Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to JK Rowling, and the song belongs to Garth Brooks. It's called "A Friend to Me."
CATALYST: MEMOIRS
Well you and I
We're buddies
And we've been since we first met
Me and you
Well, we've sure been through
Our share of laughter and regret.
Lord knows we've had our bad days
And more than once we've disagreed
But you've always been
A friend to me.
You can be so stubborn
There's times I think you just like to fight
And I hope and pray
I live to see a day
When you say I might be right.
And there's times I'd rather kill you
Than listen to your honesty
But you've always been
A friend to me.
You've always been
Time and again
The one to take my hand
And show me
It's okay to be
Just the way I am
With no apology…
Oh, you've always been…
And you will 'til God knows when…
Yes, you've always been…
A friend to me…
Before
Prongs
When I was younger, whenever I tried to decide on the best day of my life, I always ended up with a tie. Was it the day I met Lily? The day I met Sirius? Maybe it was when I became an Animagus?
I thought I had found a winner once and for all the day I married Lily Evans, my high school sweetheart and the only woman I ever wanted, with Sirius Black as my best man. What could be better than having my best friend standing next to me as I started the rest of my life with the woman I loved so much it made me crazy? She had been making me crazy from the time I was thirteen, and he been making me laugh from the time I was eleven. That moment was perfect.
Then came July 31, 1980, and any other day of my life instantly didn't matter. Far and away, there was nothing more beautiful than the instant I saw my son for the first time, when my wife handed him to me for the first time, when we were all together on the first day of his life. I remember thinking that the human heart couldn't possibly hold so much emotion. I remember whispering for the first time, "Harry James Potter… I love you." I kissed his little forehead, his perfect little forehead, and I kissed Lily's lips, her perfect little lips, and said, "Lily May Evans Potter… I love you, too." We were a family and there was nothing else in the world.
However, there were other things in the world, of course, and not all of them were good. In fact, the world Harry was born into was mostly things that weren't good. In 1980, all of wizarding Europe was living in fear, particularly Britain. The greatest witches and wizards of the age were being killed by the most fearful wizard of all time—Lord Voldemort, whose name so many feared to speak.
Only one man stood against Voldemort. Albus Dumbledore was the only force more powerful than Voldemort's evil, and Dumbledore's Order of the Phoenix was the only alliance that stood any chance against Voldemort's Death Eaters. I was a member, and so was Lily, and so were our three dearest friends, my dearest friends since our days at Hogwarts: Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew, and Remus Lupin.
Sirius Black was my best friend—that was clear. He was a pure-blood from an old money family like mine, but unlike mine, his were closed-minded and thought that Muggles and Muggle-borns should be killed off. Like me, Sirius was a prankster. Unlike me, he was the epitome of that sexy rebel type that girls love: he was good-looking, popular, rich, smart and tough. He rode a flying motorcycle, he ran away from home… there were lots of things that people didn't know about him, and I'm not sure if they would have believed those things. Regardless, nobody messed with the duo of Black and Potter, the two students on top of every class who had the power to curse you into oblivion or make you a total social outcast. Or both. Severus Snape was the greasy Slytherin kid that we targeted most often, but that's another story.
Peter Pettigrew wasn't really talented or really smart. I guess he was average, but compared to the rest of us, he seemed pretty…dumb. He was the tag-along in the group, but we didn't really mind. Everyone needs an audience, and since he laughed at our jokes and everything, he was always a part of the fun. There's really not much else to say about Peter; teenagers didn't come any more typical than him. Not particularly good or bad at anything, not really handsome or really ugly, not really rich or really poor. Dead centre, that's Peter.
Remus Lupin was just as smart as Sirius and I, but his brains came through hard work instead of talent and cruising. If it sounds like I'm bragging, I'm not. I have much more respect for the way Remus did things than the way Sirius and I did. We were absolutely horrific brats, to be honest. Remus was a bookworm and a prefect, the teachers' favourite, cool by association, but he was also a werewolf. He was the last person anyone would expect to turn into a murderous monster once a month, but he did. He hated it. Well…wouldn't anyone? He hated being isolated and feared, and it made him so desperate to have friends that he never told us about his lycanthropy. I guess he was just hoping against hope that Sirius and I wouldn't be as smart as we were, because it didn't take us long at all to figure out the truth. He was worried we'd desert him, but one thing we have is loyalty. Sirius is much more loyal than he seems, and so am I. Anyway, we decided we could keep Remus company by becoming Animagi, since werewolves don't really hurt animals. So we worked out how… Okay, not Peter, really, because he wasn't that smart. We told him how. We pulled off the spell successfully, and it was from out Animagus forms that we got our nicknames.
While Sirius was the definition of the "cool guy" and Peter was the definition of the "follower," Remus was, pure and simple, a "nice guy." The nicest guy I have had the pleasure of meeting. But he would do anything to keep friends, and… That's another story, too.
Personally, I'm more like Sirius than any of the others. I was into pranks and everything, but where he had flawless good looks, I had Quidditch talent. I often laughingly suggested that if you mixed my athleticism with Sirius' looks and Remus' general goodness—not to mention the smarts we all had—you'd have any girl's idea of the perfect man.
After graduation, the good old days of the mischief, for which we were all so well-known, had to end. Life became serious, and not just because of jobs and families and the usual adult responsibilities. We joined the Order of the Phoenix, because we couldn't sit by and watch innocent people being slaughtered, but the bottom line was that we were losing the war. There weren't enough of us. Voldemort was killing us all. We had nowhere to turn; enemies were everywhere, allies were scarce. And I, Lily and Harry were at the top of the Dark Lord's hit list.
I suppose I should explain a little more. First of all, understand that Dumbledore was a dear friend of ours. Second of all, understand that Lily and I were both powerfully magical, and the odds were strong that Harry would grow up to be even more so. Both of these things made us targets for Voldemort's wrath, but there was a third factor which put us directly in the line of fire. Our baby son became Voldemort's obsession. He would stop at nothing to see Harry dead, and that meant Lily and I, too, because he could never kill our son while we yet breathed. We would protect Harry or die trying.
This third factor was a prophecy made on a rainy night in March of the year Harry was born; Dumbledore heard it. It declared that there would be born a boy with the power to defeat Voldemort. He would be born at the end of July. He would be born to parents who had three times escaped Voldemort's wrath. He would either murder Voldemort or be murdered by him. And Voldemort would mark him as his own equal. At the time this was all predicted, Lily was five months pregnant.
Dumbledore told us about the prophecy. If we had a baby boy at the end of July, he said, that child would fit the description of the one foretold… and we would have to guard him, not just because he was our son, but because on his shoulders would rest the safety of the world.
When Harry was born, it was, as I said, the most beautiful day of my life. It also became the day that Lily and I took on an even greater burden than that which we already bore. However, we weren't yet sure if Harry was indeed the one of which the prophecy spoke. Alice Longbottom had just had a son, too, with her husband Frank. They were both pure-blood wizards of a very good line, whereas Lily was a Muggle-born witch. Did this mean that Harry, as a half-blood, would not be Voldemort's target? Certainly the Dark Lord hated all those who weren't pure-blood, considering them worthless and useless. Did that mean he wouldn't consider our son to be a threat? Would he chose Harry Potter or Neville Longbottom as the one to mark as his equal, the one who could destroy him?
All this set the scene for a story. It would become a part of history, some of it. Other parts would be entirely forgotten or misconstrued or just made up. The part of the story that is now legend is the middle; few people live who know the beginning. No one lives who was there.