CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-SEVEN
"You did what?!"
The day was Wednesday. Jane had just gotten back from her trip to the Pendle Hill Academy of Healing about half an hour ago. She was currently sitting across the dinner table from James and Sirius with Peter and Remus on either side of her. And she had just been given terrible news.
"It was Peter's fault," Sirius said quickly.
"It was not!" Peter defended, going pink in the face.
"We're gonna get it back," James assured her.
"Doubt it," Remus muttered beside her.
Jane glared at them all incredulously, not believing what they'd told her.
"I leave for five days, and you lose the Map?" she said.
"Well, when you say it like that, you make us sound incompetent," James murmured.
"You are incompetent!" Jane said, jabbing a finger at him.
"We didn't lose it. Filch confiscated it," Sirius corrected, as though this made it better somehow.
"Well, that's worse!" Jane said, and Sirius shrugged and looked back down at his plate.
"What do you care for?" James asked. "It's not like you spent all that time working on it, trying to get it just right."
Jane pursed her lips together and shook her head.
"It's not just the Map," she said. "How're we ever supposed to keep away from Filch if he knows right where to look? No more midnight walks around the castle with or without your damned Invisibility Cloak!"
"Well, you really shouldn't be walking about the castle after curfew anyway," Lily butted in from beside James.
All five of them, including Remus, gave Lily a sort of stern look that told her they were all trying really hard not to roll their eyes at her. She held up her hands defensively.
"Well, I'm just saying, it's against the rules," she said.
"Oh, can it, Lily," Sirius said. "Don't act like you and Prongs don't go wandering off into classrooms to snog each other when you're actually supposed to be on patrol after curfew."
Lily's face went as red as her hair.
"We don't—that's—well, that's none of your business," she sputtered, becoming very interested in her food after that, making Jane, Remus, and Peter snigger.
"We'll get it back, Jane," James tried to assure her once more.
"Oh, be realistic, James," Remus said. "How're we supposed to get it back if Filch knows we're coming?"
"Well, Moony, you're getting us nowhere with that attitude," Sirius said.
"But he's right," Jane said. "Filch now has all the passageways, all our shortcuts through the castle! We're never getting it back."
"Well, if you're going to be all negative about it, let's change the subject," Sirius said. "Tell us more about the Academy. You said you met some students from Mahoutokoro?"
Jane happily told them all about Toma and Masaki and Keiko.
"So, is she the reason you've got your wand sticking out of your hair like an idiot?" Sirius teased.
Jane aimed a kick at him under the table, but missed and hit James instead.
"Oy! That was me!" he complained, rubbing his shin, and Jane apologised as the others sniggered.
"I happen to like it very much," Jane said, gingerly touching her fingers to her hair. "Keiko said that half the girls at her school wear their hair like this. It's very popular among the Eastern Asian witches at the moment."
Sirius leaned across the table towards her as though about to divulge some great secret.
"I hate to be the one to tell you this, Janie," he said with a sarcastic air to his voice that made Jane want to kick at him again, "but you know the United Kingdom isn't in Asia, right?"
"Oh, shut it, arsehole."
"Jane's right; I like it," came Marlene's voice as she sat on the other side of Sirius with Mary right beside her; Alice and Frank weren't too far behind.
"What're we talking about?" Frank asked as he sat down, immediately cramming a drumstick in his mouth.
"Janie thinks she's Japanese," Sirius teased.
"And Sirius thinks he's actually funny," Lily snapped back playfully in Jane's defence.
"Oh, my pride!" Sirius said sarcastically, clutching at his chest in feigned pain. "It's wounded!"
"Your face is about to be wounded," Jane threatened.
Sirius flashed her a wicked grin.
"Oh, Janie, you wouldn't hurt a face as pretty as mine," he said, winking playfully, causing Jane to smile; she really had missed him.
When they were all comfortable in the Gryffindor common room, sitting about in their armchairs and in the couches, Sirius waited for a good five minutes before turning to Jane.
"Remus has all the school work you missed up in our dorm. Do you want to go get it?" he asked, and Jane smiled.
