"Yeah," James agreed with a slight grin. "One of us could be Minister if we play our cards right!"

"Or famous!" Sirius shouted.

"Or a teacher!" Remus jumped in.

His two friends froze with disgusted looks on their faces. "Honestly Moony, I will never understand why you insist on wanting such a profession," Sirius muttered.

"Yeah, nothing but paperwork and listening to kids complain all day," James agreed.

"Unless he got cool students like us!" Sirius amended, with a touch of excitement. "Then they could help make life entertaining."

Remus paled slightly at the prospect of teaching children like the Marauders. He had firsthand experience what kind of disaster that could be. Harry said nothing; he was merely watching this family with rapt attention. The first chapter had struck a hard cord inside him, as he realized he would grow up away from these people. Did he want his memories back if his own parents weren't going to be in them? He never found a chance to raise these questions however, since his mother had decided to ignore the others and start reading.

"Really?" Lily asked curiously.

"I do hope that means that we finally got through to Dumbledore," Sirius said with a straight face, "and that Harry's living with us now," and he gestured towards Remus, who was shaking his head sadly.

"You, Sirius, he'd be living with you. Werewolves aren't allowed to adopt, you know that." Harry jerked once in shock, as he appraised the man sitting next to him, but after a brief moment he relaxed again and pretended he hadn't heard a thing. If wizards existed, why not other creatures as well?

The others had continued on in the conversation, obviously not realizing such a slip had been made.

"Still, I would be able to adopt him and you'd be living with us. I could use all the help I could get in raising a kid, and we all know how much smarter than me you are." Sirius had continued in a slightly sarcastic tone at the end at that old joke.

"True enough," Remus chuckled, then frowned. "Though I'm still worried, if Harry's no longer living there, why would they make such a comment at that last sentence?" With a heavy sigh, Lily read the next sentence.

"Damn!" Sirius snarled.

"Then why didn't we come and get him?" Remus wondered, and they all turned to Harry as if expecting an answer. He however merely shrugged, as lost as them.

"What a pleasant wake-up call," James said as he rolled his eyes.

Remus quirked a brow in surprise at the comment; how thin was the walls in that house for Harry to have heard that?

"Wow, what a mind," Remus whistled. "To be able to remember that."

"I don't think he actually remembers," Lily shook her head. "Just his subconscious dredging up things."

"If only my memory was still that good," Harry sighed, rubbing his temple in agitation, wondering if he slept now what kind of dreams he'd have.

That stopped Lily cold as she turned from the book to her son, "They made you cook? You were probably just ten, and they had you cook?" she demanded, eyes flashing.

"Maybe I like cooking," Harry shrugged, unable to come up with any other reason for this.

"What's the big deal?" Sirius shrugged. "If he can reach the stove he can get his own food, faster that way."

Lily groaned and James shot him a look that clearly said 'you're not helping.'

Harry jolted in surprise, suddenly having a horrid sense of Déjà vu, but why? Was Dudley's birthday a major event in his life, something that would help him? With high hopes he egged his mother to go on.

It took a moment for that news to sink in, but once it did you'd think someone had died in the household. With a snarl of rage Lily dropped the book and lunged to her feet, as if she were intending to march to her sister's house with an army and tear every joint out of place, slowly. James didn't know what to think, was this some kind of sick joke? He reached down and picked up the book, determined to see this for himself. There were the words printed bold as brass upon the page. He too got up and made to go and curse those Dursleys to jelly for forcing his son to sleep in a cupboard. That was a place for shoes, not his son!

Remus and Sirius seemed to be more in shock, still reeling from the fact that they had not picked Harry up at the first moment. Where were they? Had something happened to them too? Perhaps the Death Eaters had killed them as well, but Dumbledore and McGonagall had not known yet, or it had happened a short time later. It was a very surreal fact to realize you were going to die.

Harry was just looking around the room in confusion;he did not really understand how or why they were so upset. Wasn't that normal?

