A/N:
I haven't run this through a BETA yet, so I apologize for any mistakes that I made. They were unintentional.
Thanks to Sirius' Sweetheart for pointing out one of my goofs. :)
The Marauders Go To Costco
It was a lovely day in March in Britain. And even more lovely now that Dumbledore had "suddenly" decided that the seventh years could all have Spring Break and get a week for vacation.
To the girls it meant going to the beach and wearing their bikinis (although the author has conveniently forgotten how cold it gets in Britain) and to the boys it meant going to the beach and drooling over the girls (and their bikinis).
Well…to most of the boys anyway.
Four of them had other plans. Actually, the correct term would be, three of them had other plans, but the fourth was taking a bit of time.
"We can go to the beach any old time, Padfoot," a tall boy with jet black hair and glasses said, lounging on his bed in the boys dormitory.
"But Prongs!" whined the boy he was talking to, draped dramatically over his own bed, his long hair hanging in his eyes.
"Besides, Sirius…the water is freezing this time of year, and when you add in the windchill factor...cold!" said another boy, with a reasonably decent haircut, who had not forgotten that Britain is cold in March, and that it is unlikely for anyone to be lounging out on the sand.
"Shut up Moony." Sirius said. The boy he called Moony (also known as Remus Lupin) shrugged, and packed a stack of books into his trunk.
"It's decided then. I'll ask my parents if we can stay in our summer cottage." Prongs (or James Potter) said.
Sirius grumbled, but reluctantly agreed. And Peter Pettigrew (or Wormtail) had no say in the matter as he was currently…elsewhere. But he was always invited to go with the rest of the Mauraders. (As Sirius always said, they couldn't have the Four Musketeers with only three of them.)
James wrote to his parents and persuaded them to let the Marauders stay at their summer cottage. Well, mansion more like. And of course, since it works so well with the plot, Mr. and Mrs. Potter agreed to let four, irresponsible, accident and disaster prone, teenage boys have the run of their lovely summer home for a week, by themselves, so long as it was okay with the other boys parents.
Peter's mother had gone on (another) cruise to Paraguay, and he was unable to reach her to ask permission. They had a long, heated discussion about whether or not Paraguay was even on the coast, and whether or not one could actually go on a cruise there. Of course, the only significant detail is that Peter was, in fact, able to go.
Remus had written home, and his parents immediately replied yes. For some strange reason, but of course that is also irrelevant.
Sirius never wrote home, unless of course he felt the need to remind his house-elf Kreacher, to feed his goldfish.
"Last time he forgot, and the poor buggers went without food for three weeks." Sirius sniffed. James patted him sympathetically on the back, and refrained from reminding him that his mother had mailed him the dead fish in a plastic baggie not two days ago, which they had poured down Snivilly's back.
And again, all of that was irrelevant, for Sirius was going, whether his mum said yes or not.
The day was fine, the weather was fair (did I already say that? Oh, yes, there at the top. Oops.) and everything was…somewhat chaotic.
"MOOOOOOOOOONY!!!!!!!!!" Sirius screamed at the top of his lungs, after searching the pantry high and low for food.
"What?" Remus grumbled, dumping his duffel bag that was stuffed with books on his bed before going downstairs to see what Sirius could possibly be screaming about now.
"There isn't any food!"
"And?"
"Well…make some! You're the smart one." Sirius said this part with a grin that usually worked on his screaming fan clubs of girls.
Remus, however, was not enchanted.
"I've told you before Padfoot, you can't "make" food from magic."
"We're going to DIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!" Sirius screamed again, collapsing into a heap on the ground, sobbing. Peter entered the pantry (which was now getting slightly crowded as it was not very big.)
"What's wrong with him?" he asked, glancing at Sirius, before grabbing a small bag of opened chips. "Ooh…chips. I love—"
"GIVE IT TO ME!" Sirius flew at Peter's throat in an attempt to wrest the bag of chips from Peter.
"Ouch—Pad—can't—breathe—choke—ing!" Peter squealed/gasped.
"MINE! MY OWN! MY PRECIOUSSSSSS" Sirius yanked the chips from Peter and downed them in one crunch, and curled up in a corner, glancing furtively around as if someone would force him to regurgitate the chips at any second. Peter had promptly passed out, from lack of oxygen, and because it is necessary for plot reasons, he'll stay like that for a while.
James had appeared, looked causally around, and suggested they go shopping for food.
"You can do that?" Sirius sprung from the floor, stepping on Peter's foot, but since he was out cold, it didn't really matter.
They left the house (leaving Peter unconscious on the floor) and decided to drive the only car that was in the garage to the closest place to buy food.
