Chapter 4. Things travel fast

James Potter had asked out Marlene McKinnon.

Sirius Black had left his best friend's house almost immediately after he had heard.

He couldn't take it and he knew that Lily was going to be a wreck as soon as she found out.

In fact he was a wreck. An almost sobbing slightly stunned wreck.

"This was why James Potter was always trouble" he grumbled angrily as he stepped outside the apparition wards at the Potter's seaside house.

He twirled his wand in his fingers, lifting it gingerly as the sea breeze washed over him, the smell and taste of the salt sticking to his clothes.

A moment later Sirius was gone and James was left calling after horizon of clear blue sky, water and sands.

James sighed bitterly, he thought Sirius would have been pleased. Sirius was the one who was constantly telling him to move on. To find someone more like himself. That's what Marlene was. Admittedly she wasn't the brightest button in Hogwarts but she was bloody good at Quidditch. She was a pureblood. The families would approve and all in all it seemed like a good idea, in seventh year before things got serious to forget Lily Evans. To stop pandering over her.

He wondered why Sirius had felt like that.

It must be to do with that letter he had been reading last night. There had been something that had obviously shocked him deeply, so deeply he wouldn't talk to James about it. And that wasn't like Sirius at all.

He had made up his mind he had to find that letter.

There was a knock on the Evans' front door. It was the day of Petunia's wedding Lily sighed. People weren't really meant to be calling this early!

She rushed to the door, frying pan in hand, bacon still sizzling contentedly, apron round her smart yellow dress she was wearing for the wedding today.

As she yanked open the front door, with a great force for someone so small, and stared open mouthed at the sight in front of her.

Remus Lupin and Sirius Black, together, in muggle suits on her doorstep.

Impossible.

She turned around slammed the door in their faces, served up the bacon and then went back home and reopened the front door.

And sure enough they were there. They sat lazily on the veranda, swing gently on the seat that hung off it. Both looking extremely dapper in contrasting ways, Remus's brown hair was sun kissed and he was bronzed to perfection whereas as Sirius was all dark hair, stormy eyes and brooding looks. Like summer and winter they contrasted perfectly.

Sirius looked at Remus, who promptly began to speak, "He filled me in on the letter, look we need to talk can we go and sit down? We have something important to tell you."

"Fine" Lily replied, still in a state of shock, as she led the two boys upstairs.

As she opened the door to her room she saw Marlene's owl waiting for her with a letter on her bed. She reached to open the parchment, when Sirius stopped her.

"I wouldn't open that if I were you" Remus said gently, taking the scroll from her hands. She saw Marlene's untidy writing was practically a scrawl over the paper. That was odd, she wondered why, but was distracted by the faces the two boys were giving her.

Remus was worried, that was usual. She was used to that face, when rules had been broken, when James had done something wrong usually to do with her. However, the look of concern Sirius was giving her was heart breaking.

It looked like his world was falling apart, only it wasn't his world but her world that was obviously about to crumble. All of a sudden she felt like a young naïve child, not knowing she was gifted, magical, not understanding the strange things she did, like make flowers bloom so quickly in the garden all year round.

By the look her gave her she knew her world was about to crumble around her, and she could do nothing about it.

Remus started to speak "Lily look – we thought it would be best if we told you – because well and it should be easier, maybe sit down. Sirius told me about your feelings towards James and well –"

He was abruptly stopped by Sirius.

"James asked Marlene out. They are staying in the house next door. She said yes. She's invited you to stay with her for the next two weeks. They were going to tell you when you got there. He said he's over you. I'm so sorry, Lily, I think we've all lost it with him a bit this time."

Then there was silence.

It was that sort of silence when you realise that everything you have has changed like when you have lost someone for good.

For Lily it was that sort of silence. It was a silence that reverberated around her head. She couldn't think. She couldn't speak. She nodded.

The boys stared at her.

Calmly, she walked downstairs when she suddenly threw up the bacon she had had only fifteen minutes ago in the hall stairway.

In those small moments, her sister freaked out, her mother and father scolded her for ruining her sister's big day so early on and shut her in her room without a backwards glance. Not noticing the two shocked teenage boy's faces.

"Are you okay?" asked Sirius, as he gingerly helped Lily into her bed, gently tucking her fiery red hair behind her hair.

She didn't reply to him. Her face was drained of colour. Her face seemed drained of vitality. Even her normally sparkling eyes were dulled, her hair even seemed to lack its usual spark even if the colour was still the same.

She turned away from them and mumbled something unintelligible into her pillow.

"You go Remus, find James, tell him I'm off for the rest of the summer, pack my stuff and bring it here, I think Flower needs a break, she needs her friends" Sirius said as he stroked Lily's hair.

Remus left without a blink. Leaving the other two alone, in silence.

"You won't find what you're looking for James" Remus said calmly as James desperately rooted through Sirius's belongings, "He is going to be carrying that letter on him for a while now."

"What? Why?" James asked frantically, "He's got to see me sometime soon!"

"No he doesn't actually, he's going on holiday, said something about not wanting to impose on you for too long and Evans offered him a place to stay, she's off travelling in her camper van seeing as she can drive. I think they said something about France." Remus reeled this off in an almost bored tone but there was a steely note in his voice James was confused by.

Bewildered he stared around the room.

"But-but they-he'll come back before school starts yes? Won't he?" he looked at Remus imploringly.

"No", Remus stated casually, seemingly he had had enough of their conversation, "I'm taking his and my stuff to Lily's. Then we are going to accompany her to her sister's wedding that she has been dreading all summer. Then we are leaving with her and Amelia. That's all you need to know. There's no full moon."

James looked gobsmacked at what one of his best friend's had said to him. He wasn't invited. Nor was Peter though, but they were going away with Evans. Evans. He wanted to go away with Evans.

But he couldn't.

"Have fun with Marlene, James, but maybe you need to rethink your priorities. Goodbye." Just like that Remus left. No backwards glance nothing.

And James just stood there staring after his friend wondering just how quickly the news of his new relationship had travelled. Why were all his friends so affected when they all found out?