The Ladders Of Love: James Potter

01

his silver lining.

JAMES FLEAMONT POTTER COULDN'T HELP BUT BE crushed as the love of his life rejected him again. Although Lily Evans rejected James Potter almost everyday, multiple times, he could still never get over the overwhelming feeling of failure.

"You look like you are about to cry."

James lifted his head, his mop of shaggy brown hair obscuring his view until he ran his rough hands through it displaying a girl in Slytherin robes standing before him with a slightly deranged expression.

"I'm not going to cry."

"Good because I have no clue how to comfort someone." She commented before taking at seat next to him on the steps of the Astronomy tower.

James observed the girl with curiosity. She was around 5'7 with long brown hair that slightly curled at the end. She had dark coffee eyes that turned caramel when the light hit them and pink lips to contrast to her olive skin. She wasn't skinny, slightly over curvy yet in all of the right places.

"You done staring at me?"

"I wasn't staring at you." James quipped quickly, snapping his head away from his subject of view.

The two sat in silence for a pure five minutes before the girl coughed awkwardly and turned her head towards the spectacled boy.
"I'm Clarisse, Clarisse Russo." She held out her hand.

James hesitated, wondering why a random Slytherin girl was being so nice to him. At first he thought she was there to laugh at his misery or even poke him with insults but after the five minutes of her occupying his side he seemed to almost be comfortable with the mysterious girl.

"James Potter." He shook her delicate hand before turning her hand around in his and raising his eyebrows at her nails.

Seven out of ten of them were painted black, the others painted with a dark magenta colour.

"The black was to signify the darkness within me."

James paused before muffling the snickers that threatened to burst out of his mouth. He slowly met Clarisse's twinkling eyes before bursting into chuckles, surprisingly she followed along.

"I'm only joking, I just like the colour." She said as giggles leaped out of her mouth.

"JAMES ARE YOU ALIVE OR ARE YOU STILL SULKING?!"

Clarisse tensed slightly from the loud noise before wincing ever so slightly, something that James caught on. He narrowed his eyes before lifting himself up into a standing position.

"That's my cue."

And with that the boy left.

✤

It was a month later when they talked again and this time it was outside by the Black Lake on October the 3rd.

"You are glaring a hole into the Black Lake, I'm surprised the Giant Squid hasn't attacked you yet."

"Don't be silly, Bob would never hurt me." Clarisse replied airily as James squatted down next to her.

Primarily the boy had come outside with his friends because of the rare piece of sun they had encountered in October. After two hours of basking in the slightly cloudy yet sunny weather, the boy mentioned going to annoy his red head before stalking off instead towards the lonely Slytherin.

"I'll take your word for it." James heaved as he sat down.

"Do you have any other friends?"

James was take aback by the girl's pure blank face before he nodded slowly.
"I left them to find Lily but I couldn't so instead I found you."

"I'm honoured." Clarisse stated, holding her hand to her heart dramatically before her eyes widened as a certain figure started their journey up towards the duo.

"You must leave now." She quickly commented, standing quickly and dragging the boy with her.

James stood with the panicked girl with a confused expression.
"Uh why?"

"Because my brother is prancing towards us and he looks like he is about to murder you!"

Shoving James up the hill, she stumbled over to her brother who looked suspiciously at her and the boy who was tripping all over himself up the hill, flustered.

"Who was that?"

"No one."

"He's not good enough for you Claire."

"You don't even know who he is Carlo!" Clarisse hissed as her brother crossed his arms.

"I don't need to, no one is good enough for my baby sister!" The brunette exclaimed as his friends jumped up behind the sibling duo.

"Don't tell me that Carlo is pulling the over protective brother card." Clarisse grinned as she faced her brothers best friend, Elliot Selwyn.

Elliot Selwyn was a burst of beaming energy, the happiest person she had ever known. He was diagnosed with ADHD when he was a child and since then Carlo and Clarisse had been very over protective of him. He often got glares for his hyper activity which he couldn't help, so Carlo would often jinx others who wouldn't mind their business. Elliot was a natural Hufflepuff, kind yet extremely sassy however unable to detect sarcasm.

Clarisse couldn't help but ship Carlo and Elliot together.

"He is." Clarisse confirmed making the older blonde gasp dramatically.

"Carlo, leave our sister alone! She's allowed to date any boy or girl she wants!" Elliot reprimanded Carlo who pouted like a hurt puppy.

"Unless they are a dickhead, then I will knock some sense into them." Elliot finished with a grin making Clarisse roll her eyes.

"Thanks for the sentiment but I can handle myself."

"We know." The boys chorused sharing a look. It was only last week when Clarisse had punched a seventh year Ravenclaw for looking at her breasts.

"Just please don't get a significant other by the end of the year, you are only sixteen and dad would go nuts!" The older Slytherin calmly stated.

"What about Pandora?" Clarisse mentioned her Ravenclaw friend, Pandora Lestrange. Although Pandora was utterly infatuated with sixth year, Xenophilius Lovegood, the two girls both knew that if either of them acted on each other the other would comply willingly.

Basically meaning there was a 99% chance that Clarisse would ask out Pandora before the end of the year unless someone else caught her eye.

"Pandora is the only person I will accept, but only because she is a treasure to the world and deserves everything." Carlo comments with Elliot nodding the background.

"Good."