Chapter Eight: The Furry-Little-Problem (or The Problem with Friends)
"It just isn't right," James said, half-heartedly charming a Fizzing Whizzbee into doing cartwheels across the dormitory floor beneath him. "It's not like she's gonna tell anyone."
"Ou ony wan oo ell er aus hes aad a ou," voiced Sirius coherently, hovering half a meter above his bed with a dozen Whizzbees stuffed in his mouth.
"I don't only want to tell her because she's mad at me," argued James, deciphering Sirius' message and letting his cartwheeling sweet careen into his cat's mouth. "I mean, yes, obviously I'd like her not to be mad at me. But this isn't just another James-fancies-Lily-so-he'll-do-anything-for-her moment."
"Then give us another reason," said Remus, a very serious expression on his face. Sirius nodded, mouth bulging.
"Well, I guess, don't you think she deserves to know? We are kinda her friends… At least I think we are. Or we were."
"Not really, no. It's our business, it's my business, just because she wants to know doesn't mean she needs to," said Remus, not angrily, but with quiet resignation. "The more people who know about it the more danger I– we are in."
"But it's Lily, we've known her for six years!"
"We've known practically everyone in our year for six years," he snapped, "we've known Snape for six years, Mulciber, Avery, should we tell them too?"
"No of course not, but they're Slytherins Moony! Lily's one of us. She's your friend for Merlin's sake." His eyes flickered between Sirius and Remus and he lowered his voice. "And, well, Snivellus didn't exactly spill did he?"
"Oh, of course James, you're so right," said Remus sarcastically. "Let's just tell Lily everything and then get Dumbledore to make sure she doesn't tell anyone that I'm a werewolf. Would you like to explain to our headmaster that you're all illegal animagi and we've betrayed his trust or should we let Padfoot do it?"
"For the record," interjected Sirius, having finally swallowed his magical sweets and returned to rest on his bed, "I reckon we should tell Lily the whole truth."
"Ah yes, because you're so discerning when it comes to revealing my 'furry little problem'. Your ideas are always just brilliant aren't they Sirius?" Remus turned on his friend with new vigour. Sirius winced at the scathing remark.
"S'alright Moony," James intervened, "this isn't about Snape. We've been over that, and I'm not saying it wasn't stupid of him, because it was a fucking idiot move—" he shot a glare over at Sirius— "but he knows that. He knows that. And this is completely different."
"Yeah, right," Remus nodded, taking a deep breath. "It's just still a bit of a sore spot I suppose."
"Chocolate?" suggested Sirius tentatively. "The best remedy for scars you can't see, right?"
"Thanks Padfoot," said Remus, accepting the peace offering.
"I don't think we should tell her," said Peter, finding an opportunity to speak. James wrinkled his brow and tugged on his hair, he was losing here. He'd been sure Pete would agree with him.
"Why's that Wormtail?"
"She's not part of the group," he said simply, with the pride of someone who was in the group for once. "It's better as a just Marauders secret."
"So…" James hesitated. "Sirius why do you think we should tell Lily?"
"What's to stop her from blabbing?" He raised a dark eyebrow. "She's found out we're animagi, but also knows you didn't tell her everything right? She doesn't actually care about whether other people know, and once she knows everything— what's really at stake, there's no way she'd let slip. But right now, she could either threaten to blab to find it all out, or she could actually tell. Even without meaning to, like when she was yelling at you she dropped a ton of hints. We can't risk it."
"I don't think she'd tell," said James defensively, forgetting that Sirius was really agreeing with him about what they should do.
"Well she bloody tried to blackmail you into telling her before, she threatened me, bribed Wormtail. So yeah, she might."
"Look, why can't we just tell her about the map and everything without telling her why you're animagi?" Remus asked.
"She's smart," James sighed, without the usual admiration he had saying that, "and she already picked up that you weren't an animagus, and she knows about the cloak. I tried just telling her part of the truth, I did, but it only made her more annoyed."
"If she tells now, we'll be expelled Moony," said Sirius. "But if she knows about you, she won't."
"No, no, you can't put this on me Padfoot. This is not my fault. I'm... Eternally grateful to you guys, you know that. I am. I don't know what I would do without you. But Lily only noticed this whole this because we started going out every night."
"No one is saying this is your fault. It definitely isn't. It's Sirius'," James grinned, trying his best to diffuse the growing tension. "Nah, Moony, we're just trying to figure out where to go from here. Even if we decided to stop exploring at night, and well the map is pretty much done, I mean I think we know every secret Hogwarts holds. But even if we stopped now, Lily knows and we need to decide what to do about that."
"I don't think anyone could ever know all of the castle's secrets."