Losing air in her lungs, Lily ceased spouting verbal abuse and strode towards the door, wand in hand. No one made a move to stop her, so Harry quickly got to his feet and stood in front of his mother with a pleading look. "It's okay, it hasn't happened yet. Or it already happened, or...oh never mind. The point is, can't do much about it now can you? I'm okay, and I doubt I was in there long. Maybe something was wrong with my room." He paused as he tried to remember this, and a vague memory of cramped and dark living conditions crept upon him, but nothing more than that.

James shook his head violently from side to side and said, "Harry, it said that was where you slept, and even if there was something wrong with your bedroom, you should share a room with your cousin before you slept in a bloody cupboard."

Feeling exasperated but unwilling to let his parents leave him, he cast his mind about for some other way to keep them here, until the baby started crying. He looked around in relief as little baby Harry kicked up a fuss in Sirius's grip, and Lily deflated as she rushed over to comfort him. James seemed to be teetering on edge, obviously wanting to go and right the wrong that had been done against his son, but looking into both of their faces; decided he couldn't leave, not quite yet.

With a sigh of relief Harry went back to the couch and sat between his parents again, and Lily transferred baby Harry to James while she got the book and went back to her place, while the older Harry sat rubbing at his temples. Just from the little he had read, a vague sort of feeling had come over him, along with the cramped feeling of before. How long had he lived in that cupboard? It must have been a while, if he could remember nothing more than that spacing. His mother, finally a little bit calmer, was ready to read on.

When James opened his mouth to ask, Sirius quickly jumped in with, "Muggle stuff James. Don't ask."

He was given a surprised look before Lily really did ask, "How would you know that?"

Sirius snorted and reminded, "I did take Muggle Studies."

"But you actually paid attention?" Lily demanded, only half joking.

Sirius simply shrugged, enjoying her shock. "Sure, I took the class to piss me mum off. What better way than to get a NEWT in the class." Lily and Remus both rolled their eyes before Lily went on.

"Oh great," Lily sighed. "My son's going to grow up with a bully."

"Hey!" The boys all snarled at the name of Dudley's victim, before James spoke. "Great, he not only grew up with a bully, but he's victim to him as well."

"I'm sure his parents at least try to prevent it," Lily said in a hopeful voice.

Remus snorted, unconvinced. "Please Lils, do you not remember where he sleeps?" Again, they all turned to Harry, like they wanted an answer, but he just shrugged. He vaguely remembered being knocked to the ground quite a bit, but not much else or who did it.

Lily and James both pursed their lips at the reminder of his sleeping arrangement, while Sirius and Remus laughed for the kids depiction of himself. "Nope sorry kid, that's genes. Your father was a scrawny git when I first met him," Sirius snickered for Harry's benefit.

"Oi!" James snapped, but had no way to deny it.

Harry merely beamed as he realized he was even more like his father.

"Are you kidding me?" Lily yelped in anger. "They don't even buy him his own clothes?"

"That can't be right," Remus frowned. "What on Earth would the school think? One boy comes in looking prim, while the other looks half sick?" James and Sirius were fuming up a storm, both wanting answers and revenge but unclear of how to get it yet.

"A perfect combination of your parents that is," Sirius told him, managing to bring up a smile for the older Harry, who again couldn't help but beam with pride.'

"Let me guess," Remus snarled. "Your Aunt and Uncle couldn't be bothered to ever get you new ones, or even bother to ask how they were broken?" Harry merely shrugged and tapped the tip of his glasses, deciding they were probably only fixed now because he had fixed them himself with magic.

"What!?" shouted all of the adults in the room, outraged that Petunia would lie about something like that. The combined volume of their fury once again set the baby off, causing them to quiet down, though they were no less angry. Lily made to set the book down and reach for her son again, but James waved her off and cradled his son close, crooning to him and apologizing for startling him. Hickory heard the disturbance and slunk down from the mantle and crawled up onto James lap, settling himself close to Harry's face again. Once the cat's tail was back in his view, baby Harry started to giggle and attempted to grab at it, settling him down once more.

Now that all the shouting was done, Remus turned on the adult Harry and demanded, "You grew up for ten years thinking that your parents died in a car crash?"

