Chapter 5: Time Flies
“Wake up sleepyhead...Get out of your bed...Don’t fall on your head...” Tami was sitting on the window seat; singing very loudly, and very off-key.
Lily squinted in the bright sunlight that flooded their dormitory and groaned. “You used ‘head’ already,” she said vaguely.
“Did I?” Tami shrugged. “Oh, well...I always suspected I suck at poetry. Now I’m sure.”
Lily groaned lagain, louder this time. “Where is everybody? And when’s first class?” She yawned.
“At breakfast, and you have twenty minutes. I would’ve let you sleep longer, but, you know, it’s the first day, and all that.”
“What?! Goodness, you know I like to be up early on school days...”
“Yeah, but we went to sleep late last night, and you were sleeping so deeply, I couldn’t bear to wake you up.” Tami smirked. She loved pushing Lily’s buttons.
“Whatever. Just do me a favor and don’t do this again.”
“Okay, fine...anything you say, Lily. But you’ll be eating your words on the weekend. I’ll wake you up at dawn.”
“Arghh. I give up,” said Lily exasperatedly, throwing her hands into the air. “I need to get dressed. Now.”
“She finally gets it.” Tami grinned. “I brought you up breakfast, by the way. You’re welcome.”
“Oh. Er...thanks.” Lily took a moment to feel abashed. Tami would never let her start the day without breakfast. “What on earth would I do without you?” Lily asked, heading for the bathroom.
“Go hungry!”
“Ha, ha,” Lily called back, her voice muffled by the sound of running water.
“Sirs,” a voice squeaked anxiously, “it is ten minutes till breakfast is cleared from the tables...and twenty-five till first class. I have been ordered to make sure that...Sirs! Wake up!”
Suddenly, each of the boys felt a jolt somewhat like an Electrifying Hex, and were completely and thoroughly awake. And furious. “I’m going to kill the little monster,” Sirius growled, looking around for the house-elf that had woken them up. He harbored an intense hate towards house-elves in general, because Kreacher, the house-elf at his house, was extremely loyal to his mother; and therefore treated Sirius with measured dislike.
“Too late. He’s gone,” James replied, yawning. “My body’s still in summer vacation sleep mode...wonder where Tiger is.”
“My body never was in summer vacation mode,” Sirius said darkly. “My mum had me up at dawn every day. I really need to catch up on some sleep-maybe I should skip class...”
Remus groaned. He had dark shadows under his eyes, and looked somewhat worse than he should’ve looked just for lack of sleep. The full moon was just a few days away. “I’m dead tired. And it’s not a good idea to skip first class, Sirius,” he said, deadpan. “Wait till second class.”
Sirius laughed, a barklike sound. “Okay, maybe I’ll take your advice, mate.”
Remus’s eyes lit up, and with a sudden newfound energy, he jumped out of bed and hurriedly began dressing. James and Sirius were casual about their newfound friendship, but to Remus, having friends was an extraordinary experience. He wasn’t used to his peers treating him as an equal, because all his neighbors had known he was a werewolf.
To have people his own age treat him like he actually mattered, not like he was just some monster,meant a lot to Remus. His self-worth had been badly damaged by one too many taunts; but now that he had James and Sirius, who treated him with respect and affection, his spirit could begin to heal. Granted, they didn’t know he was a werewolf. And he wasn’t planning on ever telling them. He knew how they would react...why ruin a good thing when he had it?
“Look, I don’t mean to rush you, mates, but we’ve got five minutes till breakfast is over...and kick the bloke in that last bed, there-he hasn’t made a sound yet.”
“Maybe he’s dead,” Sirius said hopefully, “and then we’ll have to talk to the authorities and we won’t have to go to class!”
A moan came from the boy in the last bed; the one they hadn’t met yet, having been too tired the night before for introductions.
“No such luck,” James said, straightening the robes he had thrown on and bending to tie his shoes.
Remus grinned, pulling on a pair of socks.
“Too bad.” Sirius ran a comb through his hair. He sighed. “We should stock up on food and keep it in our dorm for emergencies like these.”
Remus looked thoughtful. “Good idea. We’d have to find out where the kitchens are, though.”
“We’ll work on it.” James stood. “We’ve got four minutes...let’s go. I’m starving.”
