Celebrean - Thanks so much for all the comments! I promise not to lie anymore .. Though, I still think my fics aren't very good XD.
Frodo1512 - Okay I wrote it for you! FF.net wouldn't let me post it sooner, so forgive me!
Author's Notes: I ended up retyping this whole chapter !!! I had it done on my other computer, but that computer is being repaired... so I decided to just retype it up. I think it turned out much better than the other version of chapter 18... heheh :D! Please comment/review/flame! Be my guest, tell me your life story if you want! I'll be sure to listen .;
Chapter 18: Unwanted Gibbous
"I swear, James. Granny Potter—?" sputtered Sirius, waving his hand away at the comment angrily, "I can't believe this…!"
A sly, wide grin appeared across James' haughty face as he looked at his good friend with great interest. Sirius' handsome face was half hidden beneath his dark black hair, and he looked back at James with a look of contempt and annoyance. Every single time that messy-haired boy showed some form of a sly grin, he knew for certain that he was either up to something or just really satisfied with himself. James' self-confidence was much more than Sirius could really stand.
"Well continue!" James exclaimed, playfully, acting like a young toddler, "What happened with Bellatrix?"
Sirius frowned at him, and massaged his head with both of his hands before trying to speak. James sat there before him, his eyes sparkling and looking innocently at Sirius. Unfortunately, that wondrous sparkle in his eyes soon left him as quickly as it had come when his buddy opened up his mouth to speak:
"Well—maybe one day I'll tell you." he said shortly, looking up immediately as if awaiting some sort of reaction.
The reaction came and it was exactly what Sirius had suspected his good buddy to do. James' mouth fell open; the suspense had literally been gnawing at his brain, and this was all Sirius was going to say to him?! He rumpled his hair and sighed deeply before protesting.
"Aw! Come on!" he cried, crawling on his knees toward Sirius' poster, "You can't keep it to yourself forever!"
Sirius smiled lightly and replied, "You're right. Maybe one day, Jamesie, maybe one day."
James tried to pry the information out of him, but absolutely nothing would work. After what seemed like an hour, he finally gave up after trying forty consecutive times to get Sirius to spill the news to him. In a desperate attempt, the boy even went as far as threatening to use Veritaserum on him while he was asleep to try and provoke him. Nothing worked. This was probably one out of three chances someone could ever see James give up on doing something. Sirius was just too much for the poor boy to handle.
Instead of fighting over nothing, Sirius suggested that he should probably start his essay before Remus and Peter came in. If the two of them barged in when Sirius wasn't doing his essay, they were quite sure that Remus would suspect them or get very suspicious. If Remus found out that they had read his letter, they were sure that he'd be extremely angry with them and possibly wouldn't want to hang around them any more. If that ever happened, James wouldn't be very surprised after all; they did read something that was very precious to him.
"Accio quill." Sirius muttered lazily, taking James' Astrological essay, and quickly skimmed through it, "Ha! You emphasized my constellation—!"
James felt slightly embarrassed, he had completely forgotten what constellation he had put the most emphasis on and he quickly interrupted him, "So—So what if I emphasized Sirius!? Don't let it get to your head, all right, mate?"
"I'm so touched, James." Sighed Sirius sarcastically, pretending to wipe a fake tear from his eye, "You're such a good friend!"
James didn't know what was cornier, Sirius' sarcastic reaction or his horrible acting. Either way, he decided that he was going to keep whatever the answer was to himself rather than share it. Sirius, on the other hand, chuckled to himself as he caught the quill he had summoned only moments before.
"Accio parchment." He muttered again, toss the quill beside him, "Hey James, this quick charm is really handy!" he mused, still reading.
The drawer, which happened to lie right next to Sirius' desk, shot open and an empty scroll of parchment floated out and towards them. Unfortunately, unlike the quill, the parchment didn't stay suspended in midair awaiting Sirius to grab it, rather the parchment seemed to be very impatient and immediately dropped onto his head with a loud thud.
James laughed at the sight of it all, how humiliating it must have been for Sirius. You would have thought that the handsome chap would have been angry about the whole thing; instead he looked up at James and grinned.
"It needs a little work though."
"Those kind of charms are for lazy gits, mate." James retorted handing him a bottle of ink.