Harry shrugged, unable to fully answer him with his fuzzy memories, but unwilling to admit that he believed that was true. Sirius had a mad look on his face as he spat, "But Dumbledore left a note explaining what happened to them in your bedding clear as day. No way could they have missed it! How could they lie about such a thing?"

Lily's mind was frantic, trying to come up with some excuse for her sister. She was not in a forgiving mood after the treatment it implied her child had been getting, but finally settled on the most plausible thing she could think of. "Maybe she just said that until he gets his Hogwarts letter. She's trying to protect him from the horrible truth, just like Dumbledore wanted. He might have even told them to do it."

Sirius twisted around and spat in the fire to let out his agitation as James growled, "If he did then he'll be hearing from me! Lie to my son about something like this! You can't really believe that?" Lily deflated, no she didn't believe it, but she didn't want to think her sister would do something like this either. So she went on reading, ignoring the irritated glares in her direction.

Remus frowned in agitation. "How do you cover that one Lils? Don't ask questions; it's as if they're trying to pretend he doesn't even live there!"

Lily still had her head ducked towards the book, unwilling to admit that it seemed this way to her as well.

As pleasant as his wife," Sirius growled at Vernon's apparent morning greeting.

James snorted, "Yeah, if baby angels look like blond piglets." His friends gave appreciative snorts of amusement for that.

At the moment Harry's thoughts seemed to parallel, they all roared with laughter. "It's official , you are their son," Remus decided.

"When was it unofficial?" Harry asked, though he too seemed pleased by this.

Everyone in the room had astounded looks on their faces at the news of his count of presents. "Why would he even remember such a thing?" Lily wondered.

Harry on the other hand was busy mulling over memories that he was pretty sure had come from his early childhood and decided that this was quite common, and had finally settled on the fact that he did indeed remember this day, and suddenly wanted to encourage his younger self to hurry up and finish his breakfast.

"The way she talks to him!" Lily rolled her eyes. "I don't even talk to baby Harry like that, and he's less than a year old."

Sirius shrugged and said, "Maybe the lot of them have a mental disorder and they can't process things above a year six level?" James and Remus snickered at that.

"How often did that happen?" Sirius asked curiously, honestly enjoying the mental image of flipping a table himself onto these excuse for people.

"About once a month since he was five," Harry said automatically, and then jolted in surprise at what he said. He didn't know how he remembered that, it just sort of came out.

The others were all looking on, his parents with disapproval, and the other two with glee. "You're getting your memories back!" Remus said with a grin.

"What a horrible child," Lily muttered.

"I can't believe you grew up with that boy," James grumbled.

Everyone in the room looked appalled when Lily had kept going and immediately spluttered, "That is so not the way you deal with an impending tantrum!"

"Did I say six years old?" Sirius asked with a straight face when he heard Dudley couldn't even do simple math. "I meant two."

"That's obviously the way they dealt with it in the past," Remus sighed.

"At least the father's not in on it," James said grimly. "He's been silent so far."

"Wait for it," Harry muttered.

"I stand corrected," James groaned, looking more upset about their behavior than the fact that he was wrong.

"You're not standing Prongs," Sirius corrected with a bright smile just to pick back the mood for a second.

His friend gave him an exasperated look and Harry snickered in surprise so it seemed to have worked.

Before the pure-blood could open his mouth again when details of the presents came out, Lily and Remus quickly said, "Later."

"Huh," Sirius said in surprise, "that's usually what we give wizards when they come of age." His eyes quickly flashed to the watch on the grown Harry's wrist, and then flickered to the one on James. They were not the same one, as they should have been.

"Who gave you that one then?" Remus asked as he gestured at the slightly dented watch.

Harry glanced down at his wrist, almost as if he'd forgotten he had it on, and then frowned in agitation. All he could remember was a sense of warmth, and perhaps a hug, as he tried to remember. When he told the others, they all looked slightly happy at that, but James was still frowning. Harry should have gotten his watch, been hugged by Lily when he received it.

"What does she mean, 'take him?'" Lily asked in surprise to whatever this nonsense was speaking of her son about now. "Surely wherever they're going they planned on taking my son."

"Come off it," Sirius scoffed. "You really believe that from what we've seen so far?" Lily pursed her lips before going on.