Remus, you were right, Sirius scrawled on a spare piece of parchment. First class with McGonagall was okay, but this class is about as interesting as watching flobberworms mate. Sirius lobbed the parchment across the aisle and Remus caught it.
His reflexes were good, one of the few perks of being a werewolf. He unfolded the note and raised his eyebrows. “When have you ever seen flobberworms mate?” he whispered.
“Oh, shut up,” Sirius retorted.
There was a time when those words would’ve made Remus flush in anger and embarassment, but now he merely smiled, realizing that it was said playfully.
“What’s James doing?” Sirius muttered, deciding that in Binn’s class there was no point in using up good parchment; Binns wouldn’t recognize a disturbance if a dragon flew through the window. Well. Maybe then he would. But whatever.
Remus turned in his seat, James was sitting behind him. “Hmm. He’s drawing something...hold on a minute,” he mouthed at Sirius.
A minute ticked by. “Oh, nice! It’s a broomstick,” said Remus.
“Let me see,” Sirius articulated silently.
James folded his parchment and aimed it at Sirius. It landed on his desk, sending a quill skittering. Sirius unfolded it quickly. “Ah. It’s a Nimbus 1500. Newest model.”
“You recognized it?” asked James, smiling.
“Yeah. It’s a pretty accurate drawing...I saw one in Diagon Alley.”
“I wish I had one of those,” said James longingly, just as the bell rang.
“Don’t we all?” Sirius retorted.
"What a long week this was,” Tami said, stretching her arms. Most of the Gryffindors were in their common room, Tami and Lily included. They had just completed their potions homework. “You definitely have a talent for this, Lily. You knew half the answers without checking the book.”
Lily smiled mildly, and scratched Tiger gently behind one ear. “Thanks. It was a good idea to get homework out of the way. Now we have the rest of the weekend off.”
Lily had proven to be a natural at potions. This had come as somewhat of a pleasant surprise to her, because she hadn’t realized that muggleborns could be of equal standing to purebloods, who had been familiar with magic all their lives. She gently removed Tiger from her lap and watched her saunter away, tail held jauntily high.
“What’ll we do tomorrow?” Tami asked.
“Dunno. Sleep late, for a start. And we could go about on the grounds, I guess, and enjoy the last few warm days left this year.”
“But I thought you said, you don’t want me to let you sleep late anymore...” Tami said mischievously.
“Oh, you“!” Lily crumpled a parchment and threw it at her. Tami just laughed as it bounced harmlessly off her head, and they maneuvered their way across the common room, together, to put their books away.
Meanwhile, James, Sirius and Remus trooped into the common room. They headed towards one of the few empty couches left and threw themselves onto it. “Why is our curfew so early?” Sirius griped. “First years aren’t allowed to do anything.” He couldn’t stand rules, having had too many of them at home, for too long.
Remus shrugged. “What would we do? We don’t know our way around this place, yet. Maybe we should start figuring out how to find the kitchens.”
Sirius got up and stretched. “Good idea. Then we’ll be able to eat, at least, when we haven’t anything better to do.” He grinned. “Although I can’t think of many things I’d rather do than eat. Let’s go upstairs, though, it’s too noisy down here.”
“Aw, come on, Sirius...we just sat down,” James complained.
“Don’t be so lazy, mate. Come on up. Your bed’s much more comfortable, anyway.”
“Touche`,” James muttered, following Remus and Sirius upstairs.
“Have you seen that other boy around?” James asked when they reached their dormitory. “The one that sleeps with us?”
“His name’s Peter Pettigrew,” Remus said.
“How did you know that?” Sirius demanded, looking amazed.
Remus rolled his eyes at him. “I asked,” he replied.
“Hmm. I reckon we could talk to him every once in a while, you know,” Sirius said, as though the idea hadn’t occurred to him before.
“I reckon we could,” James replied thoughtfully. “After all, he does share our dorm. We can’t ignore him for the next seven years, can we?”
“No, not really,” Remus said drily.
“Ah, that’s what I thought,” Sirius said. “A pity.”
The month of October began without much incident, but Sirius' eating fifty-four chocolate frogs in a row at the Halloween feast definitely broke the record.
There had been bets going around as to when he was going to be sick, but when he got to the forty-ninth, he merely belched loudly, and although his face was slightly flushed, continued eating, utterly disgusting the girls.
