Hallo!
I send love to you, my wonderful readers.
This chapter is set at Hogwarts in the Marauders Era and features my original character, Keegan Bridges. And also, be warned, it's slightly more disturbing than most. Hehehe.
"Damn," Peter cursed in frustration, poking the pair of shoes he was supposed to be transfiguring into a parakeet fruitlessly with his wand. "Why won't it just work?"
"Need help, Wormtail?" Remus asked lightly. A small parakeet was perched on his index finger. James was trying to shake his bird out of his mop of hair, and Sirius kept letting his parakeet fly away all over the room before lazily summoning it back to him. Peter was the only one in the class who was having no success.
"No, I can handle it!" Peter insisted. He muttered the incantation again, and once more, nothing happened. "I think it's defective," he said of the pair of shoes lying matter-of-factly on the table before him.
"Maybe you're defective," Remus suggested passively.
"Your face is defective!" Sirius said to no one in particular.
"Your mum is defective!" James said to Sirius.
"Actually, that's quite accurate," Sirius grinned.
"Well, obviously, she had you didn't she?" James joked. Sirius stuck his tongue out.
Suddenly, a resounding BANG issued from Peter's general direction. Sirius bellowed something profane at the top of his voice before toppling off of his chair. The startled class looked around, only to find that Peter had actually managed to turn himself into an oversized parakeet.
"Pettigrew, not again!" Professor McGonagall yelled, crossing the room swiftly and drawing her wand. "When will you learn, boy, to focus your powers?"
"Peter has powers?" Sirius teased from the floor, pretending to be shocked. "No bloody way!"
The gigantic parakeet gave a squawk of indignation.
"Five points from Gryffindor for your mouth, Black!" McGonagall declared before returning Peter to his original form.
As soon as the class was over, and Peter had been assigned extra homework, everyone bolted out of the room. Not only was this the last class of the week, but the Halloween feast was waiting for them in the Great Hall. James, Sirius, Remus, Peter, Lily, and Keegan made their way cheerfully down the corridor to the feast.
"That was quite possibly Wormtail's worst incident yet," Sirius remarked as they walked.
"I dunno…" countered James, "there was that time in our first year when he ate so many Chocolate Frogs on the Hogwarts Express that he projectile vomited all over the compartment."
"Thanks for that mental picture," Keegan said sarcastically, a look of disgust on her face. "Just what we need before dinner."
"Any time."
"Oh yeah!" said Sirius, suddenly remembering with a laugh. "And Madam Pomfrey had to cart him off to the hospital wing before he even got sorted!"
"Okay, that's enough," Peter muttered, turning red in the face.
"Or the time that he sleepwalked out of our dorm last year and woke up in bed with some seventh year boy in nothing but his knickers!" Sirius reminisced fondly. Everyone but Peter laughed.
"Stop, I'm serious!" Peter said, then immediately regretted it because he had said the forbidden word.
"WRONG!" Sirius bellowed. "I'm Sirius, you're Peter!" and with that he began to laugh so loudly that two first year boys lurking at the end of the hall scampered in alarm. Every time anyone said the word "serious" around Sirius, he had to use the same old joke, and then he laughed his arse off at himself for about a year.
"Dear God, Peter, now you've done it," Lily moaned as Sirius's peals of laughter gradually subsided to a low chuckle.
"Oh, it's all Peter's fault!" Peter whined.
"Pretty much, yeah," James concluded.
"Don't refer to yourself in the third person," Remus said, "it's creepy."
"Sirius refers to himself in the third person all the time!" Sirius said.
"I rest my case."
"OH!" James yelled, startling all of them. "You know what I just remembered? One time in third year, I walked into the dorm room and –"
"NO!" Peter screamed, grabbing James. "Don't!"
" – and Peter was in there – "
"You swore to secrecy!" Peter practically shrieked, hopping up and down and yanking on James's arm. "You SWORE!"
" - by himself – "
"DON'T!"
" – dancing stark naked in front of the mirror!"
There was a pause.
Silence fell over the group for a moment.
And then –
"AAAAAARRRRGGGGGHHHH!" Sirius, Remus, Lily, and Keegan shouted in unison.
"JAMES!" Peter yelled, now redder than two short red things.
"Disturbing mental pictures! Disturbing mental pictures!" Keegan muttered to herself, pacing around in circles and wringing her hands. "Find a happy place! Find a happy place!"
"Oh my GOD!" Lily screamed, clutching Keegan's arm for support, which only proceeded to throw off what little balance Keegan possessed and send them both tumbling to the floor.
"I am going to me scarred for life," Remus stated miserably, rubbing his temples, "and when I am, you two are paying for my therapy!" He closed his eyes and began to beat his head repeated against a nearby wall.
"My poor sensitive mind!" Sirius moaned, covering his eyes.
"Your mind may be poor," Remus said, momentarily turning away from the wall, "but I sincerely doubt it is sensitive."
"Thanks Moony, way to make me feel better."
"Are you okay?" James asked Lily as he helped her up off of the floor.
"I'm…" but she found her mind going blank as her took her hand to help her to her feet. She managed an indistinguishable murmur that sounded like "Flurglesnorbit…" before she regained her composure, removed her hand swiftly from his grasp, and said "I'm fine!" while giving him her usual Yes-you're-hot-but-I'm-not-going-to-give-you-the-satisfaction-of-me-acknowledging-it-now-sod-off-before-I-do-something-I'll-regret-such-as-like-you Look.
"Oh, don't bother to help me up…" Keegan said, standing up.
"I'm going to kill you!" Peter threatened James.
"Oh, what, are you going to molt on me, Parakeet Boy?" James responded coolly.
"You just wait," Peter continued, though he seemed slightly less upset, "Mark my words, one day I'm going to find out some secret about you, and all hell will break loose!"
"Sure you will, Peter," James said, sounding like an impatient mother talking to a very uncompromising toddler. "And one day I will give up Quidditch, Sirius will no longer enjoy looking in the mirror, and Remus will be seduced by a girl with pink hair." (A/N: hehehe…)
"I'll what?" Remus asked.
"I don't know, it just popped in my head. Don't ask me to fathom the way my mind works."
Next chapter? Think chocolate, Sirius on a sugar high, shirtless Remus, and one very strange situation for two girls to walk in on.
Fictionally yours,
Kaci (aka ChocoTaco)