Author's Note:

There's good news and bad news, which do you want first? Oh yeah, this is a chapter, you can't reply. Well the good news is that I have stayed up until three this morning typing to try and get this done, ok the internet stopped working so you're getting it now, but still… The bad news is I am a very busy person this weekend so might not have enough time for writing :( But I will try, I promise.

"TELL ME!" James shouted after Madam Pomphrey as she walked away shaking her head. When she had come over to give James some more water he'd begged her to give him an update on Remus, when he got nothing he resorted to shouting and he was still getting no-where.

"Prongs, this isn't working" Sirius sighed.

"Ok then, what do you suggest? You're legs are paralysed at the moment and I'm in a restraint"

"You did try to drag the bed over to Moony when they tied you to it…"

"Yeah, well I just want to make sure my friend's ok" James sulked "And don't tell me you wouldn't have done the same if you had the chance" Sirius couldn't argue because if he was being honest he had been spending the past hour trying to use 'the force' to roll his bed over. It wasn't working.

"Well maybe if you didn't shout at the only person that could get you information" Sirius took his squinting eyes away from the bed wheels for a moment to wink at James.

"She wouldn't listen" James huffed, still trying to look over to the open door which lead to Moony, but had to sit down when the stabbing pain from his cut came back.

"He got you pretty bad this time, didn't he?" Sirius looked worriedly and the blood stain on James' hospital gown.

"It's fine, it's fine" James was trying to convince himself more than he was trying to convince Sirius. "My main concern is Remus"

"Oh God don't do it James…" Sirius had no way of stopping him.

"SOMEONE TELL ME WHAT'S WRONG WITH MY FRIEND OR I'LL… I'LL" James looked around at what was in his reach with the restraint "I WILL DO SOME DAMAGE WITH THIS TOAST"

Madam Pomphrey sighed and walked over to James "You don't shut up do you?" James had no idea what to say to that "Look, we'll have a deal, you shut up at eat that toast, and I'll take you to the door of Remus' room, Ok" Madam Pomfrey was one more shout away from just using a sleeping spell on him.

"Fine" James scorned taking a bight out of the limp infirmary toast that lay next to him, and then going on to painfully down the rest of it.

"You're stronger than I thought" Sirius joked as he flicked his toast on the floor in disgust "I accidentally ate one of creatures' sausage surprises that tasted better than that."

On seeing the empty plate Madam Pomphrey sighed and wheeled James over to the door of Remus' room "Now I want you to know" Madam Pomfrey warned "That whatever he says to you isn't because he's pushing you away, it's because he's trying not to hurt you"

James didn't know what that meant until he was pushed into the room and Remus spoke. He was lying limply on the bed with a mass of tubes running in and out of him, his skin pale and sickly.

"Oh gosh, Moon" James' eyes filled with tears, if only he'd have gotten to the tree quicker he could have been there in Hogsmeade to keep him company and look after him. Remus hadn't seen James and Sirius since that night, so as soon as he saw James his mouth fell open.

"Oh God, James, just leave me" He cried, burying his head into his pillow "It's best you just stay away from me.

"No, Moony, of course it isn't! You're one of my best friends, I would never leave you" James wanted more than anything to just walk up to him and hug him.

"Don't lie, look at what I've done, I'm a monster" he sobbed.

"No you're not. You couldn't help it, I don't blame you at all"

"But who else is there to blame?" This really made James think, who actually was to blame? Severus only turned up, Remus would have turned back there anyway and they would have had the same problem.

"So why were we still by the Whomping Willow?" James racked his brain to try and remember, but the blow to his head from the branch and from the werewolf had made everything blurry.

"I… I can't remember" James muttered "But it definitely wasn't you"

"I know you're trying, James, but it's not working. Just leave me" James could see that Remus was about to burst into a brand new flood of tears, and none of the Marauders liked to be seen crying so he got madam Pomphrey to push him back.

"So?" Sirius asked eagerly.

"He blames himself, and there's nothing immensely serious" James couldn't say anymore. Too much activity was wearing him out, so he fell asleep.

