Disclaimer: I do not own the Marauders. Or any part of Harry Potter what-so-ever, (Unfortunately…) nor did I write the song or the lyrics to 'With a Little Help from my Friends'.
Rating: K(plus) Contain mild coarse language.
Warning: If you don't know a lot about the Marauder's past, parts in this story could be considered spoilers.
Summary: A sonfic about a small piece of the marauders time in Hogwarts, including Lupin telling his friends about his 'furry little problem' and James first realizing he's in love with Lily. Based on/around 'With a Little Help from my Friends' by the Beatles.
Author's Notes: First Songfic…I tried to keep everything related, I hope I did a good job! Reviews are appreciated, as I'm always looking to improve my writing, so every bit of criticism helps! Oh yes, the bolded print are obviously the lyrics, and the non-bolded print is the actual story.
And now, without further ado…
A Little Help From My Friends
What
would do think if I sang out of tune,
Would you stand up and walk
out on me.
Lend me your ears and I'll sing you a song,
And I'll
try not to sing out of key.
'Oh my gosh, Remus! You're a werewolf?'
A chorus of 'Wow!' 'Wicked!' and 'Bloody Brilliant!' exploded from the three teens standing in a semi-circle around Remus Lupin.
'Y-yeah…I am…I was bitten when I was just a child…" Remus said, scratching the back of his head. 'And…listen…I understand if you don't want to be around me anymore…I wouldn't really blame you…'
'Ha, wouldn't you like that?" James Potter chortled.
'You're just trying to get us off your back.' Sirius Black joked, grinning boyishly.
Peter Pettigrew smirked. 'I wouldn't blame him for using every excuse he's got to get away from you two…' He joked, earning himself a nuggie from Potter and a wet-willy from a laughing Black.
'Oh, no no…you guys are really good friends, but…' Lupin paused. 'Everyone is terrified of werewolves, you know. We can't control ourselves when we…' He stopped, then mumbled, 'On the full moon.'
'Ha, it's going to take more than that to chase us off, moon-boy!' Sirius said, putting an arm around Remus' shoulders and leaning on him.
'Yeah, Moony!' James said, deciding he rather liked that nickname, and leaned on Remus' other side, his arm around the werewolf's shoulders as well.
'B-but…I don't want to hurt anyone!' Lupin cried out.
'I think we'll find a way to keep you from hurting anyone at all.' Pettigrew stated, standing in front of Remus. James and Sirius nodded in agreement.
'Trust us, we're your friends.' They said in unison.
Oh
I get by with a little help from my friends,
He gets high with a
little help from his friends,
Oh I'm gonna try with a little help
from my friends.
At The Three Broomsticks, all four marauders were sitting at a booth, relaxing with large mugs of butterbeer.
Remus was anxiously looking out the nearest window. The sun was already starting to set.
'Relax, Moony!' Sirius said, taking a swig from his mug. 'We've got it all planned out, remember?'
'Yeah, but what if-' Lupin began, but James cut in before he could finish.
'No 'what ifs' you worry wart. We've been working out the kinks all month, and secretly practicing every spare moment we got.' He said, stretching out and putting his hands behind his head.
'At least, every moment you weren't terrorizing that Snape kid…' Peter pointed out, yawning slightly.
'Psh, Snivellus deserves every thing we do to him.' Sirius stated rather matter-of-factly. 'Not like he tries to stop us, anyway. The wimp should stand up for himself or something. That Evans girl won't be around to save him every time…'
'Lilly.' James corrected.
'Huh?'
'Her name isn't 'that Evans girl', it's Lilly.'
A chorus of 'oooooh!'s erupted from the table, and behind his glasses James' cheeks reddened.
'Oh stuff it, all of you.' He muttered, staring into his butterbeer.
Lupin coughed nervously, and when everyone looked up at him, he nodded towards the window. The sun was setting rapidly, and an extremely faint outline of a full moon began to appear high in the sky.
'Fine, fine. We'll go early if it makes you stop worrying.' Sirius surrendered, standing up and brushing his robes off.
'You ready Padfoot? Moony? Wormtail?" James asked, once again testing the new nicknames they'd come up with for each other.
'You think it's a good idea to be using our animagus nicknames?' Peter asked, twiddling his thumbs.
'Prongs never has anything but good ideas!' Sirius announced.
Lupin coughed again, only this time to suppress his laugher.
James rolled his eyes and smacked Remus playfully upside the head as they all pushed through the door to The Three Broomsticks.
'Too the shrieking shack!' Sirius announced.
Remus nodded mournfully. 'Shrieking shack, yeah…' He muttered, staring at his feet.
