Harry sat down in one of Arabella's oversized, abused armchairs. The upholstery was faded, worn, and ripped in several places. Her sitting room had still not completely recovered from her little temper tantrum, and it had been quite difficult for Harry to avoid stepping on the books, boxes, and other assorted items on the floor.

Sirius plopped down in the armchair next to Harry, and sighed as he propped his feet up in front of Arabella's roaring fire. "This beats that cave near Hogsmeade any day," he said, eyes laughing.

"So where's Buckbeak?" Harry asked as he tried to push a clump of his hair out of his eyes.

"Dumbledore handed him off to an old friend of his," Sirius explained as he watched his godson's fruitless attempt to rearrange his hair.

"Don't even bother. James tries everything to tame his hair, but nothing worked." Harry looked up into the mirthful face of Arabella. She handed him a mug as she continued. "Considering your hair is the same as his, you might as well give up."

Harry glumly sighed as he took a sip from the mug-hot chocolate. "if its any reassurance, James never had to worry about messing up his hair while he was playing Quidditch," Arabella said as she sat down on the ottoman near Sirius.

"Your hair on the other hand would have looked very nice if you didn't play Quidditch-or at least brushed it after a game," Remus said as he squeezed onto the other corner of the ottoman.

"People who love Quidditch pay no heed to such unimportant things like hair," she haughtily replied as she gave Remus more room.

"Talking about Quidditch," Sirius interrupted. "How ever did you get that old Silver Arrow to go so fast?"

"Oh-I put some charms on it, you know," she vaguely said.

"Isn't that illegal?" Remus innocently asked as he nudged her.

"Auror's privilege," she conceitedly replied.

"When was the last time you were on a broom?" Harry blurted out. "Because you were great out there flying!"

Arabella's face broke out into an ear-to-ear grin. "The summer after I graduated," she said proudly. "Your father and I always said that we were going to play professionally for whatever team would take the both of us."

"But fate had different plans," Remus softly said.

"Fate didn't play into it!" she humphed. "If it hadn't been for old Voldie and his little eaters I never would have become an Auror."

Sirius swirled his mug. "Yep-you had to go off and be all noble about fighting the greatest evil of all time."

"I was very naïve about it," Arabella admitted. "And look what it's given me-nothing but sorrow, troubles, and a life time dependency on my Pensieve."

"Why are you depend,"

Arabella cut off Harry question. "Because memories hold me back-especially the bad ones. I can get rid of all my memories by putting them in a Pensieve-make them duller, easy to manage."

Arabella's grimly chuckled at Harry's look of horror. "And without my wand, I'd rather kill myself than face a Dementor."

"You put all of your memories in your Pensieve?" Harry asked, dumbfounded.

"All of them-even the good ones. I can always go back to my Pensieve to remember the good times…or, learn from the bad ones." She motioned towards the door at the other end of the room.

"My Pensieve's in there. All of my memories are in it-even the ones of James and Lily."

Harry suddenly had the strongest yearning to look into Arabella's Pensieve, to watch the memories of his parents. Arabella's memories wouldn't be the same stomach-churning minutes that a Dementor's presence offered. To see them, learn of them-the thought was too much to bear. He ached to ask Arabella if he could, but he held his tongue. Such a question was rude, unthinkable.

"You can."

Harry snapped his head up, and looked into the understanding face of Arabella.

"I have no qualm about you looking into my Pensieve to see your parents."

Remus opened his mouth to softly reprimand her decision-but Arabella placed a hand on his shoulder, and gave him a reassuring look.

Harry swallowed hard. "Really?" he asked, hope in his voice.

Arabella looked at him, something deep and unfathomable in her eyes. "Of course. You deserve to know about all of the crazy things those two did in school.

"But Harry." Gentle concern entered Arabella's voice. "All the memories in the world can't bring them back. I'm giving you this chance so then you can know them. You realize this, Harry-don't you?"

Harry nodded his agreement. Arabella reached over to place her hand on his shoulder.

But as her hand was in mid-air, her face suddenly contorted in surprise and pain. She fell to her knees, cradling her arm.

"Ink!" Sirius and Remus exclaimed in fear as they fell next to their friend. "Ink, what happened?"

For a fleeting moment, Harry feared he had done something to hurt the Auror. But as she grumpily waved the two off, she got to her feet, and furiously rubbed her left forearm.

"I'm fine!" she crossly snapped as she rolled up her sleeve. "It was just…I haven't felt it in 15 years-I wasn't expecting it." On her forearm, was a mark of dark red and orange. Harry leaned forward to get a better look and was shocked by what he saw.

Tattooed on Arabella's arm, was a miniature version of Fawkes.

"So it starts tonight," she grimly said as she rolled her sleeve down. "It's official-tonight is the reinstatement of the Order of the Phoenix."

MUAHAHAHAHA!! CLIFFHANGER!!! GRIPE ALL YOU WANT!! IT"S MY STORY! ;-}

I'll get the next part out ASAP, and sorry for making you hate my guts FOREVER.

R/R!!

What do you think of the characters?

Would you kill me if Remus and Arabella were more than just friends?

Next installment~ enemies come together at last!