"Yeah, alright," she said, getting up and stretching.
"I'll show you where it's at," Sirius said, standing as well.
"It's sitting on my—"
"I'll show her," Sirius repeated, cutting Remus off, earning a raised eyebrow from him.
Jane walked up to the boys' dorm, Sirius trailing behind her. She could see a stack of papers on Remus' bedside table, which she assumed was all the schoolwork she'd missed. She let out a groan at the thought of it.
She turned to Sirius as he entered the room, putting the pile of work out of her mind for now. He closed the door behind him, clicking the lock. She smiled at him, and before she could blink, he had her wrapped tightly in his arms, his lips already finding hers.
Jane happily wrapped her arms around his neck. Sirius slid his hands under her shirt, but he kept them on her waist, pulling her closer to him hungrily as they kissed. Jane pulled away slightly.
"I've missed you," she managed to say before Sirius pulled her back into the kiss, earning a small grunt of acknowledgement from him.
Jane smiled into the kiss, threading her fingers through his hair. Sirius walked her backwards until she had her back to a wall. He lowered his hands and lifted her off of her feet, and she wrapped her legs around him. Just as he moved to kiss her neck, they heard someone jiggling the doorknob.
Jane sighed, and Sirius rolled his eyes in annoyance before looking at Jane. She let out a small laugh.
"Of course," she said in a I-should-have-known sort of voice.
Sirius put her down, and she walked over to the pile of her schoolwork on Remus' beside table, shuffling through it. Sirius went to open the door that the person on the other side was now knocking on.
Jane flicked her eyes up from her papers to see Remus looking suspiciously at Sirius.
"Why's the door locked?"
Sirius gave him a very convincing I-have-no-clue-what-you're-talking-about look.
"It wasn't?"
Remus walked into the dorm, and Jane went back to pretending to look at her work.
"Yes, it was," he argued.
"Maybe it was jammed," Sirius suggested, walking over to his bed and sprawling out over it.
"Right," Remus mumbled under his breath in a voice that, had they heard it, would've let the two know that he didn't believe them at all.
Remus walked over to his bed and grabbed his Transfiguration book off of it. He pulled out a packet full of review questions.
"Just remembered that I forgot to put this in the pile," he said, handing it to Jane who groaned at the extra work.
"It's not too bad," Remus promised. "I'll let you copy my answers."
Jane gave him a small smile, wishing that he'd go away and that she'd have an excuse to stay up here with Sirius.
A couple of weeks later, they were on the train back to London for the Easter holidays. Lily was in a worrying mood because: "What if his parents don't like me, Jane?"
Jane had gotten tired of hearing this question, and now, whenever Lily asked it, she just replied with: "Yeah, that'd be a bummer," rather than trying to convince her that they wouldn't.
Jane wasn't sure how she felt about Lily coming to the Potters' for the Easter break. On the one hand, it'd be nice to have another girl around, and Mrs. Potter was going to be happy about finally officially meeting the girl that James was dating. On the other hand, Jane didn't know how it'd affect her alone time with Sirius. Jane figured it could go one of two ways: 1) Lily could actually distract James a lot more, and Sirius and Jane could have loads of alone time whenever James and Lily were off together. Or 2) Lily could just end up being another person to hide from, as if they didn't already have a hard enough time doing that at the Potters'.
Jane looked over at Lily, who had her head resting on James' shoulder, her hand intertwined with his. Jane was jealous of their relationship. She wanted to be able to hold her boyfriend's hand whenever she pleased, and for a split second, she almost did, but she thought better of it. She and Sirius needed to tell their friends soon, or she was going to explode.
Jane settled instead for leaning slightly into his side and looking out of the window. Within just a few minutes, she was fast asleep, snoring softly.
She had been having a good dream before one of her friends shook her awake to get off the train. It was very rare for her to have a good dream about her parents, especially her mum. In fact, she didn't really like having those dreams often because whenever she awoke, there'd be a terrible aching in her chest that she couldn't make go away. But alas, there she was, pulling her suitcase down from the luggage rack and inwardly lamenting the things she had lost, what felt like, a very long time ago.
