It was our very first lesson was Transfiguration and we were all handed matches.
“Fantastic!” Sirius said loudly. He and James were sitting at the desk in front of me. “Hey, James, don’t move.”
“Why ...?” James asked, keeping almost comically still.
“Oh, nothing,” Sirius replied, trying to light the match on the side of the table. “Hey, what do you reckon it feels like to have your hair on fire?”
James leapt sideways away from his friend and crashed into Professor McGonagall in the aisle.
“Mr Potter, I will forgive that considering it is your first lesson. However, if you act dangerously again, I will be forced to remove points,” she told him, frowning.
“Sorry, Professor. But really it was him who was being dangerous ...”
However, this was luckily not heard by the professor, as McGonagall turned and began reprimanding Peter for breaking his match in two. Remus, sitting next to him, looked embarrassed. He caught me watching and blushed a little, but smiled.
Chapter Five: Taffy’s
[Remus]
I am sitting in James’s living room, slowly sipping tea. “It was brilliant, wasn’t it?” I say, grinning over at him.
“You bet. The look on his mum’s face!” James has no tea, being in detestation of the beverage, but looks quite comfortable lounged along the sofa.
“It’s a shame she won’t let him out of his room now, though. It’s sort of quiet without him bouncing around breaking things ... still, I suppose he hardly gets much chance to be bouncy at his place.”
“Yeah. You can’t blame him. At least he gets to admire our handiwork this way! I hope he bloody does, anyway, it took forever to find all those motorcycle posters for him ...”
I look at him suspiciously. “Are you saying it was easy for you to find ones of scantily clad Muggle women? For shame, Prongs!”
“Shut up, will you? My Mum could walk in any second ...”
“Well, we wouldn’t want that,” I say solemnly, then burst out laughing when the cushion he throws misses by approximately ten thousand miles. “I’m sorry, James, who was it you said was the best Chaser at Hogwarts? I’m sure that position required aiming ...”
“Ah, shut up and drink your leafy water.”
“Tea isn’t water with leaves in it, Prongs, the leaves flavour the water and are then removed.“
James makes a dismissive noise and flaps his hand. I take another sip. I always feel comfortable in James’s house. It’s cosy, without being smothering, like Peter’s is. But it’s not cold and harsh like Sirius’s “ not that I’ve ever sat in his living room. But we saw some of the house when we came and helped decorate for him a couple of days ago and it was hardly a gingerbread cottage. Of course, Sirius has now been locked in his room for the rest of the month, but his parents can do nothing about the décor (which, as well as the Muggle posters, now includes many Gryffindor banners, too and just to really send them wild, a stuffed fluffy lion called Godric, with a red and gold scarf around its neck).
“So, are you ready for this Saturday?” James asks, looking over at me. Saturday is, of course, the full moon.
“Yes. I told you, I’ll cope. I always cope.”
James shakes his head in wonder. “I don’t know how you do it, mate. I really don’t.”
I shrug and look away. “I do it because I don’t have a choice,” I eventually say.
James nods and rolls over onto his back again, staring at the ceiling. Silences are never uncomfortable at the Potters’. I look around the room. There is a large mirror hanging over the fireplace, opposite the window, reflecting the room with loads of light. The walls are a friendly cream colour, the carpet a lightly coloured coffee brown. On the walls are family photos, his parents’ graduation certificates, shelves of the quaint little junk a family accumulates over the years. The long, dark brown sofa that James is lying across is against one wall, while two matching armchairs sit in the corners (one of which I am occupying right now). It is, as I said, a comfortable house. It’s not huge “ James may be rich, but a lot of the property’s worth lies in the surrounding acres of land they own. But there is always a spare bedroom or two for visitors, a large, antiquated kitchen, a welcoming dining room and one or two other rooms I’ve never really explored. I feel safe here.
And it’s not often I get James to myself, either. He and Sirius are always together at school and would be now if Sirius wasn’t locked in his bedroom. Peter would probably like to be here, but his family all came down to see him and he sent an owl saying he wouldn’t be able to get away for a few days. All this meant I was the only one free; my parents could hardly say no. They get so guilty when full moon is coming up, that anything they think will make me happy, they agree to. I’d never take advantage, of course, but it did mean they allowed me to spend the whole day here, at the blink of an eye. I push the thought of my parents and the full moon out of my mind.
“So, what do you want to do?” I ask, distracting myself. “Fancy flying for a bit?”
James sits up, grinning. “I thought you’d never ask. Come on, you can use my old broom. So what do you want “ Quidditch?”
“There are two of us, Prongs,” I point out, as we stand and leave the room. “I can barely score a goal, never mind catching the Snitch and chasing Bludgers about, too.”
