Her question had him smiling a bit wider, and for the first time realizing just how close they were- and the fact that he'd sunk his hands into her hair, that he was pretty sure he could feel her breathing. Well, now. This was interesting.
It was distracting have someone so close; distracting from any disappointment over the ambiguous feeling over just how much of his personal history other people seemed to know, distracting from something that had been bothering him a few moments before. But it had retreated to the edges of his mind and James had no interest in pursuing it. No, no... what he had right in front of him was plenty interesting all its own. Her hair was soft, her skin was soft, and he could have sworn she smelled just a little of almond and cinnamon. It was sweet. Almost surprisingly so.
"C'mon," he chided with a smirk, "It's Chrismas." One of his hands slipped from her hair, sweeping down to pull his wand from his back pocket.
A little upward twist of his wand had a shimmering, slightly glowing illusion of mistletoe blossoming a few feet over their heads... Hmm. It also seemed to be snowing. He hadn't exactly intended that, but since the iridescent little snowflakes were fading into nothing before they even reached Amarissa's now tousled hair he didn't bother fixing it before replacing his wand.
"Different games," he said a bit more softly, his hand reaching back up to brush along her jaw while the other idly mussed her hair a bit more. Really, he wasn't concentrating all that hard on what he was saying. It was hard to, when his eyes had dropped to her pretty, full lips. "You know, good behaviour, world peace... an array of deep-seeded traditions."
And then he stopped talking, because as the words had been leaving his mouth he'd been drawing them closer together. With an extreme sort of gentleness at first, he brushed his lips against hers. And then he was really kissing her, letting his thoughts get lost in that heady, nearly dizzying thrall of their joined and his arm wrapping around her waist. He knew himself. He was moments away from turning her slightly and leaning her against the nearby wall.
This, he decided, was much better than worrying over Auror wounds and- Oh. Oh, right. Amarissa, their Auror neighbor. Their Auror neighbor. And James' friend. It was quite suddenly too much. Too much to have someone he knew and liked wanted to spend time with in the future flush against his own body, to have his hand tangled in her hair and his tongue unfurling against hers. It was too much to take with one person. Still, his pulling away from her slightly was a slow progression. After all, it still felt nice. Even if it was... a very bad idea.
"I uh, really should get going," he said after a moment, even if he was still smiling just a bit as he left his body withdraw.