Sirius quickly took the ink, the parchment, and the feather and set out all of the things in front of him. He pondered for a few seconds before dipping the tip of his quill into the small bottle of ink. It wouldn't be a good idea to just copy James' work word by word, that wouldn't be fair to James if he did that. It also would be more effective if he just translated it into his own words, it should be a cinch for the great and powerful Sirius Black…right?
The constaletion, Sirius, is relevant to—"You spelled that wrong." James told him, pointing it out from over his shoulder, "It's C-O-N-S-T-E-L-L-A-T-I-O-N."
Sirius felt his body twitch at his mistake, and feeling much more humiliated than he ever had been. He quickly erased the phrase with a quick charm, and continued as best he could trying to ignore the serious stare James was giving him from the back of his head. An hour passed and Sirius kept his patience with James, even when the sun had already begun to descend, and the sky began to grow dimmer. James' sudden interest in fixing grammatical errors was excruciatingly annoying for him; every small detail that he did wrong James would point it out the very second he wrote it down.
"That looks more like a period than a comma, you might want to fix that, mate." James informed.
Sirius shrugged his shoulders, turned to James, and responded, "I hate to be rude, but could you find something else to do…?"
"Like what—?"
At that moment, the door to their dormitory clicked open; both Remus and Peter stepped into the room. The two of them looked extremely pleased with themselves, it was most apparent to James and Sirius that they had a very nice time without them.
Peter waddled in first; he carefully placed his small brown handbag upon his bed and plopped down next to it. At the same time Remus also walked over to his small table and placed his things beside it, and that was when they realized something they had completely forgotten. James and Sirius held their breathes for a second, they had forgotten about Remus' letter. The letter lay right smack on the table for all to see, it was even half open. It took only seconds before Remus noticed it there, and he stared at it emotionlessly, he then calmly looked over at the two sitting on the poster.
Remus' face seemed rather weary, and the color of his skin was looked completely drain. It was absolutely amazing at how calm Remus seemed for there appeared to be a strange pain in his eyes. This pain seemed to seer through James and he gulped; he completely regretted reading the letter now. Sirius, on the other hand, tried the best he could to write his essay, ignoring the icy stare Remus was giving them.
"J-James you didn't happen to find this—?" Remus began, taking the letter into his hands and fingering it, "You didn't read it—did you?"
James, who seemed to be perspiring more than usual, rumpled the back of his head nervously. He then answered back in a sort of casual laugh: "Of course not!" he lied, patting Sirius on the back, "Sirius here, just found it lying on the ground."
Remus looked back at them curiously then smiled; James and Sirius were off the hook they were successful in hiding the truth. It wasn't a good thing to be proud of, but they had a fairly good reason as to why they shouldn't tell Remus what they had found out. The poor light brown haired boy would probably become sad and avoid them, and that was the last thing they'd want to happen.
"Thanks," replied Remus, the pain in his eyes vanishing.
Even though Remus' pain seemed to vanish, James felt a harsh pang in his heart from the reply, and he merely nodded back to him. He couldn't find any words to say to his good friend; Sirius had been right, they shouldn't have read the letter. They shouldn't have stepped into the world Remus Lupin's person life, it just wasn't right. It felt as though another burden was put upon his shoulders for him to carry, and it seemed like he was going to regret it for the rest of his life…
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The following morning seemed very calm, and James probably wouldn't have woken up if it not for the fact that Sirius Black were in existence in that room at the time. James who had been all snuggled up in his blanket, dreaming about who knows what, was abruptly awoken by an excruciatingly loud and excited voice:
"It's DONE!" Sirius exclaimed, lifting the parchment up to get a nicer look at it. Besides the fact that Sirius' hair and his face looked as perfect as it always did, the boy had rather large bags under his eyes.
James wasn't very surprised though, Sirius was still working on his essay when he closed his eyes and fell asleep. The Astrological Constellation essay was supposed to be a weeks long project, and Sirius had tried to do it in one night. Talk about procrastination! Sirius really didn't have a choice in the matter though, because it was Wednesday today and they had Astrology classes at midnight that night.
Professor Sinistra had told them about three weeks ago that the essay would be due that day and there would be a lovely surprise for all of them to see that very night if they handed in their essays.
"Here yah go, mate!" Sirius mumbled, stumbling over to James and handing him his essay, "Don't worry about me too much… just…tired."
