The Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition - Season 4, Round 11 - I Open at the Close
Team: Pride of Portree
Position: Chaser 3
Individual Task: Magical Object – Two-way Mirror
Optional Prompts:
1. (dialogue) "I'm bored. Play with me!"
5. (word) coffee
8. (word) bounce
Wordcount: 988
Enthusiasm and Frustration
James Potter was enjoying a very good night's sleep, the kind that was fully equipped with a wonderful dream about the lovely, yet fierce, Lily Evans. They were both standing in the middle of the pumpkin patch on the Hogwarts grounds, the girl's hair shining bright like a fire in the sunshine as she accepted a flower from him – he didn't know, or care, what kind if flower it was, but at least it contained every colour of the rainbow – the ultimate token of his affections.
At that very moment, the vision started to fade away from his sight, only to be replaced by an annoying whisper from the waking world.
"Psst, Prongs!" an insistent voice broke through the haze of his sleepy mind. "Are you there? You awake?"
The formerly sleeping young man groaned in frustration at being so rudely awoken, and dragged from such an unusually lovely, dream by a disembodied voice, coming from the direction of his bedside table.
"Prongs, come on, I can hear you!" the voice continued without a care for the boy's unwillingness to return to wakefulness.
James stretched out an arm towards the persistent noise, grabbing the two-way mirror that was laying/lying on the antique bedside table, looking so deceptively innocent, more to make to noises/voice stop than from any desire to start up a conversation.
"What do you want?" he asked, forcing out the sentence without bothering to open his eyes. To be honest, he was not sure he would have been able to open them, even if he'd wanted to.
"I'm bored. Play with me!"
James finally opened his eyes, to be met with the sight of his best mate practically bouncing in his seat on the other end/side of the mirror, his expression alternating between a pout – with the human equivalent of his puppy-dog eyes – and a wide, maniacal sort of grin.
"Seriously, Sirius, how many cups of coffee have you had this morning?", he asked incredulously, stunned that anyone could be so awake and full of energy early in the morning.
One of the gang's official Marauder rules were that none of them were allowed to ever use the word "serious", nor any variation of it, without having it involve Sirius in some way or other, a rule that was so ingrained in every one of them, that it was automatic by now.
"Don't know," he other boy replied with a shrug of indifference. "Lost count after I spelled the cup to automatically refill itself."
Ever since Evans had introduced their whole class to the drink halfway through their fifth year at Hogwarts, Sirius had sworn by the stuff. Her intention had surely been to help her fellow students keep awake and alert during their intense studying for the O.W.L.s that were looming towards the end of the school year, but the Marauders had seen the merit in using the liquid to aid them in their pranks instead.
James had briefly – very briefly – toyed with the idea of thanking the girl for giving them such an excellent tool to assist them in their mischief making, but, in the end, he had decided against it. He didn't particularly want to be the one to cause the girl to violate her strict none-violence policy. Plus he was pretty sure she was the type of person to go for the face, and he didn't really feel like having to make up some grand story about how he got a black eye. Or a broken nose, for that matter. It would naturally have been an epic tale, though, about this huge bloke he'd been fighting over the Easter holidays, and how the other guy had to spend a week at St. Mungo's afterwards.
"And when was that?"
"An hour ago, maybe two?"
"What are you even doing up at -" he paused for a moment to check the time, then let out a groan of complaint. "- seven o'clock in the morning? It's way too early to be awake, it's only been a few hours since I went to sleep!"
"Oh, I haven't gone to bed yet," Sirius stated simply, taking another sip of the steaming hot beverage from the cup that was perpetually filled to the very brim. Apparently he'd put a spell to prevent spilling on it as well, seeing as not a drop left it's container - unless it was to enter the boy's own mouth – no matter how much he was fidgeting in his seat.
James waited in complete silence for several long seconds for the boy on the other side of the mirror to elaborate on his words, but no further explanation seemed to be forthcoming.
"Okay, I'll bite. Why are you still up?"
"Glad you asked! I'm conducting a very important scientific experiment, that will be certain to blow the minds of the Ministry and our community as a whole," the long-haired boy shared enthusiastically. "Exactly how long can a person stay awake? And it has to be without any help from either spell or potion. The muggle way! So that means no magic. Only coffee," the sentences kept coming faster and faster, leaving James unable to follow the meaning of the words, opting to let his head fall back and his eyes close in defeat instead. "But now that I think about it, coffee is kind of magical. Are you absolutely sure it's a muggle invention? I swear, a witch or wizard has to have had a hand in the process here. So, anyway, I've been staying up all night in the name of science, but then I got bored. Just the 'staying awake' part isn't particularly exciting in itself."
Only silence followed when Sirius took a break in his monologue to catch his breath.
"James? Are you listening to me?" he wondered aloud, surprised that his friend wasn't as enthusiastic as his about the subject.
"James...?"