A/N: This chapter is being put out so fast because of Shinra Izu, an awesome reviewer! Thank you for your support!
Warning: This scene does get a little graphic towards the end, I'm going to have to upgrade the rating to M in the future for the story but I don't think it is quite there yet. Thank you!
Chapter Six
It was Saturday and yesterday had marked my second full week's worth of classes. It was surprisingly easy to get into the swing of things at Hogwarts and I found the time flying by as I went through the motions of my routine. Every morning I woke up first and got ready for school, then I would head down to the common room to meet Lily, who would either be waiting for me or would appear within five minutes. The two of us would go down to the Great Hall and talk over breakfast about various things, then we would pass the copy of The Daily Prophet that she got between the two of us. Usually, the boys would show up not long after and James would inevitably do something to get on Lily's nerves, which resulted in us leaving early for class and me shooting James an apologetic look on our way out.
Classes were fascinating and I was excelling at them, except Potions which I was okay at (It really helped having Lily as a partner) and of course Transfiguration. I was disappointed at how bad I really was at Transfiguration, I had thought more than once about trying to become an animagus for a multitude of reasons but now I was more scared than eager. I read quite a few books on it and they mostly detailed how exactly the transformation can go wrong than what it really entails - I wanted to ask one of the Marauder's how they had done it, but of course that would mean spilling the beans about Remus being a werewolf. Which was it's own problem, by the way, because the Full Moon was coming up and Remus had been acting just a little bit dodgy. How soon was too soon to 'figure it out', I wonder? I needed to find out if there was another way to identify a werewolf with like an artifact or something so I could blame it on that and then inform him I didn't have a problem with it. I'm pretty sure it would ease everyone's mind. Anyway, Defence was going amazingly - Dumbledore was a brilliant teacher and I felt lucky that we had him as a resource. The man was absolutely brilliant, a tad eccentric, and more helpful than not. We had been dueling a lot in class and I wondered to myself if he was preparing us for the war that was brewing outside of the castle walls.
Anyway, back to my point, it was Saturday. Last Saturday, that had meant I got up, stretched, went for a run by the lake, and then took a nap under a beechwood tree until it was time for Breakfast, where Lily would be waiting for me. Then, I would go upstairs and shower plus change. This Saturday, however, I was being woken up at a god awful time in the morning to do something I really wasn't sure I wanted to do.
"James, I'm not sure I even want to do this." I grumbled, my voice still a little hoarse from sleep. "And why in Merlin's name did you make try outs start so early?"
"So I could find out who was serious or not." James said impatiently for the third time that morning as she basically pushed me down the dormitory stairs.
"I'm the only Sirius here, mate, you know that." Sirius said jokingly, causing me to laugh which was interrupted by a yawn and James to groan at the overused pun.
"One day, you'll stop using that." James said over his shoulder, and more than half of my sleep addled brain thought that was wishful thinking on his part. That was when he basically shouted in my ear. "As for you, of course you want to do this. It's Quidditch!"
"Why are you so loud and cheerful?" I whined, fighting the urge to dig my heels in and make him stop shoving me to go faster. "It's not natural."
"Quidditch, Jasper. Quidditch." James said in lieu of actually answering, making me think that word was running through his brain on repeat like some kind of sick, demented mantra. "Besides, you're one to talk - you get up at six forty five every morning to get ready."
"Yes, I do." I said, pretending to check my imaginary watch. "Which means I have another forty five minutes of sleep that YOU stole from me."
"You're really dramatic in the mornings." Sirius commented, easily dodging the fist I swung towards him. "And violent."
"I hope you catch a bludger to the head and no girl wants to make out with you for months." I half mumbled, half said at a normal tone of voice - which was equivalent to yelling at this time of day as far as I was concerned.
"Now that is just cruel." Sirius said, walking in front of me now. He had on his quidditch uniform but without the outer robe, and I opened my half-lidded eyes a little more now because wow, his arse in those pants was great. I mean, he really filled them out. It made me wish he could wear the quidditch uniform all the time - and in bed, preferably with me. Actually, I'd prefer him naked. Wow, I was feeling rather lewd this morning. I should probably sexually objectifying my potential future teammates anyway, so I shook those thoughts from my head and just focused on putting one foot in front of the other after swatting James away from my back.
