My first multi-chapter Harry Potter story. I hope you all enjoy it!
Chapter one
"Look at this mess." Hermione groaned as she picked up a stack of old yellowed papers and threw them back down on the floor, creating an explosion of dust. She covered her mouth and nose as it rose up, almost engulfing the three teens.
"I don't see why we have to clean this up, it's not like it's our crap," 15 year-old Ron Weasly mumbled as he sifted through some old books, throwing each one he found into a pile in a corner of the old, dusty library.
"Let's just get this over with, the sooner the better." Harry complained as he too, covered his nose and mouth while he picked up moldy looking things.
After what seemed like an eternity of sifting through books, papers, old dish rags, and the like, the three friends came upon a pile of pictures. It came up to Harry's knee, and they all looked like old, Black family portraits, they sorted through them anyways. Throwing out the ones that they knew Sirius wouldn't want, and keeping ones that he might want just in case.
"How many pictures can one person have?" Ron asked sorting the pictures into two piles.
Hermione sighed, "I don't know, just hurry up. I have a lot of homework that I have to finish before we go back to school."
Harry picked up one of the pictures that had fallen off of the top of the pile. There were letters written on the back. RRLJRS. Confused, Harry flipped over the picture. He was surprised to see who was on the front. There were two girls he didn't recognize, but the other four he knew to be Sirius, Remus, his mother, and his father.
"Do any of you recognize these people?" Harry asked turning the picture over, after one long, final look.
Hermione reached out and took the picture from Harry, first reading the back and then looking at the people on the front, like Harry had just done. Her brow furrowed in a confused look as she tried to recognize the people that she didn't know.
"It's Sirius, Remus, and your parents. I don't know who the other two are though," Hermione sighed apologetically, "Sorry Harry," she passed it to Ron then.
"I don't know either." Ron shrugged.
"You know, Sirius is in it. So is Remus, maybe they know," Hermione suggested, "Plus, we could use a break from cleaning."
"For once, I agree full-heartedly with you Hermione." Ron said brushing dust off of his pants and following Harry and Hermione out of the room and down the stairs into the kitchen where everyone was gathered for lunch.
Harry lingered in the doorway, Ron and Hermione standing awkwardly behind him. Sirius looked up and smiled at the three teens, "What can I do you for today?" Sirius asked jokingly.
"We've got buttered muffins!" Fred and George shouted at the same time.
"Fred! George! Sit down and eat your lunches right now!" Molly Weasly yelled pointing a wooden ladle at the two teenaged boys.
Harry approached Sirius nervously, as did Hermione and Ron. When he saw how edgy the three of them were he raised his eyebrows in confusion, "What's wrong with the three of you?"
"W-we found this in the library when we were cleaning, and we were curious." Harry said passing the picture over to Sirius.
Sirius took it and looked at it for a second before laughing, "Molly, look at this!" he said joyously, passing the picture over to her. Molly looked it over for a second before clasping a hand over her mouth and gasping in surprise.
"Where did you three get this?" Molly asked turning to look at the teenagers.
"We were just cleaning up like you told us too!" Ron exclaimed, like he had been caught doing something he shouldn't have been.
"Oh!" Molly kept her hand over her mouth as her eyes watered, "I remember this! I took this picture!"
"That you did Molly; it was the day after James and Lily's wedding…" As Sirius said this he got a distant look on his face.
"So…" Harry started, "Who are the other two girls?"
Sirius sighed and as he stood up, he took the picture from Molly and motioned for the kids to follow him. Instead of just the three teens, Fred and George followed too. They ended up in the sitting , and locking the door behind him, Sirius sat in one of the arm chairs. Still sighing, he ran a hand through his long hair and then passed the picture to Harry.
"The two girls in that picture…well I suppose they weren't girls since we were all nineteen at the time, but the two girls in that picture, they were our best friends. Remus, James, and I were best friends of course. Lily was best friends with these two girls. Ruby Taylor, and… and Reed Elliot."
