The rest of the week passed, but it wasn’t an enjoyable one. The excitement over the pair of Sirius and Amy was still going strong. Amy was continually receiving hate letters and notes, though she stowed them all away in a locked box. The teachers ordered a stop for all the hate mail, but everyday, one or two letters would find their way to her hands.
Lily and James weren’t going so well either. Lily received hate mail, too, from those who believed she and James were going out together. James kept on getting stopped in the hallway by students, asking if the rumors were true. He was late to class every other period and the teachers gave him warnings.
James stared out of the train window, watching the scenery go by. Sirius and Remus were playing wizard’s chess. Julianne whispered moves into Remus’ ear.
“Check, Sirius,” Remus said for the ninth time after he moved his queen.
Maya showed Sirius a way to get out of check. “Ha, Remus!” Sirius barked. “You can never defeat the awesome smartness of me, Sirius Black!”
Julianne pointed to Remus’ bishop, and Remus said, “Check.”
“What?!”
James took his head off of the window and said, “Sirius, it’s kind of obvious. Move your queen to F7 and you automatically win the game.”
“Really?” Sirius grinned and his queen moved to F7.
“Check-mate, Padfoot.” Remus leaned back and grinned. James looked back out the window, smiling to himself.
“James! How could you?”
James put on a deeply innocent face and said with a sarcastic drawl, “I never intended on that happening!”
~
Lily and Amy were leaning against the wall of the train hallway, staring at each other, in thought. There were no empty compartments to talk, so the hallway was the only option.
Amy finally spoke, “That Taylor deserves to die.”
Lily looked down to the carpet and said, “No, she doesn’t.”
“Are you kidding me? She’s my number one blackmailer and she’s your number one enemy. Of course she should burn in-”
“That’s not the point. I just want her to go away, not die. I couldn’t possibly have someone’s death on my conscience.”
Amy wrinkled her nose and snorted, “Stop being so sensible. That’s not what weekends were made for.”
“She’s right, you know.” Lily whipped around and saw James’ head sticking out from the compartment door at her waist level, smiling. He stood up correctly and said, “You’ve been out here for two full minutes.”
“Two minutes is not enough.” Lily pushed his head back into the compartment and closed the door.
There was another silence for a few seconds. Amy asked, “Do you actually like James?”
“Define like.”
“Like-like.”
“No! I ca not believe you! Actually listening in on that rubbish!” Lily’s temper flared for a second or two, so Amy tried to protect herself.
“I was just checking! You’ve been spending a lot of time with him lately-”
“We’re head boy and girl, and we're supposed to work together. What did you expect?”
“Well, I-I, er…”
Lily caught sight of two feminine heads poking out of a neighboring compartment, eavesdropping. She barked, “Your heads might get run over by the food trolley or something. Better stick ‘em back in!” The two heads retreated immediately.
Lily faced Amy again. “So, we’re clear on everything? The hate mail is only from jealous people who wish they were you and… Potter and I are not… together.”
“Not yet,” Amy muttered. Lily, who was about to go inside the compartment, swiveled her head around and asked sharply, “What?”
“Oh, nothing,” Amy replied, pushing her hair behind her ear and strolling into the compartment and seating herself next to Sirius, not saying a word of what Maya had predicted while Lily was out on evening patrols.
“Oooooh! Chess!” she squealed. “So, how does it work again?”
Lily avoided James’ face.
~
When the train stopped, the Marauders were the first ones out. The instantly flung themselves on the ground and started screaming prayers and exclamations of gratitude.
“We love you, Hogsmeade!”
“Oh, how art miss thou!”
“Butterbeer… Zonko’s….”
“I could barely contain myself all summer!”
The girls got off the train. Julianne and Amy scowled at their boyfriends. Amy tapped her foot by Sirius’ head impatiently and Julianne crossed her arms.
James heard her say, “I’m not that dedicated to a bunch of shops.”
Remus sat down on the ground and said, “Sorry. I haven’t been here in a while.”
James and Sirius stopped simultaneously and stood up. “Where to, fellows?” James asked.
“Oh, no,” Amy jumped in, “Sirius is coming with me to get some butterbeer.”
“And Remus promised we’d spend today together, too. Right, Remus?”
“Oh, yeah…”
Sirius locked his arm around Amy’s neck. “So, it’s just you and Peter for the entire day.”
Peter was overjoyed. “Really?! That’s so cool! Hi, James! Let’s go to Zonko’s.” Then he took off like a broomstick and bumped into a couple of 4th year girls examining a window display.
James twitched his eye at Sirius, but Sirius only shrugged. “Get a date in the next five minutes and meet me and Remus at the back table, man.”