I livened up a little during breakfast, eating eggs and drinking coffee (which they thankfully had as an option. I wasn't the biggest tea drinker in the world, it was just water or coffee. The old Jasper had only drank water, so it had taken awhile to get these tastebuds to forcibly cooperate, but I had trained them well because the cup of roast I was drinking now was VERY satisfying.)
"Here, you need bacon to get protein - we need you at top performance today." James said, about to stick bacon on my plate before I grabbed his hand and gave him a weird look.
"Okay, I'm here and I am mildly awake - I've accepted I am going to be trying out." I said patiently, staring him down. "I draw the line, however, at you mothering me. Besides, I don't eat bacon."
"You don't eat bacon?" Sirius asked, gobsmacked and then hitting James' hand away as he tried to sneak another piece of toast onto Sirius' plate.
"I don't eat any pork." I told them, ignoring the incredulous looks on their faces.
"Why the hell not?" James spluttered, seeming outraged. I gave him another strange look; I'm not sure if it was Quidditch or Saturday's, but he was being weird today.
"Pigs are scavengers by nature, which means that they will eat almost anything, including rotten food, faeces, urine, carcasses, and even cancerous growths." I explained, internally laughing at the disgusted looks they were sporting. "Unfortunately, their digestive systems are incapable of effectively removing these accumulated toxins from their bodies, because a pig will digest its food entirely in about four hours. This is simply not long enough to remove the excess toxins that were ingested, which means these toxins are then stored directly in the pig's fat cells and organs. Ergo, I don't eat pork because it's disgusting."
"Well that's more than I ever wanted to know." James said cheerfully, snickering a little as I saw Sirius put the bacon he had been about to eat back onto the serving platter.
"You asked." I said, shrugging
"Don't ever say the word feces while I'm eating again." Sirius said, only half joking. I nodded in acquiescence of his request. I finished my eggs and then James was rushing us down to the pitch, even though tryouts didn't officially start for another fifteen minutes after we arrived. The captain was supposed to always be early, apparently. James also informed me that the Captain should always be the first person on the field, and the last person off of it.
"Are these actual rules he's like written down or does he just make them up as he goes along?" I asked Sirius as James ranted about how the Captain should know how to play every position.
"Do you really want to know the answer to the question?" Sirius asked in a conspiratorial whisper, making me laugh which resulted in James glaring at both of us. It wasn't long before there was a pretty decent sized crowd standing on the field, of which a third James made go sit in the stands because they were just spectators.
"Okay, so thank you all for coming." James began his speech after clearing his throat to get everyone's attention. "As I'm sure you all know, I'm James Potter, Chaser and Sixth Year. I'm the Captain for this year and as you are all aware, we lost a decent amount of good players last year. So, I know that I am returning, Sirius is a returning player, and Mary McDonald is one of our returning chasers. That leaves us needing a keeper, a seeker, a beater, and one more chaser. Now, I would like all of you to get in line depending on what position you are trying out for after you have flown three laps around the pitch as fast as you can without killing yourselves. You may start.. Now."
Getting us to start by a few rounds of the pitch was a good idea, because about a quarter of the remaining people could barely fly a straight line. It was honestly a little embarrassing. There were two second year boys who had crashed into one of the towers of stands, a group of three girls who wouldn't stop giggling long enough to properly do anything, and finally one boy wouldn't even get off the ground because he was afraid of heights. That left us with seventeen people with whom James could pick from that were standing casually in front of our 'fearless leader'.
"Seriously, who trys out for Quidditch and is afraid of heights?" I heard James asking Sirius, obviously frustrated, while the latter seemed to be catching his breath after laughing hard for an extended period of time. I cleared my throat pointedly, catching both of their attention, and James quickly got serious again.
"Okay, Chasers will come with Mary and I. Beaters, with Sirius. Keepers and Seekers, you go stand on the side of the field." James ordered, causing a flurry of action.
There were two people besides myself trying out for the seeker position. A dark haired girl who looked like a third year and had very thick eyebrows that actually looked really good on her, and a seventh year boy with orange hair and an unfortunate amount of freckles on his face. James made the Chasers pass the ball to him in Mary, going in a straight formation down the Quidditch pitch twice, and two of them were easily eliminated. That left five Chasers, four Keepers, three Beaters, and of course the three seekers (myself included).
