Interviewer (I): Hi, Peter. How are you?
Peter (P): I’m good, Marty. And you? Still upset about that thing with the plaque?
I: What do you mean?
P: Well. Moony said you were upset about it because you’d failed everyone.
I: Remus said I’d failed everyone? You guys were talking about me? And how I’d failed everyone? When was this?
P: Maybe he didn’t use that word ... I remember! You THOUGHT you’d failed everyone.
I: Oh, well, that’s different. What’s your most treasured memory of the Marauders?
P: Don’t get offended or anything, Moony doesn’t think you’ve failed everyone. The opposite. He’s actually in love with you, but he won’t admit it. I’ve tried.
I: Don’t be ridiculous. What memory has stuck with you most during you time as a Marauder?
P: I’m not being ridiculous, it’s true. Although, like I said, he doesn’t like to talk about it and he hides behind that pumpkin juice thing like it’s proof you’d never work out, but I know inside he knows the truth.
I: Peter! Memory!
P: Oh, right. Uh ... when we first ever met and Sirius and James beat up this Slytherin who called me fat, even though we weren’t even friends yet. So are you going to tell Moony you’re in love with him, too?
I: I’m WHAT? I think you’re mistaken, Peter.
P: What? Everyone knows it’s true.
I: I’m wrapping this up. What would you use as a title for this book, if it was up to you?
P: I don’t know why you’re pretending like you’re not in love with him.
I: TITLE!
P: All right, all right, nobody ever listens to me anyway. I’d call it ‘Love And Denial: A Maraudering Tale’.
I: It’s not a romance, it’s a biographical and psychological study of what makes you so different and special compared with other groups of friends your age.
P: Whatever you say, Marty. Whatever you say.
Chapter Nineteen: Passing Phase
[Remus]
There is a comfortable silence in the Common Room as the six of us “ to James’s delight, Lily has started joining us in the evenings every now and then “ sit around in our usual seats and do our homework.
“Hey, Marty,” Lily says after a while. “Have you decided what you’re doing about your Aunt yet?”
I look up sharply. It’s been a week since Marty told us her Aunt Tabby expected her to help out over Christmas and still no decision has been made. The truth is, I’m kind of hoping she’ll agree to it.
Okay, I’m really hoping she’ll agree to it.
Not that I don’t like Marty. That’s the thing. I like her a lot ... a lot. I try not to think about how much. The other day, I even smiled to myself when she shuddered at the sight of a jug of pumpkin juice. That’s when I decided that there was no way she could possibly stay with us over Christmas. I know what my house is like at Christmas. It’s an old house in the middle of nowhere and it always snows. It can get quite cold. So without fail, we end up spending almost every evening in the living room, curled around our mugs of warm drinks and keeping as close to the fire as we can get. Usually, the fire is the main source of light, as well as heat. And the fairies twinkling away as decorations aren’t going to help the situation much either.
No. There’s no way she can stay with us over Christmas. What will happen if Mum and Dad go up for an early night or something and leave us down there? Alone? On purpose? Because my parents love Marty. She gets more letters from them than she does from her real family. Mostly because she hardly ever writes back to her Aunt and she writes back to my mother weekly. But that just proves my point even more. My parents would love it if we got together. I don’t think they’d ever stop celebrating.
Oh yes. They’d definitely leave us alone on purpose. And then what? What if I ‘make my move’ as Sirius so likes to put it and she freaks out? I wouldn’t blame her. I would freak out, too, if I tried to chat myself up. And how does one actually go about doing said chatting up? Without looking like an idiot? I bet Sirius would know. But he wouldn’t tell me. Not without turning it into a gigantic joke. He’d end up getting the same idea as Peter (who is being really annoying lately and keeps telling me to “talk” to her, with lots of nudging and eyebrow aerobics). Then I’ll never get a moment’s peace again. No, it would be better to just avoid contact until the whole thing blows over. Because I’m sure it will.
Eventually.
Anyway, that’s why I don’t think it’s a good idea that she stays with us in a warm old farmhouse in the middle of nowhere during the holiday season with only a roaring fire for comfort. And each other ...
... I did not just think that.