"You've got to be kidding me," James snarled with clenched fists when they were told of Harry's usual stay outside the Dursley's house, but quickly relaxed when the baby in his arms squirmed. Sirius twisted around and spat in the fireplace again, while the others vented their frustration by cursing themselves.

Harry merely watched, almost amused by their reactions. He had no problem with this, why would he want to be around these people more often anyway? They didn't seem to be very good company, unlike the people he was with now.

"Argh!" Sirius groaned when they were given a brief description of Mrs. Figg's place."I feel so sorry for you Harry."

"Why?" Harry asked curiously, it didn't sound very pleasant but Sirius' reaction seemed a little extreme.

"Cabbage, that's the worst thing I could think of, pure torture that is," Sirius grumbled.

Harry couldn't help but laugh again at such an extreme reaction from the man over something so small, and was quickly learning that's just how Sirius was. His smile lingered even as Lily kept going over the Dursleys' chatter of him.

"I bet," James snorted. "I can just imagine my son plotting how to break an old lady's leg."

"Really?" Harry asked with a frown.

"No sweetie," Lily said smiling. "He was joking."

Remus smiled and said, "One thing you should learn quickly about those two," he jerked his head in his friend's direction. "Don't take much of what they say seriously." Remus winced in horror at once as he realized his slip a moment too late.

"I take everything Siriusly," Sirius said at once, while the others just groaned and Harry laughed even harder, with the sudden realization he'd been doing that more in the few moments he'd awoken in here than his whole childhood at that place. It was a distraction for him as Lily kept going about Harry's feelings towards Mrs. Figg.

"Hum," Remus said thoughtfully. "Isn't there a Figg in the Order? She's not quite as old as Harry leads us to believe, plus she's a squib. I know she breeds kneazles then names them ridiculous things to throw off what they are."

"Could be," James agreed. "After all, Harry is 'The Boy Who Lived'. Dumbledore probably wants an Order member close to him."

"If so," Lily said in a cold voice. "Why wouldn't she have told him about the treatment Harry receives? Even if he never told anyone, it seems apparent just by the description of him."

"Right," Remus deflated. "Forget I mentioned anything."

"Who's Marge?" Sirius asked with a frown, clearly knowing he wasn't going to like the answer.

"The name rings a bell, I can tell you now she's not someone we'd like to meet," Harry answered, also frowning.

All the adults exchanged looks, knowing that if Harry was acting like this without the memories to reinforce such feelings, they were going to hate this woman.

"I'd go with the first option," James sneered, "if only because it makes me feel better than calling my son a slug."

"That is horrible," Remus snarled. "How could you treat anyone like that?"

"Prejudices," Sirius said quietly, his mind flashing back to when he had suggested bringing Remus round to his place once. He regretted that thought at once.

Lily looked up in surprise. "I can't believe Petunia's still friends with Yvonne. They were always going on about traveling together, but Yvonne left a few years ago without Petunia. Tuney swore she wasn't ever going to talk to her again for that."

James shrugged and said, "I suppose she changed her mind."

"Well she can't have many friends, probably made up with her to at least claim she still had one," Sirius snorted derisively.

A few hours ago Lily would have told Sirius off for talking about her sister like that, but then her mind swiveled back to the cupboard, and she held her tongue.

When Harry offered he could be left home alone, Remus said with a grin, "They might do that if they don't think like Harry. I believe the phrase that runs through their minds is 'see or not to be seen'. If we're still going with the assumption that they are trying to ignore his existence, Harry might just get away with that."

"Let's hope they don't think like Harry," Sirius muttered.

The idea was immediately dismissed by Petunia's statement.

"What do they think he's going to do," James rolled his eyes. "Burn it down?"

"This is awesome!" Sirius crowed when Harry had essentially said the same thing. "Now we've got a nice round number of think-a likes!"

You could almost hear the crickets chirping in the background after that kind of declaration as Remus shook his head slowly and said, "Really Sirius? Really?"

"What the bloody hell?" Lily hissed at the thought of leaving her boy in a car all day! "My son is not a dog!"

