Just wanted to see how other people pictured it. From reading various fanfics, and Oy!Angelina's great polls *thanks Angie!* I was really curious.

~Nell

I'd like to think that Lily and James had a relationship that is similar to how I dream Harry and Hermione's will be. Really good friends that blossomed into something more. Ahhhh, romance!

I don't know I just never saw Lily and James hating one another, even if it was one of those flirty things.

I just think that James would be a lot like Harry and try hard to get along with everyone if he could help it. He was probably an instigator but nothing too bad aside from being obnoxious a bit . I also don't see Lily being the type who would hold unbearable grudges and have a flaming hot temper . I mean, the woman sacrificed her life for their son instead of attempting to fight Voldemort!

I guess I always figured James hung out with the guys for a few years before he finally noticed the attractive, intelligent, wonderful person sitting in all his classes and from there they just eventually fell in love . I don't think it was as epic as love at first sight or lover and hate, I just think it was sort of normal and real.

Well that's just me and I'm going to go write my fic because now I'm all about the Lily/James action.

Oy! Angie

i always like to think that james and lily were friends before. i'd like it to have been like harry and hermione's relationship. :-)

i can also see it as being more of a just sort of getting along w/ each other, both being in gryffindor and such, until about 5th or 6th year when james sort of woke up and realized how great lily was. the first few years i think james may have been sort of preoccupied w/ the marauders. :-)

and as for love/hate, i dont' like love/hate relationships or those bickering relationships. it's one of my problems with r/hr so it would be hypocritical of me to picture l/j as being bickering.

I voted Love/Hate before I really thought about it. I was actually having a hard time deciding between that one almost all four. But I just figured that one.

I really love L/J fics but I never pictured it just one way before. I guess I don't really care what kind of relationship it is as long as it was written wonderfully. For example I really liked "The story of Lily" and that was a love at first sight one but I also liked "Crossroad" and "Lily Evans the the elf nymph necklace" and those were both Love hate.

If anyone wants to read any of these FF :

The story of Lily is at http://www.fanfiction.net/read.php?storyid=474690
Crossroad is at http://www.hiddentower.50megs.com/ecrossroads.htm
Lily Evans the the elf nymph necklace is at http://www.fanfiction.net/read.php?storyid=722595

this is probably influenced by the fanfics I've read, but I see them as a Love/Hate thing, that erupts into awesome passion and intense love.

~Batgirl

ps. can I say that I LOVE oyAngelina's fic, 'Pensieve'?? I LOVE it!!

i'm really for the Lil/James shipping. I mean how can you NOT be ? they gave us harry ! lol .. In this I kindah see that A Walk to Remember Bad boy meets innocence .. cept Lily isnt sick.. anyone else see that ?

*looks at the stories she's written and most of the ones on her REALLY favorites list*

Yeah, I'm pretty boring, I suppose. I like to think that the best relationships come out of friendship. It just wouldn't make sense for the love/hate relationship (though some of the stories are fun to read, I think the merit in "Crossroads", for example, comes from the misunderstanding of the situation, not the actual love/hate part of it.) I lean toward an almost completely integrated friendship with the guys, bordering on sisterly, before James notices what's in front of him. I'm also a rather hopeless romantic, and like to fantasize about the awkwardness that would evolve out of the greatest friendship when one side realizes that they like the other side as more than friends. It just invites so many new twists...*looks at her story* Like fights. I love fights between best friends. Not the same as love/hate, but the ones where they know exactly how to push your buttons, and can make you crazy even though you know they're right.

I'm odd. But there you have it.

everblue3

Hmm, it looks like the 'friends turned lovers' scenario seems to be the most popular of all. Must be because most of us here are H/H shippers. Well what can I say? I voted for that one as well.

Eric

Yeah, I voted friendship blossoming as well. I always asked myself why L/J had to be love/hate, I never agreed with that. I mean, it never said anything about that in canon, so it kind of really popped out of the fandom, didn't it?