The Keepers were then put into one of the goals and told to block as many shots as they could each. So, each Chaser got three attempts to score and then Mary and James tried as well. I figured whoever the Keeper was that consistently kept the most balls out of the goal would most likely selected, while the chaser would be a bit more complicated since they had to figure in speed, passing ability, communication, and ability to score when selecting them. They were pretty lucky that they only had to replace one Chaser, I could see it being a nightmare trying to train three new ones.
Sirius was meanwhile running the beaters through various exercises. I honestly wasn't paying that much attention to what exactly it was he was having them do because his forearms and arse were pretty distracting, but I knew it would be some kind of strength and aim testing, obviously. While I was waiting for the other positions to be tested, I figured I might as well stretch considering I had been yanked out of bed this morning without being given the chance too.
I started out with my arms - working from my hands all the way to my shoulder on each side, going through the numerous stretching exercises I knew. Next, I did my neck and my shoulders even more before working on my ankles, calves, and thighs. I let my mind wander, not really paying attention to my surroundings because of how habitually I did these stretches, and began to stretch my back. I ended the stretch by going into a backbend, holding it for about a minute, and then kicking over and sinking into the splits. It had taken months to be able to do the splits without it being terribly painful and so now I did it without any discomfort at all. I could imagine how painful it might look from the outside though.
"Dear sweet Merlin." I heard Sirius say, and figuring i wasn't directed at me, I ignored the comment until I heard the next part. "Guys are not supposed to bend that way."
"You mean you don't bend that way" I corrected him, standing up and shaking myself out. I felt a lot better now, more limber and ready for anything. I knew there was a good chance of me being in the line of fire at some point, if not many points, during the coming war and every advantage I had I could use - that was why I had started stretching in the first place. I don't know why it would come in handy or how, but better safe than sorry. "And you don't bend that way because you don't stretch."
"I'm not sure I WANT to bend that way." Sirius said, shaking his head at me from where he was standing next to Mary McDonald. I looked around the pitch and saw James shooting the quaffle at what must have been the last Keeper - which means the Seekers were going to be up soon. It was about time. I grabbed the school broom, which was apparently not nearly as bad as the ones described in the books because someone had made an anonymous donation and they had gotten a bunch of brand new ones recently. They weren't top of the line or anything amazing, but they flew straight and could keep up with pretty much the ones on the top of the market as far as speed goes. I reminded myself to check and see how much a really good broom was next time I had a chance because if I was careful with my money in the coming years, I should be able to buy a really good one and still be alright financially. I was justifying it by saying I might need to fly a broom during the war for some reason - you never know. It was a pretty weak line of reasoning as far as excuses go, but I wasn't going to dwell on it. I ignored Sirius' comment about my flexibility and walked out onto the pitch a little as I heard James call the Seekers over to where he had just landed. I was still within hearing distance when Mary commented to Sirius about it though, unfortunately, so my entire face heated up in a blush.
"You have to admit though, it does wonders for his arse - big and looks solid too." Mary said crudely, laughing as Sirius made an extremely weird noise. "Plus, flexibility never hurt anyone in the bedroom. You should see this book my mom has with all of these pos-"
"Alright, you guys are the last ones." James said cheerfully, thankfully cutting off whatever Mary was going to say next. I was never going to stretch in front of people again. "Now, it's pretty straight forward - I'm going to release nine snitches, three of them for every one of you. Whoever catches the most, wins."
"What if we all three catch three?" the third year girl with the thick eyebrows asked, sizing up both the red-haired freckle monster and myself.
"Then we do it again and again until someone catches more or you all fall from the sky, dying of exhaustion. We are going to give the snitches a thirty second head start and then you can begin." James said cheerfully
The sun was now mildly high in the sky, I estimated it was probably about nine by now. The three of us lined up and waited for James' signal for us to begin the chase. I had been tracking one of the snitches with my eyes the entire time, or had been trying too, until it suddenly vanished. Holy shit, those things were bloody fast. With a whistle ringing in our ears, the three of us kicked off the ground and the hunt was officially on. I dove towards the goal posts on the opposite side of the arena, eyes flitting around first the corners and then against all the stands to see if any of them were hiding there. I saw one near one of the posts and I shot off, speeding towards it as fast as I could and not daring to let the damn thing out of my sight. All things considered, for how small of a ball it was and how fast they were, it was an easy catch. I could hope they all went as well. I still wasn't sure if being on the team was a good idea, but my competitive nature wouldn't let me do worse than my best so I was going all out.