“I’m not sure,” Marty says in response to Lily’s question. “I just don’t know if I’m ready. There are too many bad memories. It’s like, every time I think about going there, I think about the fact that “”
“You know, the best way to get over your fears is to face them,” I say loudly. Everyone looks a little surprised at the way I interrupt her, but she doesn’t seem offended. If anything, Lily is more annoyed than she is.
“I know,” Marty says sadly. “It’s just hard. I mean “”
“But it will get harder,” I say. “The longer you leave it.”
“Geez, Remus,” Lily says, not one to stay quiet for long. “Stop interrupting her. Who taught you your manners, anyway?”
“It’s okay,” Marty says. She looks close to tears. What is wrong with me? “You’re probably right anyway, Remus.”
No, I want to say. I’m very, very wrong! Stay with me as long as you like! It’ll be fun ... we’ll have snowball fights and decorate trees and curl up by the fire and maybe to keep warm we’ll have to “
“I am right,” I say firmly. “You should go back and help out.”
“It’s her decision,” Lily points out, still sounding annoyed.
“Yeah!” James says much too loudly, glancing at Lily to check that she’s noticed he’s on her side. “If she’s not ready, Moony, she’s not ready,” he continues in his extremely loud voice. “Stop pushing her. She’s free to make her own choices.” I stare at him. He shrugs in apology and gestures towards Lily behind her “ rather confused “ back, as if to say, Sorry, I can’t help it.
“I know it’s her decision, Prongs. But she’ll have to go back eventually,” I say calmly.
“Sure, eventually,” Lily jumps in. She’s really taking this to heart for some reason. “Not now. Unless she wants to, of course.”
“I just don’t see how it will help to prolong the inevi“”
“And clearly she doesn’t want to, so I don’t see why you’re“”
““not going to achieve“”
““her decision“”
““pointless“”
““just expect“”
“Do you think I’m going to have any say at all in my own Christmas?” Marty asks casually, as I bicker with Lily.
“Probably not,” Sirius says. I stop bickering long enough to glare at him.
“I think I know why Moony’s getting so upset about this,” Peter says proudly. Oh, Merlin, not this again, Peter ... and why now?
“Shut up, Wormtail,” I say quickly. As if I need him blathering on about my secret passion for Marty Price right in front of her. It’s not a secret passion, anyway. Just a secret passing phase. That’s all.
“Why?” asks Lily, probably glad for a distraction from bickering with me. After all, it was fun while it lasted, but there are only so many points you can make on this subject until you start repeating them. And then the only way to make them interesting is if you say them louder.
Which, in my experience, never ends well. Best we leave it at that, really.
“Nothing,” I say. “He doesn’t know what he’s saying.”
“Wormtail thinks Moony’s in love with Marty.”
“James!”
“What?” he shrugs at me again, helplessly gesturing at Lily to indicate that he can’t help the things he must say to win her love. Or whatever his excuse is.
I really hope that girl knows what we have to put up with because of her.
[Marty]
I watch Lily playing on her violin by her window into the moonlight. Which would be very dramatic and poignant if Phyll, in the bed next to her, hadn’t stolen some earmuffs from Herbology, then distributed them around the dorm. I’m the only one without, but Lily knows not to take this to heart. Everybody knows that violins don’t work as a solo piece unless the musician is some kind of genius.
But I kind of like listening anyway.
Also, no one ever mentioned to Phyll about it being rude to steal earmuffs (it never came up that stealing is wrong, either) because they’re useful for drowning out much more than Lily’s practising. Such as Roxie’s snoring, which is the loudest noise she makes all day. And Mary’s voice, when she’s singing in the shower and thinks we can’t hear her. And the sounds of the second years next door when they have a sleepover (as if they don’t sleep in the same place every night anyway). And that time James flew to our window and knocked on it for three hours straight in a misguided attempt to get Lily’s attention in the dead of night, until his wrist got so sore he couldn’t write for four and a half days and the incessant knocking drove everybody but us insane, so that McGonagall flew up personally to meet him and gave him detention for the next two months.
