Memo: Sometimes I write really, really depressing things. This will be a multi-chaptered story.
Disclaimer: If I was JK Rowling, none of the Marauders would've died.
Their house was unlocked. The green door hung on its hinges, swaying slightly, each movement painful. Lily had insisted the door be green, had bullied Prongs into painting it such as she stood by laughing, so pregnant I hadn't known how she could even stand. Something curdled in my veins and twisted everything into tight knots. Prongs would never leave his door unlocked and open like that. Even I had to knock. He even made me answer security questions. Last time I'd shown up it had taken me ten minutes to get over the threshold.
Harry had just been born then, I understood his fear.
Walking into their house felt like the ultimate betrayal. I had done this to them. Me. Convinced them to switch, so sure in my knowledge of Pete's trustworthiness.
But they didn't have to be dead. The rumors I'd barely managed to pick up could just be rumors. After all, it was Prongs. Good ole Prongs. We'd gotten out of worse before. Hell, he'd gotten out of worse before. Twice! Besides, he had Lily. Hell have mercy on whoever crossed her.
They didn't have to be dead.
Prongs simply could not be dead.
"Prongsie?" my hoarse voice echoed through the walls of their small house. Harry stared at me from the walls, happy, chubby little Harry. My godson.
I was there, too, scattered around, moving throughout the picture. There's one of us at up in the dorms right before we all left. Me, Wormy, Prongs, Moony. We were all smiling like idiots, wide and earnest, arms thrown over each other's shoulders. Our last day as children, he'd boasted proudly, Gryffindor tie slack and slung over a shoulder. I don't know what made me rip it off the wall and shove it in my pocket, but I did. Lily could yell at me for it later, but we were so bloody happy back then. So fucking naïve and so goddamn bloody happy. So kill me, I took a photo.
"Prongs, mate, c'mon."
The house was too silent. It pressed down on me in weird places, squeezing my body until I couldn't breath, suffocating out the last fragments of hope. Someone had knocked over books. Even a hurry Lily wouldn't stand for books treated like this.
"Prongs?" If panic had edged into my voice, well, no one was around to mention it.
Desperate to clear the building I turned into the hallway that led the staircase.
James.
No.
No, not possible.
That couldn't be James, spread eagle on the floor with that vacant expression on his face.
Not Jim. Jim couldn't die. Marauders didn't die. Not like this.
Numb. I had gone numb. Not James, please, anyone but James. They couldn't take James. It was a joke. A prank. Any minute now he'd jump up and grin like always, punch me the shoulder and tease me for being such a girl. We'd pulled worse in school.
"Prongs, that's not funny." My voice didn't break on his name. It didn't. "Get up, Prongs." I aimed a kick at his side, wild and frightened. "Get up, you tosser. You're scaring me. This isn't…this isn't funny. You're not… You're not…"
James hadn't moved. Hadn't even winced at my kick, hadn't even lost his breath. His chest didn't move either. His lips didn't quirk and his eyes didn't blink and James was not moving.
Fuck.
This was worse, somehow, ten times worse than Regulus. With Regulus I could feign indifference. I never had to see his body-never got to, couldn't go the funeral. Mum probably had a nice large one, full of our shitty relatives. Reg'd loved it of course. Not like it mattered. It didn't matter that I had a head full of memories of the pair of us as kids. He'd stopped being my baby brother years ago. The day I'd left I'd given up Reg too. When Reg died I could shut myself off from his loss, pretend it hadn't happened and didn't matter. I could feign indifference to his loss hide the tears and the rage for when no one saw.
I could not hide from James. No way I could feign indifference from his body. No way I could look down at the body of this brother and say with no emotion: 'You did not matter to me. I do not care that you are dead. It's better that you're dead.' Because fuck it wasn't better. How could it be better? Everything I hadn't known I needed, Jim had given to me. Everything I thought myself lost to, he had provided. What family did I have left now?
Somehow I had sunk to the floor. My hands found Jim's face, straightening his glasses, smoothing the wrinkles on his shirt. Hazel eyes stared up at me piercing right through me but not seeing a single thing. They captured his final moments well: defiant, stubborn, angry. The look he saved for Snivellus and Death Eaters. I had never seen that look directed my way before.
"God, Jim, please, you can't leave me here. Moony's gone, Jim. I haven't seen him in weeks. I haven't seen Moony in weeks, don't you dare make me stay here. And Wormy's…" I choked.
Wormtail was the spy. Peter. Our best mate, Peter. Eager, eager Pete who tried too hard and fought so well and followed us all around like a puppy for years before he grew up. I had trusted him. We all had. Hell, I had made them switch-made them pick Pete over me. And then Pete had gone and ratted them out, got them offed. But only because I'd made it possible.
Oh Merlin, I had done this. I'd killed my best mate.
I had killed James Potter, at the very least I had as good as killed him.
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