The Tutors
Three boys sat in a room. They were, quite unusually, quite quiet. As a boy who had a mane of shaggy black hair waved his wand and turned a smaller boy with mousy grey hair's cup into a set of biting dentures, a third boy was reading a book, peering at the words through his spectacles.
The young boy shrieked and leapt off his chair, diving behind the bespectacled boy. The dentures continued their pursuit of him, and ripped through the bespectacled boy's book.
"SIRIUS!" James Potter yelled as he transfigured the dentures that were trying to take a chunk of his finger off back into a teacup. "Look what you've done. You've ruined the book!"
Peter Pettigrew whimpered and emerged from behind James's chair.
"And you, Peter. You're a wizard, aren't you? Why didn't you stop those dentures?"
Peter shrunk into himself. "I dunno James…" Peter muttered.
"Well, pull yourself together. You'll be no help to Remus if you're always so jumpy."
"Too right, James!" Sirius agreed.
James turned his disapproving gaze towards Sirius. "And you, Sirius, can't you lay off him?"
Peter looked up gratefully at James.
"Ah, James, it was just a bit of fun. Right Pete?"
"Sure Sirius." Peter replied.
"We're doing this for Remus. Could we just calm down a little and not make mischief here, please?"
"The end of the world is nigh! James Potter has asked for us not to misbehave! HELP!" Sirius said.
"Well, only when we're studying this form of Transfiguration…" James conceded.
Sirius sighed with relief.
/
"You know." Sirius remarked as he and James made their way through a noisy corridor. "We'll see our Transfiguration Grades improving with this. Except maybe Pete's."
Peter Pettigrew, who had dropped his bag, hurried to join them just as James responded thoughtfully. "Well, of course it will…" James mused. "And Professor McGonagall will wonder how we got so much better."
"We could just say we studied harder."
"Us?" James roared with laughter. "That'll make her as suspicious as Alastor Moody."
"I suppose you're right. What can we do?"
"Search me…"
"If you can't bring Mohammed to the mountain, you bring the mountain to Mohammed." Peter said from behind them.
"What are you babbling on about, Peter?" Sirius asked. "We have a problem here, and all you do is prattle nonsense."
"Sirius, you can be so thick sometimes." Peter retorted. "Maybe it's that ridiculous hairstyle."
Sirius glowered at Peter's insulting words.
"Pete, what have you got on your mind?" James asked.
"Well, so Professor M doesn't notice our rise in skill in Transfiguration, we should help everyone else in our class, so that we don't look so unusual."
"Help. People. Study? ARE YOU MENTAL!" Sirius shouted, causing innocent bystanders to leap back with shock.
"Wait a moment Sirius, Pete has something here…" James began, grinning at the prospect of tutoring Lily Evans.
"Wipe that smirk off your face, Potter." Peter told him. "We won't be teaching Evans."
"What!" James said, shocked and horrified. "Why not?"
Sirius, who had been fighting with Peter a few moments earlier, was now on his side. "Because she's intelligent, James. As soon as we start getting better, she'll push herself to get her own grades up. We don't need to help her."
"And remember, James, Evans is the teacher's pet. We'd never be able to get her to keep our tutoring a secret…"
/
Years later…
Prefect Lily Evans was wandering through the school on her Prefect patrol, when she spotted Peter Pettigrew shuffling across the other side of the corridor, his hands filled with bags filled with sandwiches and pumpkin juice.
Wondering what this suspicious individual was up to, Lily followed him, keeping at a distance as he made his away across the school, eventually stopping on a corridor on the seventh floor, before strolling back and forth past a bare wall three times, after which, to Lily's immense surprise, a door materialised and Peter walked through it.
Lily's shock prevented her from instantly following Peter, so it took her a few seconds to realise the door was disappearing.
Springing into action, Lily leapt for the door, managing to squeeze herself inside and tumbling in, expecting some sort of rowdy party to be underway – and underwritten by Messrs Black, Potter and Pettigrew.
Lily, embarrassed at having fallen over, expecting to see the cackling faces of Potter and Black above her while they partied, began to shout out commandments to end the frivolous event taking place around her.
"Alright, pack it up. Move out, come on, come on."
Lily's face flushed a bright red when she saw people, who were seated at ordered desks like they were in a classroom, turn in their seats to look at her.
James Potter, seated at a table facing most of the other students, gave Lily a gaze over the top of his glasses.
"Nice of you to join us, Miss Evans." James said, making Lily have the outrageous feeling that James seemed like Dumbledore, and instead of responding, she found herself unable to open her mouth.
