The early morning light was almost unbearable , and Lailey was not use to so much sun streaming through the blinds.
Then she felt the thin, uncomfortable cot she was stretched out out, along with the heavy cotton blanket draped around her.
Voices came from every angle, each one was muffled and unintelligible to Lailey in her current state. She could not for the life of her figure out where she was, it was all so unfamiliar. Struggling to peel open her eyes, she was only able to manage for a brief second before light, brighter than before, assaulted her head and sent her in a frenzy of new pain.
She could only assume she was lying in the hospital wing, the uncomfortable bed and unnatural lighting her first clue. The fact that her chest, head, and right arm sent sharp pains through her body every other second was her final clue.
Lailey had never been a patient in the hospital wing in all her previous Hogwarts years. She had only really been inside all of two times, and each was to visit Clara when she had had a broken bone or two.
Deciding sleep was a better option at this point, as she could not move, or open her eyes let alone concentrate on one of the many voices filling her ears, she drifted off into an uneasy dream.
A younger Lailey, by several years, stood at the top of a wooden staircase, anxiety filling her small frame. The whole house was dark, her father was away at work.
To the right of the steps, on the first floor, the tvs awful blue glow gave the hallway an unnatural, uneasy feeling. Where the living rooms green carpet met the halls boarded floors, was a zone Lailey feared to go past. Inside her mother would be lying on the couch, almost corpse like.
She took the first step...the second...the third and so on until she found herself standing at the bottom with no more stairs left.
The only thing to do was creep slowly toward the archway, leading into the living room...
And fear clutched at her chest. Lailey could hardly stand the sight of her mother, but for some unexplainable reason, some unnamed force pulled the young girl forward, imploring her to lean around the frame and look inside.
Right where she always was, her mother lay unmoving on the couch. Asleep, breathing slowly. Lailey's mother, Mara Evergrove, was merely a husk of a person. Muttering in her sleep about dark curses and evil magic. It made Lailey shutter. At least when her father was home her mother seemed more sane. She could sit up and eat, but would do little more than stare at her husband with proud adoration. Lailey resented her mother for never even acknowledging her existence.
A hand fell out from the blankets, thin and frail, reaching for the door, "Lailey..."
Lailey shrieked, wasting no time running back up the stairs.
In her sleep, Lailey whimpered and cried out. Clara sighed, stroking her best friends hair sadly. She couldn't stand to see Lailey like that.
It had been four days since Lailey had first been admitted to the hospital wing. For the first two days, all of the marauders and Clara hardly left her bedside, filled with regret and hoping she would wake soon.
The last two days the healer Madam Pomfrey had thrown them out, sending for their head of house, Professor McGonagall, to escort them to class. At night though, Madam Pomfrey could not keep Clara away from her best friends side. Or Sirius Black, the reason Lailey was in here in the first place.
Sirius was wracked with pure guilt at the whole situation. But clearly not enough to keep from falling asleep in his chair and snoring loudly, Clara thought bitterly as she glared at the boy. In Sirius' defense though, he was definitely not taking this lightly. He would sit in silence staring at the floor, every now and then glancing hopefully up at the girl he had put in this four day coma. He would apologize profusely to Clara, begging her to tell him how he could make up for this. Although he would never admit it, he also would beg and plead with Lailey when they were alone, making many different promises if she would just wake up.
"You should be in your dorm" Pomfrey berated fruitlessly. Clara only collapsed into her own chair and dropped her head into her palm as the nurse went about checking Lailey, making sure nothing was seriously wrong, well nothing new that is.
"I just...I can't knowing she's here." Clara hadn't been such a good best friend the past few days, and she was desperate to make up for it.
The nurse, after finishing up with her patient, turned and gave Clara a sympathetic look while clasping her hands in front of her. "Your friend is going to be okay." Pomfrey assured,
"Then why won't she wake up?!" Clara couldn't help but accuse.
"Her body's tired." The nurse didn't hesitate, "trust me, she'll be herself in a day or two." With that the nurse left Clara alone with the two sleeping figures near by. Being sleep deprived herself, she settled into the chair and rested her eyes.