Anyways, I agree with E.C.R. in saying that a lot of us voted that because we're H/Hr... oh well.

I can't see L/J ever being Love/Hate. It just doesn't make sense! Maybe I just say this out of intense hatred for the D/Hr ship, but people who hate each other generally don't magically love each other enough for James to die for Lily and the baby, and Lily to die for their son.

I said friends growing into something more, but love at first sight and bad boy meets smart girl work too.

"There is no greater love than to lay down your life for another." says Acts of the Apostles (my appologies to any non-christians) Does that mean that there is hate involved? I rest my case.

None of the above ... Lily dislikes James for his sheer arrogance! It's probably later when she gets to know him better and he softens up, that she falls for him! How do I know this ? Well, I just know ... and yes, James does have Hazel eyes!

The ones that have read OotP know the answer to that question. There's the reason to my vote, which I will not reveal, as it might be a spoiler.

And yes, James DOES have hazel eyes. That's also on the book!

MMM.. Hazel Eyes! I like what the book portrayed. It gives them a great tension filled, passionate relationship to look forward to.

Hmm..well, I voted 'friends first and then romance', but I'm starting to think that if L/J were friends first, it wouldn't have been for a very long time. We were given that much in OotP, at any rate. I actually tried writing a story where they were best buddies for seven years, but the thing flopped. Not only can I not look at it without screaming; I can't really picture getting amorous with your childhood best friend. Took me a while to figure that out, but whatever.

Now I like to think of Lily and James as sort of an odd couple that somehow manages to slog through whatever it was they had to slog through--Dark Lord terror, misunderstandings, getting signals crossed, etcetera. I think the turning point in their characters might have come when James dragged Snape away from the Whomping Willow. It seems like something that could have changed Lily's mind about him, and it would have to have shown a lot of development on James's part. That would have gotten them off to an awkward start--I imagine they'd be pretty platonic for a while, but given that James had been giving Lily the eye in Fifth Year, he probably would have started making the first moves at some point.

I also like to think of them as the kind of pair that would do some pretty crazy stuff together. Lily seemed to have some spunk in OotP; I think they probably jousted a few times. A lot of beating around the bush, some arguing, maybe even some shouting, but a fundamentally passionate relationship. I can't see them getting all nauseatingly lovey-dovey on each other with the whole 'I love you, Lily, please marry me despite the fact that I'm sixteen and oh, by the way, do you like the roses and lilies I've tacked up on the wall to celebrate our two-month anniversary?' / 'Oohh, James, I love you soooo much, of course I'll marry you and by the way did you know I'm pregnant, do you suddenly feel the inclination to start sobbing all over me?' thing... to me they seem more like the type that would have a few mad laughs and a few prickly arguments as well as a few passionate shags. And a few rock-in-the-storm moments later on to complement the Dark Lord, o' course.

That pretty much wraps it up. Wow, that was long-winded.

Okay...wow. I voted the love/hate one but dont completely agree with that. In fact I agree with 3 of the choices. The love/hate, love at first sight, and bad boy meets shy good girl...i kno i sound CRAZY rite? lol. Oh well here i go...

