Lily and the Black Dog
Lily always enjoyed visiting Hagrid's hut when she could, he was very kind and he always seemed to know how to make the day happier when things looked bad. Today had been especially difficult, as Professor McGonagall gave them double the amount of homework than she usually gives them, and Potter and Black single-handedly managed to spill ink all over it as they wrestled on the Common Room floor. She glared at the two prats and stormed out of the room, unsure of where to go to get some peace and quiet to rewrite her homework. Finally, she settled on visiting Hagrid, who gladly said "Make y'rself at 'ome!", and he even put on some tea and cakes for them. She got so caught up in her work that she completely lost track of the time, and after thanking Hagrid profusely, she ran out the door before he could say "No trouble 't all!"
As she made her way back to the castle, she noticed that tonight was the Full Moon, which made her think of poor Remus, who she heard howling in the distance. She quickened her pace, but then she saw something dark flung over the hill, and rolled to her feet. She gasped, for she saw a black dog that had been bitten on the leg and scratched up. It was a medium-sized black, scruffy-looking dog, which would have been rather adorable if it weren't for its beaten appearance. It was unconscious, and Lily, fearing that the werewolf she heard in the distance might find it and finish it off, wrapped her robes around the poor dog, and carried him quickly back to her dormitory.
Thankfully she wasn't caught by any professors or fellow students as she carried the dog, who now whimpered a little, into her dormitory bathroom. She pulled the robes gently off the dog, who she decided to call Snuffles for now. As he awoke, he looked curiously at her, as if to say "How did I get here? What are you doing?" She smiled tearfully at the poor thing, and said to him "You're safe now, you were hurt pretty badly, but I'm going to patch you up, okay?" He nodded slowly at her and then fearfully looked to the bathroom window at the Moon. She wondered if Snuffles really understood what she said, but put it out of her mind as she got her First Aid kit (which she reminded herself to thank her Mum for later), and got to work. She grabbed a washcloth and soaked it in warm water and soap, and gently patted it over the wounds, which made Snuffles wince and whimper faintly. She looked at him sorrowfully, and whispered "sorry," and kept cleaning the wounds. Once the blood was wiped up, she carefully disinfected the cuts with a liquid that Muggles use to prevent infections, and bandaged them. His front leg had been bitten as well, and she remembered that animals aren't affected by werewolf bites, so she repeated the steps she had taken to clean the scratches, and was soon done tending Snuffles' wounds. "There you go sweetie," she said as she smiled at him, and he wagged his tail a little. "I know you want to get back outside, but it's just not an option right now, Snuffles. You need to rest here, at least until morning, okay?" she told him, and he looked sadly out the window again, but then looked to her and nodded.
Once she finished cleaning up the bathroom, she laid the blanket from her bed on the floor for Snuffles to sit on for now, and she dug through her trunk as quietly as she could, trying not to disturb her roommates' slumber. "Aha!" she whispered to herself as she pulled out her stash of food, which she intended to share with Snuffles, who's stomach she heard growl from across the room. She smiled as she beckoned him over, and he limped to the make-shift bed and made himself as comfortable as he could. She sat on the floor next to him, and pulled out of her bag an apple, a small knife, a package of her favorite biscuits, and a box of sugar quills. She split the apple with Snuffles, cutting it into bite-size pieces for him, and gave him a few of her biscuits. She ate the other half of her apple and a few biscuits herself, she only now realized how hungry she was, and after all she had missed dinner and only had some tea and a rather hard-to-eat cake at Hagrid's. After they finished their snack, and each had a sugar quill, she told him that she'd be right back, as she went to get ready for bed.
However, Snuffles was not just a black dog: He was actually Sirius Black in his Animagi form. He stared worriedly out the window, wondering how James and Peter were doing without him to control Remus in his wolfish form in the Shrieking Shack. He was bewildered on how Lily Evans found him, and was even more so startled at how she took it upon herself to care for him, even though she probably could have just either left him there or taken him to Madame Pomfrey. Maybe Evans wasn't so bad after all, in fact, when she wasn't yelling at him, she was rather kind. Maybe there was a reason Moony and Evans are such good friends. 'But how in Merlin's name did she come up with the name "Snuffles?"' he wondered to himself.
Ten minutes later, Lily came out of the bathroom, dressed in long red pajama pants and a grey form-fitted t-shirt, and her long red hair swept up in a ponytail. As she was about to crawl into her four-poster bed, she decided to have Snuffles sleep on the bed with her, it was probably much more comfortable than a thin blanket on the cold, hard floor. She didn't want him to jump up, so she picked him up and gently placed him on the bed, and then she crawled into the crimson covers. Snuffles, who didn't seem to argue with her decision, curled up next to her feet and stared at her. Lily stared back, and noticed that his eyes looked very familiar, they were unusually silvery grey, but she put that out of her mind for now, she had too many other matters to think about. She whispered to Snuffles "You should probably get some sleep; we have to get up early and visit a friend of mine in the Hospital Wing, okay? And don't you wander off when I'm asleep!" He looked at her with his head turned to the side when she said "Hospital Wing", and he wondered if it could be…no that's ridiculous, how could she possibly know about Moony? He nodded and fell asleep as Lily set her alarm for five o' clock. "Goodnight, Snuffles" she yawned as she turned to her side and waited for sleep to come.