I woke early before my alarm the next day, and I showered and got dressed before Lily was even awake. After I was ready, I realized how early it actually was so I went down to the common room and I sat on one of the couches, trying not to fall asleep. I'm not sure how long I was actually down there because I just stared at the fire, my mind blank. I was sitting on one of the couches, hugging my legs and my chin resting on my knees. I almost nodded off, but I mostly just zoned out.

"Sky?" I heard someone say from the staircases.

I looked up and saw Remus standing in the arch by the boy's dorm.

"Hey Moony." I said, my voice a little more flat than I would have hoped.

"How did you sleep?" he asked as he moved over to the couch across from me.

"Alright when I could." I said with a sigh, looking at the fire again.

"Nightmares?" Remus asked.

I looked at him critically. "How did you know?" I asked suspiciously.

"I figured it would happen. No one expects you just to get over this like that." Remus said with a snap of his fingers.

I sighed and looked at the fire again. "Something has been bothering me." I said softly, still staring at the fire.

"I know. How did they find out about the ROR?" Remus said, almost like he was reading my mind.

I nodded slowly, hoping Remus would follow my suggestions.

"Sky, what really happened when you went looking for Peter on the train?" Remus asked, his voice almost a whisper.

"I found him in the same compartment as the people who attacked me." I said, matching his tone.

Remus sighed and I looked at him. He was looking at the fire like I had just been.

"When did you start to see something?" I asked.

Remus looked up at me, and I could see the guilt in his eyes. "Late last year. I'm a light sleeper, and I heard Peter sneaking out a lot. One night, I decided to follow him, and he met with those disgusting slimeballs. They caught me and threatened to expose my secret to the entire school if I told anyone." Remus said under his breath.

I almost couldn't hear him over the crackle of the fire, but I still did. I must have been getting some of my bird hearing. But I also heard someone coming down the boys' stairs. I looked over Remus's shoulder and he understood why I hadn't responded yet.

"Sirius and James don't need to know." I said under my breath, and Remus nodded almost imperceptibly.

I looked back to the fire as I heard the people that were coming down the stairs enter the common room. They weren't James and Sirius like I thought, but were just some random sixth years that were up really early.

"What time is it?" I asked Remus in a soft, casual voice.

He looked at his watch, and was almost shocked to see the time himself. "It's only quarter after five." He said with his eyebrows raised.

I nodded and looked back into the fire. No wonder no one was up this early; no one in their right minds would be. And that explained why Remus and I were up so early, we weren't in our right minds. I almost laughed at this thought, but I kept it in. Remus and I sat looking at the fire for a very long time. I was still hugging my legs, and resting my cheek on my knees. Remus sat with one leg tucked under him and he was leaning heavily on his arms that were cross on the arm of the couch. We didn't say anything to each other, which I enjoyed very much. I preferred the silence to talking, because I always had this feeling that when my friends were talking to me, they almost were pitying me and I didn't like that. I just wanted to forget about what happened in the ROR, but I knew that I never could. I would always have those scars on my back, and it would be a constant reminder of those events.

As Remus and I studied the fire, I could feel time slipping by, but I wasn't aware of the rate. It felt like only minutes when I heard James's and Sirius's voices coming down the boys' stairs, discussing something in hushed tones very intensely. When I heard them enter the common room, I glanced at Remus, who caught my gaze. We both looked over to where James and Sirius were, and saw that they were approaching us. Sirius plopped down on the couch next to me, and I thought he was going to put his arm around me again, but he didn't which I was secretly thankful for. James threw himself down on the couch next to Remus. He ran a hand through his hair, messing it up a little bit more than it naturally was. It was a habit I was used to, and expected out of him. Most of the time, he did it subconsciously when he was agitated or nervous. But sometimes he did it just to do it, and it used to irritate me, but I've gotten used to it.

"How long have you two been down here?" James asked softly.

Even though his voice wasn't really loud, it still was startling after the silence I had been in for so long.

"A while." I said simply, looking back to the fire.

"You worried about tonight?" Sirius asked, his voice concerned.

I had to think about when he meant for a couple seconds and then I remembered that we had Order training tonight. I had all but forgotten about it until just now. But now that Sirius brought it up, I was sort of worried about it. I didn't know what to expect and I was worried that it would put strain on my healing back and the last thing I wanted was to extend this healing process. But in response to Sirius's question, I just shrugged. He didn't say anything, which was nice. The four of us sat in silence for another minute or two, and it was a nice silence. It was just a silence that didn't need words to fill it.

