Year of the Wolf

8. Family and Friends

December came with crisp winter air and a healthy snowfall. Already there were many snowmen taking residence in the courtyard and by the lake, and some of the older students had charmed theirs to perform various amusing feats. Remus had talked the others into merely charming theirs to sing carols at passers by, and the teachers it seemed were rather impressed with both the skill and restraint they had shown.

With winter also came the reluctance that met them every morning when it became evident that they would have to eventually leave the cosy warmth of their bedsheets. Sirius had always been a morning person, but even he found himself clamouring for just an extra five minutes beneath the sheets.

'Wake up!' James urged early one mid-December morning. 'Breakfast! Warm bacon, porridge...mmmm.'

Sirius simply groaned in response and retreated further into his cocoon.

'It's nearly Christmas!' James reminded him, like this was something to get out of bed for, and he felt the mattress dip slightly at his feet.

Somehow, this did nothing to improve Sirius's mood. Christmas was not a happy time for him. Where the other students were excited to see their parents again and spend some time at home, he had always been much happier at school. He would have stayed at Hogwarts over the holidays if he could, even with the others going home. Alas, the whole sodding family was coming over and he didn't have much of a choice.

'And I'm spending Christmas with Lucius Malfoy,' he mumbled into his pillow. 'So sorry if I'm not exactly leaping out of bed.'

He supposed that Malfoy wasn't as bad at Rodolphus. Malfoy at least had a personality - Rodolphus would often just look surly and stare off into space. Sometimes he wondered if there was a brain at all between those ears. It would explain why he had married Bellatrix.

'You don't have to, you know,' James said, and his voice was suddenly quiet. 'You can come spend Christmas at my house.'

At this, Sirius sat up. Of course, he never had to tell James how little he wanted to return home, and how it actually had nothing to do with Lucius Malfoy and everything to do with the antagonism of his relatives.

'Thanks, Prongs,' he said with a smile. 'But Christmas is for family. I'm not going to ruin that for you.'

James looked annoyed and a little offended.

'You won't ruin it, you bloody idiot!' he said. 'Mum and Dad love having you round, it's not just me. And you're pretty much family anyway.'

There were many things he could say to this, but none of them seemed appropriate. This could turn very girly very quickly and let's face it, neither of them wanted that.

'I appreciate the offer, Prongs, I really do, and there is really nothing I would like more than to spend Christmas with you and your parents. But mine would never let me go, you know that.'

Not only was this some big family event what with Narcissa's engagement (and Blacks did like to draw out celebrations for nice, pureblood unions) and Rodolphus actually crawling out of his cave long enough to attend a social function (twice in one year had to be a record), but it was also the last Christmas before he came of age.

He shuddered at the thought. Maybe that was why they were getting more and more intolerable - when he came of age he would be expected to find a nice pureblood girl to marry as soon after graduation as he could, to cement his place in the family. He would become the head of the Black family and everything they owned would be as equally his as Orion's. The only thing that really appealed to him about the whole arrangement would be that once he was married, Orion and Walburga were likely to leave Number 12 Grimmauld Place as Arcturus and Melania had when their son married his cousin.

Yes, they were running out of time to browbeat him into their way of thinking. Sometimes Sirius wondered what they would say if they knew that the moment he turned seventeen and inherited his share of the Black family fortune, he was out of there and intended to never speak a word to any of them ever again. Maybe he would marry a muggle, or donate whatever was left of his share after he bought himself a house and secured his future to pro-Muggle-rights groups. They would love that.

James was still looking at him.

'They're getting worse, you said so yourself,' he said.

'It's nothing I can't handle.'

'Will you "handle" it if Orion beats you again?'

Sirius felt the blood drain from his face. There was a reason it had taken him so long to tell the others, and here it was. He wondered why he had ever told them at all.

'He did it on impulse. Lost control. When he stopped and realised what he had done, he was pale. He just snapped.'

'And he could snap again.'

'Then yeah, I'll handle it.'

'This is not just some "stuff" that happens, Sirius! This is not okay, it's never okay. I really don't feel comfortable knowing you're going back there and quite frankly it worries me that you're being so blasé about it.'

Sirius groaned and pushed off the covers, scooting further down the bed to where James sat doing a pretty good impression of an angry Slughorn with the colour he was turning.

James's problem was that he was pampered and spoiled and so used to getting everything he wanted. It was all fair and good when it came down to broomsticks and material goods, which his family could afford, but there were some things that he couldn't have, no matter how much he kicked up a fuss about it. He was heir to a family who loved him; a kind, generous bunch of people with hearts as big as their fortune. He couldn't understand what it was like for Sirius to grow up with his legacy, and quite frankly, Sirius didn't want him to understand, because that would be a step towards a shared predicament and he wouldn't have wished his family on anyone, least of all his best friend, who would not have lasted two days with them.

'Not everything in this world is fair,' he said, making sure that James was looking him in the eye before he continued. 'It would be nice if we all had families that cared about us and tucked us in at night and kissed us goodbye before they sent us off to school for another year. But the real world doesn't work like that, and sometimes there's nothing you can do about it. This is one of those times. So let's chalk it down to "shit happens" and go get some breakfast before the first years eat it all.'

James opened his mouth to speak but closed it again and locked his jaw. Sirius was fully aware that he was asking him to just sit back and let him deal with this alone, which was like asking Snape to wash his hair or McGonagall to let them set their desks on fire. But that was the thing; it was his problem, and his alone. On top of everything else, James had something of a hero complex. And of all the things he wanted, seeing his best friend safe and happy with a loving family was just something that wasn't going to happen, no matter how hard he tried to make it so.