Speaking of Lily and James, I have just this evening decided that they will be my new Secret Cause. It’s good to have a Secret Cause you can work on in private, as well as lots of Public Causes. Such as my Secret Cause to watch over Remus before we were real friends. And my Secret Cause to get Peter to stop eating sandwiches with mayonnaise in them, because they ‘don’t agree with his stomach’ but he likes them too much to resist if they’re put in front of him (I eventually managed this by convincing the House Elves not to use mayonnaise in their sandwiches, and I managed this by making up some false statistics which pointed towards mayonnaise as the root of most deaths in teenagers under 18. I had to keep it as a Secret Cause so as not to embarrass poor Peter). And I suppose I had a Secret Cause to teach the Marauders responsibility by convincing them I hated them that time, although Lily was in on that one too.
Anyway. It’s clear that James loves Lily and that she likes him at least a little bit, if only as a friend. And I don’t like to see James suffer from lovesickness, especially when his friends are clearly suffering as a consequence, which Sirius solemnly assures me on a regular basis that they are. So the best thing to do is to get them to go out and let whatever it is they have run its course.
Whether that’s two days of agony and the subject never being brought up again, or a long happily married life with seven children remains to be seen.
But it will have to be secret, because Lily is not going to like knowing that I’m basically making decisions about her love life for her.
But I’ll do it anyway, because it might distract me from my own.
Unfortunately, just as I consequently distract myself from this thought by planning Phase One in the latest Secret Cause, Lily stops playing and says casually, “So Remus is in love with you, huh?”
Which brings me right back to the very thing I was distracting myself from.
“No,” I say, checking that the other girls still have their earmuffs on and can’t hear our conversation. Which is another thing they’re good for, if you can do it without the other girls realising.
She smiles knowingly.
“No!” I repeat. “Nobody is in love with anybody. Except for James, but we all knew that anyway. Speaking of which, why don’t you go out with him for a bit? You know ... give it a whirl?”
She looks disgusted, probably at my lack of subtlety. “Don’t make me vomit.”
“What? It’s a good idea. He’s very obviously infatuated by you and the only way you can help that is to put him out of his misery and agree to give it a try.”
Now she looks like she’s torn between laughing at me and yelling at me. “Hello, Mrs Pot, I’m Kettle, now why are you calling me black?”
I am confused. Pots? Kettles? What’s she talking about?
Evidently my confusion shows on my face. “Marty, you can’t tell me to do that with James when you need to do it just as much with Remus.”
Wait. What? How are we talking about me and Remus again? I thought I’d diverted that situation!
“Remus isn’t in love with me,” I say.
She rolls her eyes. “Of course he’s not. And James isn’t a complete idiot.”
“He isn’t,” I say, even though I know she’s being sarcastic. And that she’s right (about James, not about Remus).
“Oh, come on. It’s obvious. Can’t you tell just by looking at him?”
“That James is an idiot?” I ask, although I know who she’s really talking about. And she knows I know that too. I sigh. Because actually, the answer to that is no. Sure, I know James loves Lily. But only because he tells everybody that fact on a daily basis. How are you supposed to tell if someone is in love just by looking at them? I don’t exactly have much experience to compare it to.
“I can’t,” I insist now to Lily. “I’ve never liked anyone in that way before. I don’t know what it looks like.”
She looks as if I’ve just told her I’ve never brushed my teeth. “What do you mean, you’ve never liked anyone ‘in that way’ before? It happens to everybody. Everybody. Even idiots like James who shouldn’t be allowed access to that much of an excuse for stupidity.”
“It’s true. I’d rather be doing something useful.”
“Well, yeah. So would a lot of people. That doesn’t stop it happening though, it’s not something you choose to feel. You’ve never had a single fantasy about someone you know? Or don’t know? Not even a celebrity or something?”
“No,” I admit. “Who would I fantasise about? None of the boys at this school, that’s for sure.”
I can’t believe I’m having a conversation with my best girl friend about boys. It’s like the third year I never had!
“Come on. Not even Remus? You lived with him for almost the whole summer. Are you saying you never once saw him shirtless? The same for the other three, who must have been around a lot. Maybe Remus and Peter might have shied away, but I’d bet my violin that Sirius and James didn’t.”
“Well, then you’d keep your violin. But it still never occurred to me to think of them like that.”
She stares at me.
“Are you even human?”
