A / N : Stan Shunpike. The young conductor of the Knight Bus, if anyone needs me to refresh their memory. Imprisoned by Rufus Scrimgeour in HBP for allegedly discussing the Death Eaters' secret plans in a pub. I sort of wondered why a person would do that, and so . . . this. I'm trying to branch out and do different things as I go on, which is why we're seeing a variation on the "prisoner in their cell" theme more and more. For example, how someone ended up in Azkaban in the first place, like in this one, or the effects it has on them afterwards, which is how I plan to approach Arthur Weasley's one. (He visited once, apparently.) The last one could also be viewed (in a way) as the effect Bellatrix's incarceration had on her and even on Voldemort. This one was written through a headache (and the last one was edited through insomnia. Will I ever learn?) so please tell me if you spot any little spelling errors and so on. Okay, I'll stop rambling now. Enjoy!

Stan Shunpike

Stan's last real girlfriend – his first real girlfriend, if he's brutally honest – before Azkaban was a girl named Veronica Clarke. Veronica was a Nice Girl. She helped around the house, she never once forgot Mother's Day or her great-aunt's birthday, and she was never, ever, in trouble at school - not so much as a detention in seven years. She got all Acceptables in her NEWTs, which wasn't incredible, but to Stan (who scraped only a handful of Dreadfuls in his) wasn't to be sneezed at either. And she had rules. Kissing was okay, but only after the first official date. He could touch her neck, sometimes, if it was a really good day, and sometimes he could even hook his arms around her waist and pull her up against him. Though never more than that. If Stan overstepped these boundaries, he would find himself on the receiving end of a prolonged and frosty silence. And no-one did frosty silence like Veronica. She made Professor McGonagall look like a novice. She could drag these silences out for weeks. The thing about Veronica was that she was a Nice Girl. (Stan-speak for a tease.) She just wasn't a particularly nice girl. In fact, there were times when she could be cold and crushing and downright cruel. And yet, somehow, Stan kept coming back for more, after every cutting put-down and every during every thawing of the long-running Stan-and-Veronica Cold War. He thought it would all be worth it in the end. Thought that maybe, when Veronica said cruel things to him, she really only meant to be funny. Maybe it could be their thing. Couples had that sometimes, didn't they? A "thing".

So he fought harder to try and please her, because he really, really liked her, and he was starting to think it might even be more than that. It might even be love. But how could he tell her that, when every day he came closer and closer to losing her? The trouble was, Stan wasn't a particularly interesting person. He was just someone who'd flunked all his exams and wound up in a dead-end job. (Conductor on the Knight Bus? Come on. There was probably no job in London more pathetic than that, as Veronica had kindly informed him one rainy evening when Stan couldn't even scrape together a few Sickles to take her for a drink. He was forced to conclude she might have a point.)

So, in the absence of a truly interesting life, Stan made the fatal mistake of making one up. It began innocently enough. He would show up to take Veronica on a date, and invent a really hectic day at work to keep her interested. A famous person rode the Knight Bus that day. A customer at the Leaky Cauldron had a heart attack. A really pretty girl flirted with Ernie (was she out of her mind?). He would say anything to keep that glazed look at bay, anything to stop Veronica looking at him the way she did sometimes, as though he were the most boring thing on earth, and she would tear her hair out if he didn't do something interesting soon.

The thing about lies though, the thing no-one had ever told poor, hapless Stan, was that they were addictive. One after another and another and another . . . . pretty soon, they had begun to snowball, and worse, Stan was starting to believe them, starting to find it hard to tell the difference between dreams and reality. Particularly when reality was looking grimmer by the day.

By the time Veronica dumped him for once and for all – the last chilling act of the Cold War – he really, truly wasn't sure if she was right or wrong, when she screamed that he was a fantasist, and told him to grow up.

That night, Stan blew a week's wages in the Leaky Cauldron. The next morning, he could remember nothing of the night before. It was a mystery to him when he awoke to find himself in a holding cell in the Ministry of Magic, waiting to be questioned by the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. They told him – the new, no-nonsense Minister Scrimgeour and a rather less sure looking Auror by the name of Kingsley Shacklebolt – that he had confessed to being a Death Eater the previous night. At first, he thought they must be joking. As if You-Know-Who would ever recruit him. Stan Shunpike, a Death Eater? Veronica would have died laughing.

But they seemed to be serious. Scrimgeour, anyway. Stan opened his mouth, about to set them straight, and then he was struck by a sudden realization. If he confessed, he'd be arrested. And if he was arrested . . . . he'd get his name in the paper. Everyone would be talking about him. He'd be famous. And maybe he would finally be interesting enough to keep a girl.

Veronica might even see.

She might take him back.

So he kept his mouth shut.

Later on, stone cold sober and screaming his innocence in Azkaban, Stan realizes that this may not have been his best idea.