Jane wondered if she should visit her mother's grave again. It had been a while since she'd left flowers, almost a whole year. Maybe on her way, she could stop by and see Sammy and Sarah or some of her other old Muggle friends. However, she knew she'd stop by her old house to check up on her father if she went back to Stockbridge, and she didn't think she was quite ready for that. So, she let the thought shrink away.
An hour or so later, Jane was sitting around the dinner table with Sirius, Lily, and the Potters'. Mrs. Potter had taken to Lily quite well, and Jane figured that if the two ever broke up, Mrs. Potter might just kick James out of the house and let Lily move in instead.
On the topic of James' mum, Jane noticed that she looked a bit…odd. She was paler and thinner than she normally was, similar to the way Remus looked in the days just before a full moon. She looked as though she had aged, which surprised Jane because even though she knew the Potters were older than the average parent of someone her age, Mrs. Potter had always looked much younger than she really was.
Another odd thing about Mrs. Potter was what she was wearing. A purple sweater, in the springtime? Granted, it might have been a bit cool outside still, but not cool enough for a sweater. Jane wondered if maybe she were ill. It wasn't totally implausible, but it was worth it to note that over the time she'd known the Potters, Jane had never known any of them to have ever been sick, not even from allergies. Jane herself had a pretty impressive immune system, but even she got the sniffles every now and then.
Jane decided not to bring it up to James. After all, if he wasn't going to mention it, why should she? She decided that she was only overthinking things. After all, everyone gets sick at least a couple of times; why should Jane think that Mrs. Potter was the exception?
After supper, Jane and the other three spent their time at the pond. James and Lily were sitting on one of the boulders, looking up at the stars and snogging occasionally whenever they thought Sirius or Jane weren't looking.
Jane was laying down in the little, wooden row boat that was tied to the dock that was usually neglected by the teenagers; Sirius lay on the dock, keeping one of his hands on the little boat as though to make sure Jane didn't float away (not that she actually would). She occasionally traced her fingers over his as James and Lily were paying no real attention to them anyway.
Twilight had come and gone, and the night sky was dotted with twinkling stars and adorned with a bright, full moon that made them all worry about Remus, though no one said anything. There was a slight breeze that rustled the leaves of the tall trees around them, and the crickets chirped in a soothing way as the slight rocking of the boat lulled Jane into a sort of blissful trace.
If Jane looked closely at the trees above her, she could just make out the glint of the brightly coloured fairy cocoons on the underside of some of the leaves. She had watched some hatch once before, and it had been a very beautiful sight. As she had learned last winter, Mrs. Potter liked to use the tiny creatures as Christmas lights, which Jane just assumed was normal in the wizarding world as she had seen them used as decorations at school as well.
Jane rolled her head slightly to the side and once more started to run her fingers lightly over Sirius'.
"Sirius?" she half-whispered.
"Hmm?"
Jane stared back up at the sky, still tracing her fingertips over his hand.
"I love you."
Sirius' hand suddenly disappeared from the side of the boat, and Jane furrowed her brow. Sirius propped himself up on one elbow and looked down at her. He was quiet for a few seconds. It was the first time she'd ever said it without any playfulness in her voice. It's funny how when someone says something in a serious tone, it makes you actually think about the words being said.
"I love you too," he finally said, and the corners of Jane's lips twitched upward for a moment.
Jane patted the side of the boat where Sirius' hand had been before. He smiled a bit before obeying her silent command, laying back down and returning his hand to the boat so that she could run her fingers over it again. She sighed.
"This is our last break from school before we graduate," she commented.
"I'm aware," Sirius replied.
"Do you think Dumbledore's gonna need us right away?"
Sirius shrugged even though she couldn't really see him.
"I dunno. Suppose we should be ready just in case though."
Ready? What did that word even mean? Jane hadn't even gotten her licence to Apparate yet because she was afraid of being splinched. How in the world was she supposed to fight in a war?
She grabbed onto his hand and squeezed it gently.
"We're gonna be okay," Sirius said, seeming to know that this was her way of telling him that she was scared. "We're all gonna be just fine. I promise."