"Serves you right though." Implored Remus, who had also most likely awoken from Sirius' sudden outburst, "I told you to finish it, didn't I?"
"You said no such thing!" growled Sirius, drooping his head onto James' shoulder, "Do we have to go to class…?"
James laughed and patted him on the head; he felt a tad bit sorry for Sirius. Without anything else to do they slowly got out of their beds and hurriedly changed into their uniforms; breakfast was probably already being served downstairs, and they were all quite desperate to get some sort of food into their empty stomachs.
Peter was the first to finish dressing and he waited for them by the door; his attire was very simple and he looked just like any other Gryffindor student at Hogwarts. Remus was delayed a bit for his hair had grown out a bit more than usual making him have to brush his hair even more precise to make it look neat. Peter and Remus, who were always the first to finish, began conversing over the upcoming classes to pass time as they waited for Sirius and James to finish up.
"Sirius, you having trouble?" Peter asked, looking at the droopy-eyed mess that was Sirius; the boy seemed to be having a very tough time getting his tie on properly.
"I'm fine! Fine! Just perfectly fine!" grumbled Sirius, redoing his tie for what seemed to be the fifth time. "Ruddy tie, there's something wrong with it."
It was very obvious to everyone that Sirius was in a particularly bad mood that morning considering the fact that he didn't get very much sleep. Even so, he was the next to finish dressing and he leaned against the door, closing his eyes hoping to get at least five minutes of sleep.
James was always the last person to finish up. The messy-haired boy would always get done dressing first, but he was always the last to finish. The delay was caused by his messy hair, his unfixable hair that would never stay down. Quick flattening charms didn't even have a single effect on his indestructible mess that he called his hair! He would try combing it down for hours, keeping everyone waiting.
"Bloody hell!" shouted James, still combing it.
"Give it up, mate. It'll never work; we even tried some muggle peanut-what's-it-paste, remember?" sighed Sirius exasperatedly, then turning to Remus and Peter he add, "And that method didn't turn out very well."
"Oh! Shut it." James muttered, tossed the comb aside and joining his friend at the doorway, "Genetics, don't you just hate them?"
The four of them quickly walked out of the door and toward the Great Hall for breakfast. Remus and James had to literally carry Sirius all over the place for the boy was much too exhausted to do anything much the less eat! Out of the three of them, they had to each take turns shoving food into his mouth; Sirius wasn't very pleased with it and kept bang his head on the table to keep them from suffocating him with food.
"You have to eat something!" James exclaimed nudging at Sirius, "People are staring…"
"I dun wanna…" he mumbled back, he voice trailing off as he hid his face with his hands.
They all shrugged. It didn't seem like Sirius was going to cheer up any time soon. Just when the mail began swooping in, Remus jerked forward all of a sudden as if he had remembered something
"Something wrong, Remus?"
"Huh? Oh, I just have this strange feeling that I forgot something important." He replied scratching his head. "Not quite sure what, though."
Peter who had just finished reading a letter from his mother looked up at Remus and replied innocently, "Oh, did you forget to look at my calendar? You usually ask me every morning so I left it out today for you to look at. Is that what you forgot?"
"That's right! I almost forgot—!" He exclaimed, but soon noticed the suspicious glances both James and Sirius were giving him, "Oh—you know, we have Astrology class tonight, I just wanted to know what moon would be out while we're gazing. We get extra point for Gryffindor if we answer correctly to Professor Sinistra, right? Um…I'll check it out later…"
"Hey that's a good idea…!" Sirius exclaimed groggily, lifting his head. "We should have done that, Jamesie."
Even though the alibi was quite accurate and Remus made a very good point, there was just something not right about it. James didn't know what it was, but he knew for certain that that was not the main reason why Remus wanted to look at Peter's Daily Moon Phase Calendar…
After breakfast, it was time for Charms Class with Professor Flitwick. Sirius slept through that class with ease; Remus who was forced to pair up with him regretted it very much. The lots of them were learning quick spells that could possibly come in handy, like the bubble-head and Alohamora charms.
James and Peter, who had teamed up together came out with very good marks at the end of class, but Sirius and Remus only barely made passing grades. Professor Flitwick apparently had pity on Remus for having a partner that didn't listen to directions and gave them some extra consideration points.
