James sprinted the whole way back to his dormitory, mind and heart racing.
When he got there, clutching a stitch in his chest and gasping, he was hoping it would be empty so he would have time to collect his thoughts. Instead, he was met with Sirius yelping, "What the hell happened?"
"She laughed," he said, as though that explained everything, and to him, it did.
That one laugh had reignited a fire that he had considered extinguished for months, and now he needed to put out the flames once more or else they would take over like they had before.
Despite all of the firewhiskey, the girls he'd kissed, and the dozens of times he'd assured himself there was nothing there, he still fancied Lily.
"Er, what did she laugh about, exactly?" Peter asked, unsure of why laughter was such an awful thing. Then his eyes widened. "Did you do something idiotic and now you regret it?" There was an implied again hanging in the air.
"No! I mean, not exactly. You remember when I couldn't perform a basic Color Change Charm?"
"Are you referring to just last week?" Sirius joked. Peter shot him a look, which he ignored, as he often did.
James pretended Sirius hadn't spoken. This was usually the best tactic. "And I had to go to Flitwick for help and I—"
"Tried to kill the poor old man," Peter suggested, unable to help himself.
"An event that will forever live in infamy," said Sirius, grinning brightly.
"You're the worst," he complained. "Both of you. It's a shame Moony has to be ill. He'd have something useful to say."
"Sorry," they said with equal insincerity.
"I told her that memorable story and she laughed."
"How dare she!" Sirius exclaimed, putting a hand over his heart and affecting a look of shocked horror.
"Merlin, how should we punish her? Public hexing almost seems too kind!"
"It really does," Sirius said. "Are there any rules against burning witches at the stake on school grounds?
"I hate you," James grumbled. "I wish I'd been sorted into Hufflepuff. I'm sure I'd have better friends there."
"But you'd miss out on all the fun!"
"Forget it. I'll just wait for Dorian to get in. Maybe he'll listen to me."
Dorian Gray harbored more resentment for his parents than the average sixteen year old should.
For starters, they named him after an Oscar Wilde character. What sensible adult would even let that idea cross their mind during the baby name brainstorming sessions? His Muggle-born mother had loved the book growing up and after marrying Charles Gray, she thought it would be the perfect opportunity to pay homage to her favorite story; his father couldn't come up with anything better to name him, so it was decided early on that he would be Dorian Gray.
They were always going through rough patches over one thing or another, and never did anything to ease the problems. Charles had been a Slytherin, while Iris was a Ravenclaw, and their fights often centered around who was cleverer. Pathetic, really. It made him all the more glad he'd been sorted into Gryffindor, if only because it meant neither of his parents could use him in an argument.
And lastly, because he couldn't stress it enough, they named him after an Oscar Wilde character.
He was writing the final sentence of what was surely the best History of Magic essay he'd ever written when a frazzled redhead burst into the Common Room. "Has anyone seen Potter?"
"He's upstairs," Dorian said.
She gave him the look he had grown used to getting from his fellow Gryffindors. The look that said I think I recognize you from somewhere. "He left his wand in the library." She twirled it between her fingers, not liking the way it felt. It was so different from her own.
"I could take it to him," he volunteered, preparing himself for the inevitable question.
"Er, sorry, who are you, exactly?" Lily asked.
He laughed, because it was the only sensible reaction. His first couple of years, he'd gotten upset whenever somebody asked. But now he just brushed it off. It wasn't their fault; his roommates were so infamous throughout the school that it wasn't surprising that nobody really knew who he was. "I'm Dorian." She still had a blank look. "Sixth year Gryffindor," he added.
"Really?" She tried to place him, convinced she had only seen him in passing. Then it dawned on her: "You're the one who—"
"Got into the Devil's Snare," he finished. Once people realized who he was, that was the one event they could always tie to him. During his first year, he'd tripped in one of the greenhouses and was at first thankful that a plant had been there to break his fall. That was, until he discovered what the plant was. And even though it happened five years ago, that was the only thing anyone really knew about him.
"Sorry," she said. "I guess I knew there was a fifth one up there, since there's five beds." She only knew how many beds there were from studying in there with Remus once before the noise from the others became unbearable. "I just never really considered who it was." As soon as she said it, she realized that it wasn't helping the fact that she didn't know somebody she'd been going to school with for years. She opened her mouth to apologize again, but Dorian stopped her.
"Don't. Trust me, I know better than anyone how much attention those four require. There's hardly any energy left to figure out who the poor soul is that has to share a room with them. Besides, we've only got one class together anymore and you're usually showing off or scowling at James, so it's no wonder you haven't seen me."
Well, they definitely didn't have Transfiguration together, she thought bitterly. "Charms?"