James’ shoulders dropped and his eye hurt from all the twitching.
“No chance of that. Catch up with you guys later.”
~
Lily and Maya pulled up next to the bookstore. Maya pointed at a book displayed in the window. “Look! ‘Squib Against Squid, Special Edition.’ I heard it’s a great book. Everyone’s talking about it!”
Lily looked at a crowd of people in the store, “Yeah, all the smart people. Others would rather buy ‘How to Be the Queen of Hogwarts’ than a book on how a squib is taken hostage by merfolk.”
Maya looked into the store and frowned. Taylor and one of her friends were pointing and laughing at the pages and pictures in the book, then finally gave the clerk a few coins. But, they didn’t leave the store. They just spread around, picking up magazines and posters. It didn’t even cross their minds to go to get some butterbeer or even look out the window.
A pair of arms locked around Maya’s and Lily’s neck. Lily flinched, but let go of the sudden wariness when James poked his head between the girls’.
“There are better places to be than in a book shop.”
Maya picked James’ arm off her shoulders and said, “No way. You take Lily and Peter, while I get that book. I’m not leaving without it.”
“Fine, fine.” James took a few steps back. Maya opened the door and Lily followed, rather quickly. Maya mouthed “no.” Lily looked at her friend in astonishment and imploringness.
“Go with James,” Maya said.
“What?” Lily whispered back.
“Go with James. You know every inch of this store. Learn something new.”
“With James?!”
Maya shrugged. “Choose: James or Taylor.”
Lily squinted at her friend, turned on her heel, and said to James, “I’m not going in there. Taylor might rip me to shreds.”
~
“This... this is a Disappearing Parchment,” James explained. He picked a sheet of parchment and gave it to Lily. “Someone writes on it, and a few hours later, it turns invisible. So, it’s really funny when a student writes an entire essay and then it’s gone.”
Lily put it back on the Zonko’s shelf. “Really witty. You could give someone a heart attack with that. Honestly! Making them write an entire essay that took them hours and then all the work goes to waste.”
“But it reappears a few hours. So no harm done.”
“Well, that’s better.” Lily crossed her arms as the door opened and an icy gust of wind flew around the store. It flipped James’ already messy hair up to the ceiling.
A few 3rd year boys popped in front of Lily and James and threw some exploding confetti in the front of them.
The boys stuck their tongues out at Lily and James, as if showing them who was boss, as the confetti popped all around Lily and James. “Lovers!” one of the boys shouted, as he and his clan escaped into the aisle next to them.
James swapped the confetti aside and pulled out his wand, a childish grin on his face.
“Yeah? Well, kiss this!” He levitated two buckets of Exploding Confetti and dumped it into the adjacent aisle. He pulled Lily down and covered his head.
There was an explosion in the aisle, following by the sound of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Bean waterfalls.
“What the-?” The manager came running down the aisle, his face plump and pink. He looked at if he was not used to running, because James noticed his growing wheezing and strain.
“Oh, great,” James murmured, “Come on.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her through the clusters of Hogwarts students, his face hardly concealing excitement. He dropped a couple of galleons on the table and pulled out of his pocket on of the many “Sorry about the mess” notes with a neat signature of “Prongs” and placed it under a coin. He always had one ready in case he had to leave one.
He pulled Lily out of the store, never letting go. Not because Lily would have stayed behind if he did, but because this had never happened before.
They ran to the bookstore. He peered through the window and saw Taylor’s wavy hair in the back of the store, surrounded by her friends, reading out loud from a magazine.
James cautiously opened the door and dragged Lily behind a bookshelf.
“Can you let go of me now, James?”
“Oh, yeah.” He rapidly let go of her hand, only wanted to hold it again. He began to push the books back in order, pretending they were digging into his head.
~
James sat on the cushioned window-seat, looking out of the window. Lily was watching him through the spaces between bookshelves. She unconsciously removed “101 of the Most Stupidest Minister Quotes” and flipped the pages. Maya stood on a stool and picked up “Dreams of Crystal Balls, Crystal Ball of Dreams” and nearly fell off.
Lily had never noticed this side of him before. Yes, he had always seemed smart and clever, but the naughty and mischievous kind. He was brave, she'd grant him that. But, before, to Lily, it seemed like he was just foolish and careless of the consequences.
Perhaps it was time to give him a chance…
A pair of sticky hands covered her mouth. Lily gripped the bookshelves and tried to scream. The pair of hands held tighter and pulled Maya and Lily backwards.
Amy waved at them. The hands loosened and Lily sighed and glared at the owner of the hands.
“Sirius!” she exclaimed. But Sirius put up his finger three centimeters from Lily’s lips.