After Charms, Sirius was sound asleep. There was absolutely no way anyone could, would, or should wake him up. 1) When Sirius was asleep there no possible way of waking him, 2) He wouldn't even bother to care who was disturbing him, and 3) if one were to successfully wakes him up you'd have to answer to his horrible wrath.
"How are we going to move him?" sighed Peter looking at Remus and James with sudden curiosity and interest. "We're not going to drag him again, are we?"
"No, I have a better idea…" James chuckled, pulling out his wand, "Wingardium Leviosa!"
The instant he said this, Sirius was lifted in mid-air. Peter clapped his hands at the wondrous spell James had thought of and they were off to their next class, History of Magic with Professor Binns. Several of the passing students laughed at the sight of the sleeping boy floating in mid-air. Bellatrix, who was one of those who walked by, pretended as best she could to act like she had never seen them before in her entire life. Fortunately for Sirius, History of Magic was excruciatingly slow and almost everyone fell asleep during this class anyway so he got a whole class that he was able to sleep through without any disturbances.
Oddly enough, though, after History of Magic Sirius still hadn't woken up. He slept not only through break, but also slept into Herbology class. Unfortunately for him, though, Professor Sprout didn't let him have much sleep during her class. Kept shouting at him, she did, it was the only possible way to keep Sirius awake, or so say she. Even though that was a pretty accurate tip by Professor Sprout, shouting was the very last thing James wanted to do to Sirius.
Thankfully enough after Herbology was lunch, and by that time Sirius had finally caught up on his sleep. James, Remus, and Peter were quite thankful for this because they didn't want to have to shove food into his mouth like what they had to do during breakfast.
Everyone knew that Sirius had a very good reason to be awake. His reason for being wide-awake wasn't just because he caught on his sleep though; it was quite simple really, for there next class happened to be Potions. For some odd and unknown reason, the Potions class happened to always be a double class, and the Gryffindors were always paired the Slytherins. So why, exactly, does Sirius need to be awake for Double-Potions? Even Peter himself could find the answer to that question! It was—
"Snivellus." Scowled Sirius harshly, upon entering the drafty Potions Chamber, his eyes were fixed on the greasy black haired, hooked nosed boy walking in front of him. Peter's eyes glittered at the sound of Sirius' scowl; the small boy was probably thinking about what kind of jinx or hex Sirius was going to do on Snape.
"Keep it to a minimum." Implored Remus, furrowing his brows as he sat in a seat next to Peter.
The tables and seats were set up in pairs; in Potions, both Peter and Remus knew not to pair up with neither James nor Sirius for those two had a score to settle with Snape. Instead the two of them paired up with each other and sat behind them. As usual, the duo sat next to each other, obviously a table away from Snape and his partner who, today, happened to be Lucius Malfoy. Malfoy was supposed to be in his fourth year, but for some unknown and suspicious reason he was sitting in with the first years.
Every Potions class would literally be a war of the ingredients and who makes the best potions. Sirius was more serious about it than James; he just happened to be the back up just in case Sirius was "killed" in the line of fire. Snape was a very worthy victim—erm—opponent for Sirius because of his rather good potion brewing skills. Even so, Sirius seemed to win most of the time, but on occasions Snape got higher points leaving Sirius to be scarred and hurt for life.
"What potion!?" Sirius stammered at their poor Potion's teacher that had to deal with this kind of thing practically every other day.
"We'll be brewing Boils Cure Po—"
The Professor sighed and scratched his head when he realized that Sirius was no longer listening and had already started taking all the ingredients and setting them out in front of his cauldron. Remus shrugged, opened his Potions book (Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger) and began reading thoroughly about the Boils Cure Potion before doing anything. Peter, who had left his book up in the dormitory, cocked his head to have a better look at the ingredients on Remus' textbook before taking them out.
Sirius tossed James their book of Potions, and James immediately opened the book and murmured to Remus, "What page?"
"Four hundred and twenty-five. Seriously, you could've looked in the index—"
"We're not going to look at an index for something like that!" Sirius muttered waving his hand lazily.
Remus sighed, but Peter seemed rather impressed by Sirius and James; his small eyes were full of so much wonder and awe.
"Dried Nettles?" James asked, naming off the ingredient necessary for this potion.