"You know, technically, you're not even supposed to do that to dogs," Remus said wisely. "Even if you leave the windows open a little, the direct sunlight streaming into the car without any, or little, ventilation outwards can cause heat strokes in dogs. The bigger the dog, the more likely."

"Thank you for that educational lesson Professor," James rolled his eyes. "Now I feel bad for locking Padfoot in the sun room last week."

"You did that?" Sirius yelped. "You told me Peter did that!"

"I lied," he said simply, smirking a little.

Harry felt an instant of blood chilling hatred for something Sirius had just said, but the combination of his ingrained no questions habit and honestly not even sure how to address such a feeling made it quickly fade to the back of his mind before he even recognized it.

Lily sighed as she realized what her boys were trying to do, pissed though they were as well, they were helping her to try to take her mind off of it. It was in vain however, as she still had to keep reading.

"Yeah, cause that's the most important part of that suggestion, the newness of the car," Sirius rolled his eyes as he twisted around to spit in the fire.

Remus leaned forward and rubbed his temples in agitation, just imagining the noise of fake crying was giving him a horrid headache. While the other three adults were shooting each other significant looks, knowing full well that all three would like to pop that kid a good one in the mouth when they were still kids. Harry was still frowning, straining to remember what happened.

"And the year levels are still dropping," Sirius chuckled at the new nickname.

"You keep going with that and you're going to reverse them back into the womb," James reminded him.

Sirius just shrugged, clearly saying 'it works.'

The moment it was told of Dudley's look being shot at Harry, the reaction was instantaneous.

"Jerk-"

"Prat-"

"Oaf-"

"Pig-"

"Arse."

They all looked at each other, startled upon realizing they had all used different insults that still fit him perfectly.

"It almost makes you feel for all these ugly people," Harry sighed dramatically, causing the rest of the room to chuckle more in surprise than anything Harry was so openly mocking Dudley's friends arrival, giving them the hint he wouldn't always remain the quiet kid he'd mostly been so far.

"Charming boy that one is," Sirius sneered as he tried not to picture whose arms this new friend of Dudleys, Piers*, he would have been holding.

"'Course he stopped," Remus snarled, though he couldn't pretend he wasn't grateful even the mockery of the noise was gone from his head in picturing all this. "Can't look weak in front of your awful friends."

"You can show any emotion around real friends," Lily agreed quietly, coming to the sudden realization that it had not mentioned one single friend of Harry's.

"I don't think a zoo trip's worth that," James wrinkled his nose at the idea of being crammed in the backseat with those turds.

"Yeah, was there even space?" Sirius pondered, picturing half the back seat taken up by that pig.

"They- they wouldn't do that, would they?" Lily gasped, horror etched into her face. Locking him up until Christmas had to be at least six months considering it was the middle of the summer as far as she could tell of this narrative.

"I doubt that," Sirius muttered with a horrible look on his face. "Unless they don't value their lives at all." Harry pursed his lips and did not comment.

"That's not right," Remus muttered sadly. "No child should have to grow up with no one listening to them."

"I didn't totally grow up that way," Harry muttered to himself, trying to recollect this vague sense of friendship he had. He was hoping that, like with this birthday, more memories would come back to him if he had more Déjà vu. So far, nothing, he could just remember his childhood, which wasn't that pleasant to remember anyway.

"That's not right!" James hissed in outrage. "Unless you consented to that, and I doubt you did, they shouldn't have lopped off all your hair. I don't care how old you are!"

Harry decided not to mention that his Aunt had threatened him with a week in his cupboard if he so much as flinched to try and stop her, since there was nothing he could do about it now and it would probably just upset him further, and was even more relived at the next line reverting the affects anyways.

"Good," James sighed in relief, running his hand through his hair.

"Your hair is way too important to you," Remus joked.

"Why shouldn't it be? It's what got me this beautiful family," James agreed.

"I did not fall in love with you because of your hair," Lily snapped. "That's what kept me away from you for all those years!" Before they could get into a familiar round, Remus cleared his throat, to Harry's disappointment as for some reason watching bickering felt very familiar to him, and Lily read on.