"You…you…I thought you had a resemblance to Headmaster Dumbledore for a moment."
James's eyes widened. "I'm sure that you have hastily changed your flattering perception, Miss Evans."
"I certainly have. And why do you keep calling me Miss Evans?"
"Is there any reason why I should desist from doing so, Miss Evans?"
"Yes!" Lily cried.
"May I enquire as to the reason and receive a response that answers my query, Miss Evans."
"It – it's too polite! Potter is never polite. You're not acting normally. Why are you sitting up there, and why are all these people here?" Lily asked.
Sirius, who was walking around the students, hushed her. "Miss Evans, please, Master Anderson is about to undertake a complex wand manoeuvre which requires precise concentration.
Lily walked right up to James's desk. Peter sat at the end, grading some papers.
"What are you up to, Potter?" Lily demanded, seizing a piece of parchment from the pile in front of Peter.
Lily glanced at the title.
Transfiguration – Animals (Year 6).
Student #: XLIV
Date: XV/II/MCMLXXVI
Projected grade: Exceeds Expectations.
Before Lily could read any more, Peter snatched the parchment back, and as he did so, James stood up.
"Thank you, once again, for an excellent display of proficiency in our lesson. You all performed admirably, and your improvement is astounding. All of you are headed towards Outstanding grades on your OWL's and your NEWT's. The time of the next meeting will be posted on the Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin noticeboards. Now, you must all be aching to leave my presence, so, class dismissed!" James told the students, who left.
Sirius Black came up behind Lily, so she was surrounded on three sides by Marauders.
"Pete, you've given us a dilemma." Sirius informed Peter solemnly.
"What are we going to do with you, Evans?" Peter asked gently.
"Do with me? Erm…what have I done?"
"This is our secret. And you know it. We couldn't possibly have anyone finding out, now could we, James?"
"Plenty of people know about it."
"Not teachers."
"True, not teachers." James conceded.
"Would somebody please tell me what is going on?" Lily asked, feeling extremely confused.
"Well," James began. "I few years ago, we – that is, Sirius, Peter and myself noticed that some of our classmates – yourself excluded – that we could help improve their abilities in Transfiguration. So we began teaching a few students one at a time."
"Why didn't I know about this?"
"Well, for starters we made anyone pledge to keep the meetings secret. Secondly, we only approached those that needed assistance. With your beauty only matched by your brains, Miss Evans, you certainly did not require our help."
Lily decided to pass over James's compliment. "How did you know my grades?"
"We broke into McGonagall's office and read her grades." Sirius laughed. Lily whirled around to face him.
"You. Did. What?"
"It's true." James admitted.
"Well, you couldn't expect us to do everything legally?" Sirius asked, affronted.
"But…McGonagall would have been delighted that you are helping students – unless you aren't, and that's why you've kept it secret…"
"Evans…" Sirius began. "Haven't you listened to McGonagall lately? She always seems so pleased with our classwork."
"Well, I've got to tell her about this. You shouldn't be breaking into people's private information like that."
"True." James said. "But we've got a reputation to uphold."
Lily growled under her breath. Even when he was doing something decent, James Potter had to throw in some obnoxious behaviour to ruin it.
"Now, Evans, if you tell Professor McGonagall about us, she might disband us."
"Now why would she do that?"
"Because she thinks that she is the one who has taught us all. If she found out that her students went to a handful of sixth year miscreants, it'd break her heart!" Peter said.
"Alright, if you promise not to break into her office and read our grades, I won't tell her." Lily offered.
"That seems reasonable enough." James said, nodding and looking at his friends.
"James, she needs to make an oath." Sirius said, eyeing Lily closely.
"Err…What kind of oath."
"A solemn pledge not to reveal our secret."
"And how would I do that?"
"I only know of one way to be sure…"
Peter and James nodded solemnly.
Sirius drew his wand.
"You don't mean…You can't expect to me make an Unbreakable Vow?" Lily asked, more than a little worried.
James walked around the desk to face Lily. Sirius grabbed Lily's hand and lifted it and James lifted his own until they were almost touching.
To Lily's great shock, James didn't grab her wrist as was part of an Unbreakable Vow, but used his little finger to hook hers.
"Do you, Lily Evans, solemnly swear to uphold the secrecy of our organization, and do you, James Potter, solemnly swear to not break into Professor McGonagall's office and read the Hogwarts' Students' grades?"
"I swear it." James declared.
"Well…Sure…Alright, I do too." Lily said. "You shouldn't scare me like that, Black. A pinky swear, really…"
And Lily left, shaking her head all the way to the Gryffindor Common Room.