The next snitch that I saw was actually right behind the red-haired guy's back, seeming to almost shadow the oblivious guy, and he freaked out when I sped towards him. I remember him yelling something about knocking people out of the sky being against the rules, but I pulled my broom to the side at the last minute and snatched the golden ball from the sky. That was two. If I caught three more, I would win by default; I needed to catch at least two more. I wasn't sure how the other two were doing so I just tried to focus on finding the snitches and ignoring the other two people on the field as well as the cheering crowd of spectators - it seems that now that it was a reasonable hour, more people had showed up to watch the tryouts than I thought would honestly care.
I couldn't see the balls anywhere so I drifted higher in the sky, noticing the dark haired girl doing the same, and scanned the field. The other guy didn't seem to have a strategy at all because he was just flying listlessly around the field, head whipping left and right, and it honestly looked like he was looking faster than his mind would be able to process - which meant he was more likely to miss something. I took a deep breath, closing my eyes for just a second, and drew in a sharp breath when I realized something. I could feel magic; it was most likely because I was not used to it being in my body or the world around me, or at least this kind of magic, so I was able to feel it inside of people. Like Dumbledore's felt like a blanket, McGonagall felt like a calm lake, Sirius felt a bit like a storm, Lily was like a campfire, James was like lightning, and Remus was kind of like a river. It was hard to describe really but those were the best metaphors I could think to describe them. The snitches, however, kind of felt like James - like little balls of quick, fast lightning. I could feel one of them over by the Hufflepuff stands, so I shot over there hoping I was right. Briefly, I wondered if this counted as cheating, but shrugged it off when I realized that no one could actually prove it.
The snitch was almost at the very top, blending into one of the banners waving wildly in the air. I did a quick scan of the arena and was surprised when I saw that it was only myself and the third year still up in the air. Then I realized what that must mean - we each had four balls, so it would be impossible for the other guy to catch up at this point, so James had pulled the freckle monster from the match. I closed my eyes, scanning for that little blimp of energy, and reeled when I felt it by the Ravenclaw section. She was closer, so I casually started drifting that way, hoping it would stay there and I could at least get a head start on catching it. My plan was blown out of the water (sky?) when I saw the third year shoot off towards the Ravenclaw stands. She must have seen the snitch. I cursed and then shot off as well, lying as flat on my broom as I could, trying to gain as much speed as I possibly could get out of this broom. The wind was sharp and cold as high as I was, but it was blowing in my favor. I angled my broom down, beginning a very gradual decline in height. I was extraordinarily close when she got to the stands and whipped around them, the little ball of gold in front of her by a few feet. I flew like my life depended on it, coming up behind and slightly above her, surprisingly gaining ground on her. She had her hand outstretched, almost in her grasp, and that's when I decided to do something really stupid.
I locked the top portion of my feet around the broom, gripping as tight as I could, and held that position even as we both started to dive with the snitch. The ground was still plenty far away, I was almost directly on top of her, and she was literally inches away from grabbing the snitch, her gloved hand stretching as much as possible. That was when I turned upside down, dangling from my broom and holding on with my feet locked tightly around the thin piece of wood, which seemed a hell of a lot smaller with every millisecond, and snatched the winged, golden ball right as her fingers touched it. Ignoring the scream of frustration she let out, I delicately pulled myself back up on my broom just in time to stop myself from crashing into the Slytherin stand - well, crashing into it too hard. I still hit it hard enough to leave a dent and to throw me off balance, but I straightened my broom out and headed towards where James was standing. I could still hear the girl cursing up a storm, saying words no third year should probably even know let alone say in public, and she threw her gloves down onto the ground just as my feet touched. I gave her a sympathetic smile, told her good game, and she grudgingly replied. I knew she wasn't really mad at me, just the fact that she had lost by so close, so I walked towards where James was beaming at me.
"You aren't the best in the world, there is a lot to improve, but you are absolutely on the team." James said, beaming at me.
"You are one ballsy man, mate." Sirius said, ruffling my hair and clapping me on the shoulder. "I'm surprised you didn't die. Merlin, you should have seen her face when you nicked it right from under her nose - she was livid."
"Thanks." I said sheepishly, rubbing the back of my neck and completely aware of how his arm was still laying across my shoulder. Sirius Black was going to be the death of me, I swear that now.