“Well, we’ll just use Quaffles then. Don’t worry, though “ I’ll let you get a couple past me!”
“So chivalrous ...”
Within fifteen minutes, we are up in the air and I am losing horribly “ as expected. But I save a couple and once, I nearly knock him off his broom during a daring tackle that pays off spectacularly.
“Lupin scores again!” I cry. “Another magnificent goal! He’s certainly not losing by sixteen points, this one, no he’s not!”
James laughs. “In your dreams, Moony.” And he flies past me, taking the ball from my hands unexpectedly, with light-fingered ease. Naturally, he scores four times in a row before I can catch him up and knock the ball out of his hands again.
“That was cheating,” I say, hovering in mid-air, clutching the ball to my chest.
“Simple rule, mate. Get ‘em while they’re too busy celebrating. Like that time when we were playing Slytherin last year and they were so busy rubbing our noses in it, they didn’t even notice Smithy going for the Snitch until it was too late ...”
While James’s eyes glaze over with pride, I suddenly lunge towards the other end of our playing area and manage to score again.
“Oi!” he yells after me. “I was reminiscing, there!”
“Yeah, yeah. Get ‘em while they’re massaging their massive heads, that’s what you said, isn’t it?” I ask, grinning. He laughs, then accelerates, heading straight for me. For a moment I call his bluff, but then we both swerve out of the way at the last possible second and start to laugh again. I glance down and realise that I’m actually airborne (shocker, I know) which immediately sobers me up. It’s all fun and games until someone breaks their neck, after all.
“Boys!” a voice calls from down below. We both look down and see Mrs Potter looking up at us, hand blocking the sun from her eyes.
“Yeah, Mum?” James calls down.
“You have another visitor!”
We look at each other “ who would that be? Not Sirius, he’s imprisoned in his bedroom. Had Peter managed to escape the numerous aunties, after all?
“It’s Walburga Black’s son!” There is a hint of dislike in her voice at the thought of Sirius’s mother and I don’t blame her, to be honest. In fact, I wouldn’t blame her if I wasn’t being honest, either, because you just can’t help but dislike everything about Mrs Black.
“Sirius?” James asks, confusion replacing the laughter on his face.
“That’s the one. Well, don’t just hang there, James. He looks a little dishevelled ...”
Without any further questioning, James dives to the ground, pulling his broom to a stop expertly and dismounting. I am not far behind and we make our way back inside the house, hurriedly.
Sure enough, Sirius is standing by the fireplace, looking extremely rough around the edges, his trunks “ full to bursting “ standing next to him. Well, well.
“Sit down, Padfoot,” James says, sounding shocked. “I have a feeling this might take a while.”
[Marty]
“And would you like milk in your tea?” I ask, brightly.
“Yes please, lovey. You’ve grown so much!”
“Of course, Mrs Chalmers,” I say brightly. This is untrue, I’m actually quite short, but I still smile and say, “I’m always growing. Can’t seem to stop. Be through the roof, next. Tell me: have you ever heard of the Plight of the Pixie?”
“Why, no, dear, what’s that?”
I launch into my explanation and catch my mother’s eye. She winks and beams. I grin back and continue telling Mrs Chalmers about the pixies.
I love my mother. She’s so smart “ and the only parent I have. My father died when I was very little, of an illness, so I’ve only ever had my mother, really. And my Aunt Tabby, of course. They own and run the tea shop on Diagon Alley, Taffy’s (a mixture of Tabby and Saffy; my Mum’s name) and when I’m home for the holidays, I help them both out. But I don’t mind; I love my job! My Mum and Aunt are both campaigners for The Cause, too, so it’s sort of become a centre for all things campaigning and protest-y. It’s the perfect place to have a petition signed. I love it here. This little backstreet tea shop is my favourite place in the world; I never feel as safe as I do when I’m here. I’m never treated like a kid, people listen to me ... and I’m not the weird protester kid, like at school. I fit right in.
“Marty, honey?” I hear Aunt Tabby call. “Could you help me over here? I’m suddenly snowed over with coffees ...”
“Don’t you mean snowed under?” I ask, laughing over at her, before grabbing a mug and starting to fill it with the strong smelling liquid. Aunt Tabby’s tendency to mix her words up is rather infamous and one of the many loveable things about her. I hand the first one “ naturally “ to the first person in line. He has a long coat, with the collar turned up and a hat pulled down over his eyes. “Thanks,” he mutters, taking it and going to sit in the corner. The next person I serve is similarly sincere and the next and the next ... in fact, the shop is suddenly filling up with grave looking men and women, talking to each other solemnly. I look over at Aunt Tabby.
“What’s going on?” I ask. The happy atmosphere suddenly seems drained.
