FLAMES

Genre: Romance/Humor Pairings: Remus Lupin x Sirius Black, James Potter x Lily Evans Rating: R (for later chapters)

Okay, okay. for those who are clueless, 'FLAMES' is a game where you count the similar letters in the names of two people and count a forward and backward across the words 'FLAMES', crossing out the letters you land on.

By the way, sorry for the bad writing style, I'm a rookie at this fanfic stuff. ^^;; Gomen, gomen!!

Code: F - Friendship, L - Love, A - Admiration, M - Marriage, E - Engaged (yes, I know, it isn't really a noun, but 'engagement' sounds weird), S - Sweethearts!

Try playing it; it's fun.

Oh well, here's the fic. ^_^ Enjoy!

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Chapter One - Love

All the Gryffindors roared as James Potter, the Gryffindor seeker, caught the Golden Snitch in his hand, waving it at the audience. Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew, two of James' best friends, waved back, smiling.

Sirius Black jumped off his broom in an overly macho way and walked towards James with a very familiar smirk on his face.

"Good show, mate!" cheered Sirius, patting James on the back a little bit too hard. James winced and rubbed his back, muttering "thanks".

Sirius grinned; obviously the extra-hard pat was done on purpose, because he did it again, this time even harder.

"Bloody hell, Sirius!! Would you STOP that?!" said James angrily, though he had a slight grin on his face - Lily Evans had just winked at him, giving him a 'come here and gimme a hug' gesture.

Luckily, Sirius had noticed the distorted look on his friend's face and decided to leave him alone with his hot redhead girlfriend, when he thought he heard his name being called.

It was.

"Padfoot! Hey, Padfoot! Over here!!!"

He turned around to see Remus waving his arms in the air, looking like he was about to fall or something. Sirius smiled. 'Damn, he's cute.' were his first thoughts when he saw the young werewolf, but when he realized he was drifting off to Remus-wonderland, he put himself together and waved back at him.

"Wait a minute, I'm coming down, don't move, okay?" yelled Remus. Sirius nodded in reply, then smiled again. He was smiling a lot today. After dinner, most of the Gryffindors gathered in the Common Room to celebrate. Soon, there were mugs of Butterbeer everywhere and half of the first and second years were asleep on the floor. The third and fourth years had to wake them up, and soon everyone had retreated to the comfort of their beds.

The Marauders stayed behind, of course. They weren't sleepy at all - in fact, they were wide-awake. For a good ten minutes the room was silent, until James broke it with a single word.

"Flames."

"--What?" said the other three in unison.

"Flames! Let's play Flames. Anyone got an extra piece of parchment and a quill?"

Remus hurried off to the dormitory then reappeared with a parchment and quill.

The four gathered in a circle in front of the fire. "Okay, who should we try firs-", "Oh James, you know you don't have to ask that question. Too obvious." Sirius took the quill from James and started to write.

JAMES POTTER LILY EVANS

FLAMES

"All right. same letters. There's the E. And the."

JAMES POTTER LILY EVANS

FLAMES

"So, you've got four? Let's see."

FLAMES

"F, L, A, cross out M. E, S, F, cross out L. A, E, S, cross out F."

"Ooh, this is getting interesting." Said James, he knew he and Lily were meant to be.

"Shut up, James. A, E, S, cross out A. E, S, E, cross out S."

FLAMES

"ENGAGED!! We're ENGAGED!!" yelled James, bouncing up and down.

"Pete, would you please let Prongs calm down?? He'll wake the others." Said Remus, though in a playful way.

"Hmm. now whom should we match?" asked Sirius, his hand on his chin.

"I know, I know!!" said Peter, grabbing the quill from Sirius.

SIRIUS BLACK NARCISSA BLACK

"Wormy, you bloody git!! Give that back!! I will NOT let you match me up with my stupid bitch of a cousin!!"

Peter was rolling on the floor, laughing uncontrollably. James joined in. An hour passed, the Marauders were running out of ideas. Another ten minutes of silence. Guess who broke it?

"Idea!"

"What?"

"Idea!! I've got an idea!! Gimme that."

James started scribbling SIRIUS BLACK on the parchment.

"Me again, huh?" Sirius said, beaming with curiosity. "Who could the lucky gal be?"

Remus' eyes widened at the two names James had written on the parchment.

SIRIUS BLACK REMUS LUPIN

"Let's see what your fate shall be!!" said James, when Sirius tore up the parchment and started storming up the stairs, his face red with anger. or was it embarrassment?

"Good lord, Sirius, what is WRONG with you?!?"

"What's his problem?"

"Sirius."

Soon three of the Marauders were upstairs, probably sound asleep. Remus was left alone, staring blindly at the fireplace, lost in thought.

What could it have been.?

.surely Friendship.

.but.

...what if it isn't?

He took the remaining pieces of the parchment and started writing.

SIRIUS BLACK REMUS LUPIN

Cross out the similar letters.

SIRIUS BLACK REMUS LUPIN .Fifteen common letters. Let's see.

FLAMES

F, L, A, M, E, S, F, L, A, M, E, S, F, L, cross out A. F, L, M, E, S, F, L, M, E, S, F, L, M, E, cross out S. F, L, M, E, F, L, M, E, F, L, M, E, F, L, cross out M. F, L, E, F, L, E, F, L, E, F, L, E, F, L, cross out E. F, L, F, L, F, L, F, L, F, L, F, L, F, L, cross out. oh my God.

FLAMES

All the letters were crossed out except L. L. L meaning Love.

Remus crumpled the parchment and cleared it up. Was it true? Love? Could they actually.

"No. Never. Even if I could love Sirius, love Sirius with all my heart, which I've been hesitating to do ever since the beginning. Sirius could never love me. never."

It was then and there that he went up to the dormitory, into his bed, without dressing down, his thoughts more clouded than ever.

"Bloody. hell."

Sirius was holding up his parchment, staring at it and doing FLAMES several times just to see if he got it right.

"Love. Love. Love."

He shook his head and, instead of crumpling it up, folded up the parchment and tucked it into his Potions book.

"Remus. what would you say if you found out our names meant Love?"

He imagined Remus running away from him and refusing to talk to him ever again. "No, he can't find out. He WON'T find out. It's just a game, after all. Why bother?"

And with that relieving thought, Sirius closed his eyes and drifted off to dreamland.

TBC

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So? What do you think? ^^ Was it okay? Please review!! Or email me. I would really like to know if my writing style was okay, moreover correct. X_X

Email: sirius-black@mindless.com

Thank you!! ^__^ I will happily finish the fic if I get enough feedback. ^^ Oh well, I'll finish it even if I don't get any feedback. For the sake of Sirius and Remus! Woohoo!