James told everyone he would be posting the final results by Monday morning after breakfast, telling me and the dark haired girl - whose name I learned was Piper - that I was the starting Seeker and she was the reserve. The girl seemed happy enough that at least she made it on the team, admitted to me she thought it was a pretty great catch, and we all headed off of the field in a pretty good mood.
"We are going to win this year! I can feel it!" James said, lively and jovial with a spring in his step. "We have a lot of training to do, but we have a solid team even with the new recruits."
"Yeah, we are going to destroy the other teams." Sirius said, just as hyped as James was. There attitude was pretty infectious and I couldn't wipe the grin off of my face even if I had wanted too. When we left the stadium, I started to walk in the direction of the castle when James called me back.
"Oy, Tatham, where you going?" James called out loudly
"To take a shower?" I told him, phrasing it like a question. "I smell worse than the Giant Squid probably."
"Don't insult Bessy!" Sirius exclaimed, obviously joking - I hope.
"We are required to shower in the locker rooms so we don't transport mud into the castle." James told me, gesturing to the bag in my hands. "That is why we bring extra clothes like I told you."
"I don't have any soap." I said, hoping I didn't sound too nervous and wondering how the hell I was going to get out of doing this.
"You can borrow some of mine." Sirius replied, waving away the excuse.
"Uh, okay." I said, already feeling my face get a little more warm. Oh Merlin, what have I gotten myself into?
We walked into the locker room and when I asked where the other people who had tried out where, James told me they had showered after their practice and had come back to listen to when the results would be posted and to see the end of the Seeker game. I was going to ask who he was going to pick for the team, even though I wouldn't know who they were, and that was when Sirius and James both started taking off their clothes. I quickly turned around, facing a locker, and stripped my shirt off as well.
'You can do this.' I thought, controlling my breathing. 'Just don't look and don't think about Sirius or James being naked a few feet from where you are standing. You'll be fine.'
I stripped my pants off and heard James and Sirius both go towards where the showers must be, because a moment later I heard water come on in that direction. With my gut churning and my nerves all over the place, I walked over to where the sound was coming from and had to stop myself from sighing in relief. There were partitions separating the showers. Sure, they were really low and probably wouldn't cover much from the person standing next to you, but if I picked one far enough away that wouldn't be a problem. I visibly relaxed and slinked into the shower, closing my eyes and feeling my muscles relax as the warm water went down my back. It honestly felt so good I just stood there like that and probably would have continued to do so if it wasn't for the fact that I felt the stall door behind me open up and a small breeze made me break out in goosebumps.
"Uh, hello?" I squeaked, wincing a little at the unmanly sound I had just made. It wasn't my top priority though considering my arse was on display to someone and I didn't want to turn around in fear I would bone up. I heard something being set down on a shelf to my left and I glanced behind me, keeping the front of my body facing forward and blocked from view, and saw body wash on the built in shelf. I also caught a glimpse of the most delicious looking arse I had ever had the pleasure of seeing. Instantly, I felt the blood start rushing south and my dick began to harden.
"Brought you soap." Sirius said casually, although his voice sounded a little more hoarse than normal which was definitely not helping out with my situation at all.
"Thanks." I said gruffly, feeling awkward as can be and refusing to try and get a glimpse of any other part of Sirius - even though it wa extraordinarily tempting. I used the soap and washed myself quickly, turning the water to cold towards the end of the shower, and wrapping the towel around my waist. Thankfully, both Sirius and James had pants on when I walked into the locker section to grab my clothes and slip into them. I laid the soap down next to Sirius' bag and walked over to my locker, grabbing the underwear out and turning my back to my fellow Gryffindors before I let the towel fall down and quickly stepped into my underwear. As I was sliding my boxers up my legs, pretty much right when I was bent over, I heard a weird noise but when I turned around James was just giving a weird look to Sirius who was looking for something in his bag. Mentally shrugging off whatever it was, I finished getting dressed and headed up to the castle, ready to study a little bit before meeting up with Lily for lunch.
A/N: So, this was a fun chapter to write ;) I don't know why, but the story isn't saying it had been updated since May 2nd even though I have updated I think going on three times now since then.. I sent an email to Fanfiction support but they haven't gotten back to me. I would really love to see some more reviews and let me know what you liked, if there is anything in particular you want to see, and stuff like that. Thank you everyone so much for reading and I hope you enjoy!