Aunt Tabby gives me a reassuring smile. “You’ll see. There are a lot more serious issues at hand right now, Marty. Your Mum’s been organising these meetings once a month for a while, now.”
“What are they about?” I ask, curiously, looking around uncomfortably.
“You’ll see.”
Someone claps their hands, twice. I turn to see that it was Mum. She is standing tall and looking around at the group gathered.
“Welcome back, everyone. I’m sure you’ve noticed the rise in these awful things that are happening ... it’s time we stopped holding marches and did something much more useful about You-Know-Who’s reign of horror...”
[Remus]
“All right,” I say, fixing Sirius with a fierce stare. “Stop avoiding the question. What happened?”
He sighs and says humourlessly, “Can’t I dodge it a little bit longer?”
“No,” James replies, firmly. “You can’t just turn up at my house with those,” he jabs his finger at the trunks, still waiting by the fire, “and just expect us not to ask any questions. I mean, I have no problem with you staying and I’d let you whether you told me or not ... but my parents won’t. Especially not the eldest Black son. They’ll need a reason, mate.”
“But your parents have always liked me before now!” he pleads, looking horrified that it might not be going to plan. “I thought they didn’t care about that stuff!”
“Of course they don’t, not really, but you’ve got to admit it will look funny you coming to stay with us, won’t it? Look, I know my parents. They’ll happily fight off anyone who starts sniffing around, as long as they know there’s a good reason for it. You don’t have to go into too much detail if you really don’t want to.”
Sirius sighs again. “We had an argument, all right? So I left.”
“Sirius,” I say gently, as James sighs at the lack of information. “You’ve been arguing with your parents ever since you first got put in Gryffindor. Why now?”
“No reason. I’d just had enough, all right?”
“But why now? You’ve put up with it for years, Sirius, something must have triggered it.”
“I don’t want to talk about it?”
James is losing patience. His hand has flown to his hair and a vein is showing itself rather prominently on his neck. Despite his understanding words, it’s clear that he doesn’t understand at all. Not being able to help his friends is possibly the one thing that gets to James the most; just look what he did for me. He takes a deep breath and tries his hardest to look composed. “Come on, we could help you, couldn’t we?”
“I said I don’t want to“”
““Talk about it,” James finishes for him, dryly and I can just about hear him snapping from over here. “Right. Just like you haven’t been talking about it for five years. It’s good to know you feel you can trust us, mate. We feel like you really appreciate our friendship, don’t we, Moony?”
He’s being a bit harsh, but in a way, he’s still right. I don’t know what will work better, the understanding approach, or James’s new aggression. I suppose I’ve never been one for conflict, though, so I look Sirius calmly in the eye. “Look, Padfoot,” I begin. “If you just tell us what’s going on, we’ll be able to “”
“They were going on at me about you guys, all right?” Sirius burst out. “I was locked in my room, like you know and my Mum came in. Remember the only non-Muggle picture we stuck up? It was of us four, wasn’t it? And she started asking who you were, pretending to be all interested ... then Regulus came in. Oh, he told her all about you guys. How you’re a Pureblood, Prongs, but love Muggles. How Moony is half-blood“” this is true, my Mum’s Muggle-born ““and Wormtail’s Dad is a Muggle. As if that wasn’t bad enough, he started telling her all about our little feud with the Slytherins ... she hit the roof. I’ve never seen her that bad. Started blasting stuff to pieces. I just grabbed Reg and ran. Little bleeder’s a right git, but I wouldn’t want him to be around for all that ...”
James and I are on the edge of our seats. We’ve never heard Sirius talking about his family in such a serious way “ or show any signs of affection for his little brother.
“What happened then?” James asks. Sirius groans and closes his eyes.
“Well, I dragged him out onto the street. He said we shouldn’t have left her on her own, but I told him we didn’t have to be anywhere near that madwoman, especially when she’s being like that. We got on the Knight Bus to Diagon Alley and I bought him an ice cream to shut him up for a bit. He kept banging on about how we should be helping her, not leaving her in such a state. So I told him that it wasn’t our job. He asked when we’d go back, then and I just said ‘I’m not.’”
“What did he say to that?” I ask.
Sirius shrugs. “He was shocked, I guess, kept trying to talk me out of it. I tried telling him how screwed up it all is, this Pureblood nonsense, but he just doesn’t seem able to ... well, he can’t accept it, after growing up with it for so long. Can’t accept that it might be wrong, he’s not strong minded enough. Well, I told him that we could just leave them all, told him you’d put us up,” he nodded at James, “but he wouldn’t leave Mum, couldn’t even comprehend the idea. Anyway, eventually we went back and I asked him to get my trunks while I waited in the hall, in case Mum found me “ I knew she was upstairs, you see. To his credit, he didn’t tell Mum what was going on, just got my trunks and brought them down to me. He tried to stop me again, talk me out of it, but I said no. Then I tried to get him to come with me, but he wouldn’t. I even told him she’d blast me off the family tree, that I wouldn’t be his brother any more. That we wouldn’t ever be able to see each other properly again, because it’s not gonna happen at school, is it? Not with him in Slytherin.”