Sasha, Kara, Lily, and Peter were sat eating lunch in the Great Hall because Madam Pomphrey wasn't letting anymore visitors in considering the state James had gotten himself into.

"This is terrible" Sasha couldn't believe what had happened "I mean, they could have been killed!"

"I know, although they did say they were going to do anything to help Remus" Lily excused the life threatening situation Sirius and James had put themselves in.

"Yeah yeah, I know, but… Hang on, Peter why aren't you up there with them in hospital?" Kara looked quizzically over at Peter who was shoving a baguette into his mouth.

"Well Madam Pomphrey wouldn't let us because…" He started looking confused.

"No, I mean, why aren't you seriously injured?"

"Well that's nice Kara" Lily tutted.

"Seriously, though. I thought all three of you turned into animegi to look after Remus, so if that's the reason James and Sirius were hurt, where on earth were you?" Peter was stuck.

"I was… I was, in detention?" He stammered after glancing over at Filch.

"Oh yeah? What for?" Kara glared at him.

"For eating in class" It was the reason Peter was always in detention so that was easy.

"Who were you with?"

"Filch"

"What were you going?"

"Polishing trophies" Peter wasn't going to sneak around without having a rock solid excuse, and no-one dared to talk to Filch, not because he was scary, but in case he started babbling about 'the good old caretaking days'

"Right" Kara wasn't convinced as she stared into Peter's eyes trying to find out what was beneath his story.

"Oh my god what was that foul tasting medicine!?" James spluttered after Madam Pomphrey had fed him a thick brown liquid.

"Hot chocolate?" Madam Pomphrey looked at his puzzled. James had been forced into drinking so many disgusting potions that were slowly making the bruises and cuts on his skin fade everything was starting to taste sour.

"At least you're almost ready to leave" Sirius moaned as he glanced over at his bedside cabinet which was now full of healing, pain relief, temperature control, infection preventing, bone healing, and God knows what else potions.

"Yeah but what am I going to do without you and Moony?" James sighed at the prospect of being surrounded by girls all day… and Peter.

"Well I suppose you could paint each other's nails, and have pillow fights, and get a makeover…" Sirius laughed.

"Don't" James sunk down in his bed "Get better quickly, Pads, all of this girly attention is going to kill me"

"My heart bleeds for you" Sirius retorted "Surrounded by all of those girls whilst I'm living it up in the infirmary"

"Fine, fine" James tried to avoid arguments with Sirius because he always lost.

"You better warn Snivellus that I'm going to kill him when I get out though" Sirius gritted his teeth

"Sirius I promised Lily I wasn't going to lay a finger on him, so neither are you" James said sternly

"But look at what he did!" Sirius whined

"Sirius you know Severus didn't do this, and you know who did, so I wouldn't go threatening to kill whoever did that to you" James warned

"Can't I just beat him up for being a git?" Sirius asked hopefully

"No!" James sighed "You'd be as bad as the Slytherins if you do"

"He asked me to roll him in here" Madam Pomfrey announced as she brought Remus into the ward on his bed and placed him in-between James and Sirius.

"Moony!" Sirius cheered "Come join the party!"

"It was getting painful in there, they have a radio that only plays classical music and the peace of it was killing me"

"So you came to us for a bit of excitement in your life, understandable" Sirius grinned, planning all of the amazing things they could do.

So after five minutes of staring out the window and discussing the shapes of a cloud floating past Sirius finally snapped.

"MERLIN'S BEARD I'M BORED" He shouted, punching his mattress.

"It's the infirmary, Pads, not Zonkos" Remus pointed out.

"Still no excuse to be bored" he moaned, looking around "Hey, is it just coincidence, or are those mops next to the wheelchairs calling to you?"

"Sirius you've got a leg that you can't move with the other seriously injured; Remus has a serious head wound and his skin is 50% bruises, 30% cuts, and 20% acutal skin; and I have a massive hole in my stomach meaning I can't move/twist it"

"All I'm hearing is it'll be fine, it'll be fine, I didn't like twisting my stomach anyway" Sirius grinned. The Marauders being the Marauders couldn't help acting like idiots, so they set about wheelchair jousting.