"Okay, maybe not, but we've certainly got the farthest! Besides, it'd be impolite to know everything about a Castle before you marry it Pete. You haven't even proposed yet," James joked, throwing a box of toffee rings over at Wormtail.
"Huh?" Peter fumbled with the box before dropping it and spilling toffee all over the floor. Sirius levitated some of them into his mouth.
"Never-mind Wormy, keep your innocence. And Remus, well it's your decision. I would never dream of telling Lily without your say-so, and neither would Sirius. And I know that would be hard for you, so I'm not going to force you into it or go behind you if you just say no. But there is no way, no way that she would treat you any differently. She's a muggleborn, the Slytherins hate her just as much as they would hate you if they knew. Obviously they already hate you because you're a Gryffindor and you're one of us, but you know what I mean. She's like us. She's your friend and she cares… She probably cares more about you than she cares about me doesn't she? Maybe I need be a prefect for Lily to like me."
"James. Not helpful. Or relevant," Sirius said. "Point is Moony, you, plus telling Lily about your secret, equals happiness and rainbows and us not being expelled and Lily still being the nice friend she is to you. Yay."
"And equals her talking to me again and realising that we're decent people who wanted to help our friend rather than just break rules."
"I can see that you're not going to let this go," said Remus resignedly.
"We absolutely would let it go. Just after you agreed," said James with a grin. "This is you agreeing right?"
"Yes. I'm agreeing. But I tell her. No one else, okay?"
"Absolutely."
"And I'll wait outside and obliviate her if she reacts badly and you want me to," added Sirius.
"Not that she's going to," reassured James.
"I'm going to do it Mary," moaned Lily, with her face firmly pressed into her pillow.
"Do what?"
"Drown myself in the Black Lake," came the reply.
"I don't think that's a great idea sweetheart. Maybe as last resort? I've heard that drowning is particularly nasty. But I'm sure Slughorn would let you use the classroom to make a Draught of Living Death, then you'd stay beautiful and be able to escape all your problems."
Lily groaned into the red and gold pillow.
"Lily. Seriously, you need to stop moping and get up. Or at least tell me what happened with James."
Lily groaned louder, her fists crumpling up her sheets. "No."
"Lily this is ridiculous. Come on."
"Fine," she sighed, turning over to lie on her back. "I yelled at him."
"Right… And?"
"He didn't yell back."
"I don't really see what the problem is with that Lils," said Mary, furrowing her brow. When Lily didn't reply she continued. "Look, I wasn't there for the fight in the common room, but Robin and Jas filled me in. From what they said, and correct me if it's wrong, you finally found out his secret. The one you spent so long trying to figure out before Christmas. And you told him as much." She paused for confirmation and Lily gave a slight nod. "And then you went up to his room to talk it out and when you came out you were upset and you've been moping here ever since."
"Pretty much," agreed Lily, and then it all just came spilling out. "He was being decent and telling me the truth even though I had just… Tried to hex him… And we could have been fine, despite my idiotic outburst after I first found out, but I just had to start yelling at him again because he didn't tell me the whole truth. Merlin, it's none of my business! I mean, yes he did something incredibly stupid, but he had every right not to tell me, and he has every right now to just ignore me completely. All of them do! He's probably told them all by now what a horrible inconsiderate witch I am. Oh Merlin. I wish a Hebridean Black dragon would eat me! I bet he hates me."
"And that bothers you?"
"Of course it bothers me!"
"A year ago it wouldn't have, so why does it now?" Mary questioned, trying to hide her growing smile.
"I don't like it when people don't like me."
"Most of the Slytherins dislike us," she reasoned.
"Well that's for something I can't control. I should be able to control my temper."
Mary twisted her lips in thought.
"And I suppose… Iwasfinallystartingtolikehim," Lily mumbled quietly.
"What was that?" Mary asked with a grin, having heard perfectly.
"I was finally starting to… To like him," she repeated. "As a friend of course! But he's the same idiot he's always been, and I'm the same stubborn hothead I've always been. We're never going to change. So why can't I stop thinking about him?! It. Stop thinking about it."
Mary wasn't sure what to reply to this, but before she had to consider it they were interrupted by the door flying open.
"What's up Lily-Bazily?" Marlene McKinnon asked loudly, upon entering their dorm and seeing the redhead draped on her bed.
"I'm having a crisis."
"She's having a crisis."
"What kinda crisis?" Marlene enquired, chewing on some of Drooble's Best.
"An existential one," cried Lily from the bed, her hand thrown over her face.
"A romantic one," Mary whispered. Then she mouthed James with a knowing look. Marlene winked back.
"That explains the dramatics then. And the giant blue stain on the common room wall," nodded Marlene, blowing a bubble twice as big as her head for effect. She sucked it back in and continued chewing. "Well do have fun, I just popped in to grab a top up of ink, if you need me to talk to lover boy for you I'd be happy to."