"That- that- that-!" Lily stuttered, unable to come up with a proper insult for her sister actively locking Harry in that place for any length of time! No, no Petunia Dursley was no longer her sister, she didn't deserve the title. No Tuney she had ever known would do this to her son.

The males were clearly just as upset but after a look at Harry, who was staring apprehensively around the room as if thinking they were all going to start yelling at him. Then let out the breathe he was holding when they merely scowled and started muttering all the things they'd like to do to those relatives of his.

Even at the news of Harry not being punished for something didn't seem to quell them.

"You never should have been," They all snapped at once, startling baby Harry in James arms.

"How much is terrible trouble?" James growled, rounding on his son.

Harry just shrugged and tried to put an innocent look on his face, but Remus intervened. "Don't lie Harry, that face isn't going to fool us. You remember, now tell."

With a huge sigh Harry admitted, "A week in the cupboard, and a week of chores." While the adults started muttering in disgust, Harry mentally added 'and a day without meals.'

"Nice, you apparated!" James tried for a grin at his sons display of magic rather than continuing to purse shouting.

"I don't think so," Lily shrugged. "He probably would have described that odd feeling, he could have just flown."

"Either way," Sirius whistled low in his throat. "Damn."

Their thoughts were once again ripped off of the child's magic in favor of that horrid home life.

"How skinny were you, for you to believe that?" Sirius asked at such a bizarre explanation as the wind.

Harry chuckled slightly and said, "I also thought the over large clothes would act as a parasol, help catch the wind."

Far from finding this amusing, it merely aggravated them that his clothes didn't fit properly.

"Yeah, I suppose," James amended his earlier statement at Harry's thought of just being anywhere new. "When you put it like that."

"Moony, I bet you can't guess his top three favorite things to complain about!" Sirius said, choosing to make a joke out of it rather than curse some more.

Remus decided to play along as he pretended to mull it over and said, "Um, people at work, the bank, and the council."

"Err!" Sirius made a sound like a buzzer. "It's Harry, then Harry, then Harry!" Harry burst out laughing at their antics, so the bantering served its purpose.

"What's wrong with motorcycles?" James asked as he rolled his eyes.

"Jamesie, let me put it to you this way; if it's cool, he doesn't like it," Sirius said with a straight face and a serious tone.

"Why on Earth would you do that?" Lily moaned when her son pipped up about his own dream of motorcycles, hoping this wouldn't ruin her son's, rare, good day. If they had learned anything about those Dursleys, it was that Harry shouldn't be drawing attention to himself.

"Sorry," Harry muttered. "It was the euphoria of being out, besides it's not like they ever listened to what I said anyway. Mostly they just ignored me if I did say something. Didn't expect them to actually hear me." Nobody appreciated this bit of honesty.

"Pity he didn't actually crash," Sirius sighed.

"Sirius!" Lily snapped. "My son's in that car."

James shrugged and said, "Yeah Lils, but he's a wizard, it wouldn't even scratch him. Plus, I like the irony," and a dark look overtook him as he remembered that horrible lie.

"Yes, but if he did crash, he'd blame it on Harry," Remus pointed out, which put a stop to any kind of thinking like that.

"Shows what you know," Sirius sneered, though the ability of flight in motorcycles was low on his list of sharing with Vernon. He'd start much closer to the top, like where his intestines were soon to be hanging.

"I don't think it's you, so much as you might mention them to your cousin," Remus said slowly when Harry expressed his thoughts on the Dursleys feelings of such things.

"What's a television?" James asked instead of snapping that wasn't helping like he wanted to.

"Eh, it's kind of like if the pictures that we talked to had backgrounds that moved as well, inside a box. Runs on the Muggles form of energy called electricity, that's how they were watching the news on the first chapter," Sirius happily explained. He knew James had a good reason for not having registered that the first time, but he would have thought back on that eventually so he just added it on now. James nodded in understanding, not pressing for more details like he wanted to.

Lily kept things going by speaking of the ice cream stand, but all of the adults still shifted in agitation, thinking 'at least he got some thing.'

"That's right Prongslet," James patted adult Harry on the top of his head when he heard the inclusion of Harry's thoughts on the gorillas. "Think positive." Harry laughed at the way he was doing that, but then determined that he would have to ask about those nicknames they kept using when the chapter was over.