Lailey had been drifting in and out of consciousness for what seemed like ages. She still, however, did not have the strength to keep her eyes open without them falling shut due to exhaustion. At the very least she seemed to be becoming more and more aware of what was happening around her every time she woke up.
This time she could focus on the conversation, but couldn't quite match the voices to people.
"I'm sorry! I didn't know it would hit her!" The voice was gruff, clearly of the opposite gender but most definitely on edge and shakier than it should have been.
"Right," a higher pitched voice seethed, "doesn't change the fact that...what was your stupid spell anyway?"
There was a slight pause.
"It was a stunning spell...I guess my anger must have amplified its effects...not to mention her falling down all those steps..."
There was a soft sigh, closer to Lailey, and the feminine pitched voice spoke once more, "I can't believe she got in the middle of this." A clammy hand grasped Lailey's fingers, "the whole reason I wanted her to be with Remus that night was so she wouldn't be there. I would never let Lailey near him otherwise.
The first voice snorted, "Remus would never hurt her..."
"He's been with tons of girls."
"You shouldn't believe every rumor...besides Remus is just a harmless flirt...never really had anything serious."
"Oh and you have?"
There was a greater silence than before. All that could be heard was a few birds chirping, along with a soft breeze. Lailey was pretty sure the window closest to her was open. The peacefulness was beginning to lull her back into a deep sleep.
"Sirius...maybe can we just be even? Y-you hurt my best friend after all."
"I didn't mean too!"
"I know! But don't you think we've caused enough harm fighting? We lost 50 points in muggle studies yesterday! You sorta owe Lailey as well...truce?"
"I really wish this wasn't how my retaliation turned out...but you're right...truce."
This time there was crickets chirping nearby. The air smelled slightly muggy, as if it had just been raining for a prolonged period of time.
"Hurry! Bring him to a cot...his wounds look bad!" Madam Pomfrey rushed around the wing, gathering together supplies to be used to treat Remus Lupin.
The three boys, James, Sirius, and Peter, carried in their best mate and settled him into his usual cot. Pomfrey, coming back with everything she needed, pulled the curtain closed. The metal links connecting the fabric to the poles scrapped obnoxiously against each other, slicing into Lailey's dreams and tugging her closer to consciousness than she had been since her accident.
She opened her eyes long enough to see the marauders being shooed out from the curtains. They were filthy, mud soaked and dripping, a trail of sludge leading to the door and ending at their feet.
"Lailey?" Sirius looked over hopefully, and a little panicked.
Lailey lifted up a weak hand and wiggled her fingers before being dragged back into her dream world.
"Mummy and daddy are...Magic?" Lailey asked incredulously. She was a only a few years older than the version of her that had stood at the top of the steps and looked down in fear at the living room.
She was now sitting in the living room in a comfy chair. The lights were on, which comforted her greatly, and her mother was a patient at St. Mungo's after having a seizure. He father was currently sitting at her mums bedside.
"Yes little darling, and so are you!" Her aunt, who was babysitting for the time being, squealed, "I know you are only seven, but pretty soon you will come into your magic!"
"Magic..."
"Yes! And once you turn eleven you will be off to Hogwarts, your parents attended that school you know..."
"What is Hogwarts?" The girl asked anxiously, jumping in her seat.
Talking about "magic" seemed to excite Aunt Maryann very much.
"It's a school, for people just like us. They will teach you just about everything you'll need to know about magic! It's a magnificent castle...huge! With a lake full of mystery..."
Lailey was absorbed in her aunts tales of witches and wizards, dragons and giant squids, and the days she had been a hufflepuff student at hogwarts.
"What was mummy?" Lailey questioned after her aunt told her all about the four houses and each of their values.
"Why, she was a Slytherin!" Lailey shuddered, "but you my brave dear," she touched Lailey's face gently and grinned brightly, "are bound to be a Gryffindor."