What
do I do when my love is away?
Does it worry you to be alone?
How
do I feel by the end of the day?
Are you sad because you're on
your own?
No,
I get by with a little help from my friends,
Mmm I get high with a
little help from my friends,
Mmm I'm gonna to try with a little
help from my friends.
'I can't believe we missed out first class…' Lupin sighed as his friends pulled him outside for lunch. The werewolf looked completely exhausted from the previous night, and had quite a few bruises and scratches on his face. His friends looked no better.
'And we got a bloody detention for it! Lame… Slughorn needs to get the stick pulled out of his a-' Sirius said, interrupted by Remus' elbow being thrust into his ribs.
'Ow, Moony! Sheesh, I was going to say…uh…armpit! Yeah, Slughorn needs to get the stick pulled out of his armpit!' Remus smirked, and rolled his eyes.
'Well well well, what do we have here?' James said suddenly. At the top of a nearby hill, under a tree, sat Severus Snape.
Peter chortled.
Snape looked up, and frowned as the marauders approached him, sneers on their faces and a mischievous gleam in their squinted eyes.
'Oh look, so you weren't sick, were you? Won't Slughorn be frustrated to find out that four of his students just decided to skip class?' Severus glared, the corner of his mouth twisting into a smirk.
'Shove it, Snivellus!' James spat, wrenching his wand from his pocket. Sirius eagerly copied the action, followed shortly by Peter, and after several reluctant moments of internal struggle, Remus did the same.
Snape merely rolled his eyes, placing a bookmark in the book he was reading, and reaching for his own wand.
'Severus! Severus! No, don't antagonize them!' A female voice echoed up to the hill, reaching the ears of all the boys far before the source of the sound did their eyes.
A young teen with long red hair pulled back into a ponytail was running up the hill, robes billowing behind her slim form.
James nearly dropped his wand.
Do
you need anybody?
I need somebody to love.
Could it be
anybody?
I want somebody to love.
Lily Evans' green eyes flashed angrily at the four marauders.
'You jerks!' She spat, approaching Snape's side.
James shoved his wand into his back pocket. Remus eagerly did the same, but Sirius gave the same pause his wolfy friend had when they drew their wands in the first place. Peter mimicked his friend's act.
'And you! You should know better than to give them a reason…' Lily turned on Severus, but her voice trailed off and she sighed helplessly.
'It doesn't matter. Nothing I say will keep you guys from bickering like children.' She spat, crossing her arms. 'I guess my only option is to keep you away from them.'
Her delicate hand launched out and snatched Snape's wrist, wrenching him to his feet. He hurriedly bent over and scooped up his book and bag.
'Let's go, Severus.' Lily said in a haughty tone, adjusting his silver and green stripped tie, then fixing her own orange and red tie, and dragging her friend along by his arm. Severus of course, followed, as it seemed he had no other alternative.
The four marauders watched them go.
'Bah, she's always ruining our fun!' Sirius growled, kicking the grass a few times, then pushing his long hair out of his face.
'Why does she bother with him, anyway?' Peter put in.
James' eyes never left her, during the whole encounter, and still they never left her retreating figure.
'W-wait! Lily! Hold on a second!' He yelled, taking off after the red headed Gryffindor girl and the greasy haired Slytherin boy.
'James? James? Where the hell are you going?' Sirius yelled, but made no move to follow.
'What do you want?' Miss Evans demanded as she spun on her heels, hair flipping out behind her as she did so.
'L-listen, I-'
'Are you going to apologize to Severus?' Lily asked, her eyes hard as she glared holes into James' head.
'Huh? N-no!' The boy said, shocked. Him? Apologize? To Severus? Ha! The idea was laughable!
'Then I have no desire to speak with you. Good day, sir.' She whipped around again, Snape at her heels.
James just stood there, in shock. A girl. A girl had just refused to talk to him. Refused to talk to James Potter. Was she mad? Any other girl would die to talk one on one to him…he just didn't understand…
Would
you believe in a love at first sight?
Yes I'm certain that it
happens all the time.
What do you see when you turn out the
light?
I can't tell you, but I know it's mine.
Oh I get by with
a little help from my friends,
Mmm I get high with a little help
from my friends,
Oh I'm gonna try with a little help from my
friends.
'Really Prongs, it's no big deal! She's just a girl, there are plenty others…' Sirius, as well as Remus and Peter, were standing next to the couch James was pouting on in the Gryffindor common room.
'Just a girl? Just a girl?!' James nearly yelled.
'Whoa, easy tiger…' Sirius took a step back. He himself had quite a temper. When he was pissed, the whole bloody world knew. And only his best friend James had a temper that even closely rivaled his.