Lily shot a disgusted look at the Marauders, clearly remembering their favorite hobby on the occasions they got bored in the school corridors, but she was in too much of a temper to really go at that now. Besides they had, in the past few years, made it clear to her that they did at least slightly regret doing those things.

Harry frowned, but chose not to bring up the fact that the book left a little something out. The only reason he had been allowed to finish it was because it was half melted in the sun and Piers had refused to eat it because it had looked disgusting . Uncle Vernon had shoved it roughly to the side and Harry just took it and no one stopped him. The adults in the room looked so pleased that Harry had gotten something like that; he just couldn't bring himself to mention his memory.

The book left the ominous note in Harry thinking it was all too good to last.

"Dun, dun, dun…" Sirius said in a low tone voice.

"Sirius." Lily scolded .

"Sorry Lils." Sirius said trying to hide a chuckle only to get a glare from Lily.

"A lovely thought, that one," all three boys sighed, clearly daydreaming this very thing and many other ways to torment Vernon.

"Poor snake," Sirius shuddered, "having to get a close up of that."

"I don't believe it!" James pretended to faint. "Who are you and what have you done with Sirius? He would never say poor snake! Horrible snake maybe, disgusting snake probably, but never poor!"

Sirius just shrugged and said, "I have nothing against the animals, 's'not their fault, so don't take things out of context mate." James pouted slightly because Sirius hadn't played along but let it go for now.

"I didn't know he could do anything smartly," Remus gasped upon the window comment, making Harry chuckle.

"It's an expression Remus," Lily rolled her eyes while Remus frowned at her.

"I know that Lily." Remus grumbled.

"Sounds like fun to me," Sirius drawled. "Parties every night and people to freak out, what more could you want?" This time the others just ignored him.

"Your life's got to be really bad if you're sympathizing with a zoo animal," Remus muttered, mostly to himself.

"Snakes can't blink," Lily frowned. "They don't have eyelids."

"Maybe it's a trick of the light," Harry agreed, trying to think back to what was about to happen.

All four of them frowned, finding this action of raising up to look at Harry rather odd of a common animal, perhaps the snake did tricks?

"It-" James started, and then stopped, seeming unable to keep going. Sirius and Lily also had astounded looks on their faces. Harry frowned and edged away from them, having a faint memory of lots of eyes boring into him with hate, fear, and dislike.

Remus caught sight of this first, and quickly said, "It's alright Harry, we're not mad at you. Just confused. Parseltongue goes down through bloodlines, and James isn't one. We just don't understand why you're one."

"Oh." he muttered, relaxing again at that, but then frowned as the word tickled something in his mind. "What's a parseltongue?"

"It means you can talk to snakes. You speak parseltongue, so you're a parselmouth," Sirius said slowly, still trying to get over the shock.

Lily and James exchanged a look, and decided that they wouldn't tell him they were so freaked out because the only snake talking people were those of very dark and evil magic, but this was their son. No, they wouldn't give him any more to worry about, so Lily just read on. Taking the hint, neither Remus nor Sirius intended to go into any further details either.

"I rather like this snake," James laughed, trying to shake off the last of his confusion. "It's right friendly."

"You were taking this rather calmly," Lily voiced, "had this happened to you before?"

"No," Harry shrugged, "but after all of the weird things that had happened to me, I just kind of went with this." Privately adding it was nice to talk to anyone who paid the slightest bit of attention to him like this reptile was doing. He had often spoken to the spiders in his cupboard sometimes in this same way, though they'd never responded back of course.

"I doubt it could have been that fast," Sirius snickered as he tried to visualize Dudley rushing back to see this.

All three males clenched their fists at him shoving Harry so hard, wishing they were ten years old again so they could punch that git in the face and not get into as much trouble for it.

"What happened?" the boys asked in excitement upon hearing of Dudley's fear, hoping their little Marauder Jr. would come up with something more creative than punching him back later.

"The glass went wherever it wanted to," James rolled his eyes.

