Chapter 14- Take a chance
When I got back to my dorm I saw Sirius sitting on his bed, looking bummed. He hardly ever got like that; he was the most easygoing person I'd ever known, and hardly let anything get him down.
"Hey, Padfoot, what happened?" I asked. He looked up at me suddenly and cocked his head to the side.
"My sister had a boy. He was still born." He said slowly. Jesus. Well no wonder...
"Annie? Is she ok?"
"Yea, she's just pretty upset."
"How are you doing?"
"Not that great. I just wanted to be the cool uncle, you know, the one he could go to when his parents are angry for all the pranks I'd teach him to pull. Now that can't happen." He said in a dejected sort of way.
"Trust me; you are going to be a great uncle when the time finally comes. I'd want you to be my son's uncle if you could."
"Yea, I'll settle for god father, though." He said with a smile.
"He is going to be the biggest trouble maker Hogwarts has ever seen."
"Well let's go make some trouble; we don't want to make it too easy for him."
"Of course not." I said with a laugh.
"Slytherins?" he asked. I nodded and he grabbed the Marauder's Map while I took my Invisibility Cloak out of my trunk. We had all put false bottoms in our trunks to conceal anything that wasn't allowed in school and put undetectable charms on them so no one could find them unless they knew about it. It was a pretty fool-proof plan.
We got under the cloak and snuck down to the dungeons.
"So, Prongs, what's up with you and Lily?"
"I have no idea where we are. This is more complicated than I would have thought."
"Well I think you're doing a pretty good job. Lily likes you."
"What?" I practically shouted. What was he talking about? He probably heard this from Rita Skeeter or one of her other gossiping friends. If she really did like me then why did she kiss Sean?
"Err-alright. Why are you so surprised about this?"
"I erm-kinda like her, and then I kissed her out by the lake and it was really good. Three hours later I saw her kissing Sean Wood. Then I talked to Chastity and I found out some things about Lily and I don't know what I'm doing."
"You like her? Jesus, James. That is one screwed up relationship, but that explains why Chastity was telling Lily to apologize to you."
"Huh?" I asked. What is he talking about?
"Hold on, I recorded this cause I wanted to let you know." He said and used the spell we'd invented to record conversations and play them back.
"Lil, you have to apologize to James!" I heard Chastity's voice say.
"I can't. No, I don't want to. What's the point?" Lily's voice answered.
"The point? The point is that you should apologize to him so you don't feel so guilty and maybe..." but Lily's voice cut her off.
"Maybe what? He'll forgive me? I'm not even sure I want him to forgive me."
"Why not?"
"Why not? Because. Because I really do like him; I like him so much it drives me crazy and I don't know what to do with myself. I can't even stop thinking about him. It's so hard for me, and it scares me, Chastity; I don't want to be hurt. If I tell him how I feel I'm scared he'll feel the exact opposite."
"You're hurt right now though, aren't you? You're hurting yourself."
"But..."
"I'm not done. If he didn't like you at all then why does he spend time with you? Why did he kiss you and why would he care so much that you were crying? Can you honestly tell me he doesn't like you? James is a great guy, Lil, and you have to take a chance if you want to be with him."
"Then Chastity walked out. That's all, James. James?" he asked. I was just standing there, shocked.
"I really do like her, Padfoot. A lot, actually, and I don't know what to do about it."
"If you think it is worth it then make your move. You've got to like her a lot if she's worth all that. If she is you just have to tell her, and I'm sure Remus will understand. Worried for you, sure, but he'll still understand if you explain it to him."
What was I supposed to do? I liked Lily, really liked her, but that wasn't supposed to happen. I couldn't just let her get away with what she did to Remus, and she could do the same to me. Still, I really liked her. Then what was Remus going to say about it? I had to listen to what he said about it. I kept going back and forth in my mind the whole time we were pulling pranks on the Slytherins. One thing kept coming back to me though. "You have to take a chance"