He was staring at the back of her head for a whole ten minutes before Sirius kicked him under the table and he snapped back to reality. She had done something different with her hair, James was sure of it, though it seemed to just hang in the way it always had.

'What does he have that I don't?' he fumed quietly. Sirius just sighed and very possibly rolled his eyes - James wasn't going to look up.

'Greasy hair?'

If James thought even for a moment that Lily Evans would show some interest in him if he just neglected to wash his hair, he would have done it.

He just didn't understand how she could look down on him when other girls tried (and failed) to catch his eye, and yet she, a muggle-born, was close to Severus Snape, the Dark Arts-obsessed wannabe Death Eater.

And he had seen the way that Snape looked at her, and it made his skin crawl and his blood boil. Snape was closer to her than he could ever hope to be, and it just wasn't fair.

'Look mate, I'm sorry that she ignores you,' said Sirius, whose voice was barely a whisper above the cawing of the birds around them. 'But it's not the end of the world.'

'Padfoot, she's perfect,' James sighed. He tried to think of words to describe just how perfect, but such a thing was just not possible. Even as, with a flick of her wand, she silenced her bird so flawlessly Professor Flitwick became so excited he struggled to speak.

'Then stop brooding and bloody well ask her out, before you drive me crazy,' Sirius said, turning back to his frog.

The lesson was child's play for them; they had mastered the silencing charm before Flitwick had even begun to teach it. Peter, on the other hand...

The sound reached them before the rapid expansion of his bird was noticed. Instead of silencing it, he seemed to have amplified its caws and now the bird was growing to match them.

Flitwick ran towards him in a hurry and with a flick of his wand the bird returned to normal, though now looked rather flustered (and honestly, who could blame it?).

'Less- Less gusto next time, maybe, Mr. Pettigrew,' said Professor Flitwick.

Remus, his partner for that lesson, patted him consolingly on the back, but even his attention was drawn by the howls of laughter at the next table. James scowled at the two Ravenclaw boys.

'Would it be wrong of us to practice our charms on them?' asked Sirius in a low, deadly voice.

'I think the more appropriate question, Padfoot mate, would be "Do you think it's worth the detention?"'

Flitwick's detentions were often easier than others, and it took a little more effort to earn them. Most would think that the boys would take this as a challenge, but they genuinely liked Professor Flitwick and so were less apt to act up in his lessons.

'The idiot can't do anything right,' snickered one of the Ravenclaw boys.

'How did he end up in Hogwarts anyway?' laughed the other.

'Shove it, Aubrey,' snapped Remus. 'I haven't seen you cast it yet.'

The boys laughed even harder.

'Even having you as a desk mate isn't helping him, Lupin,' said Aubrey. 'I'd just give up if I were you.'

'Forget charms, Prongs,' sneered Sirius. 'I think I feel a hex coming on.'

With a jab of their wands to silence their animals to appease Flitwick, Sirius and James moved out from behind their desk.

'You know, for Ravenclaws, you two are pretty thick,' said James.

Aubrey puffed himself up and smiled confidently.

'This doesn't concern you, Potter,' he said.

'Actually, Peter is our friend,' Sirius pointed out. 'So it kind of does concern us when a couple of dicks are making him feel uncomfortable.'

Aubrey seemed caught between a desire to stand up for himself and the fearful realisation that he was up against James Potter and Sirius Black. While James himself often failed to pull off intimidating when he tried, Sirius was capable of it with no effort at all, what with his tall, well-built frame and arrogant looks. And everyone in the school knew that they were heavily into Defence Against the Dark Arts and learned jinxes, hexes, and their counters just for fun.

Whatever Aubrey's retort may have been, it was stolen when Flitwick called an end to the lesson and urged them all to practise their charms for homework.

'You didn't have to do that,' said Peter as they left.

'Start standing up for yourself and maybe we won't have to,' James told him.

'I'll help you with the charm for next lesson,' Remus promised. 'We'll show them.'

'He's going to need all the help he can get.'

All four of them spun around at the sound of the hostile voice. Only Aubrey laughed at his own joke; the other Ravenclaws, even his friend from before, seemed to think that he had gone too far.

Remus threw out a hand to stop James and Sirius, and James realised that his friend also had his hand on his wand. This gave him strength, and almost immediately he raised his arm.

He wasn't sure what incantation he had shouted, and he could not discern Sirius's cry either. And Aubrey was about to laugh, having assumed that their hex had failed, when his eyes began to bulge and his cheeks puffed out.

It was rather magnificent to watch, and passing students stopped and stared as Bertram Aubrey's head expanded, and continued to expand. Both James and Sirius let out laughs of joy at the sheer irony, whilst Remus stood open-mouthed and Peter cowered behind them all.

By the time Flitwick emerged, Aubrey's head was almost twice its original size. He seemed to recognise the spell, though its casters did not, and reversed it almost immediately, instructing Aubrey's friends to take him to the hospital wing to get checked over.

'What were you thinking?' he squeaked, rounding on James and Sirius. The pitch of his voice rose in his anger and it took a moment or two for James to realise that oh crap, Flitwick was head of Ravenclaw. 'Double detention!'

He spluttered a little more, but seemed to be out of words and returned to his classroom shaking his head. Quiet laughter had broken out in the hallway in his wake.

'Definitely worth it,' Sirius said with a smile.

AN - Thanks for reading! And a huuuuge thank you to Fea just me, Kazo Sakamari, Ranger Indecisive, RodeoTown and PhoenixHopeFire for reviewing! I'm so glad everyone liked the last chapter. This one was just a bit of a filler too (well, half there), but I promise you the next few most definitely are not.

As always, thank you all and please review!