JAMES & LILY MEET : Secretaries Bullpen at the Royal Bank of Scotland : 26 Feb, 1981
Lily drops the phone back on its cradle and bunches the wire into one of her hands, moving it slowly out of the way of her work space. Her desk is covered with papers and entirely disorganized because she's lost a list of names that her boss at the bank needs this afternoon and she's torn apart the table trying to find it -- but to no avail. Lips set thin and pressed tight, she crosses her legs and pulls herself back in on the rolling chair until her elbows touch the edge of the table and her fingers sit lightly in front of the word processor that's blinking happily back at her. She'll do it from memory, really -- there'd only been several dozen names scrawled over the lines, so she couldn't see the problem in making it happen. Slowly, Lily grabs her mug of coffee and takes a sip, bracing herself for the rest of the day.
James has two suits. They were both of them his fathers, and they are both hideous. They are the exact same cut; too short in the legs, ridiculously long shoulders, odd seams. They are the exact same suit, except that one is navy and one is black. James has somehow managed to wear the trousers of the black suit and the jacket of the blue. Not to mention that he is also wearing Sirius's button down, which is a bit poufy for James's tastes, really, but everything looks the same when it's half-eight in the morning and one is hungover.
He leaves the meeting with Mr Driscal, his boss and head of lending, and wanders back out into the bullpen, sighing at himself. His head pounds. Sirius's shirt is too small, which is not his fault, really. He hasn't got James's muscular build, is all. It's expected that the thing be a bit tight through the shoulders.
James goes to the coffee station next to the secretary's desk and grabs some randomer's mug from the shelf. He looks up and stops, suddenly, at the sight of a radiant red head and long, pale arms, seated behind the desk.
There's a moment of silence after James' feet stop moving across the floor and after he's shut the cabinet when Lily expects to hear him pressing the buttons for the coffee machine, and then there's a moment of dread where she hopes that he doesn't decide to ask her to do it for him because he's "got a meeting" or "doesn't know how." She sees him every day and knows that he's perfectly capable of doing it -- so she keeps her head dropped and focussed on sipping her coffee, hitting idly at the processor with one or two fingers in the meantime while she tries to pull names out of the back of her mind. But the silence goes on a bit too long and in the middle of one of her sips of coffee, she flicks her eyes up just to see what's going on and Lily finds him, well. He's blatantly just staring at her, and she's not quite sure what to do about it. "Can I help you?" she asks, just a bit of a tone to her voice. Even though he's not technically the one she answers to, he is -- begrudgingly, she admits -- her superior at the firm.
James opens his mouth, shuts it, finally decides on a dashing smirk. "Say," he drawls. "Weren't you a bit older and uglier yesterday?"
Lily's not impressed. "No," she answers.
"I'd say you were," James presses, unconcerned by the dangerous lift of her eyebrow. "I'd have noticed sooner if you were this fit before." He sets the coffee cup down, strides toward her and sticks out his hand. "I'm James. Potter."
"I know," Lily tells him, dropping her eyes to his hand. "I'm surprised you've noticed anything at all about me, actually. I've been sitting at this desk for the last four months and you've not once said hello." She smiles, says, "but since you're so keen on observation, you might notice that your clothes don't match."
James's grin grows. "You're a quick one," he muses, "despite the hair and everything." He drops his hand, sticks it casually in the pocket of his trousers. "Had a bit of a night last night. My flatmate and I had some people round. In fact, you should come next time -- what was your name, again?"
"Lily," she offers tentatively. "Evans. But I think I'll stick to mine for awhile, if that's what the morning after is like."
"You're Scotish," James says, by way of nothing. Then, he shrugs, looks at her for a moment, before rocking back on his heels. "So. Can I get your number, then?"
Lily swivels her chair back toward the word processor still blinking away at her from the other side of her desk, re-poising one hand and smirking slightly. "Thank you," she says, "but no." She tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear and looks back up at him, nods at the mug still sitting where James had left it on the counter. "But if you're making coffee, it looks like I'm just about ready for another cup, if you don't mind."
James positively beams. "Oh, of course, Ms Evans. Cream? Sugar?" He walks back over to the coffee station, pours a steaming cup. He brings it back over to Lily's desk, sets it down. "Afternoon," he smirks, tucks his hands in his pockets and goes back to his office.