure if the action was meant to mollify him, or demonstrate what he’d missed. Either way, her breath confirmed that the two had indeed been drinking copious amounts of wine in his absence.
“Mmmm,” James murmured agreeably into the kiss. “You want to show me what else you did?” Lily answered him by jumping up to wrap her legs around his waist. He gasped a little as her kisses moved down to his neck.
“I—ah, don’t know if I believe you. I don’t think Sirius is strong enough to hold you like this.”
“Oh no, I was the one holding him,” Lily said as she climbed down. Sirius barked a laugh from where he’d moved to the couch.
“Right, Lils. Let’s try that sometime.”
James laughed as he crossed the room, flopping down next to Sirius, who pulled him in for another quick kiss.
“Why can’t I come home to this every night?” James grinned against his lips.
“We don’t want you to take us for granted,” Sirius said as he pulled back, settling in against James.
James was mildly affronted by this accusation. Maybe it had taken him a while to realize that his best friend who he’d grown up with and would do anything for and occasionally made out with was more than just a friend or brother, but really, he’d been in love with Sirius since they met.
Sirius knew this, of course, so James decided not to rise to the bait.
“How was practice?” Lily perched on the arm of the sofa; the glass of water in her hand explained that she’d made a detour to the kitchen before joining them. It was already half-empty, and Lily was far steadier than she’d been when he walked in, though it was always hard to tell exactly how drunk Lily was at any given moment. Two drinks at a club, and she was starting to slur her words, but she could down six mimosas at brunch with her sister and give no indication of being anything but perfectly sober.
James jerked his head noncommittally in response to her question. “Diggory’s still a bit of a pompous ass, but at least he knows what he’s doing. I think we’ve got good odds for our match Sunday.”
“Remus said he might be able to make it this weekend,” Lily said as Sirius started to play with her hair—it was just long enough to be at his eye level.
“We should all get dinner after. Pete’s covering the match, so we can kidnap him as well.”
“When’s his article on the PRIDE march coming out?” Lily asked with poorly masked interest. Sirius noticed too, and smirked. “Oh hush,” Lily swatted at both of them, apparently noticing their matching expressions. “Just because you’re jealous he didn’t interview you.”
“Your name’s not even in it,” Sirius pointed out lazily. Lily huffed.
“I didn’t want to be anonymous. It’s not my fault I could get fired for being out.”
“How is old Mr. Riddle cool with you sleeping with two different men at the same time, but not with you being bisexual?”
“He doesn’t know I’m sleeping with both of you,” Lily replied at the same time as James muttered, “Old perv probably wishes she’d be in a three way with him.”
Lily liked her job as a chemistry teacher at a private high school, but all three of them hated the head of the school board. Besides doing his best to keep the school in the dark ages, he was a powerfully conservative voice in the little surrounding community and a grade A dick. Lily had been put on probation twice already for trying to change the school’s abstinence only sex-ed curriculum. Remus, who taught Lit, pointed out she could actually be risking her job by attaching her name to comments in an article about LGBTQ+ rights. Lily had reluctantly seen the wisdom of this, but James could tell it chafed.
“At least you’re still helping the cause,” he reminded her tentatively. “Raising awareness.”
“I know. I just—feel invisible,” Lily whispered, sliding off the arm into Sirius’s lap. James immediately put his arms around both of them. As confidently as Sirius could announce himself “queer as fuck”, as comfortably as James walked down the street holding a boy’s hand, as happy as Lily had been with her college girlfriend, they all knew what it was like to have to hide. And even in perfectly accepting communities, the closet had a way of sneaking back up on them; if James had banged his head against a wall every time someone assumed Sirius was just his and Lily’s third-wheel roommate, he’d have one hell of a concussion.
“How could anyone be invisible with this muck?” Sirius held up his hand, which was still tangled in her bright red hair. Lily’s laugh was half-hearted.
“I mean come on—I already feel like a porn character,” she pressed on. “Sex-crazed girl who went through a lesbian phase in college winds up so thirsty that she lives with two different men! It’s all the awful parts of the promiscuous bisexual stereotype, but I don’t even get to have my identity acknowledged!”
“Hey love,” James said gently, but he couldn’t think of how to follow it up. He wanted nothing more than to always be able to comfort Lily and make her perfectly happy, but it was an elusive ability. He was far better at football.
“And I know there’s nothing wrong with being a promiscuous woman, fuck anyone who says differently, but I feel—reduced. Erased.”
“Like people don’t see the real you,” Sirius finished. Lily nodded into his shoulder. They sat piled together for several minutes without talking. James’s thoughts—love for Sirius and Lily, a few good curses for Riddle, the kind of philosophical introspection born only of exhaustion—swirled around in his head until finally he started to doze off. Of course he cared that Lily was upset, but he’d also been up since half five.
“Ready for bed, Prongs?” The childhood nickname sounded fond coming from Sirius’s mouth. James started guiltily before agreeing. “Lils?”
“Yes, please.” The boys exhaled a laugh together, and the collective mood lightened. James scooped Lily up off Sirius as he stood; she was a full foot shorter than he was, so the gesture was neither difficult nor unusual for them. He dropped her on the bed—a king size, the one indulgence in a household subsidized only by the salaries of a teacher, a minor league football player, and the modeling odd jobs Sirius picked up—and went to brush his teeth. None of them had to get up early the next day, but they were all asleep before one, which was unusual for Lily, at the very least.
James drifted off, Lily curled into his side, his hand gently twined in Sirius’s hair, content.