“Of course I am! Just because the sight of a boy doesn’t send me into some kind of insane frenzy, doesn’t mean I’m not human.”
“Well, no, not any boy. But it honestly never crossed your mind that one of them might be a good kisser?”
Okay, I am really, really glad the other girls can’t hear this. If this is how they spent their third year while I was holed up in a corner stalking (uh, observing) the Marauders, then they are welcome to have it back. I want out.
“Did it cross your mind?” I demand. Because I know for a fact that it didn’t. She hates them all. Well, maybe not anymore. But she did. Any second now, she’s going to burst out laughing and agree that the idea of the Marauders in that way is preposterous ... any second now ... wait for it ... why isn’t she agreeing with me yet?
“Well, yes, of course I did. It never went further than that in my case, obviously, but the thought did at least cross my mind. And it went further than that for people who weren’t idiots who called themselves the Marauders.”
“Like that Snape guy?” I ask, suddenly curious.
She shrugs. “Yeah, when we were younger. When he was still quite sweet, until he became even worse than they are. But not just him. Other people. Like ... I don’t know, like Stevie Wells, who was Head Boy when we were in fourth year. People like that. People I would very obviously not have a chance with. But it didn’t stop me thinking about it. Are you seriously telling me that you never had somebody like that?”
I think about it. Have I? I honestly can’t think of anybody. Romance has just never appealed to me. It’s occurred to me, but only so I can think about how much it doesn’t appeal to me. Maybe because I was only a baby when my father died, so I never grew up around couples the way kids who have both parents do. The only adult male who was ever around as more than a customer in my childhood was Garfield, who was never exactly linked romantically to my mother or my aunt. Unless I missed that, too. After all, my Aunt Tabby still lives with him, doesn’t she?
“I really don’t think I have,” I admit. Except for Remus, but that was only recently that it even occurred to me that that was even near the realms of possibility.
Maybe Remus could be my secret fancy. I could giggle when he looks at me (even though there’s nothing funny about him looking at me) and bat my eyelashes around him (as if that won’t make me look demented) and say Mrs Martina Lupin in my head (like I have nothing better to do) and plan what we’ll name our children (but that hardly seems fair, since he deserves a say in that too). It will be like having my first boy infatuation five years late. Then, in five years, when I’ve reached the stage Lily is at now, I might be ready to actually take it further.
She shakes her head sadly. “You, my friend, have missed out on a major part of your teenage years. I can’t believe you’ve never felt the inner angst of unrequited love. It’s a right of passage. Why do you get to skip it and go straight to the good part?”
“What’s the good part?” I ask, snapping out of the daydream I was forcing myself to have about my wedding day (not that it worked. I keep thinking about other things, like when the Charms homework is due in, rather than what colours my flowers would be, which is what I was trying to make myself think about. If that’s even what you think about in those daydreams. I have no more idea about that than anything else apparently).
“Well, being in love with Remus and having him returning your feelings. I mean, that’s where you are now, after all.”
“Um,” I say. “No it’s not. Remus isn’t in love with me and I’m not in love with him.”
I just have a forced fancy for him to teach myself what the experience feels like.
“You really don’t like Remus?” Lily asks, sounding shocked. I haven’t been telling her this for the past ten minutes or anything, after all.
“No!” I insist. Oh, wait, hang on. Yes I do. I forgot. Darn. This is a lot harder than it sounds. How come no one ever mentions how difficult it is to remember who you’re supposed to have a passing fancy for? Why are people always saying how happy it makes them to be in love, rather than how hard it is to remind yourself?
“Well, maybe you just don’t realise it yet,” Lily says eventually. “But I can assure you that you do, even if you don’t know it.”
I decide not to tell her about how I am forcing myself to like him. It might not work, after all. I should just steer the conversation away from me and back onto my Secret Cause. Secret Causes I can deal with.
“Like you and James?” I shoot at her.
“No,” she says gently. “Because James only thinks he’s in love with me and Remus actually is in love with you. And I know I’m not in love with James, whereas you think you know you’re not in love with Remus.”
How does she keep doing that? Every time I bring up her and James, she twists it into me and Remus! How am I supposed to argue about her and James if I only end up arguing about myself? That’s hardly fair. Where do you learn that skill anyway and how come no one ever told me about it? Just when did I get so completely clueless?