“Shush! We just came back from the Three Broomsticks!” He took his finger away and took out his wand. He looked at the window seat, where James was sitting. “Where’d he go?”
Lily stared at an empty window seat. Two chatting girls walked past them, taking a sour glance at Sirius and Amy.
Sirius stomped his foot in pretend, childish frustration. “Hmmph!” Amy patted his shoulder.
“Better luck next time.” She kissed him and ran her hands up to his cheeks. Lily looked back at the vacant window seat and walked over. She stopped when she saw James’ face staring through the window. He was not looking at Lily, though she was momentarily thankful, because it was the same face he made when he saw her talking with Diggory on the train. He was glaring at Sirius. His eyes showed numbness and his mouth showed astonishment. He glanced at Lily for a split second and then he turned away.
Maya and Lily ran to the window, looking at the gradually shrinking figure of the Marauder.
“Where,” Maya asked, “does he think he’s going?” James turned a corner and he was no longer in sight.
Suddenly, all the candle flames turned from yellow to bright red and started buzzing loudly. Amy and Sirius parted and they stared curiously at the buzzing, red candles.
Everyone in the store started talking.
“What’s going on?”
“What’s wrong with the candles?”
“People are trying to read here!”
The store manager came tearing through the aisles, her eye glasses bouncing off her chest madly. She waved her hands in the air, ushering, “Everyone, please go to the back of the store! Everyone, to the back of the store now! Please do not panic and quietly retreat to the back rooms in an organized fashion!”
But, people did not “quietly retreat to the back rooms in an organized fashion.” Instead, one 3th year thought it would be helpful, and yelled, “Dementors!!!”
There was screaming and running as everyone burst to the back of the store.
“No! No! Please! There are no dementors! Everyone please collect yourselves!” But the manager’s coaxing attempts did not stop the mad rush for safety. “Yes, this is an emergency, but please hush!”
“Dementors?” Lily looked out of the window again. She shook her head. “No, no… there can’t be dementors.” She touched the window pane. “It’s… it’s not cold.”
Sirius held Amy’s hand and said, “We should go to the back of the store anyway.” He jogged along with the crowd, pulling a reluctant Amy with him.
“Come on, Lil.” Maya put her hand on her shoulder. “Come on, Lily.”
Metal shutters snapped down on the windows and doors, and the store was pitch black, except for the red candles, which were now silent, and the light from the back of the store.
Lily decided that there was nothing productive in remaining where she was, so she followed Maya and ran to the crowd.
“Are you the last ones?” the manager asked, pulling Maya and Lily in one of the rooms.
Seeing Sirius’ shaded face, Lily suddenly remembered. “James!”
“Who?”
“James Potter! He went out! What’s going to happen to him?”
“Oh, your friend will be fine,” she comforted. “Everyone is being pulled into stores. No one will be left outside.”
Maya ran to Amy and Sirius. Lily looked at all the scared faces crowded together.
“What is going on?”
“I can’t tell you. Ministry officials will be here soon enough.”
“Ministry officials?” Lily stared hard into the lady’s face, searching her eyes for clues. “Are there dementors?”
The manager sighed. “I sure hope not.”
~
James kicked a small, twisted pine tree and chips stuck to his shoe. He kicked it again, with more force.
“Does…” “Whack!” “…he…” “Whack!” “…know…” “Whack!” “…how…” “Whack!” “…much…”
“Whack!” “… it…” “Whack!” “…hurts?!”
He asked the tree, as if it were a human being, “Does he realize how easy he makes it look?” The tree did not answer, as all trees do.
“Do you think- for a second- that my friend has liked Amy Wellings since the day he first laid eyes on her? Do you think Amy has ever given Sirius death glares?!” But the tree did not reply, or think, as all trees do.
“OK, maybe she did once in third year when he stole her panties from her drawer just for fun, but…”
James did not kick he tree again. “Do you think Sirius has tried so hard over the summer to be better, to change?” He paused and the sight of Amy and Sirius kissing still flashed in his mind. “Sure, he’s been on a kabillion dates before. None of them have affected me so far, except this one. Maybe… it’s just that he’s so close to Lily and I’m still as far away as before.”
James leaned against the tree, eyes closing. He had barely any sleep for days. He had done his rounds around the castle, practiced quidditch until his muscles stung, done his essays and research and letters, and gone to sleep past one in the morning. His nights were haunted by the distant faces of his dying parents and twirls of red hair. There was Snape behind a dark cloak and a pair of red eyes, watching the red-haired bundle, in the mist. He crawled out of bed at five-thirty every morning to get to the shower first, daydream for a few minutes, and finish his essays and research and letters.
James pulled his cloak over his head, and fell helplessly into waves of reveries.
