DECEMBER 10 SUNDAY
Way past one and feeling alright.
The work-in-project, The Map, lied on the dorm floor like a Twister mat. It was that big. Big and full of moving dots with names on them. They had worked on it all day, only taking breaks to admire it.
It even obeyed verbal commands.
"Mischief managed," said James.
The Map shrunk and rolled together into a blank scroll of A4 parchment. Looking at it, even in its blank state, made the chaps feel a bit... solemn.
"Ok who has the nicest handwriting?" Sirius asked.
"That would be me!" said James, whipping out a very fancy looking goose quill. "This is a fancy-writing quill. It makes writing look neat and fancy. Watch!"
He found some scrap paper and wrote: Arse Cheese. It looked so elegant and sophisticated.
"So write something on it!" said Sirius. "Write: Map of Hogwarts."
"Map of Hogwarts? This is not just a map of Hogwarts! This is so much more than a mere map of Hogwarts!"
" 'Not just a mere map of Hogwarts! A map of Hogwarts- and more!' "
"What about: Magic Map?"
"Lots of maps are called that."
" 'The ORIGINAL Magic Map!' "
Other suggestions included: More Than a Mere Magical Map of Hogwarts, Mysterious Map, Map of Marvels. None of them clicked, yet they found themselves stuck on the alliteration. Sirius summoned a dictionary and some liquorice allsorts.
"Ok stop me if you hear a word you like. Macabre. Macadam. Macaroni. Macaroon. Macaw-"
"Maybe skip the obviously useless ones?" James thought.
"Ok. Oh! Machiavellian! That goes in my mental maybe pile."
"Not in mine."
"Machinate: to plot with evil purpose. I like it! Machismo? We're macho!"
"You must be painting your nails with glitter testosterone!"
"You know it! Mad. Madcap. Made- because it was made, by us. Magic. Magisterial. Magnamininniminity. Magnesia. Magnificent! Magniloqueloquient. Majestic! Malapropism."
"What's that?"
"I think it's when you insert something in the wrong hole. Male. We are male."
"Male Map?"
"Maledictory. Malefactor."
"Our magnet is called The Malefactor's Magnet."
"Malevolent. Malpheasant. Malfeces. Malicious. Malign. Malodorous. Man- what we are going to be one day!"
"We are going to be a man?"
"Maniac. Manual. Manuscript. Many-sided. Map. Maraud. Marble. Mare's nest."
"This is going to take forever! I have gone word-dumb!"
"Marmoset."
James took the dictionary from Sirius.
It came to pass, that they had the radio on in the background. It came to pass, that Captain Meat-Hook's sound technician, Marauder Mike, had his own midnight show on Sundays.
That was Little Willy by The Sweet. You are listening to Marauder Mike's Midnight Music. The next request comes from James, Sirius, Remus and Peter They ask: Hey Mike, can you play Hot Love by T Rex? So here is Hot Love, by T Rex."
It came to pass, that the chaps squealed like hysterical Beatles fans. It had already been James's plan to close his eyes and see where his finger landed in the dictionary. When it landed on the word 'marauder' it sealed the deal.
"Everybody cool with Marauder's Map, then?"
Everyone were cool. James wrote it, and with the fancy goose quill it looked really good.
"We should sign it," said Sirius. "We should use those names we came up with!"
"Which ones?"
"What names did you come up with?" Remus asked.
"Um... Roger. Keith. Like, what would we name our kids."
"You want to use potential names for kids as signatures?"
"It's cockney rhyming slang."
"I remember that!" said Peter. "It was when we were down in the chamber of the magic circle and my tapeworm tried to come out."
"What were you doing in the chamber of the magic circle?" Remus asked.
"Are you serious?" Sirius asked. "We were activating the emergency network, don't you remember that?"
"Maybe it was when you were counting all that silver."
"We may have gotten lost down there one time before that, 'though."
"How did it go anyway?"
"Fine. Actually, now it's coming back to me. We were in the crystal balls cupboard because we wanted to see our futures and you said you refused to go in there."
"I meant, how did it go with the silver? You said you found all this pirate silver and you had to count it all. You must remember. You spent months counting all that silver. The revenant pirate kidnapped your cat and messaged you with newspaper letter cut-outs. You showed it to me and everything. I see you got Zeppelin back."
"Pinball. That's Zeppelin over there."
"Have you finished counting the silver now?"
"Yeah we've finished counting it now."
"How much was it?"
"It was a lot. That's why it took so long to count it."
"I can't even count to a hundred without skipping numbers," said James.
"How come you didn't just weigh all the coins, and divided it by the weight of one coin?" Remus asked.
"Mick. George. All rubbish names. For signatures I mean. Look there simply weren't big enough scales!"
"Barky," Sirius recalled. "Thorny."
Remus lit up. "Tree names!"
"Those were two but we actually had a lot more."
"Tree names! What a great idea! Because this is vegan parchment, made from free-range trees!"
"Those were our thoughts exactly. Tree names, because it's paper. But now we think trees are too mainstream."
"Shame. Beechy. Leafy. Twiggy."
"Twiggy is good." The turn came for Sirius to light up. "I just came up with the perfect tree name for you!"
"What is it?"
"Fir-y!"
Sirius laughed and Remus lost all interest.
"Maybe not tree names then."
"Why not?"
Because now James and Sirius really were keen on tree names!