A big thank you to everyone who left reviews for the last three chapters! Enjoy!
A week or so after the boys ate dinner with Andromeda, the Mauraders once again have congregated at the Potters for a day of fun and mischief. James convinces Remus to "prank Floo" Lily, with some hilarious results… and a result that is somewhat surprising!
Disclaimer: All characters belong to J.K. Rowling, and no, I'm not making any money from this!
"No way, Prongs."
"Pllleeeeaaase, Moony?"
"NO, James, I won't do it!"
"Oh, come on! It'll be fun!"
"Ah, suuuure, soooo much fun for me to Floo Lily under the pretense of "discussing prefect things" so you can spy on her..."
"It's not spying! It will just be a simple conversation between two friends."
"That you get to watch without Lily knowing!"
"So, yeah, even by Marauder standards it's spying."
"Padfoot, Wormtail, I did NOT ask your opinions."
"This is ridiculous; I refuse to act like a fool for you. Besides, we don't even know if her house is connected to the Floo Network!"
James pulled out a thick leather bound book from his night stand and held it up. "Floo Network Directory. I already checked it out," He flipped the book open and turned over the pages, stopping at the E's. He pointed triumphantly at an entry that had been circled in ink. "'Evans, Lily. 151 Perkins Lane. Connection established 1972.' She must have had it installed the first summer back from Hogwarts."
Remus had an odd expression on his face that was something between disappointment and annoyance. "No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no! Back me up here, Sirius!"
Sirius shrugged. "I dunno, mate, summer's starting to get boring- we could do with a bit of fun don't you think?"
Remus looked back and forth between the two black haired boys. James looked at him, grinning wide, while Sirius merely leaned back on James' bed and put his hands up behind his head.
"Moony, I'm warning you… if you don't Floo her for me I'll put the Leg Locker curse on you for the rest of the summer!" He pulled his wand out of his back jeans pocket.
"Not if I put the Bat Bogey hex on you first!" Remus cried, whipping his own wand out.
The two friends eyed each other warily, neither totally willing to put a spell on the other.
Remus pulled back his wand. "Fine," he sighed. "I'll do it…"
"YAHOO!" James shouted, interrupting him.
"But only because it will prove once and for all that you don't hold anything that closely resembles her favor," Remus concluded his sentence forcefully.
"Oh, don't be so pessimistic, Moony!" James grabbed him around the shoulders with one arm and gave him a shake. "C'mon! Let's go downstairs and Floo her now!"
James grabbed his invisibility cloak off of a peg on the back of his bedroom door and pulled Remus downstairs to the Potter's family room, closely followed by Sirius and Peter. He draped the cloak over his shoulders after positioning Remus in front of the fireplace, thenmotioned for the other two boys to hide behind the couch.
"This is going to be a disaster; you know this, right, James?" Remus sighed as he knelt down to stick his head in the fireplace.
"Naw, it'll be great!" James thrust a jar containing the Potter's supply of Floo Powder at Remus. "Go on! Take some powder! Remember, it's 151 Perkins Lane."
"Sounds like he's memorized it," Peter snickered behind the couch.
"No comments from the peanut gallery!" Remus barked over his shoulder, he threw a meaningful look in the direction of the Floo Powder pot floating in midair. "That goes for you, too, Prongs! And put that jar down!"
The jar returned to its usual place on the mantle.
"Ok, everyone be quiet!" Remus reminded them one last time. He threw a handful of the powder into the fireplace and shouted, "151 Perkins Lane!"
A great non burning green flame engulfed Remus. He peered uncertainly into the scene that lay before his eyes. A tall girl was sitting on a bed directly opposite the fireplace. Her face was hidden by the cover of a very large book
"Lily?" Remus asked tentatively.
The girl looked up from her book. It was not Lily, but a girl with blonde hair and a long bony face. She took one look at Remus' head in the fireplace and screamed- throwing her book in the air and tearing from the room.
James could hear the scream, but was unable to see what Remus could. Sirius and Peter poked their heads up from behind the couch in curiosity.
"What's wrong!" James hissed.
"I think it was her sister… you know the Muggle one?" Remus said.
