Chapter 37: The Order of the Phoenix
We hadn't spent much longer at the party, when a frantic looking James dragged me off to the outskirts of the party to discuss something 'extremely important'. I could hardly bare the look of disappointment on Addi's face as I excused myself from our dance. As it turned out, we had received an owl from Dumbledore calling for an emergency meeting of the Order of the Phoenix.
With much objection from James and Sirius, who were apparently at least on speaking terms at the moment, I returned to Addi once more, to tell her that we had to leave, and briefly explain what was going on. She said nothing, but nodded understandingly. I hurried off after Sirius, James and Lily quickly, before guilt caught up with me and forced me to turn back.
We quickly scrambled to the woods behind Clearglen school, from which we Apparated to Hogsmeade, as close as we could get to Hogwarts. A brisk jog from there led us back to our trusty old sanctuary inside the walls of the welcoming castle.
We were greeted at the large wooden door by McGonagall, who solemnly led us into the cavernous Great Hall. The room was lit by soft torchlight, illuminating the grim faces of a group of people who were gathered around a single house table. The low murmur of hushed voices was interrupted by a loud crack of thunder. The ceiling overhead was a troubling stormy gray. At the head of the table, I spotted Dumbledore, who, upon our entrance into the hall, stood to greet us.
"Welcome to the Order of the Phoenix," he announced rather grimly. We glanced around the table as several of the members greeted us. "Members, these are our four new—"
"Sorry I'm late!" Peter came rushing into the room, breathless.
"Excuse me, our five new recruits to the Order of the Phoenix. These are James Potter, Sirius Black , Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, and Lily Evans. Please sit." He motioned to several empty chairs at the far end of the table. We silently obeyed his command.
"Now, the five of you are here because you are the most capable young people in your year at Hogwarts. If you haven't guessed already the Order of the Phoenix is a league against Voldemort. We work to help break up Death Eater attacks, save lives, and our ultimate goal is to defeat Lord Voldemort himself. These people," he motioned to the others seated around him. "have been trained as aurors, spies, strategy planners, and dark arts specialists. You will be trained as well, and soon you will be helping us with attacks. You will be owled immediately at any time of emergency. That is why you were called here tonight. I'm sorry to report that a Muggle family was killed earlier this evening." I felt a sickness building in the pit of my stomach. So this was reality; this was what I had heard so much of, but never really known the danger. Certainly, facing Voldemort had been one of the most difficult things I had dealt with in my life, as had been losing a very close friend, Erin. But somehow I had still always felt sheltered. Now we were going to be the ones who stopped Voldemort from stealing innocent lives. I thought of that family. Had they been expecting their deaths? Did they have kids? Small children? Had they just been sitting down to a nice dinner when their lives were unexpectedly stolen from them? James and Sirius fully understood the cruel horrors of the work of Voldemort. Their parents had had their lives robbed from them in vain. But was there something more that none of us could understand? Had they understood why they were killed, while the rest of us were here with only guesses to the reason why? I settled myself in the chair, feeling as though I was right where I wanted to be. If there was a way to stop Voldemort, I wanted to be a part of it.
"Logically, our new members will need training," Dumbledore explained. "James, Sirius, the two of you will become aurors. Sirius, Frank Longbottom will be training you. James, Professor McGonagall will be your trainer. Lily and Remus, you will both be trained by Arthur Weasley as strategy planners, and Peter, you'll be trained by Victor Brown as a spy." Arthur Weasley waved to Lily and I from a few seats down the table. He was a friendly looking young man of mid-twenties with a mess of wavy red hair, wire rimmed glasses and lots of freckles. He looked awfully familiar, and I remembered a boy a few years below us at Hogwarts named Tom Weasley, and concluded that this must be his brother.
"Well, I believe we've got everything covered, so this meeting is adjourned," announced Dumbledore, standing. Others stood and abandoned the table, gathering in crowds around the Great Hall to hold discussions with their fellow Order of the Phoenix members. Lily and I met up with Arthur. He shook each of our hands and we introduced ourselves. We agreed that our first training session would occur the following Monday at ten o'clock at the Three Broomsticks. After the meeting, we returned to our flat to get some sleep.
The next morning, I volunteered to pick up Addi at King's Cross Station. She had taken the early train from Clearglen School to London. The others were busy doing some last minute improvements to the girls' flat before her arrival. Addi's train pulled up to the station right on time, but Addi was nowhere in sight. After a few moments of searching, I began to get the feeling that something might have been wrong. But I knew it wasn't time to panic, and in any case I didn't know what I should do. So, I wandered throughout the train station. Twenty minutes passed; soon nearly half an hour. Finally, seated on a bench, quite alone, face buried in her hands, I found Addi. I hurried to her side. She glanced up, her face pale and her tired eyes weary, with dark circles under them. My guess was she had spent half the night before awake crying, after all that had happened.
"Hi Addi." I tried my best to sound cheerful.
"Hi," she replied weakly, making no effort to stand.
"So, ready to go back to the flat?" I asked. She didn't answer.
"Addi?"
"I've got somewhere else to go," she responded quickly, her eyes transfixed on the ground.
"Somewhere else?" I questioned, surprised. "Why? Where?"
"What do you care?" she snapped. "Neither does anyone else." I was determined to stay calm.
"Of course I care." I sighed. "Could you at least tell me where you're going?"
"A friend," she answered. "They're picking me up later." She sobbed quietly. I took a seat on the bench next to her, hardly able to believe what I was hearing. Addi couldn't be leaving me; this couldn't be over.
"Why don't you want to come back and stay with us?" I asked cautiously.
"I don't want to be an interference to your lives!" she shouted, turning away and burying her face.
"How could you ever think that?" I asked quietly, feeling guilty about the night before.
"Well, you apparently want time on your own, my brother thinks he's dating my best friend, and James and Lily are perfectly happy in their own little lives! There doesn't seem to be a place for me in that!"
"Do you really have somewhere to go?" I asked, fearing that I might have to leave the train station without her.
"Oh, who am I kidding! I've got no one!" she cried desperately. "You, and Sirius and Mari, you are all I have! Why do you think I'm so concerned?"
"Everything will work out," I said calmly.
"You always say that! When, Remus? When is it all going to work out? Sirius is going to ruin Mari's life with his ways, and she won't do anything about it, and last night you told me you don't want us to be together now, and everything is so wrong!" I watched painfully as Addi burst into fresh tears. It hurt me so badly to see her upset that the pain stabbed through my heart like a knife. It was at that very moment that I realized how much she meant to me, how much I loved her more than anything. I pulled her into my arms without objection and told her how much I needed her and told her with all honesty that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her. She silently considered my words, and finally returned them, her mood brightening slightly.
On the way back to the flats, we talked about Sirius and Mari. Addi seemed to find Sirius completely at fault for what had happened between he and Mari the night before. I casually suggested that Mari had something to do with it as well. In my opinion, no matter how frustrated we all were with Sirius, we had no right to blame everything on him. He had been through a very rough time in the last few months, and the last thing he needed was an intrusive girl to torment his feelings. Addi didn't seem to agree, and I didn't argue.