First off James deff. comes off with that whole bad boy air to him and Lily seem to be the the quiet side or good girl shall i say? Well to address the love at first sight i dont think they just were like "oh look at her or him! I love them..blahblahblah..." you get my point. I do however feel they might of felt that "gut" connection..does anyone know wat i mean? that instant sort of connection of the eyes n feeling in your stomach and heart flutter with out even talking to the person? i kno i have and i think thats wat they had you dont have to talk to someone and like wat they say to feel the connection or feel the "vibes" i guess i can say? Maybe im confusing you but yea..lol Also, Lily can have a pretty bad temper when she wants to and be stubborn to, as does James..i think this due to OotP...so there for all though they may both feel the connection or perhaps "sexual tension"(who knows why or what that "gut" feeling is ) they may be to stubborn to admit it and argue just for the sake of arguing..
Have you ever like someone who at time you hate with a passion yet you really truely dont hate them for some strange reason..a certain connection that no
matter how mean you are to eachother deep down you kno you like that person but would NEVER in a million years admit it to them! I've felt like that and i think that is how the love/hate thing is. The bad boy/ good girl thing...well lets just say good girls are bad at heart and Lily sure has that fire to deal with a "bad boy" like james potter does she not? And really a guys wants a good girl on the outside..not a smut...really..thats wat i think anyways. This is getting long so imma end it here.
Plz let me kno if any of it makes sense...hehe. Im new to posting and in a rush when posting this so it may not...
Thank yoU!
James n Lily
Harry n Hermione...

Bah, the best romances (to read, anyway) are the ones where the couple starts out as friends... unfortunately, my stand on this results in me getting paired off with all my guy friends...

I think that it started out as love/hate. They hated each other, but were attracted. Later, they became friends and fell in love.
It is obvious from the fifth book that they were not friends in the point of Snape's memory. I believe they became so later.

I agree with star22.

It's canon now that Lily despised James when they were 15. He had to go through some changes, namely deflating his ego a bit, before she began to see him as something more than a git. I think over the course of their seventh year he probably wore her down gradually, winning her over with his newfound maturity, until eventually she agreed to go out with him out because he deserved a chance, at least.

James, on the other hand... I think he was obviously infatuated with her. He saw in Lily someone with qualities he genuinely appreciated - loyalty, fair-mindedness, intelligence... and I'm sure the fact that she seems to have been very pretty helped too. Also, I see him as someone who, on a VERY subconcious level, loves a challenge. The Marauder's Map, becoming animagi, playing Quidditch - it all adds up to the sort of person who lives for thrills and difficult tasks. Lily was his most difficult task. In some way, deep down, I think a little of it was the thrill of the chase. He wanted her because he could never have her. Of course, that can't be the whole story, because if it was then the relationship probably wouldn't have lasted. But I think it must've been part of it.

So. I didn't vote for any of those because none of them are right for me.

He liked her, she didn't trust him. He changed, she eventually fell for him. It's too complicated to boil down to a single option.

Bleh... this just begs the question... have any of you ever been in love before?
In my oppinion it was more likely to be hate or strong dislike to love... no one can control who they love or why, (being the whole point of the emotion 'love') because it is such a strong emotion, it can take over you in a blink of an eye, it cant be helped.
the other options are also possible, but well... if you follow the book a bit, love/hate is the most realistic, regardless of what the details are according to JK when she does give info in some unknown interview.
Of course Lily would give her life up for her son! Christ... no mother wouldnt. the fact that she defended harry rather than fight voldie was probably the fact that she knew she couldnt, seeing that james couldnt. I dont have a child myself... but I do have a little sister who i would take a bullet for, especially if there was no chance that i could fight back.

I see it as being hate-to-love, but with 'hate' being a slightly too strong word to use. They might've started out friends, or at least more friendly, but as James' head inflated Lily wanted to spend less and less time around him. She could very easily hate the things James does (hexing people, his cocky attitude, etc.) without hating him exactly. Her real anger and frustration would come from the fact that she knows he can be better than that - he was when they first met - but doesn't seem to want to try.

Then, once he did grow up a bit (the Whomping Willow incident theory makes sense to me) the only real obstacle left was convincing Lily he'd changed.

We haven't seen their married life at all, but I think James and Lily worked very closely together, at least in their work for the Order. I think Lily was a tough fighter, which would then make it impossible she was all that traditional - she wouldn't have any will to fight. Contrary to what a lot of people think, that doesn't preclude her also being a very devoted wife and mom. Both she and James would likely see their time at home (and later, with Harry) as kind of their private island away from the craziness of the war... which makes Voldemort's invasion of it all the more hateful.