"So, where are they now?" George asked, "Why aren't they here, in the order?"
Sirius laughed, "Ah. They would be. They would have thought that this was the most perfect thing in the world. They would have also thought it ironic that we had the base here at my old home."
"So, if they're not in the order…then… please tell me they aren't on Voldemort's side!" Hermione nearly yelled.
Sirius laughed at this too, "No, definitely not. Those two were the most honest and all around wonderful people I knew besides James, Remus, and Lily," Sirius paused again, "…No, the reason they're not here now is because they're dead."
"How long ago was it when they…passed away?"
"They were both killed only hours after this picture was taken…" Harry now knew why Sirius had gotten that faraway look when Molly had talked about the picture.
"H-How did they die?" Fred asked.
"Fred!" Hermione yelled.
"No, it's okay. Well, I would tell you, but it's a long story…" Sirius said.
"We have time to listen." Harry said intent on hearing the story.
Sirius laughed, "Well, I guess you do. It all started falling into place, I guess you could say, our fifth year at Hogwarts. We were at Hogsmead when it all started. God, we were all so happy, and we thought we knew everything…"
1975- 5th year students.
"Lily! Hurry, we're getting wet!" A girl with shoulder length curly hair and bright blue eyes yelled, giggling, waving her umbrella around.
"I'm coming!" Redheaded Lily Evans yelled as she too, giggled as the wind whipped her coat around her legs.
"God, Hogsmead is so rainy today." Reed Elliot, the curly headed blond laughed as they walked into the small café.
"Where's Ruby?" Lily asked as she shrugged off her coat and hung it on the coat hanger near the door.
"Hey!" The two girls turned around to see the brunette friend standing in the door, "So sorry I'm late Lily. Reed gave me the wrong time." Ruby Taylor laughed as she too hung her coat up on the hanger.
"I did not! You're just blaming your chronic lateness problem on me!" Reed laughed as the three girls walked to the back of the café where the tables were.
"Oh god, look who's here." Lily said trying to hide her face behind Reed's back.
"Yo! Evans!" James Potter yelled as he waved a hand, and ran the other through his shaggy black hair.
"Hey James!" Reed yelled, pulling Lily with her to the table.
"Hey there, little cousin." James said pulling Reed into a one-armed hug.
"Come and sit down!" James said motioning to the three open seats at the table.
Reed pranced over and took a seat between James and Remus, "Hello Reed." Remus said smiling at her, "How was your vacation?"
"It was… it was okay. Uh… how was yours?" Reed asked twitching nervously in her seat.
"About the same, nothing special."
Sirius chose that time to burst out into a booming laugh. It was obvious that Reed got nervous when she talked to Remus, and everyone knew why, except for Remus of course. Sirius motioned to a seat, as Ruby, sat next to only seat left was in between Ruby and James, which was where Lily was forced to sit.
"So Evans," James started, "What are you guys doing here?"
"I have a name you know!" Lily seethed, "And we can go anywhere we want to, thank you very much!"
"Sorry," James mumbled, which wasn't something he did often, "I was just asking."
Lily sat down in a huff, obviously not pleased with her sitting arrangements. She was even rude to the waitress when she asked her what she wanted to eat and drink. Reed sighed, and leaning across the table she took one of Lily's hands in her own and smiled.
"Calm down okay?" Reed whispered.
"I am calm." Lily growled. She sighed then, "You're right. I'm sorry."
"What's with all the whispering?" James asked.
"They were talking about how sexy I am," Sirius smiled, and wiggled his eyebrows, "Weren't you?"
"Get over yourself, please. It's not a very becoming trait." Remus said taking a sip of his water.
"Seriously, Sirius, get a life." Reed laughed.
"You know, that stupid pun of your guys' is really getting annoying, seriously." Sirius said sending everyone, even Lily into spasms of laughter.