James shot up from the couch, swinging his arms around wildly.
'I don't get it! I simply don't bloody get it!' He growled.
'Wouldn't any girl, especially in my own house just die to have a piece of this?' He cried out, turning quite a few heads.
'Yeah James, sure, just tone it down a bit…' Peter whispered, not liking the glances they four were receiving from others in the common room.
James however, seemed not to hear his friend, as he continued ranting and raving.
'I mean, how dare she, doesn't she know what she could have? Doesn't she know what I could do for her? Doesn't she know-'
'Perhaps she thinks you're too arrogant.' Lupin interrupted, his expression mildly emotionless.
'What?' James turned to face his friend, eyes ablaze. 'What do you mean 'arrogant'?' He hissed.
'Hey, it's not like he was inferring that you are arrogant, he was just-' Peter attempted to mediate the situation, but Remus was already moving on.
'You know, arrogance. an attitude of superiority manifested in an overbearing manner or-'
'I know what arrogance means, Remus!' James said his friends name with venom dripping from his voice.
'I was just saying. Think about how you must look when you're bullying her friend.' Lupin pointed out with a careless shrug.
Potter gained an expression of dawning understanding, then overwhelming dejection as he sunk back down onto the couch.
'Listen mate, like I said before, she's just one girl. There are plenty fish in the sea, if you catch my drift.' Sirius said, sitting down next to his friend and nudging him gently in the ribs with his elbow.
'No Sirius, she's not just one girl. She's the girl, I know it! When I look in her eyes, when I hear her voice, when she flips her beautiful hair…' Potter's voice trailed off, and his head sunk.
'I don't know what it is Padfoot, but I just get this feeling, and I see her as the one for me, not just another snog.' James added, his voice forlorn.
'That my friend, is little thing called love.' Remus said, patting his friend's shoulder.
'Love? But…but…I thought you had to know someone for years before you…ya know, fall in love…' Peter said, looking aghast.
Lupin just smiled as all three of his friends looked up at him for some sort of explanation and amusement twinkled in his eyes.
'Don't you guys believe in 'love at first sight'?' He asked, smirking.
Do
you need anybody?
I need someone to love.
Could it be
anybody?
I want somebody to love
Oh...
After staying up most the night trying to help James figure out ways he could get Lily to go out with him, morning came all to soon for the four Gryffindor boys. Well, at least for three of them. The over-efficient Remus Lupin was already awake and getting ready for the day, knowing that he'd better wake his fellow marauders up now so that they'd have time for breakfast.
'I doubt shaking them will work. These three are bloody logs…' Moony muttered to himself, and after hanging his tie around his neck, he whipped out his wand.
'Wingardium leviosa.' He chanted, and one by one lifted his friends' mattresses off of the frame, and flipped the sleeping boys off of their comfy beds.
Each one groaned, rubbing heads, knees, elbows, or whatever else they'd landed on as they sat up, wondering what was in the pumpkin juice last night to cause them to sleep on the floor.
'Good morning Marauders!' Remus greeted cheerfully, tucking his wand away.
'I suggest you hurry up and get dressed if you enjoy eating breakfast.' He said, grinning, before returning to the bathroom to comb his hair.
James groaned as he stood up, stretching slightly as he did so.
'How the hell is that kid so…awake in the morning?' He asked Sirius, who shrugged and yawned.
Peter stood up and bustled about getting his clothes and such. He'd been awake since Remus got up, but didn't feel like being teased by Padfoot or Prongs for being 'excited for class' or something, so he was waiting in bed, wide awake, simply waiting for one or both of his other two friends to get up. Even if that meant getting up late.
Potter, Black, and Pettigrew hurriedly dressed and readied themselves for the day, feeling absolutely famished.
'It's about time you guys were ready, let's go!' Remus smiled. He'd been waiting in the common room.
'What would we do without you, Moony?' Sirius asked, grinning.
'Well Padfoot, we certainly wouldn't be eating breakfast.' James responded, giving Remus a nuggie.
'We'd definitely get more sleep, Prongs!' Peter added, smirking slightly.
'I'm certain that if you three slept in until you wanted, you'd be missing Slughorn's class too, Wormtail.' Remus said as he adjusted the hair James had so nicely mussed.
All four friends burst out laughing as together they made their way to the Great Hall, joking around, pushing each other, and laughing the whole way. Deep down, they all knew they'd be nowhere without each other. They'd be nowhere without their friends.
I
get by with a little help from my friends,
I'm gonna try with a
little help from my friends,
I get high with a little help from my
friends
Yes I get by with a little help from my friends,
with a
little help from my friends.