I see it as Lily Hates James/James Loves Lily but gives her a hard time, anyway.

I think Lily loathed James initially, but eventually fell for him after he matured a little and she saw what a great guy he really was. As for James, I don't think he ever hated Lily. He may have teased her and given her a hard time, but I think he always loved her, even from the very beginning. I think he kind of knew she was the only one for him. He just had to wait for her to see it, too.

After they finally got together, I see them as being extremely devoted to one another, and I get the feeling that their relationship was very, very, very passionate! It was not luke-warm. It was super hot. But that's just me.

I think of it as a major rivalry in the beginning. i mean, these are supposedly two pretty darn good wizards who seem to have rather inflammatory personalities. one would think that they would have at least an academic and maybe even a social rivalry at school. obviously, something big must have happened to turn this rivalry into a full scale war, and hatred to grow between the two. maybe james washed his glasses one day and saw lily in a new light or maybe it was just puberty, but, either way, james stopped hating lily so much anymore and i think that that's actually kind of sweet. he's kind of like a puppy, following her around everywhere. a large, Quidditch-playing, arrogant puppy. she finally got to him in fifth year and he went off with his tail between his legs and he deflated his head (probably with the help of the sensible Mr. Lupin) it's now that i get all warm and fuzzy inside when these two realize, well, Lily finally realize, that they're perfect for each other. love, mushiness, baby Harry, premature murder, you know the rest of the story. this is just my take on the whole affair, though....

I always saw it as friendship first (like Harry and Hermione ). After reading OotP, I probably said something like, "This is so stupid! They didn't hate each other!". But recently I've become a bit more partial to love/hate. The fic that really turned me on to love/hate was The Demons Inside by Eyes-of-Lily. It's an excellent piece of fanfiction, and if you haven't already, GO READ IT! ...And if you have, it never hurts to read it again. What amazes me about it is that it captures the essence of OotP so well, yet it was started before the book came out.

So, I guess I've been converted to canon... now I like to think of their relationship as Lily hating him --> something happening (such as the Snape prank) that shows her that he's really a good person --> friendship, with James trying to pretend he's gotten over her (HA!) --> romance. I always knew I'd be writing L/J fanfiction eventually, but the one I'm working on right now is love/hate... I always saw myself writing something where they're friends and classifying it as AU. But I guess not.

If you've survived all that, I again suggest reading The Demons Inside and giving love/hate a second chance. Let's all give a hand for love/hate!

~Lady Mel

Well i believe that something changed James(maybe his parents being killed by Voldie?)and he matured by this and came to realise that life is priceless and became more lenient with their peers(i.e. Slytherins,but just a little tinny bit).And when Snivellus tried to discover the marauders secrets,he ran to protect Snapes's life and not to being famous or something else,but by this point Snivellus was so in love with his hate to James that him couldnt vanquish his feelings of loathing and did not forgive him,even when he died.This changing in James is what brought Lily to him.It looks like he was aware os her beauty,but his bad boy act just made her go away.When he became a more caring and friendly person,she was atracted to him(or it was already,just waiting for the maturing part...who knows besides JK?)Well,it would be like them were liking each other,but there was something that was in between them,something that it was in their way.When they removed that,they've fallen so in love that nothing would get in they're way again.Well....only Voldemort,but thats beyond the point,because the proof of their ultimate love survived:Harry.

merged with similar topic - PK mods

The problem with our interpretation of the L/J relationship

The way us hp fans look at l/j is relationship is that of total perfection. Somehow after thinking about it, it doesn't really add depth to them. I imagine them to have a pretty complicated relationship...not the pic perfect one that is interpretted generally.J.K revealed that James was a bastard and i loved it! Basically, it would be more perfect if we didn't interpret the lily/james relationship as perfect.I mean we hardly know anything about them and while we can still speculate, i think that they were too very imperfect people who found perfection in each other...okay this is confusing...

no, it isn't confusing at all. I don't think any relationship is perfect, they would both have had to work at it, to make it work. I think that something quite major would have to have happened for them to be a couple, the way Lily dispeised James in OotP, i think we will find out more in future books.