"ON YOUR MARKS, GET SET, JOUST!" Remus shouted before James and Sirius begun wheeling full speed towards each other. Mops in one hand and buckets on their heads "Actually don't you think this is a bit dange…"He was cut off when James took a blow to the head and falling over, his mop jamming under Sirius' wheel sending him flying across the infirmary. James and Remus sat in silence waiting for a response.

"THAT WAS AWESOME!" Sirius screamed in delight as he got back onto the wheelchair.

"Didn't it hurt?" James asked, wheeling over to prod him with his mop to check.

"Obviously, but hello! I FLEW! C'mon remus, me versus you" He grinned wildly

"What have we unleashed?" Remus laughed before grabbing a mop and continuing the jousting.

"Oh James!" Lily cried as he hobbled into the common room "Why on earth have they let you go?"

"Apparently there's nothing more Madam Pomfrey can do other than wait for the medicine to finish working on the bruises so there's no point in me staying there" James explained as he limped over to his spot by the fire "Wormtail!" He exclaimed giving Peter a high five.

"How are you doing Prongs?" Peter squeaked as James plonked himself down next to him.

"Oh yeah, fabulous, it's as if these scars have become a part of me that I just don't want to let go"

"He's being sarcastic isn't he?" Peter asked the girls, they nodded.

"So wh…" Kara started to ask.

"I know what you're going to ask, you're going to ask what happened. Well I can honestly say I can't remember much at all. Me, Pads, and Moony were caught outside the Whomping Willow for some reason, Severus appeared…"

"Severus?" Lily asked with a puzzled look on her face.

"Yeah, wasn't it obvious?" James was confused by how oblivious Lily was.

"He's turned up to lessons as normal for the past couple of days, nothing weird at all" Lily explained, in complete disbelief that he was involved.

"Well he was definitely there, unless it was his twin brother, I saved by dragging him away and licking him so he woke up"

"Hang on, what you're saying is that Severus caught you in your stag form, unless you licked him in the face as a human, then I'm seriously worried" James thought about it and slapped himself.

"Shit. If that git tells anyone then so help me I'll feed him to a werewolf myself" He scorned clenching his fists.

"Well he definitely owes you after that" Kara piped up.

"Yeah, he better do something big"

"We are NOT having the theme as 'Love in Paris'" Sirius scribbled it off the list immediately. He had been released from hospital the week before, and Remus had only just been discharged so it was the perfect time to plan the ball considering there was only ten more weeks until the end of the year.

"Fine, what about 'Love in…" Sasha got interrupted once again.

"NO, NO LOVE ANYWHERE! For goodness sake, what's wrong with a, er,' night of really loud music and, er, food' theme?" Sirius moaned.

"No" Sasha gave him evils as she looked up from the paper where she was currently doodling hearts and swirls.

"Great, total girliness then" Sirius sighed.

"What theme is in the middle then?" Lily asked, the group just gave her blank, confused looks "You know, not girly or boyish, back at my Muggle school we had a magic themed dance, everyone turned up wearing pointy hats and fake beards"

"Well that's totally stereotypical" Remus moaned "And anyway, how can wizards have a magic themed night? That's like a Peter having a pie themed dance, it's just natural"

"Hey!" Everyone just ignored Peter's protests.

"Well what do we all love?" Kara asked trying to get out of yet another Muggle/Wizard argument.

"Ice-cream?"

"Quidditch?"

"Make up?" the boys gave Sasha a weird look.

"Air?" Sirius was getting desperate.

"Well, we all like parties" James pointed out.

"You want to have a party themed party?" Lily stared quizzically at him.

"Good, eh?" He smiled convincingly at her but got no-where, she still stared at him in disbelief.

"I think James is onto something" Sirius nodded, but Lily shook her head "Think about it, who has ever had a party themed party?"

"We're not going down this route! I simply refuse!" Lily argued, not budging.

"Fine, think of something better" Sirius' eyes interrogated her, an eyebrow raised.

"Ok, let's do a, ur, masquerade, how cool and mysterious is that?" Lily stuttered.

