CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

During the last week of the school year, with exams coming to a close and Quidditch over and done with—Gryffindor had beat Ravenclaw, winning the cup—Jane had time to relax with her friends again. A Hogsmeade trip with James and Sirius had caught her up on what James had tried to tell her earlier: that Remus was not in the Hospital Wing on the night that he was supposed to be. While Jane admitted that this rather strange, she saw no reason for them to be all secretive and suspicious about it.

"Why don't you just ask Remus about it?" she had asked, not quite sure what all the fuss was about. After all, Remus was there friend; surely, he'd clear everything up if he had been privy to their concerns. James and Sirius had looked at her as though she had just suggested that they give Filch a hug.

"Why would he tell us the truth now if he didn't tell us the truth about being in the Hospital Wing in the first place?" Sirius had asked. "This needs proper investigating!"

Jane had rolled her eyes at Sirius' dramatic tone.

"I'm sure you guys are just overreacting. He was probably in the loo or something."

"I bet that's exactly what he'd want us to think!"

However, James and Sirius never did just ask Remus about it, and they had made Jane promise not to mention it to him. Seeing as how she didn't think any of this was a very big deal, Jane found no trouble in keeping that promise. She was certain that they would lose interest in the whole thing over the summer break anyway.

Upon hearing of Jane's summer plans, James grew increasingly unbearable in their last days at Hogwarts. Seeing as how Lily could hardly stand to be in the same room with James, Jane and Remus were typically his only hopes to get to her, and James liked taking advantage of those connections whenever he could, much to Jane and Remus' chagrin. The two of them often took turns on who had to whatever favour James had asked of them, sometimes even betting a few Sickles here and there on what Lily would say or how she'd react; Jane had lost many a Sickle to Remus because he seemed to be eerily good at it, and she was convinced that he were cheating somehow.

"What on earth do you want me to do about it?" Jane had asked James.

"Put in a good word for me?"

Jane had let out a snort of laughter at his expense.

"I highly doubt that you'll even come up in our conversations. What am I supposed to do? Randomly talk about what a good person you are? Just at the mention of your name, Lily goes on a rant. Face it, James, no matter how many good words I put in for you, Lily Evans will never take a liking to you. I'm a witch, not a miracle worker!"

Of course, James was just as stubborn as ever, and everything Jane had said on the matter had went into one of his ears and straight out of the other without the hindrance of a thought. Not even Sirius could get through to James when it came to Lily. James was happy with remaining overly optimistic about it all no matter how many times Lily openly and publicly rejected him.

Aside from all of that—all of the excitement and joy that came with the end of the school year—Jane was dreading going back home. This was not caused by the impending doom of a boring summer, as it normally would have been, nor was it the prospect of her parents telling her that she could not go with the Evanses to France, for Jane knew this summer was going to be one of her best yet since her parents had already agreed to let her go. No, this was a different kind of dread caused by a very separate reason, a reason Jane had not given much thought to until she stepped off of the train and onto the platform.

What was she going to tell Sarah? Jane could see it now: Sarah's excited face as they pulled up to their drive. How was she supposed to tell her friend that she was leaving yet again? However, they had a little over a week before Jane left for Lily's, and the trip wasn't going to be the whole summer. When Jane got back from France, she would have plenty of time to make it up to her, and that was exactly what she would do, she really would.

Jane was tired of always feeling guilty whenever she thought of Sarah, and the only way she figured she could fix this issue was just by being a better friend. She would work harder at writing letters while she was away, and she would stop dreading coming home so much. She had made all of these promises to herself before, but Jane was certain that she really meant it this time around. After all, Sarah had been the first real friend Jane could ever remember having, and she had made a promise to herself long ago that they would always remain best friends. She was going to make sure she kept that promise no matter what.

She could still be best friends with Sarah even if they didn't see each other as often as they used to. Jane was sure that there were loads of people that went to separate schools from their best friends. If these theoretical people could make their friendships work, then Jane could too. After all, the bonds of friendship don't break just because you make new friends or you hardly saw each other anymore, right? Jane felt certain that friendships—especially one like her and Sarah's—had to be made of stronger, more durable stuff than that.