If you think about it, it makes perfect sense: James was an only child to elderly parents that were rich and treated him like a prince. Rich enough, in fact, that when they died and left everything to their only son, he didn't have to work and could support himself, his wife and a new baby in a cottage in Southwest England for three years, with tons left over for Harry ("a small fortune") after he died. Of course he would think he was entitled to everything, with that kind of upbringing. He was probably a spoiled little rich boy; Hogwarts was probably a step down for him.

Add in the Pride and Prejudice romance story that JKR is referencing and you've got yourself a good, honest, and decent story on your hands.

~Salamon2

Something that was brought up on another board was that Amortentia may have been involved. Not that James knowing drugged Lily to get her, but that Snape mixed the potion for a Potions class with the intent to use. In the theory, Sirius switched the hairs as a joke. When Snape slipped it to her...oops. No one could say anything without all of them getting into loads of trouble. Luckily for all involved--with the exception of Snape--Lily admitted to fancying James all along, so no real harm done.

This stemmed from Lupin saying that James and Lily were suddenly and fiercely in love. Not sure if this one will pan out but it's an interesting thought. Another for my plot bunny list.

I know what you mean about the perfection thing.
I have read so many stories where one moment Lily hates James' guts and then he kisses her and WHAM they are deeply in love and couldn't live without the other one.
Sometimes people can get away with it but it just really annoys me most of the time.

your so right ! its like people exshally exept that lily will fall madly in love with james after one kiss , when she hated him for alot of time !
But I gess its easy for people to write this kind of storys . that's why i'm so picky about the story's I love and read !But to tell you the truth the fact that we found out that James was a bastered only made me for example love that couple even more. It mad it more interisting and complex and you can even see that even for them evreything wasn't so easy .

I myself always thought they had a slightly rocky courtship at first..I mean she is smart and responsible and he was..well a bit of a prat. He was very stuck on his self..But I imagine once they really fell in love they learned to compliment each other. I mean no relationship is perfect, but I don't think theirs was anywhere near bad either.. I just can't see it like that.

When does JKR say that James is a bastard? In Snape's Worst Memory in OotP? I don't think that proves he's a bastard all around, I think that proves that he's a jerk to people he doesn't like.

Also, when does Lupin say that James and Lily are suddenly and fiercely in love? All he says when Harry's talking to him in the fire is that Lily started dating James in their 7th year.

Sorry if I sound argumentative, I'm just hoping for some clarification on whether these statements are people's opinions or hard facts from JKR herself.

well, from what I've read from the hp books, I'd say that L/J relationship was a Love/Hate one. As much as I wish it wasn't....poor Harry....anyway. If I haven't read the books though, I would have thought that they were friends first first and then....well you know. Kinda like h/hr ya knoW? *sighs* too bad h/hr didn't actaully happen...*mutters darkly*... ah well

Well, I never thought that their relationship was one of Love/Hate but more like a series of misunderstandings about the character of the other, Lily and James were the true different, really the whole opposite attracts theory. I think they never really knew each other, they just knew each other from school not as friends. I think something might have happened during their 7th year, that made it easier to get to know each other, such as receiving the head positons. I think in the end Lily lost some of the stuburness of veiwing James as a Prat and James grew up from an immature prankster.

