[closed] you put on quite a show~

[prongsed]

WHO: James Potter (who is currently more stag in his head than James) and Lily Evans
WHAT: The blood got James and Lily is running to the rescue.
WHERE: Crabclaw Inn, Room 33
WHEN: Day 39, early evening.

Comments

[potionsandcharm]

Regardless of her apparent animosity toward James, Lily didn't hate him, and that was the precise reason she'd worried herself with him now. After so many others had gone astray because of these bleeding journals, she couldn't stand by and allow James to go through the same thing alone. Even if Sirius had been here, she'd have at least accompanied him to make sure everything was fine.

She might not have been the nicest person in the world to James, but she wasn't about to leave him defenseless.

It took somewhat longer to find the inn than she would have liked, but at least she arrived, and finding James' room followed shortly thereafter.

She took a deep breath, then knocked. "James?" She called out. "James? It's Lily."

[prongsed]

"Lily?" He pushed himself to his feet, head spinning. He made his way to the door quickly, undoing the bolts and throwing open the door in one smooth movement. Lily, oh thank god, Lily.

"Lily, thank you thank you so much," he said, no small amount of relief in his tone, thankful the stag was being tame, at least for the moment. "This--it's like I'm two different people and I can't stop these crazy thoughts and I just want to go home and it feels like home isn't home but it's out in the jungle with that crazy fucking jaguar or whatever it is and I don't get it but I don't want it but some part of me does and it's so strong..." The words rushed out of his mouth with little to no pause between them, the last few ending with a somewhat wistful note to his voice; something nostalgic about the sound, curving around his words in a warm embrace.

"Maybe I should go. Maybe I will..." James trailed off, his eyes downcast but a feral smile graced his features for a split second before he shook his head violently, hands coming up to pull at his

[potionsandcharm]

This was crazy.

Crazy.

And she could hardly understand a word spilling from his mouth. How was she supposed to help him while he was in this delusional state? Sputtering nonsense about stags and jaguars and-- she'd never seen him like this. It was almost overwhelming.

"Don't be ridiculous, James-- James." Why was he turning away from her?!

She moved forward to grab his arm and swing him around, and threw a quick, hard slap across his cheek. "JAMES. Don't be like this. Don't be stupid! You can't let it influence you like this, James. You're a Gryffindor. You can get through this."

[prongsed]

The sharp pain cleared his head for a brief moment, however cliche it sounded. "M'not stupid," James mumbled, rubbing at his cheek. "It's so strong. It's just so unbelievably tempting."

James sat on the edge of the bed, trying to get his thoughts under control. He felt almost feral. He wanted...he didn't want. It was a tug of war between whatever spell this was and James and they were at a standstill, neither side pulling an advantage over the other at the moment, just tossing and twirling and making a right mess out of James' mind.

"Don't...let me leave. Please," James said, feeling very small. He beat down the side of him that wanted to be big and important and relevant, the side of him that was still telling him that he could do well with the others in the temple. The side of him that wanted---NO

He could do this. "How do we get rid of it, then?" he asked parts of his voice touching on notes that were a little bit more than desperate. "Haven't people been burning the pages or what have you?"

[potionsandcharm]

Don't let him leave? Easier said than done, especially considering he lack of correctly working magic. Ugh. ...She'd do her best, though, regardless. She wasn't about to give up-- she'd tie him down if she needed to.

"All right," she replied, shutting and locking the door behind her. "I don't have a thing on me for setting anything on fire." Sighing, she crossed her arms, then uncrossed them and moved to take a seat next to him. She couldn't begin to understand what, or how, James was feeling. She rarely kept up with the journals, and as soon as hers began bleeding, she resolved to have as little contact with it as possible.

Apparently, though, it was causing people to go loony.

"I'll stay here with you until you're feeling well again. I don't know what else to do-- throw the journal out of the window?"

[prongsed]

"No no, we can't do that, it's the only communication we have, I'd...it would be dumb to throw that away. Maybe just...rip out the pages and chuck them at a local?" James suggested, half-joking, half-serious. He was a little too far gone to distinguish why it would be bad to throw bloody pages at a person.

"I don't think I could be around when you have to open it though," James said, the same weird fondness coming into his voice again before he beat it down with a large stick. "It's just. I wish I could explain this feeling. Like everything I could ever want is in that jungle, but I know that's not reasonable but I believe it anyway." He scrubbed his hands over his face.

"I'm sorry you have to clean up my mess again. I'm a bother without even trying."

[potionsandcharm]

"Better that you know that you're being unreasonable than be completely oblivious to it. At least then you have a fighting chance, don't you think?"

She pondered the various options she had to deal with the journal. The best she could come up with was tossing the bloody thing out the window, or at least keeping it in her possession, at her place, to ensure that his hands didn't get on it until the whole thing blew over.

"Right, then, you need to listen to me, James. Whatever you do, do not let yourself forget that what you're feeling now is unreasonable. You're strong enough to overcome this, I know you are, and you have unfailing determination." She knew the latter first-hand, after all, didn't she?

"So help me, James Potter, I will not allow you to run off into some bloody jungle, even if it means I need to tie you to the bed."

[prongsed]

"I'm not going to get sucked into it," James said petulantly, crossing his arms. It was easy to say when the need wasn't so strong anymore. "I'm. I can do this."

James felt oddly serious for maybe the second time in his entire life. The first was never spoken about ever ever ever for fear of Disrupting the Path of Space and Time (technical term). The need for a stupid joke was there, something about vampires and how he would prefer unicorns or something, he didn't know, but yet for the first time, it didn't seem like the time. "This place is weird," he stated, propping his elbow up on his knees and cradling his face in his palm, sighing. "Not like I'm a great advocate of making sense, but there's a difference between crazy and crazy, if you catch my drift."

The words registered in his mind, that that longing in the back of his brain was dumb and unreasonable, but it didn't stop it and it frustrated him. The comment about his determination made him grin, made him a little more normal and made the time a lot more right to crack a joke

[potionsandcharm]

This place sure was crazy. All sorts of it, which Lily was, to be quite clear, pretty much sick and tired of. Leave it to her to get sucked into some crazy world with curses running amok-- Speaking of curses existing in apparent great magnitudes, why, oh why, was her wand constantly backfiring on her? If magic was dulled for everyone else, but still certainly existing, there must be a way to....

She was getting ahead of herself.

"Glad to be of service," she said somewhat sarcastically, but with sincerity. She really was grateful she was able to help him. Who else did she have here, anyway, aside from Severus Snape? Given the circumstances that had arisen since her arrival, she couldn't say she'd be pleased if either of them ran off.

"Well!" She gently slapped her thighs, then rubbed at her knees, looking at him almost expectantly. She was preparing to leave, but only after being reassured of his certainty in the ... lack of running-off-into-the-jungle feelings. "If that's all, I think I'll be off."

Why did a part of her want to

[prongsed]

"Hey, um, wait," James said, standing and grabbing his wand off of the bedside table. "Does your wand keep dying out in the middle of spells, too? Because I could use a spell or something to burn the pages, but I can barely get the effects to last more than three seconds."

James knew that this was important. Lily was being nice and this was his chance to prove that he wasn't a total wankstain and also because he knew if she left he would be back to square one, still lonely, still alone with the buggering book. And knowing Lily, she would've found a way to work the magic even here.

"I tried doing the fire thing earlier, but I couldn't get close enough without wanting to go au natural with my kitty friends," James joked, head clearing up more with each sentence, hoping to the Powers That Be that it stayed that way.