"Goodnight boys," said Euphemia Potter, at 10pm sharp that night, after she told James and I it was time for lights out. She closed the door quietly, and James turned to me immediately.

"We wait now," he whispered. "My dad is always the last one asleep, he goes to bed at exactly 11:13pm every night."

"Why 11:13?" I asked.

"I don't know," said James. "But never question his ways. So we'll start getting ready at about quarter past eleven."

I nodded. "What do we do now, then?"

"We keep ourselves awake, of course," said James. "I made lots of coffee before you came over. Lots and lots."

"I see what you're thinking," I said, raising an eyebrow, "but we don't want to be too hyperactive, or it might end up disastrous."

"If you feel sleepy, drink some, and we'll do something to pass time," said James. "And… and to get our minds off Sirius. Let's play truth or dare."

"OK," I said. "Truth or dare?"

"Dare," he said, grinning.

I grabbed out the book I'd brought with me. It was a historical fiction muggle book. I handed it to him, saying, "I dare you to read an entire page of this book."

"Oh, god, I can't do that," said James, opening the book to a page, then began reading aloud. He seemed incredibly bored by it, then chucked it at me nice he'd finished, grumbling, "truth or dare?"

"Truth," I said.

"Are you lying to us?" he said. "Sirius and I are both really suspicious… you disappear literally every single month… your excuses are becoming quite pathetic, so we both know you're lying. So… are you?"

I felt myself trembling, and clenched my fists in fear, noticing my palms had become sweaty. He was right, my excuses were pathetic… I was a terrible liar. I took in a shaky breath, then said, "Yes. Yes, I have been lying."

"Aha!" he said, clapping. "Knew it! So, what's the real story, then?"

"I can't tell you," I said, squeezing my eyes shut and shaking my head.

"Why not?" he asked.

"I just can't," I said, opening my eyes and looking straight at James. My voice trembled a bit.

"You can't just tell me there is something else then not tell me what it is!" he cried out.

"You shouldn't have asked, then," I said.

"Remus! You can't do this to me!" he whisper-shouted, crossing his arms.

"Trust me, you're better off not knowing," I said, trying to laugh light-heartedly. I took a sip of the coffee. "Ew! Is this coffee!?"

"You've never tried it before?"

"No, never! It's horrible!"

"I know," James said. "But it keeps us awake. So, before you rudely changed the subject, you were saying?"

"James, I already told you I'm not going to tell you what it is," I said. "Orders from my parents and Dumbledore, I can't tell anyone."

"Ah, so Dumbledore knows?" James said.

"Shut up! What time is it?" I asked.

"Ten minutes past ten," said James, looking at his watch.

"Truth or dare?" I said.

We played truth or dare for an hour straight, until we were both bored out of our minds and tired as hell.

"OK, let's just start getting ready," James said.

"Ugh, I don't want to see Monty again," I said, turning around and starting to get changed.

"We're not catching the Knight Bus," said James proudly. "We're taking brooms."

"What?" I said, sitting on James's bed to put on shoes. He sat next to me, putting on his own shoes. "James, I don't know how…"

"Did you pay attention in flying class?" he said.

"Of course I did, but I'm terrible at it," I said.

"Yeah, but you can fly," said James. "Just terribly. And you can't go on mine because we'll be taking Sirius back with us and three people can't fit on one broom. Alright, let's go, and be quiet!"

He led me out of his room into the silent hall. I followed him into his garage, where there were at least a dozen broomsticks attached to the walls. James grabbed two of them, and handed one to me. We walked outside in silence, then James mounted his broom, and I followed suit.

"What about the muggles?" I whispered. "Won't they see us?"

"It's the middle of the night!"

"Some muggles will be out at this time," I said.

"Will they seriously be looking up in the air, though?" James asked, rolling his eyes. "Come on, let's just go."

I looked around nervously, then we both kicked off the ground, and flew up. James was a lot faster than me, he zoomed up through the air with ease. I flew up too, trying helplessly to grip onto the broom for dear life.

"Um, James?" I called out over the howling wind. "Do you even know the way to Sirius's house from here?"

"No, I was hoping you would!" James yelled back.

If I hadn't been using both hands to desperately cling onto the broomstick, I would have face-palmed. Instead, I simply said, "Well how are we meant to get there now?"

"Well we're currently in South-West England, and Sirius lives in London," said James.

"OK, so we need to travel East," I said, trying to picture a map in my head.

"Which way is that?" James asked.

"I'm not a human compass!" I hissed. "Ugh, it would be easier to tell in the daytime…"

"This was a stupid idea, to take brooms," said James. "But… we can't really change now… we could go a bit lower…"

"Uh… OK…" I said hesitantly, and we went down, getting a better view of where we were. Then I saw a sign just below us. "Look! There's a sign — coast that way… so that means we need to go this way."

James nodded, and he shot off, and I followed, trying to stay on my broom. We flew for about an hour, looking down at the streets below us.

"Monifa will already be there," I said guiltily.

"It's OK," said James. "Being there late is better than not being there at all. But, you're really slow."

He came to a halt, and stopped my broom with his hand. "Climb onto mine and hold yours."

"What!?" I said, looking down. "Climb… climb from my broom… to your broom… from this height!?"

"I'll hold your broom while you do it," he said, gripping onto my broomstick. "Now come on, they're really close together, there's literally no way you could fall."

I took in a few deep breaths, then reached my right leg across over the top of his broom. I gripped onto his broom, then dragged my other leg across.

"Thank god," I said, shaking.

"See? Easy," said James, handing me my broom. "Alright, hold on!"

Trusting his word, I gripped onto the broom, putting mine in between my hands. Then the broom started moving at a ridiculous speed. Cold wind whipped through my hair, and made my lips fold back.

We flew at this pace for another fifteen minutes, until I caught sight of the Big Ben.

"London!" I shouted over the wind.

We lowered down into Grimmauld Place, and saw Monifa waiting for us.

"Finally!" she cried. "I though you weren't going to come!"

"Sorry," I said.

The three of us walked down the alleyway to Sirius's house together, and I picked the lock open with a bobby pin we'd gotten from James's mother.

"Invisibility cloak," I said to James, but he shook his head.

"Don't have it sorry," he said. "I… I forgot it… I'm really sorry!"

I wanted to stab his eyeballs out at that moment, but I decided to stay calm. "Let's… let's go. And be quiet."

The other two nodded, and we opened the door. The house was dark and silent. Monifa motioned for us to follow her. We walked upstairs and walked through a small hall, coming in front of two doors. Monifa opened one of them silently, and we caught sight of Sirius on a bed, fast asleep.