Her aunt, as it turned out had been wrong. Lailey was not brave enough for Gryffindor. When she had finally gotten into hogwarts, it had been her dream ever since her aunt told her about it, and the hat finally dropped onto her head, it completely covered her face, it wasted no time shouting out "Ravenclaw!" And reminding her of the hours and hours of time she had spent in her bedroom reading book after book of anything she could get her hands on.
Lailey groaned, no longer trapped by the heavy hand of groggy sleep. She felt freer than she had previously, and was even able to drag herself into a sitting position. She cradled her head, nurturing a small headache.
"Lailey?" A surprised voice, closer than she had expected, spoke "you're awake! Please tell me you feel alright."
Lailey looked up, startled to be met with piercing gray eyes staring at her with guilt. Sirius Black was certainly not in his normal state. His hair was almost as messy as James Potter, as if he had spent way too much time running his finger through it. Which was certainly not a habit Sirius regularly possessed. He seemed tired and resigned, he slouched slightly and seemed as though he had been worrying days on end.
"I'm fine." Lailey replied, and despite the aching from every point of her body, and the fact she was in quite a state, she meant it with all honesty.
Sirius seemed to relax visibly, settling back into his normal self, "thank god!" He cried, covering his face with his hands and sighing in relief.
"What um...what are you doing here?" Lailey questioned, she was confused to say the least. Her and Sirius had little to no contact in previous years.
Sirius looked as though he has swallowed something highly on pleasant, "it was...my spell that put you in here in the first place."
Lailey sat in stunned silence, the past few days falling on her all of the sudden. She remembered her "date" with Remus and even the odd moment she caught the marauders in, in what she assumed to be last night as the curtains were still pulled across the bed Remus had been placed in. She noticed the other marauders nearby, watching.
"Where's Clara?"
"James convinced her to sleep in her dorm last night," Sirius replied, "I imagine she's still there as classes don't start for another hour.
She looked down at her hands resting in her lap, they were shaking.
"Are you guys like friends now or something?"
"No!" Sirius replied defensively. "We put our problems aside to focus on yours."
"I don't have any problems?" Sirius gave her a pointed look, "oh..."
"So since this is our fault," he gestured to the other marauders, "is there anything we can do it make it up to you?"
Lailey could not think of anything that would make up for missing however many days of her life. "You don't have to do anything, you're just trying to absolve your guilt."
He didn't argue, "Still I almost killed you..." He did seem very apologetic, "I can't stand the thought of hurting someone so innocent, so can you just humor me?"
"Honestly," she sighed, "I have no idea."
James, from across the room, suddenly grinned as he stepped over to Lailey's bedside, "then I guess old Padfoot here," he smirked at his friend, "will just have to provide you with the best week of your life."
Lailey's eyes widened in horror. Having Sirius making sure she was happy wasn't the kind of attention she needed right now. Definitely more rumors than she could handle. "That's not necessary!" She was perfectly fine with going back to being unnoticed, spending all her free time perfecting her homework, keeping with prefect duties, and being, well, nothing special.
She was afraid that if she allowed herself to enjoy life too fully, or became too carefree with her life, she could become susceptible to awful things. If her mother wasn't proof enough, she just wasn't comfortable being in the limelight. She did not need attention from outsiders, and she most definitely did not want to be anything like her mother had been during her hogwarts years. Even for just a moment.
"No I think that's a perfect idea," Clara stood in the doorframe, she had come in unnoticed but certainly claimed attention now. She sauntered over to Sirius and grinned menacingly. "I think you should make it your responsibility to provide Lailey with as much fun as you can possibly manage within the next seven days."
Sirius glared, surely he was about to argue? "Fine." I consented, unwillingly, "From today until next Wednesday I will be completely at Lailey's service."
Lailey groaned, falling back into her bed. Five days she had been unconscious. She had missed the weekend, losing the time to complete the Friday homework. Along with the first two days of school this week. She would have far too much to catch up on, and now she doubted she would have much time to catch up with the marauders breathing down her back.