"Actually, that's cool, we can all just finally be a school united without the sub-conscious barrier of houses dividing us into social classes that are stereo typically obliged to despise one another" Kara piped up and everyone just stared at her.

"Er, yeah, what she said?" Sirius tried to avoid eye contact with Kara.

"Great. One decision" Lily smiled as she wrote 'masquerade' on the paper next to Remus' scrawls and Sasha's doodles.

"It's so good to have you back" Lily smiled up James as they lay underneath the oak tree holding hands.

"It's good to be able to hold your hand again" Jams squeezed her hand beaming back at her as he gazed into her gorgeous green eyes that drew you in the more you looked at them. "You have the most mesmerizing eyes" he whispered.

"They're nothing special" Lily blushed stroking his hair.

"I could tell it's you just by your eyes you know, they're the first thing I noticed when I first saw you" James admitted, going pink after realizing what he'd just said.

"Really? The first thing I noticed was how obnoxious you were" Lily laughed, in protest James poked playfully at her ribs making her collapse in laughter "Oh God James don't tickle me!" She laughed, James knew he'd found her weak spot so he rolled on top of her and tickled her even more until Lily managed to roll on top of him and pin his arms to the floor.

"Do NOT tickle me" James just laughed and easily rolled back on top of her.

"What was the first thing you noticed about me again?" He asked raising an eyebrow grinning.

Lily sighed "James, as soon as I noticed your gorgeous hair and entrancing good looks and I fell hopelessly in love with you" She said sarcastically.

"Was it really that hard to just tell the truth" James laughed rolling back onto the grass Lily sighed sarcastically.

"You know the sky's really blue?" James asked without even thinking about it.

"Oh I hadn't noticed" Lily said sarcastically lying back and looking at it as well.

"But seriously, look!" James waved his hands over the whole sky "It's like the sky is a completely blank canvas, there's no people telling you what you can and can't do, holding you down, you're just free to glide completely detached from what you left behind down on earth" he said dreamily.

"Is that why you do Quidditch?" Lily asked looked over at him.

"Well that and the fact that I can catch a peanut on my broom when it's thrown a hundred metres" James smirked and Lily hit him playfully.

"Show off"

"I need to be that good though; I'm desperate to be captain next year after Fabian Prewett's gone"

"James the ban on Quidditch might not even have been lifted by seventh year" Lily sighed

"It better be, I mean chances are we're going to be dead in five years anyway"

"James!"

"It's true though, so there's no point in not playing quidditch and enjoying it until the end, and considering Marlene McKinnon should be trying out we'll have a pretty kick-ass team"

"She'll only be in second year though – it's a bit risky"

"Have you seen her play keeper? She definitely gets it from her older brother, Scott. Plus she should be in third year now, but she got held back from her first year for two years because she had a mental breakdown after her uncle was killed" They went quiet after remembering the massive attack so Lily quickly changed the subject.

"Well I'm sure you're going to be picked James, you're an amazing quidditch player" James blushed, not used to receiving anything other than empty compliments.

"Ok then, what do you want to be next year?" James tried to take the subject off how apparently great he was.

"It sounds totally sad, but I want to be head girl" Lily announced going as red as James.

"What, so you can share a room with the head boy?" James raised an eyebrow, worried at the thought of Lily being put on her own in a separate common room with another boy.

"No! I mean my sister was head girl at her muggle school, and look at her! If I'm not head girl Petunia will have it to rub in my face for the rest of my life. Plus it'll show Shanice because she's been bragging about McGonagall probably choosing her after the muffin baskets she sent her for weeks"

"No-one in their right mind would give Shanice that much responsibility, don't worry Lils you'll be great"

"Thanks" She beamed.

Author's Note:

I'm an emotional wreck. Whose idea was it to put a The Script album on while I was trying to write this? That's the reason I had to have a scene there with James and Lily, I needed to vent some of this romantic stress (sounds a bit strange and a tad wrong) so I used the story. I will now go and cry – why did I listen to oh if you could see me now? God you people probably think I'm crazy. Before I say more stupid stuff that's

-Mischief Managed