"Rotten luck!" Sirius laughed.
"See, James, I told you that this was a bad idea!" Remus made to stand up out of the fire, then paused. "Wait, I hear footsteps, someone's coming!"
Remus heard two sets of footsteps in the hallway outside of the room and a girl's voice speaking rapidly and hysterically.
"A FACE the fireplace, Lily! I was just reading on the bed and it appeared- just like that! I thought you weren't supposed to do magic outside of school! I'll tell Mum! It's just not decent to have these things happen in our house! AIIEEEEE- it's still there!"
The bony faced girl reappeared in Remus' line of sight, looking petrified and pointing at his floating head.
"Shush, Petunia! Get a grip!" Lily joined her sister's side and peered into the fireplace. Her face broke out into a smile. "Remus! How are you?" She turned to her sister. "It's ok, Petunia, he's a friend from school."
"Hi Lily," he responded, his eyes nervously on Petunia, who was slowly backing away from the fireplace, wringing her hands.
"He shouldn't be here!" Petunia said accusingly.
"Petunia, it's how wizards communicate, they don't have telephones," She pushed her sister gently towards the door. "Now just go and leave me alone if you are going to be discourteous."
Petunia let herself be pushed out into the hallway then turned around. "Oh and it's not discourteous for you freaks to go popping yourselves in and out of fireplaces, scaring normal people out of their minds?" Petunia said shrilly. Lily rolled her eyes and shut the door in her sister's face.
"Sorry, about that, Remus," Lily apologized, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "My sister doesn't like magic- it freaks her out."
"It's ok. I guess it would be disconcerting to see a head in your fireplace if you weren't used to it."
"Yeah, still, she doesn't have to be rude about it." Lily crossed her legs Indian style and leaned forward, her hands supporting her head and her elbows on her knees. "So, what's up?"
Remus just said what first popped into his head. "Er, well, nothing really, just enjoying the summer holiday. Kinda wanted to talk to you about…" he trailed off, suddenly losing his nerve and forgetting what he was planning on saying to her.
"Prefect things!" James whispered behind him.
"PREFECT THINGS! Yeah, that's it!" Remus said abruptly, and little too loudly.
Lily tilted her head and looked confused. "Prefect things?"
"Uh, yeah, prefect things… so, uh, who do you think will be the new Fifth Year Prefects this year?"
"Hadn't really thought about it, to be honest." She responded, still looking bewildered.
"Oh, well, er, yeah, me neither. Ah, so I was thinking maybe we could come up with some new disciplinary tactics…"
"Disciplinary tactics?" Lily interrupted, her confusion deepening.
Remus' face grew hot and he became more nervous. "Well, erm, yeah. I mean, new and more effective ways of keeping discipline and order in the common room and hallways…" He knew he sounded lame, but hoped maybe Lily did not notice.
Lily lifted an eyebrow and smirked slightly. "Ah, so you've finally come around to my idea of chaining James Potter and Sirius Black to their beds and letting them out only on supervised visits to their classes, eh?"
"OY! Not nice!" James shouted suddenly from under his invisibility cloak. Lily heard James' voice and saw Remus' look quickly to his right.
"What was that!" Lily asked standing up and walking right up to the fireplace. She bent down and tried to peer through the green flames.
"SHHH, you git!" Remus hissed in James direction. He turned back to Lily and tried to laugh. "Oh, it's nothing- just the… aaah… GHOUL! Yeah, that's right, just the family ghoul!"
"The family ghoul?" Lily asked, her auburn eyebrows crinkling and a look of incredulousness growing on her face.
"Oh yeah, the family ghoul, Bingo- he's a bit of a rascal and makes noise at the most inopportune times, sorry about that- he didn't scare you did he?"
"Quit talking about ghouls and talk about her, you prat!" James hissed, not so quietly.
"Who is that!" Lily asked forcefully.
"Bingo, you little dickens, quit trying to scare my friend Lily!" Remus shouted, trying to sound convincing, over his shoulder. Noises sounding suspiciously like unsuccessfully stifled laughter were coming from the direction of the Potter's couch and echoed through the green fire and into the bedroom where Lily was standing.