“What did he say?”
“Well ... he said ... he said that someone had to stay behind. That if she lost both her sons at once, who knew what she’d do? That one of us had to be the loyal one. So I said fine. I patted him on the back, said ‘see you around, Reg,’ and stepped into the fireplace with my stuff. And then I came here. All right? That’s the story.”
“I’m sorry,” I say after a minute of silence.
Sirius grins, widely. “What for? They were mad, the lot of ‘em. I’m glad I’m free. Screw those idiots. I don’t need a family. Especially not a whiny little brother. You two should be glad you’re only kids. Could have got away even sooner if it weren’t for him.”
I don’t believe a word of it. My gaze slides towards James, just as his looks towards to me. He raises his eyebrows, disbelievingly and I raise one back at him.
“Sure, Padfoot,” James says.
“Whatever you say,” I add.
Sirius nods, defiantly. “Glad we’re on the same page. Now, am I wrong, or were you two shooting goals in Quidditch? Come on, Moony, I’ll be on your team, that way it might be a little fairer ...”
I don’t feel the need to be offended by this, since I know it’s true, anyway. “All right, then. Good plan.”
Sirius rummages in one of his trunks, pulling out his broom and we all head into the outdoors once more.
[Marty]
Saturday night and Mum and Aunt Tabby are arguing. Now, this doesn’t happen often. They’re normally perfectly cooperative, going along with their lifelong theory that fighting won’t solve anything. However, just occasionally, opinions clash. This time, their opinion on me.
Aunt Tabby, being the more sensible one when it comes down to serious matters (but not everyday things), doesn’t think these meetings protesting about You-Know-Who should continue while I’m around. She says it’s too dangerous.
“As soon as she’s safe at school, we can start them again, Saffy, but we can’t cause too much fuss while Marty is staying here. She’s just a kid!”
Mum, however, doesn’t think we should stand down now. She’s very sensible when it comes down to everyday problems, but tends to get carried away by the bigger picture.
“She’s perfectly safe with us. Do you think I would put my own daughter in danger? Besides, you know she’s just as serious about The Cause as we are! You’ve seen the way she fights for it! She won’t want us giving in on her account!”
“We’re not giving in, we’re just toning it off until school starts again!”
“Toning it down, Tabby, or cooling it off! Why can you not even speak properly?” Mum jibes at her. I gasp, although no one can hear me in my room, as I listen to them downstairs in the closed café. We never get angry with Aunt Tabby’s language slip-ups. Never. We’ve always laughed them away with her. This must be more serious than I thought.
“I’m going to ignore that,” Aunt Tabby says calmly. “Because it’s completely irrelevant. We’re not giving in on anything. We’ll just wait a few weeks. Or have the next one somewhere else. All right?”
“All right. You’re right, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean what I said.”
“I know you didn’t. Come on, let’s lock up and go to bed ... Marty can be properly involved when she’s of age ... although hopefully this will all be blown under by then ...”
“You mean blown over.” I can hear the smile in my mother’s voice this time and I know things are all right again.
“Yeah, yeah. Of course. You know, it’s really not my “ what was that?”
I sit up straight, having heard the same thing that Aunt Tabby apparently did. Like several loud cracks. Like several people apparating all at once. Right outside our door. Instinctive panic grabs me, chokes me. Somehow, I know that whoever just apparated cannot be hear for a good reason. I grab my wand off my table and race downstairs, still in my pyjamas.
When I enter the main café, I hear the end of my Mum’s shocked and scared sounding sentence. ““Eaters, could it?” I have no idea what she’s talking about. But my Mum never gets scared. And what was panic before, suddenly transforms into blinding terror. The door bursts open and out on the street, I see several cloaked and hooded figures, all staring in towards us, ghostly and eerily lit by the full moon behind them. I scream.
Mum whirls around “ turns her back on the people outside “ to face me. “Marty,” she yells, stricken. “Marty, get upstairs, go somewhere safe, go somewhere far away from“”
She stops mid-sentence and behind her I see bright green light, flash. And, horrified and numb, I watch my mother crumple to the floor.
AN: *Shivers* I hate doing that. But I’m afraid it was necessary for certain plot points/character developments. I promise. I’m really not the kind to go around killing characters for the sake of it ... so please leave a review, to cheer me up!