“I’ll ask her to join the Quidditch team tomorrow…”
~
The miniature explosion in Zonko’s had scared the wits out of Peter. Tingling fear spread through him and he started yelling, “James? Hello? James? Where are you?!” He rounded the corner and saw Lily and James running down the street.
“Hey! Wait for me!” Peter ran past the counter, and a small mound of gold caught his eye, along with a note from James, that was not addressed to Peter.
Peter’s sneaky eye darted around him, searching for anyone who might be looking. Everyone had seemed to be at the explosion site, trying to get a first-hand look at what happened. He swiped a few coins off of the counter and dumped them into his empty pockets. He looked around again, and scurried out the door.
“Ja-a-a-a-a-ames? Lily-y-y-y? Where a-a-a-are yo-o-o-o-ou?” Peter was looking anywhere but forward, so he did not notice the figure he was walking towards until he bumped into it.
“Sorry-sorry!” he squeaked. “Sorry, sorry! I wasn’t looking! Sorry!”
The figure turned from the window display and Peter’s breath caught in his throat as he stared into the face of Bellatrix Black.
“Uh…”
Bellatrix took a glance at her accomplices, and when they gave her do-it looks with their eyes, Bellatrix giggled.
“It’s alright, Pettigrew,” she said smoothly, “These things always happen at school.” She put her hand on his short shoulder. “I’m sure it was an accident. No harm done.” She gave a smile that would usually give even Sirius the creeps, but Peter was taken by surprise by her act of kindness, that nothing else came to mind.
“Er… thanks?” Peter answered and/or asked. “I mean… ok?”
“I heard you were looking for Potter. You like being part of the Marauders?”
“Yes… and yes?”
“Well, my friends and I are starting a new group. Sort of like the Marauders. You see, we’re not sure how to start it or what to do so we thought that it would be very profitable if you were part of our group. You know, to help us out.”
“Cool! I can have James and Sirius and Remus join and maybe more people!”
Bellatrix shook her head. “We don’t want our group to get so big so soon. It’s also kind of private, so I don’t think that everyone should know about it. Just our little group.”
Peter nodded his head. “I see.”
Bellatrix tilted her head in interest and asked, “Do you want to go to our meeting place? Away from the crowds so we can tell you the rules and everything?”
“Sure!” Peter was so enthusiastic. They wanted to be his friends! They thought he was a better choice than James and Sirius!
As Bellatrix and her friends led him away, Peter made himself a vow.
I am going to be the best and most useful member their group has ever had.
~
Sirius, Amy, Lily, and Maya were in a circle, with Sirius’ illuminated wand. The rest of he students in their room had joined their little groups, and were talking in hushed voices.
“How long have we been in here?” Maya asked. Lily showed her a watch. “An hour?!”
“And I could be working,” Lily groaned, “on my Head Girl duties.” She patted her feet on the ground.
“Well, we’re not going anywhere. The ministry officials are still checking Hogsmeade.” Amy rolled her eyes. “What takes ‘em so long?”
Sirius crossed his legs and piped up, “How about a relatively harmless game of Truth-or-Dare?”
“We can’t play Truth-or-Dare in here, Black,” Lily snapped. James had asked her that exact question in 5th year. She had agreed. She supposed Sirius didn’t let from the red rash on James’ face afterwards.
“What about hide and seek?”
“That’s for three year olds.”
“No! They play peek-a-boo.”
Maya’s and Amy’s laugh was cut short and Lily’s small smile faltered when everyone heard noises outside. Lily stood up and walked to the closed door. She leaned against it and said, “There are people walking outside!”
Someone Apparated in the center of the room. Amy screamed at the figure standing at her feet. So did the rest of the students. Lily’s breath was caught in her throat and she tried to make herself smaller in the shadows.
But the screaming subsided when Albus Dumbledore lifted his head and stroked his beard.
“Ah, so I see this dark room has not bored my students numb,” he said cheerfully. “This was just a drill. Sorry it took so long. We had to make sure everything was working. Everyone back to the school for dinner.”
Everyone mumbled to each other as Professor Dumbledore strode to the door and tapped it with his wand. The door swung open, and everyone ran out to the light.
Lily was about to join them. She was extremely hungry. She saw Julianne and Remus in the crowd already outside, cheerfully talking with each other, but a voice held her back.
“Miss Evans, would you mind if I kept you here for a moment? You too, Mr. Black.” Lily and Sirius exchanged looks. “The rest of you may go.” The two of them returned to the old professor, wondering what could have happened.
Lily suddenly became concerned when she saw the strange look in Dumbledore’s eyes. He looked down on them and clasped his hands together.
“We have not yet found Mr. Potter.”