Chapter 9:

Sure enough, Remus was standing alone at the end of a bed near the entrance to the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomfrey was busy fussing over Peter's nose, which had been shrunk back to its normal size. It was, however, still broken, but with a flick o the wand and a disgusting snap it was fixed and Peter was left to wrinkle and rub it gingerly. I approached Rums as the last bit of blood was being removed from Peter's face and hands. Peter looked fine, but Remus? Oh, he was definitely furious. I said nothing, afraid of attracting a similar outburst to the one just displayed by James. I should have known better – it was Remus who began the conversation.

"Peter is always the slowest," he finally muttered. "The least James could have done was stood there and taken what was coming to him." At that, he finally looked at me. "What did he do, anyway?"

"Had a Hufflepuff explode a potion," I replied. He gave me the look I had given James back in the common room – he knew that wasn't the whole story. "It was a boil-cure gone bad," I sighed, shaking my head and looking back to Peter.

"Oh, sweet Merlin."

He buried his face in his left hand, propping himself up on Peter's bed with his right. I almost told him then to prepare to have that reaction many times if he continued his friendship with James and Sirius.

"Of all the stupid things," he continued, shaking his head. He started to laugh softly, more it seemed for himself than at his friend's predicament.

"That's not all he did," a voice from behind me growled. Both Remus and I started and spun around to find Sirius looking sullen with his hands stuffed deep in his robes and his shoulders back. He looked rather defeated, but his eyes showed the fire I had missed at breakfast the first day. One shoulder shrugged toward me. "He bloody blamed her for the whole thing. Said that if she hadn't 'betrayed us to the enemy' he wouldn't have felt inclined to do it."

I felt my face going red. I really did not want to be a part of this conversation. I instead reached for a set of potions Madam Pomfrey was returning for and helped her carry them to the storage cabinet at the end of the room. When I returned, Sirius and Remus were deep in hushed conversation, and Peter was standing nearby looking nervous and awkward. I motioned for him to leave with me.

"This isn't the first time, you know," Peter said quietly after we had left the Hospital Wing. "Third time, in fact. I guess I just need to be a little bit faster next time."

"No," I corrected him. "James needs to be nicer. You shouldn't let him push you around." I almost stopped dead in my tracks then. Here I was sowing the seeds of Peter's betrayal and James' death. How could I take that back without sounding completely uncaring and arrogant?

"You're wrong. James and Sirius let me be their friend. Even Remus says he doesn't mind being around me. I don't mind this if it means I'm still their friend."

I breathed a sigh of relief.

"You're a really loyal friend, Peter."

I only hoped he would stay that way for a very very long time.

Dinner was awkward that night. My sitting with the girls only seemed to infuriate James even more, but from what I gathered from the unusual silence around the boys, both Remus and Sirius had refused to talk to James until he fully apologized to both Peter and me. So, as expected, I was halfway up the stairs on the fifth floor after dinner when James came up from behind me. I motioned for the girls to go ahead while I talked to him.

"Look," he said quietly as we walked. "I'm sorry for saying that stuff I said. I know that you live with Gwen and have to get along with her to stay sane so… I'm sorry". It was a very robotic apology – he had definitely been coached by Remus. But it was enough for me.

"I accept."

He looked rather confused and paused for a moment.

"Your apology? I accept it." I continued.

"Oh." he said, chuckling nervously. He reached up a hand to ruffle through his hair, and I couldn't help but smile.

"Alright, well… see you later?"

"Right. See you," he nodded.

He fell back to join his little posse as I caught Remus' eye. He gave me a side smile, and I nodded in return. It had been enough to restore the bond I shared with the boys – they had saved my life, after all. I jogged to catch up with the girls, who almost instantaneously broke out into questions (or, in Gwen's case, jeers and insults) about the encounter.

"Honestly, you lot, lay off." I said, walking ahead of them. I reached the portrait behind some fourth years and hurried in after them, leaving the girls to follow me up the stairs to the dormitory. They tried asking again, but I just crawled into bed silently and pulled the curtains closed around me. I knew the problem wasn't over.

My brain mulled over the day's events while the other girls laughed and chatted. I caught a couple of scoffs from Gwen, who had turned her attention to me instead of James, and pulled the covers even tighter up to my chin. I knew, very soon, that my loyalties would be tested.