"That is so revolting," Lily muttered, green eyes narrowed.
"Boys," Tami said, shaking her head. "Let's get out of here."
"Take along some food, we'll eat it upstairs."
"Okay." Tami grinned and reached for a mound of chocolate frogs.
"No!" Lily groaned. "Please, no frogs."
Laughing, they piled licorice wands, cauldron cakes, taffy dragons, sugar unicorns, and pumpkin pasties into their arms, then headed for their dormitory.
5 Nov. 1971
Dearest Mum and Dad,
Me and Tami have become mates with another girl in our year, Danielle Cruz. She never stops talking, seriously! I know Tami’s a chatterbox, but she can’t compare to Dani. You couldn’t shut Danielle up if you paid her, honestly. She’s really sweet, though; very nice, and smart, too. Everybody can’t help but love her. I wish you could meet her, but she’s going home to Wales for Christmas. She has a third year brother, Justin, in Ravenclaw. He's sort of cute, for a boy.
I’m having a fantastic time in Hogwarts! It’s definitely my favorite place in the entire world, except for home, of course. The holidays’ll be here soon, and me and Tami’ll be coming home! Too bad we can’t bring Dani along, too.
Send my--Lily hesitated. Then she lowered her quill decisively, and continued writing.--love to Petunia.
Love you and miss you,
Lily
28 Nov. 1971
Dear Dad,
I can’t believe it’s already the end of November. Time sure flies when you’re having fun! And boy, are we having fun. Lily is an absolutely marvelous witch, just like I knew she would be. Don’t worry about me, though, I’m not bad either! And Dani keeps us all smiling. She’s really a dear.
That boy I mentioned in my last letter, James Potter, got into a serious scrape yesterday with Mr. Filch. Apparently, Potter’s kneazle and Filch’s cat got into a disagreement over something, and were having a grand old catfight in the Entrance Hall.
Mr. Filch was going to give Potter a detention for a month, but just then Professor McGonagall came along and asked Tiger-that’s Potter’s kneazle-what had happened.
I reckon, being a cat animagus, the Professor can talk to cats. So anyway, she let Tiger and Mrs. Norris each tell their own version of the story, and decided that Mrs. Norris provoked Tiger. She scolded them both, though, and told them off for not behaving like ladies. Can you imagine that?!
And then she said that Potter couldn’t possibly have stopped that fight from happening, as he hadn’t even been there when it started, so it was entirely not his fault. Filch was furious, of course, and Tiger had such a self-satisfied expression on her face-as if she had planned the whole thing. I couldn’t stop laughing the entire day.
Hugs and kisses,
Tami
P.S. Mrs. Norris’s left ear was torn almost clean off, but all Tiger got was a scratch on one leg. Ha!
P.P.S. Only two-and-a-half weeks till the hols!
10 Dec. 1971
Dear Dad and Mum,
We-that is, Sirius, Remus and I-have finally found the entrance to the kitchens. We knew it had to be somewhere underneath the Great Hall, but there were more than a hundred paintings down there, all of food, and it took ages to find the right one. Especially since the house-elves hardly ever use the entrance.
Thanks for that tip about having to tickle a pear, Dad--
“Oh, why did you tell him?” Mrs. Potter asked. “We had to figure it out ourselves.”
“Shush,” Mr. Potter replied, laughing, and continued reading the letter from their only child.
--it narrowed the search considerably. Though there must’ve been a hundred pears down there.
Mr. Potter laughed. “Yeah, well, I didn’t make it too easy for him.”
The house-elves are very friendly and helpful, and now we’ve all the food we could possibly want.
Remus's grandmother hasn't been feeling well lately, although the healers haven't yet diagnosed exactly what is wrong with her. He's going home to be with her this weekend...I hope she feels better soon.
Tiger is busy exploring the castle, and every other day she’ll show me some new shortcut she’s found. She manages pretty well on her own, but every once in a while she’ll get stuck in one of those disappearing steps and realize that she still needs me, or at least my help, sometimes.
Some days I hardly see her, and she’ll come back at the end of the day, purring and fed. She’s having a great time here, whatever she’s up to. So am I.
Only six days till the holidays; we’ll be home soon!
XOXO James
P.S. Send the horses my love, especially Middy, and give them each an apple from me.
A/N: I would love to hear what you think...please leave a review!