“Who’s in love with James?” demands Mary, taking off her earmuffs, after apparently noticing that Lily has stopped playing. It took her long enough. “Is it you, Lily? He’s mine! How could you betray our friendship this way?”
“Don’t worry,” Lily assures her calmly. “You’re the only person in the entire world who could ever love James.”
Mary nods. “You can bet on it.”
Lily tries not to laugh and I decide not to mention to Mary that she just insulted the object of her affections. Some things are better left unsaid.
Especially when there are people around to hear them other than the ones you want to hear it. And those people are all taking off their sound blocking earmuffs.
However, there is an ear splitting squeal from next door “ the excitable second years “ which can only mean one thing. They’re having another sleepover. We all reach for our earmuffs (some for the second time in one night, straight after taking them off) without saying another word, as one high-pitched squeal turns into six.
Well, if those girls spend the night having the kinds of conversations Lily and I just had, then good luck to them, is all I can say.
[Remus]
Luckily, the last Quidditch game before Christmas isn’t a Gryffindor game. I don’t think I’d have been able to take that on top of everything else.
Peter is continuing to tell everyone that Marty and I are destined to be and the more he says it, the more I believe it ... sort of. I almost put mayonnaise in his sandwiches to shut him up. On several occasions.
Meanwhile, I’ve barely spoken to Marty, things have been so awkward. Sometimes I’ll catch her eye and smile before I can stop myself. It’s so stupid that Peter’s delusional (okay, not that delusional) ramblings have made us unable to talk to each other unless there’s someone else around. The one or two times we’ve been on our own, the silence has been so awkward I’ve been driven close to jumping out of the nearest window. Not that I would. Knowing my luck, it wouldn’t even work.
And now we have to commentate together. It’s fun, of course, it always is. Beforehand, Greg McJacks tries to get his commentating job back. It’s weird that a month or two ago I’d have been the one begging him to come back so I didn’t have to sit up there and talk with the entire staff and students of Hogwarts listening. But I really enjoy doing it with Marty. Well, I did, before Peter started stirring things up.
But as McJacks insists that, “It’s only a small hangover this time, I only had thirteen drinks last night and when I woke up, the bush I was in wasn’t even that far from the school this time. Commentating is my life, you understand that don’t you, Romulus? Minnie? You know that, right? Right? My head is killing me ...” I realise that the last thing I want is to give up commentating the games. Besides, people like our double act. There isn’t quite so much muttering about Ministry conspiracies when we do it.
Okay, now that I think about it, there is. But Marty’s way of happily rambling along about the way the Minister is trying to hide the fact that trolls are really the superior descendants of the lost and ancient tribe of Unicorn-Centaurs, is completely different to McJacks’s drink induced mumblings about the Ministry being out to steal his beer money.
And even if that time he treated us to ‘I’m a Believer’ was pretty hilarious, the truth is that Marty and me are just more family-friendly. Not that there are any small children. But if there were, they wouldn’t be forced to stay inside to stop them picking up bad language. Which McGonagall is only too happy about.
So we gently tell McJacks that we think he deserves a break from the stress of having to pay attention to what’s going on around him and when that doesn’t work, Marty casually mentions that the house elves sometimes like to share a bottle of butterbeer when the students are all away for the morning, so he is out like a shot. We go up to sit in our places (in silence of course) and say no more about it.
But even if we can’t speak to each other before it, when the game starts we’re fine. Maybe there isn’t quite as much playful banter as usual. But we’re still fine.
“Slytherin wins!” Marty eventually yells as the incredibly good looking Slytherin (according to girls we know, at least), Keith Robertson catches the Snitch easily, then slicks his hair back and smiles sexily (uh, so I’m told) at a nearby adoring fan. Much to James’s disgust “ or maybe because of James’s disgust “ Luanne had admitted that she was going through a “passing phase” for him, like most first year girls ... the ones who don’t like Sirius that is.
“But ...” James had stuttered. “But ... Slytherin! Bad!”
“Uh,” Luanne said. “Don’t discriminate, James. We’re all people.”