"Check." Sirius answered back.
"Crushed snake fangs?"
"Got it."
"Stewed horned slugs?"
"Right here."
"And lastly, porcupine quills?"
"Uhh… I thought you brought those."
"Oh, you're right!" James exclaimed, pulling out a small bottle of long porcupine quills from his pocket, "I forgot all about 'em."
From Snape's table Remus heard Snape mutter under his breathe to his partner, "Stupid good for nothings, think they're better than everyone else…"
Sirius and James apparently hadn't heard Snape's insult for they were already putting their cauldron on the fire to heat. Remus turned to Peter who had apparently gone white with fright and he, for some reason, was silently whimpering to himself.
"Is something the matter, Peter?" he asked, looking at him with concern.
"I-I forgot to bring the slugs…" Peter cried out in a soft voice so only a few could hear him.
Remus sighed and patted Peter on the shoulder; without the horned slugs, the two of them couldn't possible leave the class with passing grades. Remus didn't yell at Peter like Sirius would most likely have done, rather he tried to comfort Peter as best he could; they could flunk once and a while, right? It wasn't that bad…
Sirius and James overheard their friends' predicament, and quickly came to their rescue. The two of them, who had finished brewing their potion, had a lot of extra horned slugs, and being really reliable friends, they were quick to help out.
"Hey, Peter," Sirius said smiling, "You didn't forget them, James was just holding them for you. Isn't that right, Remus?"
Remus blinked, but mutely nodded while James quickly set down a half-full bottle of horned slugs onto their table. Peter looked up at the bottle then to James and Sirius, and he immediately stopped whimpering. Remus smiled at his two good friends; as much as James and Sirius were girl-crazed and sort of arrogant, the two of them were really good people at heart. The both of them were very loyal, and Remus noticed it that very second they contributed. Peter wasn't as stupid as you would have thought, for he knew for sure that that was their bottle not his because of the fact that he never had horned slugs to begin with. Even so, he gratefully took the bottle and emptied it into their heated cauldron that Remus had taken off the fire.
Snape who had overheard the whole thing sneered at the thought of it all.
"Looking out for your wimpy friend, Black?" Snape scathed, "Or are you just looking out for him to save your own neck? Just like all the other people in your family."
Sirius froze and his face darkened. James knew by now that Sirius hated being a Black, and that remark clearly severed a mark deep within him. Sirius, personally, knew what Snape said was true about his family, but he wanted to believe that he wasn't like that; he didn't want to be like the rest of the heartless people in his family.
James glared harshly at Snape, for it was the only thing he could do at that moment, he had no clue what kind of bad mouthing he could possibly say right then and there. The remark was just so harsh that it left them to stare at him with the utmost revulsion.
Snape, as well as Malfoy, looked rather pleased with themselves, but even before anyone could do anything about it Remus boldly spoke out for them:
"Snivelly, as much as my friends loathe you, and how much you hate us. I must ask you to keep your greasy hair and you abnormally large nose out of ours, and other people's, businesses, thank you very much."
He said all this in one breath silencing everyone. James, Sirius, Peter, Snape, and Malfoy stared at Remus in awe and disbelief. That was the very first time they ever heard Remus badmouth anyone. Remus took no notice of their emotionless stares; rather he continued to work on his and Peter's Boils Cure Potion.
Not wanting to start any more trouble neither Snape nor Malfoy decided to say anything else during the rest of the class. Class ended shortly after and everyone filed out quickly to go about their own businesses before supper. Sirius and James had won once again and gained one point more than Snape and Malfoy had.
"Oh… what an achievement." Said Remus sarcastically as they walked through the corridor toward their usual hangout spot by the oak tree, "You got one point more than your enemy."
"Achievement, indeed! I'm so glad we beat him!" Sirius exclaimed, putting his arm around Remus, "Oh, and thanks for backing me up, Remie."
"Remie—? What are you playing at?" Remus frowned, "I'm not very proud of badmouthing Severus, it's just that I had about enough of his idiotic remarks."
"You're all so cool!" Peter shouted out, in wonder walking backwards while facing Remus, "I thought it was brilliant, what you did."
"You're just cool as us, Peter." James winked, rumpling his hair. He then turned to Sirius and stammered, "Would you quite with the nicknames, already? I've had about enough of Jamesie."
