The rest of the summer passed in a daze of happiness that Remus Lupin would later remember fondly as some of the best times of his life. He spent as much time as he could manage playing house with Ophelia in her little London flat. They passed their days exploring the city, practising magic, reading books and eating sundaes at Florean Fortescue's ice cream shop in Diagon Alley. Their nights, on the other hand, were spent indoors, exploring their newly-found physical relationship. The other Marauders visited weekly, and every once in a while Lily, Marlene, and Alice would come over for a night of gossip and manicures. When Ophelia's 17th birthday came around, Remus took her out for an extravagantly cheesy date: a picnic under the stars accompanied by a string quartet playing all of Ophelia's favourite songs. In all, the summer between their sixth and seventh year at Hogwarts was closer to perfection than either Ophelia or Remus had imagined.
Of course, the two had little rows from time to time. A few weeks into July, they had a spat about the proper way to make a bed. Once, they argued because Remus couldn't find his left shoe, and he was certain that Ophelia had moved it somewhere while cleaning until he found that it had been kicked under the bed at some point. These arguments did nothing to diminish their relationship, however. In fact, every time Ophelia reminded Remus to wash the dishes or to sweep the floor, he took their relationship more and more seriously.
Lord Voldemort, on the other hand, was not having such a happy-go-lucky, carefree summer. When his admittedly foolish scheme to kidnap Ophelia from Hogsmeade failed, Voldemort resorted to what should have been his original plan: take Ophelia once she was out of school for the summer and far away from Dumbledore's protective gaze. All he would have to do is go to her home, make sure she was alone, break in, and take her.
The trouble was, Voldemort couldn't seem to pinpoint exactly where Ophelia's home was.
He had good information directly from Bellatrix Black, Hogwarts spy extraordinaire, that Ophelia had been overheard inviting her friends to visit her flat in London over the summer. When he heard this, Voldemort immediately set his top Death Eaters to work on scouting out every flat within 20 km of the city, while he worked on determining which protective spells and charms Dumbledore might have put in place.
But the end of June approached quickly, and Voldemort, still without any solid information on where in London the girl would be living, sent a Death Eater to tail her out of King's Cross when she got off the Hogwarts Express at the end of term. The unfortunate Death Eater lost sight of her, however, when, in his haste to perform his task well, he tripped over a small muggle child and had to endure being angrily berated by the child's mother until a King's Cross employee told the woman to settle down.
Thus, Voldemort spent the hot summer days poring over a map of London and going through stacks of records he'd had stolen. With each passing day he grew more and more frustrated. As August drew to a close, it became a common occurrence to hear the crunching sound of furniture being violently destroyed wherever he was working. Soon enough, it was September 1 and Voldemort had gotten no closer to finding Ophelia than he had to winning the muggle Miss Universe Pageant.
…
Ophelia White looked around sadly as she shut her trunk (which was stuffed to the brim with her belongings). It was September 1, which meant back to Hogwarts for her and the Marauders. She had had such a wonderful summer in her flat that she was having a hard time leaving it. But at the same time she was thrilled to get back to school.
She took a cab to King's Cross and hurried through the barrier between platforms nine and ten, pushing her trunk and her owl's cage in front of her. She stood on her toes for a moment, searching –
Suddenly, she was knocked to the ground due to the most forceful group hug she had ever had the misfortune to experience. Ophelia disentangled herself from James and Sirius and climbed to her feet again, laughing.
"It's good to see you too guys, but you know it's only been three days, right?" she said as she pulled Sirius to his feet.
James jumped up, saying, "Yeah, but three days is just too long, Ophelia. Really, we can't handle it."
"Apparently." Ophelia smiled, then spotted Remus making his way over, followed by his and James' parents. "Hey, Rem!"
Remus gave her a quick kiss before Mrs. Potter said, "You've only got a few minutes, you all better get on the train!"
The boys and Ophelia quickly found an empty compartment to dump their belongings in before jumping back down to the platform to say a quick goodbye to the Potters and the Lupins.
"See you, Mum, Dad." Remus hugged both his parents while Mrs. Potter was being assured by James and Sirius that they would indeed be on their best behaviour while at school.
Ophelia was standing awkwardly next to the group, unsure of what exactly she should be doing, when Mr. Lupin stepped closer and said in a low voice, "I just want to say thanks, from me and Mary both. I've never seen Remus this happy, honestly."
Ophelia grinned widely, a warm feeling spreading through her, but they were all ushered onto the train before she could respond.
Not long after pulling away from King's Cross, Peter came through the door to their compartment, whining that he hadn't been able to find them on the platform, but the other Marauders and Ophelia were already too busy talking and joking to pay Peter much attention. He sat without speaking much the entire journey.
When they arrived at Hogwarts, everyone poured through the oak front doors hurried towards the feast that the Great Hall promised. As she took a place at the Gryffindor table, she heard a loud squeal.
"Sirius! It's been ages, how've you been? Did you get my letters? I sent probably a hundred of them," Marlene said breathlessly, as she, Lily, and Alice joined the Marauders and Ophelia. Marlene's eyes were wide and full of admiration as she stared at Sirius for the first time in two months.
"Er – you know, I –"
Sirius was interrupted by Dumbledore, who stood up at that moment, gave his usual short speech, and insisted they all eat until they couldn't eat anymore. The Headmaster's eyes sought out Ophelia and gave her a quick nod when she looked up.
The start-of-term feast was brilliant as always. The students dragged themselves to their dormitories, sleepy and full of excellent food.
Ophelia undressed, pulled the hangings around her bed, did her usual Silencing Charm, and fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. But mere hours later, she was awake again, sobbing loudly. Her nightmares had become more and more frequent over the summer.
Wiping her eyes, Ophelia took several deep breaths to regain her composure. She decided quickly to go to Remus' dormitory. Over the summer, she had always felt better with him around when she woke up from her nightmares.
She slipped out of bed, pulled her dressing gown on, and tiptoed to the door without noticing that Lily's bed was also empty.
At the top of the stairs leading down into the common room, Ophelia paused. She could hear a pair of voices, talking and laughing. She took a few steps down and peered down.
James Potter and Lily Evans were sitting close together next to the fireplace, their voices hushed. Ophelia couldn't help noticing that they were holding hands.
And just as Ophelia was about to turn away and head back up the stairs, James leaned towards Lily and kissed her. And Lily kissed him right back.
Ophelia felt a surge of joy and wanted to rush down there, hug her two friends, and say, "I told you so!" as many times as she could before Lily hexed her. Instead, she went back to bed as quietly as she could, a huge grin plastered on her face, and her nightmare entirely forgotten.