“You’re doing this on purpose!” he had whined. “You’re trying to rebel against me! What did I do to deserve this? Why him? It’s because of his bad boy image, isn’t it?”
Then Lily had wandered over and asked what was going on (she probably noticed James rocking back and forth in distress). When he explained sorrowfully, Lily had only said, “Oh, well, I know where you’re coming from, Luanne. Who wouldn’t?”
It was funny to watch poor James’s head explode.
I think of that now as Robertson is patted on the back by his team mates and many young girls are reaching from the stands to touch him, even though their arms aren’t nearly long enough.
“I wonder if Prongs will give him the ole ‘touch my daughter and die’ speech?” I mutter to Marty. She laughs.
“Probably. I don’t think he has much to worry about, though.”
“Because he would never go for a first year Gryffindor, seeing as he’s a sixth year Slytherin? I know. But try telling Prongs that.”
“Actually,” Marty says, smiling to herself. “That’s not what I was thinking. I was thinking that if any guy tried to hurt Luanne, she’d certainly make him live to regret it.”
At this point, James stomps into the teachers’ stand where the commentators sit and sits down miserably.
“I knew it,” he says. “That smarmy git caught the Snitch just to provoke me. Now he’ll probably take Luanne and impregnate her. They’ll have a hasty marriage, they’ll both become drunks and then spend the rest of their lives hating each other. And me. It’s all an elaborate plot to destroy my morale now that we’ll have to play them in the final.”
“You should really have more faith in your daughter’s judgement,” Marty points out.
I catch her eye and grin as James falls forwards and buries his head in his lap. I can’t help it. It’s so much fun laughing at James behind his back with her. Why should we let Peter get in the way of harmless fun? So what if I’m in love with her?
I mean ... going through a passing phase. Right. But still, that doesn’t mean we can’t carry on making fun of James without him realising like we always have. Besides, it’s not like it’s flirting. I do it with Sirius and Peter too and no one could say I’m in love with them.
I am pleased with this conclusion. “What you should do,” I say calmly, patting him on the back soothingly, but smirking at Marty as I do it, “is give him the ole ‘touch my daughter and die’ speech.”
Marty snorts with laughter. “No you shouldn’t,” she assures him, whilst trying to cover up her giggles. “You should take this personal attack on your morale and use it by being a stronger Captain than ever and throwing it back in his face.”
“I should?” James asks, looking up at her with large desperate eyes.
“Definitely,” I agree. “Then give him the ole ‘touch my daughter and die’ speech. Make sure it’s where I can see you.”
“Okay,” James says, standing up. “Right. I’ll do that. But not now though. First I’ll make sure there are locks on the windows of all the girls' dormitories.”
“There are,” Marty tells him. “But they can be opened from the inside. So if Luanne wanted to let him in, she could.”
Luckily for us (after all, it will be funny to find out what happens when he is caught hovering by the windows of a first year girls’ dormitory), James doesn’t appear to be listening.
[Marty]
“So, the first years thought James was a lecherous pervert, huh?” Lily asks, giggling to herself over her Potions essay. I can’t help but join in her laughter.
“Yeah. He insisted he was just checking no one could get in for security reasons, but I don’t think McGonagall believed him. Of course, that’s what he really was doing this time, but the memory of the knocking incident is probably still fresh in her memory.”
“Well, since it’s obvious he can’t get a girlfriend his own age, it’s only natural for him to go for the adoring younger girls.”
“But he wasn’t,” I insist. For the Secret Cause, I feel like I need to make sure Lily knows James isn’t a psychotic pervert (as opposed to just being an idiot, although that’s not much better). “He really was checking the security. He was worried Keith Robertson would come in the night and impregnate Luanne.”
However, this serves only to make Lily laugh even harder.
Speaking of Luanne, she wanders over to us now and sits down.
“I can’t believe how embarrassing James is,” she says, burying her head in her hands.
“Well, he is your father,” Lily points out through her chuckles. “It’s only to be expected.”
“As if Keith Robertson would ever look my way, anyway. I mean, I’m a first year Gryffindor. He’s hardly going to look twice.”
“Pretty funny though, right?” Lily asks. “And like I said. I’m right with you on the Keith Robertson front.”