Mary giggled at this while Lily spluttered in horror.
"No. No— He's… I'm— I don't. No. Marlene, no!"
"Later!" Marlene grabbed the ink she wanted, a lurid shade of red that Mary thought no one should have to read in, and exited the room with a flounce and flourish of her wand. Some matching red confetti sprinkled down on Lily's head. A few pieces fell into her mouth as she continued to vehemently protest.
"He currently hates me Marly!" Lily shouted at the closing door. "And I'm still annoyed at him! Ptuh," she spat out the confetti in her mouth then turned back to Mary. "That girl is crazy."
"Oh tell me about it," she agreed, shaking her head at Marlene's antics. The dorm seemed incredibly quiet now that she had left.
The silence was broken by Lily's sigh.
"Okay, let me get this straight Lily. You're angry at James because he was doing something dangerous which you don't approve of and he won't still tell you the whole secret. He's angry at you for sticking your nose where it didn't belong, and you're angry at yourself for not having the self-restraint to forget about it. Mm that's a right conundrum," Mary looked down at the redhead with pity. "I think some Chocolate Cauldrons are in order!"
Not long after Marlene's dramatic exit they had another visitor to the dorm. Mary and Lily had only had time to eat a single cauldron each before Jasmine Shafiq poked her head around the door.
"How are you feeling Lily?" Jas asked cautiously.
"Could be worse," she replied with a shrug and a half-hearted smile.
"Well that's good to hear. Are you up for a visitor?" Jas paused, thinking. "Although he couldn't really visit you I don't think, so you'd have to go out to him. So perhaps visitor is the wrong word…"
"Oh I don't think I could bear looking Potter in the eyes right now."
"No, not Potter. Lupin." As Lily took a moment to wrap her head around that, Jas rambled on. "You see, Robin and I were playing snap and her last card had just blown up when Marly came over to ask if we could help her write her Divination logbook. Oh why in Merlin's name did she write in that blasted red ink? Almost gave me a headache. Robin's lucky she dropped the subject. Anyway, then Lupin comes over and asks if we'd all seen you 'cause he wanted a word, and well I couldn't stand trying to read in that abominable colour one second more, so I upped and offered to come find you."
"And here you are," added Mary, putting a merciful end to the girl's rambling.
"And here I am!"
"Did Remus look angry?" Lily ventured anxiously.
"I think I'd describe him as nervous, although Robin commented that he looked worried, and Marly thought he was more concerned, so I couldn't be certain."
"But not angry?"
"Mm no I don't think so, but I could ask Robin if she thought he was angry."
"Nah that's okay, thanks Jas," she replied, and Jas left with a nod. Lily over at Mary. "I guess I should face the music then huh?"
"I'm sure it'll be fine Lily," Mary reassured her. Rallying all her Gryffindor courage Lily pulled herself off her bed, smoothed her hair, and took a deep breath.
"If I'm not back in an hour…"
"I'll dredge the Black Lake for your remains," Mary finished. "Hopefully before the Giant Squid eats you."
"Hey! Squidy and I are buds! He would never eat me," said Lily defensively.
"Oh that's right, I forgot he was on the top of your eligible bachelor list," Mary deadpanned.
Lily laughed and was silently thanked Mary for taking her mind off her worry, even if her sense of humour was a touch grim sometimes. Then she set her jaw determinedly and left the safety of her dorm to find Remus.
He was sitting in one of the squishiest armchairs, a red tartan one set apart from most of the others with a decent view of the forest. He was twiddling his thumbs together agitatedly and wasn't making use of the window at all, eyes darting around at the floor. Jas had been right, he did look nervous.
She plumped down on the chair next to him.
"So you wanted to talk?"
Well this really could be renamed the 'Chapter with all the Italics' couldn't it? Okay, maybe I went a little overboard...
Alas, the angst is still not over! Don't worry though, the next chapter is the last one (excepting the epilogue), and I assure you a resolution is imminent. Also, I can't believe it's almost over! Ahhh!
Your excited Ravenclaw author who likes Italics a bit much
P.S. Idk but some people might be a little confused about my portrayal of Lupin, cause he seemed a tad mean and angry in this chap, so I thought I'd just justify it a little. People always write Remus as the calm quiet nice guy, and I'm like… This is the man who abandoned his pregnant wife to go adventuring, who yelled at 3 teenagers telling him not to, and who was totally down with murdering his old friend after like 5 minutes. #savage. He was also super scared of people's reactions to his condition, so it makes sense that he was somewhat hesitant to do so, even if it was just Lily. Hopefully that cleared it up a little, and if you didn't like it then that's totally your choice (the wrong choice, but yours nonetheless ;) ).