"Ah! Looked who the snake dragged in!" James said looking up.
Lily turned her head to see who he was talking about, and froze, "Please, James not in here." She pleaded.
"Hi Severus!" Reed smiled waving. She was genuinely happy to see him, as she was with most anyone she saw.
"God," Sirius muttered, "Hi Severus!" he mimicked in a high voice, trying to make fun of Reed.
Reed turned around to glare at Sirius, "Please, be nice for once."
"Why should I?" Sirius asked, his eyebrows rose.
"Because we're in a public place!" Lily yelled.
"Because he's nice to me." Reed said.
"What exactly do you consider nice, Reed?" Remus asked trying to keep his head down.
"Well, he waves to me in the hallway." Reed said.
"Yeah, When Francesca isn't around." Ruby laughed.
"He's never made fun of me either, so don't be mean!" Reed said looking straight at James when she said it.
"Okay I promise, I won't be mean to him. I swear," James said half-heartedly, "You're lucky you're my cousin."
"If you want to know what I think," Ruby said, taking a sip of her tea, "I think he just wants to butter your muffin."
Remus chose that time to spit his water out in surprise. It went all over the place, but mostly just Reed's shirt. Remus quickly grabbed a napkin, and started trying to wipe it off, only to realize that most of it was around a place that he shouldn't be touching, especially not with James sitting there, so he apologized for that as well.
Reed laughed, taking the napkin from Remus, assuring him that she was just fine in the process, "Really, it's okay. I have a tutoring session with Sprout that I have to go to, so I'll see you guys' later okay?" Reed asked getting up.
"Please tell me you aren't failing Herbology." Lily groaned.
"No, I just need help for the final is all. You can split my food with someone else, okay?" Reed got up from the table and started towards the door, she stopped at the coat hanger before leaving.
They watched her, as she stood on her tip toes, trying to get her coat off of the hanger. Someone must have moved it to a taller peg, and being only 5' 2" Reed wasn't very tall.
"Maybe you could go be her knight in shinning armor, and get her coat for her Mooney." Sirius said waggling his eyebrows.
"I don't think I need to, someone else has it." Remus sighed.
The rest of the table turned to look at who Remus was talking about. Severus Snape was standing beside Reed, getting her coat off of the top peg for her. They could see Reed thanked him a million times over, as he even helped her into her rain coat. They started talking about something that they couldn't hear, and Reed wrote something down on a piece of paper and passed it to him with a smile.
"I told you he wanted to butter her muffin. She probably just wrote down a time for him to meet her in the library so they can get it on." Ruby said.
"That's not funny!" James yelled, as he tried not to choke on his food, it looked like Remus was doing the same, "That's it! That creep needs to leave her alone."
"James, sit down!" Lily yelled grabbing his arm.
"Not until I know what he wants from her." James said storming off.
"It can't be much; I thought he was going with Francesca." Sirius said watching James's back as he walked over to Severus.
"Aren't you going to do anything?" Lily yelled desperately.
"No," Sirius said shrugging, "You can't do anything when James is involved, it's better to just let them hit each other." Sirius took a bite out of his sandwich.
"They just pulled their wands out on each other." Ruby sighed, "And here I thought James promised Reed he would be nice. I hope she doesn't hear about this one."
"Oh god! Did you just see that!" Lily asked, as Severus flew over one of the empty tables.
"There's nothing you can do Lily, just let them battle it out. In the mean time, I'm going to leave, so I can't get in trouble for any of this." Remus said leaving money on the table and calmly exiting the café through the back door.
"I think Remus has a good idea." Ruby said, leaving money for her food, she left through the back door as well. Sirius and Lily were right behind her.
So, how did you like it? Trust me, it picks up after this chapter! Please, please, please, please Review when you're done reading, it makes my day to see reviews from you guys! And if you didn't like it, then don't tell me how much you hated it. You didn't have to read it! But Constructive critizism is welcome