"What's that, the family leprechaun?" Lily said sarcastically.
Remus decided it was time to bail ship.
"Well, Lily, it was great talking to you! See you in September!" he said and quickly disappeared from the fireplace.
He backed out of the green fire, stood up in the Potter's family room and turned around.
"Way to go, Moony! You blew it!" James said accusingly, tearing off his invisibility cloak.
"ME? It was going fine until you started shouting!" Remus shot back.
"I wasn't shouting!" James yelled.
"Yes you were! You were making too much noise! She heard you!"
"The only thing she heard was you gibbering like an idiot!"
"I told you this wouldn't work, next time you want to prank Floo Lily leave me out of it! Better yet, why don't you work up the nerve to actually Floo her yourself!"
"He shouldn't bother, I won't answer back." A voice said from the fireplace.
James and Remus turned from shouting at each other and looked in the direction of the voice. Lily was picking herself up from the brick floor of the fireplace and dusting herself off. When she was standing upright the boys saw that her face was deep red to match her hair, and she looked furious.
James tried to put on a winning face. "Lily! How good to see you! What a pleasant supri-"
"Shut up, Potter!" Lily said, her voice full of anger.
"Lily… h-h-how did you get here?" Remus said rather pathetically.
"It's a simple spell- Returnus- it allows you to go to the fireplace that Flooed you last if you don't know the address. I'm surprised you don't know it." She looked back and forth between the two boys. "Well, well, we have Remus and his "family ghoul" standing here in front of me. And where there's a Remus and his ghoul there's usually two "leprechauns" as well…"
Lily looked around the room and her eyes fell upon the couch. Stepping around James, Remus and the coffee table she peered over the top of the couch to see Peter and Sirius still crouched behind it.
Peter smiled sheepishly. "Hi Lily!"
Lily sighed. "Hello, Peter." Sirius and Peter rose and came out from behind the couch.
"Who wants to tell me what is going on here?" Lily demanded, her hands on her hips.
Four voices started speaking at the same time.
"Well you see…"
"Err…"
"Before you get mad again…"
"We just wanted to say hi…"
Lily sighed again. "Enough," The four boys stopped talking. She turned to Remus.
"I'm really surprised at you, Remus. Prank Flooing? That kind of thing is funny when you're thirteen- not when you are an almost of age wizard."
"Well it was more like Floo spying- we weren't trying to prank you or anything- just spy on you," Peter piped up.
Sirius poked him. "Wormtail, shhh!"
Lily shook her head. "That's not any better! Seriously, Remus, I'd expect something stupid and immature like this out of Potter and Black, but not you."
"Hey! That's a little harsh, Evans!" James said, looking a little hurt.
Lily's green eyes focused on James. "Not really, Potter. If you wanted to talk to me you should have just Flooed yourself instead of making your mate do it for you… granted I probably wouldn't have wanted to talk to you anyway, but still…"
"Oh, come on, Evans! I'm a nice guy!" James exclaimed.
Lily snorted. "Oh, yeah, nice guy, sure. I've seen you and Sirius here always showboating around thinking you guys own the school, hexing whomever you want and teasing innocent bystanders."
"If you're talking about Snivelus as an innocent bystander you've got your wires crossed, Lily," Sirius jumped to his and James' defense.
Eager to avoid a confrontation about Severus Snape that would result in more shouting, and possibly a spell fight that might cause injuries, Remus interrupted.
"Okay, okay, enough about all that. Lily, I'm really sorry."
Lily smiled at him and removed her hands from her hips. "It's ok, Remus. I'm sorry I got so angry. Next time, just Floo when you want to chat- not because Potter talks you into it."
"Okay," Remus responded, grinning. He looked at James who was eyeing Lily hopefully, most likely wishing she would apologize to him as well. Remus suddenly had an idea.
"Do you want to stay for dinner?"
Lily looked surprised and for a moment it seemed like she might decline. But just as she was about to say no she had a change of heart.
"Sure, let me send an owl to my parents- but I don't think they will mind."
A/N: What do you know, I had another Maurader chapter in me after all! Well, now that I've written this one, I'll have to write at least another about how the dinner goes, what do you say?