The car, it turned out, was a tiny "smart car". It just happened to seat two people. And it was hot pink.
"Dumb car, more like." Sirius muttered, squished between James and Remus.
"Make it bigger!" Sirius complained, as he sat with Remus on the passenger seat.
"Change the color," Remus murmured darkly as two guys in a very macho jeep laughed loudly at them at the stoplight.
James ran every red light from there on, and when he finally pulled into the lot of a large warehouse, Remus was green, and Sirius looked as if he had just gotten off the world's fastest roller coaster for the twenty-sixth time.
"Woah." Remus muttered.
"How the bloody hell are we going to find a parking space?" groaned James. Sirius was unconcerned with their predicament, as he had just discovered that the car had a moon roof.
"Hi!" he called, standing up in the car and waving happily to whoever would look at him.
Remus was not pleased, as Sirius's foot was in a place that was rather uncomfortable.
"Ha!" James whipped the car around in the middle of the isle, and ignoring a lady in a brown minivan who was patiently waiting with her turn signal, pulling into a spot just as a red truck pulled out.
"Yee-haw!" Sirius screamed, as the car did a complete 300 degree turn in two seconds, causing the lady in the minivan to give James the finger before driving off. Remus extracted himself from the car, moaning about whiplash and nutters and something else that James quite didn't hear. They locked up the car, and hurried to the entrance.
Sirius immediately grabbed a shopping cart and looked at it, quite entranced, as he flipped the baby seat part of it up and down with a very puzzled look.
James was trying to talk the security guard at the entrance to let them in, claiming that he had lost his Costco ID inside.
Sirius was now screaming as he flew back and forth in front of the store, nearly crashing into a little girl sucking a lollipop. He managed to stop in time and just hit her grandma instead.
"My apologies!" Sirius called over his shoulder, hopping back onto the cart and screaming as he went back the way that he came.
"Is he with you?" the Security Guard asked, and both James and Remus turned around in time to see Sirius crashing into a large group of nuns, screaming something about muggles who dressed like heathens of old.
"No." James and Remus replied at the same time. Sirius had abandoned the shopping cart (which drifted lazily out onto the nearby highway, causing a major pileup) and proceeded to help the nuns to their feet.
The Security Guard abandoned his post, and proceeded to make his way over to Sirius. Remus and James looked at each other, grabbed a cart, and slipped inside. Sirius evaded the guard in all of the bedlam, and popped up at Remus's elbow, causing the latter to shriek like a girl and knock over a pile of boxes.
"Let's split up." Remus suggested, throwing Sirius a dirty look, "And meet back by the checkout stand when you're done. Here," he added, handing them a list that he had written before they left, but the author had considered it an insignificant detail at the time, and therefore is putting it in now.
Sirius grabbed the shopping cart and began flipping the seat up and down rapidly as James led him throughout the store. It made a rusty screeching noise, like the time when they had charmed the blackboard in Binn's room to make sounds as if nails were running long scratches down it every time he wrote on it.
"Shut it!" James snapped, after the third isle of the creaky racket, pushing Sirius sideways and causing the cart to slam into a large, perfectly stacked pile of canned corn.
Sirius stopped, but snatched the list out of James hands.
"Okay…we need apples, bread, eggs, mushrooms, oranges, pickles, shrimp…what are we buying all this stuff for? I'm allergic to shrimp, anyhow." Sirius said, wrinkling his nose.
"Hey it's in alphabetic order!" James noted, peering over his shoulder. Sirius huffed wearily.
"No, it's not. "o" comes before "p", remember?"
James gave him a funny look, but ignored his comment.
"Essentials first…" James decided, and grabbed seven boxes of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese ™ off a shelf.
They passed along several of the isles, taking whatever they decided were "essential."
The cart was loaded to the brim with six boxes of Lucky Charms (for Sirius), four boxes of Fruit Loops (for Remus), five boxes of Cheerios (for James), and eight boxes of Raisin Nut Bran (for Peter). They also had twenty-four boxes of pop-tarts, three supersized bags of Cool Ranch Doritos, a sixty-four pack of Top Ramen, three packages of Beef Jerky, four packages of Turkey Jerky, a box of energy bars, trail mix, fifteen bags of Twinkies, a copious amount of Ding-Dongs, Oreos, Cheetos, fourteen boxes of apple fruit juice, three six-packs each of various sodas (Root Beer, Pepsi, Coke, Cherry Coke, Mountain Dew, Mr. Pibbs, and Dr. Pepper).
"What?" James asked defensively as a young girl ogled their cart. "We're growing boys."
"Now we have to get some of the boring stuff that Moony wanted I suppose…" Sirius began, as they made their way out of the junk food section.