I watch them as they discuss this between themselves. Apparently Lily was right and every girl does have an unrequited love at some point. How come it never happened to me? What’s their secret? I look over at Remus, who is sitting with Peter a little way away. I’m not sure where Sirius and James are. Is Lily right? Am I in love with Remus without even realising it? My forced fancy didn’t work out too well, because I kept forgetting about it. But I guess anything’s possible. It was fun commentating today, even though there were a lot of silences before and after the game (but never during, of course. We’re professionals after all. Sort of.) while I tried to figure out whether I was happy because I was spending time with my friend or my soul mate. Only I couldn’t.
“Marty? Are you there? Marty?”
I snap out of it. “Huh? What?”
Lily smiles. “I was just asking if you had realised that you’re in love with Remus yet.”
I sigh. “You say that, Lily, but I’m just not sure it’s true. Luanne, you know how it feels. What do you think?”
“What do you mean ‘I know how it feels’?” she asks.
“You know, being in love,” I point out. Maybe I’m not the only one who forgets who I’m supposed to be in love with after all! I knew some research would solve my problems!
“I’m not in love.”
Wait. What? “Not even with Keith Robertson?”
“Uh ... no. That’s different. That’s just a passing phase. Mostly to wind James up.”
“There’s a difference?” I ask, more confused than ever. Lily and Luanne exchange glances.
“I see what you mean,” Luanne says.
“Didn’t I tell you? Hopeless,” Lily agrees. Well, that makes me feel better. I can’t help it if I apparently have no clue about anything.
“Marty,” Luanne says gently. “You’re in love with Remus. Everybody can see it. Except you.”
“Then doesn’t that defeat the point?” I wail. I mean, really! Why did no one tell me having proper girl friends made everything so difficult? Boy mates were never this complicated. They just did stupid stuff while I wrote down the stupid stuff they did. They never tried to tell me how I felt about Remus.
Well, lately Peter did. But never before then. They were just as clueless as I am.
“Do you think I might be a boy?” I ask. However, Lily and Luanne don’t have a chance to react to this (probably a good thing), because at that moment, James and Sirius come bursting through the Portrait Hole.
And James has a black eye.
“James!” Luanne cries, shooting out of her chair and rushing over to him. “Are you okay?”
Which proves, really, that as much as she complains about how embarrassing he is, she still cares about him. Merlin. They really are like father and daughter.
“What happened?” Lily asks. I note with some satisfaction that at least a small part of her seems to care too. My Secret Cause is going pretty well and I’ve not even done anything yet.
“It was Robertson,” Sirius explains, as James waves Luanne away and tries to look like a wounded hero in front of his daughter and Lily. “Uh ... Prongs decided they should have a chat.”
I turn in my seat to catch Remus’s eye, grinning at him and trying not to laugh. Peter notices this interaction and looks pleased with himself as if he personally orchestrated it.
“The ole ‘touch my daughter and die’ chat, right?” I ask, turning back to Sirius.
“That’s the one,” he nods. “It didn’t go too well, though. Robertson said he didn’t even know anyone called Luanne, then Prongs said it had better damn well stay that way. Then Robertson called him crazy and asked why his eye was twitching and walked off to meet his girlfriend. Then Prongs was so annoyed he walked into a suit of armour.”
I look to see how Luanne takes the news that Robertson has a girlfriend. But she seems to be too busy laughing at James’s stupidity (now she knows he’s okay) to care. Maybe that’s the difference between love and a passing phase like she has. Maybe when you’re in love it hurts when they don’t return it, but when it’s a phase you’re too busy having fun with friends to mind.
I try to imagine what I’d do if Remus had a girlfriend. With worrying clarity, I realise that I would be hurt. A lot. Sweet Merlin. Maybe I really am in love with him.
Now what?
AN: *Grins*. I love James when he’s being an idiot. Anyway, I’m afraid that there is only actually one final chapter left ... *wipes eyes*. I apologise for all the girl talk in this one and the amount of times I used the words “in love”. Personally I rather enjoyed writing all that, but my brother couldn’t stand that part and made me skip some of it out, (although he’s a fourteen year old boy). I hope you liked it more than he did. Please let me know!