Sirius snickered, "Why should I? Jamesie, Remie, and Petie!"
The three of them stared at Sirius with disgusted faces; what kind of corny nicknames was Sirius trying to give them? They continued to walk and before they knew it the oak tree finally came into view; its leaves briskly swayed in the wind as a small gust of wind blew passed.
"I don't like Petie!" wailed Peter flailing his arms.
"Remie… is such a bad name." Remus added.
"Jamesie is a girl's name for Merlin's sakes!"
Sirius laughed at his three friends, rushed over the oak tree, and took his seat against the tree before responding, "But Jamesie—!"
"Stop!" snapped the three of them all at once.
Sirius frowned; he apparently got the message now. James, Remus, and Peter sat down victoriously, finally free of corny nicknames and they relaxed on the soft grass in front of the castle. As usual, James lay flat on his back staring up at the sky from behind his circular spectacles while Peter and Remus sat upright gazing around the Hogwarts' grounds.
There were several groups of people making their way through the corridors and walking about on the grass in front of them cheerfully. None of them seemed to pay any attention to the group of Magical Mischief-Makers relaxing under the cool shade of the oak tree. The students all seemed much too wrapped up in the things they were doing to really bother to look around at the scenery that stood in front of them.
The day had been quite eventful, and the four of them had many things on their minds that had to do with what had happened that day. As James continued to reflect on everything going through his mind, he took note of how wonderful the sky looked from down here; the elegant shades of blue began smearing together and a sudden shade of crimson began to spread across the sky as the sun began setting. With the sun dimming, the clouds slowly began to fade with it, and James caught glimpse of what appeared to be a small portion of the moon. It was apparently poking its round head out from behind the dissipating clouds.
"Hey look! I got the first glimpse of the moon!" James exclaimed pointing upward. Sirius glanced at James and smirked while Peter stared up at the moon his face in complete awe. Remus, on the other hand, didn't look up; he clutched his chest and shuddered. Perspiration was beginning to drip along his weary face to his shaking palms completely drenching his cloak. None of his friends seemed to notice; and Remus looked quite glad they hadn't yet.
"It's coming out!" James shouted, still looking up, "Wow, it looks like it's full!"
"F-full—?" Remus gasped looking around at his friends.
"No, not yet…" Peter mumbled staring, "It's close to it though…I think it's still a waxing gibbous! Maybe 93% to Full…"
Sirius grinned at Peter then looked back up at the sky, "You know your phases, don't you, 'lil Peter? Hm?" he finally noticed that Remus was shaking and breathing heavily, "You all right?"
"Me…? Fine!" Remus laughed, trying his best to fake a smile, "D-do you think it'll be full tonight, Peter?"
The yellow-haired boy turned to him curiously and shook his head, "I can't tell… Why do you wanna know?"
"Just—Just want to know what moon we'll be seeing tonight during Astronomy."
James finally sat up, he looked at Remus; he knew for certain now that he was up to something. Remus was just covering it up with Astronomy that night, why in the world would he be so interested in the moon…? There was something just not right about the situation. Remus, James thought to himself, why don't you just tell us…? What's bothering you?
"Uhh… I'll check the calendar, all right?" Remus huffed, wiping some sweat from his face, standing up and looking down at his two friends. "I'll be all right alone, don't worry about me! I'll meet you in the Great Hall."
With that said, Remus stood up and walked away from them. James felt as though he had lost the ability to talk; there was something holding him back. For some strange reason, he began to have a very horrible feeling of foreboding, like something was going to strange was about to happen that night at midnight. Something that was to change their normal mischievous little lives from that time forward…
:: The Rest to Come Soon! ::
Next Chapter: The Moon's Sorrow
The wheels on the bus go round and round, round and round
THE FRIGGEN WHEELS ON THE BUS ROUND AND ROUND ALL THROUGH THE TOWN!
The driver on the bus says move on back, move on back!
THE FRIGGEN DRIVER ON THE BUS SAYS MOVE ON BACK ALL THROUGH THE TOWN!
The author of this fic says review this fic, review this fic.
THE GIT AUTHOR OF THIS FIC SAYS REVIEW THIS FIC ALL THROUGH HER TOWN!
(Overly hyper... sorry... I was also severely beaten by my fellow towns people for screaming all over the town )