"Hey Padfoot…they've got a frozen food section!" James said. The two looked at each other.
"We're going to need another cart," they said simultaneously. Sirius spotted a relatively empty looking cart sitting by itself at the end of an isle. Well, if you can call a cart loaded with a good month's worth of groceries and a someone's two year old toddler relatively empty. Sirius could, and had no problem relieving the cart of it's burden. A poor middle aged woman found her screaming little boy mounted on a pile of flour, bread, eggs, and salad not one minute later. James and Sirius were already in the frozen food section, pulling out boxes of popsicles, ice cream, and other frozen treats.
"You can freeze anything!" Sirius squealed, taking three of every type of TV dinner and frozen pizza that existed. At the end of the isle was an old lady wearing a hairnet, thick glasses, and plastic gloves standing over a tiny table cutting minature corn dogs into halves, and placing them in little Dixie cups on a teal green tray.
"What are you doing?" Sirius asked, putting one hand on his hip, and staring her down.
"Would you like to try one?" the lady asked, offering the tray. He took five, and threw them into his mouth in quick succession.
"Not bad." he decided, and reached for another, but the lady just frowned, and swatted him away.
"If you want more, you can buy some." she said, her mouth bunched in a puckered line, and her eyebrows meeting in the middle.
"Fine." Sirius said. "And you look like a pickle!" he called over his shoulder.
James had wandered in the produce section and was trying to figure out which ones were oranges and which were apples.
He decided to just pick two random fruits. (Which turned out to be watermelon and papayas…but it was a mistake anyone could make. Really.)
Sirius found him moments later, and was staring in awe at a pyramid shaped pile of apples (he could tell the difference). It was taller than him. He leaned down, and spotted one right next to his shoe that looked just perfect…
"How was I to know the entire thing would come down on me?" Sirius said huffily to James after they had been kicked out of the produce section by another hairnet lady.
"I know mate," James said sympathetically as they wound their way through the bakery section, pulling out various baked goods and piling them on their carts precariously.
They stopped and picked out a few sheet cakes. Sirius found one that said "Sorry" on it.
"I forgot to return Remus's hairbrush back in second year," he explained to James.
They wanted to go through the electronics section, and the camping section, and the sports section, and the…well, you get the idea. James suggested rather intelligently that they get in line soon, otherwise they might never get home. Sirius's stomach rumbled rather loudly, and he agreed.
Remus was already in line, with a cart full of "non-essentials." Sirius began picking through the cart, wrinkling his nose.
"Toilet paper, milk, cheese, bread, butter, jam, aspirin…come on Moony…you could at least have gotten something that we could have used."
"I'll be using it alright." Remus muttered, snatching the aspirin bottle from Sirius.
They stood in line for a good three hours (or so it felt to Remus, who had to constantly swat Sirius away from the candy bars lined up along the register).
"Card?" A sweaty looking woman in her forties asked, when they finally reached the checkout.
Sirius pulled a pokemon card that he had found on the ground and handed it to her.
"Your Costco card." the woman said impatiently.
"Uh, well, you see…" Remus began, but the woman just shook her head. "Security!" she yelled over her shoulder, and a burly man appeared out of nowhere, causing James to squeak in fright.
The three were very effectively escorted outside. Without their food.
They left very dejectedly and went back out into the parking lot.
"Great." James groaned.
"Maybe it was an accident?" Sirius shrugged.
"If someone in a brown car can back into a tiny pink Smart Car eight or nine times accidentally," Remus said sarcastically, remembering the lady in the minivan.
"You never know." Sirius shrugged. Then he brightened. "I'm driving home!"
James and Remus paled, but before they could move, Sirius had glued himself to the steering wheel.
The ride home was…painful. To say the least. Sirius had successfully broken every traffic law that had ever been written…twice.
The three of them got home, exhausted, drained, bruised, and hungry. Peter was sitting on Mrs. Potter's white couch eating a slice of greasy cheesy pizza.
"What?" he asked, as they eyed him hungrily. "You can get pizza delivered you know…"
Reviews make me very happy!
Llyr
Update: It has been brought to my intention that stores in England don't sell Lucky Charms ect. *Huff* I know that, people...it's supposed to be completely AU/ OOC...all that jazz, lol. I think I was too subtle in my hinting that it's supposed to be dumb. Technicalities...
(Costco is a big warehouse that sells items in bulk, btw. You need a Costco membership card to get in.)
Lol...sorry if I offended anyone, by the way. It was (again) unintentional.
I was walking through Costco the other day, and decided to model it after that. Anyone who lives in America and has actually been to Costco will know what I'm talking about. Especially the evil hairnet ladies.
*hides from evil hairnet ladies*