"That was a pointless interruption James," Lily snapped, starting to get to the end of her rope.

"Quite the clean-up job for Ministry though," Remus chuckled.

"Knew I liked that snake," Sirius laughed, he'd find some way to give it a treat for snapping at Dudley even playfully.

"If only, if only, if only," James hummed under his breath, even with his ire at such a horrid child though, he really wasn't going to consider hurting the kid and was glad the snake hadn't done any real harm like these boys were exaggerating.

"No!" all the adults gasped, now Harry was going to get in trouble again! Piers tattling like this was the worst thing that could have been done! They were all shaking, just a bit. What kind of punishment would he really get for putting his cousin in danger?

"Why?" they all hissed at once, trying not to picture those reasons of why Dudley's friend would have to leave the house first.

"No meals?" Lily murmured, looking faint.

James quickly placed baby Harry in her arms, which seemed to steady her, but then he lunged to his feet and started swearing at the top of his lungs. In a fit of pure rage Sirius summoned up a pillow off the sofa and stuffed it in his mouth to keep himself from doing the same while his hands clenched and unclenched as if wishing to wring somebody's neck.

Remus jumped to his feet and spat in the fire, and Sirius noticed that there was a bit of blood in there. He must have bitten his tongue with the effort of not copying James' actions. "I can't believe this" Remus growled, pacing back and forth in front of the couch, looking very much like a mother wolf protecting her cubs. "I really can't believe any of them. Even Peter or Sirius alone would be better guardians than them!"

Sirius would have made a comment about that any other day, but now he felt that Remus had never spoken truer words. Harry went around to all of them and did his best to reassure them, until they were all at least quiet enough or still whispering mutinously but low enough to hear, that Lily went on. Lily gently deposited baby Harry back into James' arms so she could finish the chapter.

Lily clenched her jaw so tight her vision started to blur to keep the tears away; you shouldn't have to sneak around your own home! Even if that was the farthest thing from home any one could picture.

The boys were all looking murderous that Harry would have to put such useful skills as sneaking about to something like that, but managed to hold their tongues.

Sirius twisted and spat in the fire for that horrid reminder, and noted absently how badly it was starting to sputter out. He quickly pulled out his wand and helped the flames back up to a healthier level while the others looked at him enviously, wishing they could do something similar to vent.

Now they were all shifting their weight around, trying not to picture what had been done to their Harry, and a blinding flash of green light was no good omen.

"We ran a green light," Lily muttered snidely, wishing more than anything she could answer for Harry what had happened to them.

Everyone deflated like tires with punctures in them. "You, didn't even know what we looked like?" James asked sadly.

"I do know," Harry reminded him, "now. Besides, like you guys pointed out at the beginning of the chapter, you can fix this. We can read all this, and hopefully I'll remember enough so that we can prevent this from happening. I can grow up with you guys."

"Nothing would ever please us more," Lily whispered.

Both Remus and Sirius winced at that, convinced they must have died, as well as Peter, to leave Harry like that.

"That's not family," Lily hissed in outrage, but did not need to elaborate, they all knew what she meant.

"Huh," Remus muttered. "Those are probably surviving members of the Order. I can't believe Dumbledore would just leave you there with no one watching you."

"Look what good it's done," James muttered in disgust.

"That was horrible," Lily murmured, flipping to the next chapter. "I don't think I can stand another chapter about your younger years."

James reached over and placed a comforting hand on her shoulder before saying softly, "It's okay Lily flower, I'd like to think his Hogwarts letter will be coming soon, very soon, and then they'll have to treat him decently. They'll know he's a wizard, and wouldn't do a thing to him."

Lily sighed, unconvinced, but passed the book to James none the less as she took her son back.

Hope this chapter was okay. It's one of my favorites, if only cause I love the peoples reactions to this and the next one. I always mark how good a story this is, or could be, by this and the next chapter. So I'm hoping sincerely that you guys are pleased with this one.

*Piers Polkiss is the biggest clue that Peter Pettigrew was the real bad guy of book three. Seriously, face like a rat, even their names are eerily similar! He even rats out Harry in this very chapter like Peter did to James and Lily all those years ago. JK did it again!