"Yep!" He saw that she still looked guilty. "Seriously, don't feel bad about it. I'm never around Gryffindor anyway. I spend most of my time with the Ravenclaws."
"If you say so. So you'll take him his wand?"
Peter and Sirius were still having fun at James's expense, something they'd been enjoying for about fifteen minutes. He was considering which hex to use, or whether he could hold out until Remus recovered and he had somebody he could talk to about serious matters, when the door mercifully opened.
"Just the bloke I was looking for!" James crowed. "Have a seat!"
"I'm just here delivering your wand," Dorian explained. "Lily brought it by. Said something about you leaving it in the library."
"I knew I was forgetting something," he mumbled.
"James," Sirius began solemnly. "I tell you this all the time and I'm sure you're tired of hearing it, but you're an idiot."
"Dorian, my friends are horrible."
"We tend to surround ourselves with likeminded people," he said before he could stop himself.
James grinned. "I like this one," he said, as though they had just met and had not, in fact, shared a room since the age of eleven. "You should hang around more often."
"Look, I appreciate the effort to be more inclusive, and I'm sure you feel very off-balance because Lupin is sick again, but I can't fill in for him." There was a reason the five of them interacted infrequently, and things were meant to stay that way. Dorian identified with people from other houses, and he wondered all the time why he was in Gryffindor. Even Slytherin seemed like a better fit for him. The Marauders didn't need to try to force a friendship that none of them wanted. So without another word, he was gone, shutting the door quietly behind him.
"See," Peter said, gesturing towards the door. "Not even he wants to listen to you!"
Even James had to laugh at that. "Merlin, I really am pathetic."
"You are," Sirius assured him. "But in Moony's untimely absence, if you need to talk about it, Peter is always here to listen."
"Hey! Don't drag me into this!" Peter protested.
"Just forget it. It'll pass, won't it?" He was trying to convince himself and really needed their reassurance.
"I wouldn't count on it, Prongs. Personally, I never thought you were over her in the first place."
Peter nodded in agreement and James sighed. "Now you're willing to give advice?"
"And then he just ran off!"
"Well then," Marlene said with mock seriousness. "That settles it."
"He's completely mad, that one. You'd better watch out," Rebecca warned.
"Lily, I think you're getting yourself worked up over nothing. He probably remembered he had to do something and left without giving you a reason. He's not known for being tactful," Mary reminded her.
"But don't you think it's a little odd?" Lily pressed, just wanting one of her friends to agree with her. "Potter just shows up and offers to help, even though we've hardly said a word to each other since, well, since— Oh, you know." It was still a fresh enough wound that none of them referenced it specifically. "So he helps me out and fixes my eyebrows on the condition that I help him in Charms—not something inane like going to Hogsmeade with him, but an actual request. And then just when I think things are going well and maybe he's not so horrible after all, he runs away."
"It is a little odd," Rebecca conceded. "But think who we're talking about. Is there really a normal behavior for Potter?"
"Yes! Normal would be if he'd come to tell me that Remus was sick—which is weird in and of itself. That boy falls ill more than anybody I know—and then laughed at my eyebrow mishap for a good ten or fifteen minutes before offering to fix them for me if and only if I say I'll go out with him."
"What I think is strange is how much you care," said Mary.
"I don't care!" Lily exclaimed, too quickly and too defensively. "I don't care that much," she amended. "But c'mon, if you suddenly got the best help at your worst subject and then, just as suddenly, they were gone, you'd wonder what happened too."
"Why don't you just ask him?" Marlene suggested.
"Because we don't talk! I think the only time I've spoken to him since the incident was to give him and Sirius detention a couple weeks ago. We can't go from never interacting to him being nice to me to him up and leaving without a word, all in the same night!" Why didn't they see how out of character it was?
"You're not even focusing on the real issue. I'm concerned about what's wrong with Remus," Rebecca said, hoping for a change of topic. Whenever Lily got in one of her intense moods, it was easy enough to get her going off on tangents, and she'd been rambling on about James for a dreadfully long time.
"You know, you're right." Whatever mysterious illness was plaguing him, it had to be serious. Most magical ailments had cures of some sort, so what could possibly keep coming back? "Okay, let's put the Potter issue aside for a while and investigate."
Mary shook her head but smiled. Lily wasn't herself if she wasn't poking around in somebody's business, usually because she thought it was for their own good, and also because it provided her with a distraction from whatever was bothering her at the moment. It was because of this that she pulled a large volume out from under her bed. "Magical Maladies of the Twentieth Century!" she said excitedly, offering it to Lily.
"Why do you even have that?" Marlene asked, snickering.
"Light reading," she snipped. She wanted to be a Healer one day and was trying to get a head start by reading through several books on the subject.
Lily clapped her hands together, glad to have a new project. "Let's get to it, then!"