I don't think the two reunited outside Hogwarts, but actually united in their 7th year.

i don't read many L/J fics, just makes me a bit deppressed if i do and realize that the writer has really characterized them well and then i remember that they die and pretty much everyone of their generation just has an awful future to look forward to, but i do read a few and i do have an idea as to how they may have gotten together and how their relationship was, if you'll excuse my ramblings

but as to how i view their relationship

in my post in how i view lily's character, i mentioned that i didn't think she had many close friends- in part because i think petunia's jealously and hateful behavior towards lily really hurt the young witch and i doubt that she had any other close friends besides her sister until snape came along and in part because i think once they were sorted into the 'enemy' houses snape would have wanted to keep their friendship a secret to protect both of them and if lily had really let anyone too close then it would have been really hard for her to keep her friendship a secret so she was probably nice but deliberately kept many people at arms length even if they were under the impression that lily was their best friend the feelings were unlikely to be mutual
in my head then snape messed it all up by calling lily a mudblood and just being an overall jerk and suddenly lily was emotionally alone and she was probably dead set against letting someone else get that close and just end up hurting her again
then comes in my idea of james, (i agree that he was probably a bit immature but no matter what JKR says i can't see him being a complete bastard- unless she meant in the sense that his parents weren't married when they had him- after all, he made friends with Sirius who was from one of the darkest families around- the malfoys proably wished they had as dark of a reputation as the blacks had and not even being in gryffindor was enough to stop everyone from disbelieving that sirius could go bad in an instant- as well as making friends with a werewolf and a kid who had to have been a total wimp, especially by gryffindor standards and therefore an automatic outcast, no one who could be considered a bastard in the personality sense could do that, and a bastard would have let snape be eaten by remus, he was probably just very impulsive and slightly hyperactive and very prone to doing stupid things to impress people, especially lily, but anyway) james i think would have to have been rather observant and quite flexible or i don't think he would have been a very successful prankster and in being both observant and flexible i think he saw a difference in lily once she was no longer friends with snape, she was probably quite deppressed and that might have been the start to him growing up- he wanted to help her and in order to do that he'd have to get closer to her and to do that he'd have to change her opinion which led to his need to mature a bit
james may have had a huge crush on lily but when he saw that she was emotionally vulnerable i don't think he was so much of a bastard that he took advantage of it, i think that he tried to be her friend, i'd like to think that he tried to help her get back to her normal "potter i'm going to kill you for doing whatever it is you did to those third years" self to bring everything back to normal, i don't think james delt well with change especially with the war against voldemort making everything so chaotic and unpredictable outside of hogwarts so bringing lily back to her spitfire, willing to tell him off self probably became quite the priority for him, and along the way while he was helping her, lily saw a different side to him, a side she liked and james's crush on her became less of a crush and more like actual love as he got to really know lily instead of just liking her for being pretty or being spirited enough to actually tell him off, though i'm sure both of those qualities helped
once they got to the point that they were both in love i think things may have been a bit awkward for them, james had mostly wanted things to go back to normal and lily would probably feel guilty that she felt such a way towards a boy who had been so cruel to her childhood friend, never mind the fact that she and snape were no longer really friends anymore, but after a few possibly dramatic or comic misunderstandings they got together and lily never stopped telling james off when she thought he went too far and james probably never stopped doing stupid things to make lily impressed or at least make her laugh but i think they had quite a bit in common and of coruse by that point they were good friends so while their relationship had a few bumps, and what relationship doesn't?, it was strong, the sort where each makes the other want to be a better person in some way, in part to become more like the person that their significant other sees them as and because their significant other makes them want to be better for themselves

so, yeah, in my head they actually became friends first and then from that came like and like became love- it was never a love/hate relationship, just a few misunderstandings that JKR blew out of proportion

Yeah what I meant was that J/L relationship wasn't exactly Love/Hate. I don't belive that Lily actually HATED James, she more hated the things he did. On the subject of James himself, I think she was just in deep denial. And yeah, Jamse probably grew up from being a prat and Lily was forced to realize this.

before I read ootp and I discovered fanfiction, I always imagined that Lily and James were kind of a high school sweethearts. But now I see them as much more of a love/hate relationship turned friends turned romance.

I agree with littleBeastie - I see L/J growing from love/hate relationship to friends and, finally, to lovers. Ever since the fifth book I saw them like that