But after a few more minutes, I heard rapid footsteps coming down the girls' stairs. I looked up at the arch and saw that Lily was practically running down the stairs. When she reached the bottom and saw that I was sitting on the couch with Sirius, James and Remus, I saw her visibly relax and let out a sigh of relief. I looked at her curiously, but she didn't seem to catch it. She just walked over casually and sat down between Remus and James. James's mood seemed to brighten by a thousand percent when Lily sat down, and I could see it in his face. He stretched and subtly put his arm around her shoulders. I smiled slightly to myself as she adjusted herself under his arm, getting closer to James as she did so. I saw his eyes brighten significantly, almost like he expected her to throw his arm off of her like she would have this time last year. I looked at Sirius and he had the same triumphant satisfaction in his eyes that I know I had.

"You gave me quite a shock this morning." She said after another moment of silence between the five of us.

I looked at her questioningly, waiting for her to go on.

"Usually I have to drag you out of bed kicking and screaming in the mornings. When you weren't in your bed, it sort of shocked me." Lily explained.

I nodded, realizing what she probably thought had happened. "I'll make sure to leave a note next time I wake up at five in the morning." I said with an ironic smile.

She rolled her eyes but laughed all the same.

"Should we go get breakfast?" she suggested casually.

We all agreed and stood up to go to breakfast. The boys and Lily grabbed their school bags, and it reminded me that I left mine in my room. I turned to go get it, but Lily looked at me with that mothering look she was so famous for and held out my school bag. I assumed that she had put everything in it for the classes I before break. We all walked out of the common room and down to the Great Hall together. James was walking close to Lily, but wasn't touching her. It was surprising but I let it go. Sirius was holding my hand, and I was gripping the strap of my messenger bag with the other. Remus was walking between James and Sirius, in the middle of the two couples. I almost felt bad for him, but I knew better than to push the girlfriend subject, because of his furry little problem.

We walked down to the Great Hall in silence, and when we got there, we were some of the only students in the room. It must have been early still, but there were more students trickling in behind our group, so it wasn't too early. We sat down in the middle of the Gryffindor table and started pulling food onto our plates. I picked at my food a little bit, and barely ate anything. A nervous feeling in the pit of my stomach was taking up most of the room, and I was full after only a few bites of toast.

"What's the matter, Songbird?" Sirius whispered in my ear.

I jumped a little, but looked at him all the same. He had a worried look in his eyes, and I knew that he had noticed that I wasn't eating. I shrugged again, and took another bite of toast, forcing myself to swallow. I felt like someone was staring at me, and I looked around, trying to figure out who it was. I noticed that the group of Slytherins was not at breakfast, which pleased me, but it didn't give me a whole lot of confidence. I looked around subtly again, and noticed that my feelings were not unfounded. I noticed that people from the other houses were glancing at me every once in a while, and were whispering behind hands to other people around them. I sighed and put my toast down, pulling my legs up to my chin again. It stretched the skin on my back painfully, but I pushed the pain away.

I saw Sirius looking around as well, and he noticed that people were staring and whispering as well. James noticed what Sirius was doing and then he looked around as well. His ears grew red as I saw the muscles in his jaw tighten. The people who had been glancing at me noticed that Sirius and James realized what they were doing and looked nervously down at their plates. I still had the feeling that I was being watched, but I smiled a little to myself over what Sirius and James had just done for me. I didn't even have to say what I was feeling, and they knew. It was nice to know that I had friends like that. I put my feet back on the floor, and picked up my abandoned slice of toast.

I leaned my head on Sirius's shoulder and took another bite of my toast. I could almost feel the smile on his face, even though I couldn't see it. I felt Sirius's lips brush the top of my head and plant a small kiss on my hairline, and my heart swelled a little with love. We finished breakfast in silence, realizing that we had to go to class. Almost simultaneously, we all stood up and walked out of the Great Hall together. Remus and I headed off to Arithmancy, while Sirius, James and Lily headed off to Transfiguration. I sighed a little after parting with Sirius, but Remus nudged my arm a little and held his arm out like a gentleman would to escort a lady. I laughed a little and took it as we headed off to our first lesson.

As I went through my lessons for that day, I realized how much work I had missed being absent for four days. I sighed, realizing how much work it was going to be to catch up. My first lesson alone had three long essays that I had to write and it only got worse from there. Because I had missed so much practical work in DADA, Cloud showed no mercy by assigning me two long essays to make up for the practical stuff. He knew I could do what he had been teaching, and could probably school the rest of the class in it, but he probably didn't want it to seem like I was getting special treatment because I was his sister. I figured that much out by the sympathetic look in his eyes when he assigned the essays. Slughorn was a little bit more relaxed, only giving me one relatively short essay to do on the history of a certain special ingredient, but the rest of my teachers were just terrible. Sirius informed me that they had been doing mostly practical stuff, and it was unfair what the teachers were doing to me. By the end of the day, I had about ten long essays I had to do in two weeks or less. Lily said she'd help me do some of them, but I would have to copy whatever she wrote in my own handwriting. It really didn't help because I still had to write the essay even if I didn't have to do the thinking involved with creating it.