The next week came and went in a blur. I had classes every day, and every day the professors would call me in after the lecture to make sure I was catching up properly. I was, of course. With the help of Remus, Sirius, and James (who had finally come to his senses and apologized to Peter as well), I was flying through the coursework.

"Very nice. Very nice!" Remus exclaimed one evening, as he watched me levitate a spare bit of parchment. We had taken up quarters in an empty classroom near the Gryffindor common room. "It's almost strange how you take to certain spells but not others…" He simply shook his head. "No matter. It's almost time for Charms. You can show off your levitation abilities when Professor Flitwick calls you in after the lecture."

I reached for my schoolbag and followed Remus out the door. We headed down to Charms, chatting about the session.

"It just seems odd to me that you had the swish-and-flick of wingardium leviosa down the first time you tried it, but you couldn't simply point your wand to direct water using aquarego."

I grinned at him, but I really wished he would drop the subject. I only knew how to swish-and-flick because like all good Harry Potter fans, I had found a stick in the backyard and practiced in my bathroom mirror several times, imagining that fated feather floating up high above my head.

"Maybe I'm just lucky?" I supposed. That satisfied Remus until we got to class. We would soon see if it would satisfy Flitwick as well.

Before I knew it, the weekend had come and I was shaken awake by Lily.

"There's someone downstairs to see you." she said, throwing clothes at me. "He said to grab your money as well." I hopped out of bed and pulled on the skirt and top Lily had so elegantly chucked at me, then made my way down to the common room, purse in hand. A boy was waiting there, and when he saw me, he motioned for me to hurry on my way down.

"I'm here to escort you to Hogsmeade," he said matter-of-factly. He rather reminded me of my first impression of Percy Weasley, and sure enough, a prefect's badge was pinned to the front of his robes. "Professor McGonagall seems to believe there is something there that you need."

I nodded. I completely forgot that McGonagall had arranged for the Hogsmeade trip. I ran back to the staircase and yelled to Lily to bring my cloak and gloves down, and soon the cloak, gloves, and I were accompanying the prefect past the statues of the winged boars that guarded the gate between Hogwarts and Hogsmeade. There was no words exchanged the whole trip, only a couple of coughs from the prefect when I found myself too distracted by my surroundings to move as quickly as he would have liked. He must have found the scenery boring having seen it for two years or more, but the black lake was still and the forbidden forest a mass of black and green. What I would trade for a camera…

Hogsmeade lay in the flatlands below the castle's cliffs, a town of shops and inns and many, many people. The whole town was bustling with business. My eyes were drawn immediately to the Cleansweep ("The Fastest Broom in the World") lit beautifully in the window of a nearby store. And there was Honeydukes, and the Three Broomsticks. Oh, what a wonderful world I had stepped into.

The prefect coughed again from behind me. I suppose I would have been irritated too, if I had to escort a very overwhelmed looking eleven-year-old through the streets of Hogsmeade. Embarrassed, I pulled my cloak closer over my shoulders and headed for Gladrags Wizardwear, to purchase clothing other than just the robes Dumbledore had given me. Another cloak, two sweaters, and a Holyhead Harpies shirt later, we emerged from Gladrags and I beelined for Armisti's Animalia – its storefront boasting several owls and quite an assortment of reptiles.

I let the shop door slam behind me, thinking that the prefect would follow me inside, but he remained outside instead, chatting with a passersby. He slipped the man a knut and took the paper the man offered. He looked inside the window at me, frowned, and then turned back and opened up the paper. I took that to mean I was allowed to continue, so I let my eyes wander around the store. Soon a lady approached the back of the counter. She produced a sickly sweet smile and smelled strongly of lavender.

"What can I do for you, child?" she asked me. I frowned at her; I was not a child.

"I wish to purchase an owl. Something sturdy but with a good temperament."

Her own temperament changed in an instant – she pursed her lips and reached under the counter, pulling out a large book a moment later.

"Do you have any specific species in mind?"

"No, just something that won't bite."

"Alright then." She flipped through several pages of the book before running a long finger down one of the pages. "I would recommend a barn, brown, snowy, or… tawny. Definitely not a great horned or screech if you're looking for a nicer owl." Shutting the book in a cloud of dust, she replaced it and came through a panel in the counter to reach the opposite side of the small store. "One of these?"

None of them specifically caught my attention… except for one. In the far back of the store, a single tawny owl sat in its cage silently. I approached the small cage and then squatted down to look more closely. He was beautiful, with a single white mark between his big round eyes. He opened his wings and paced around the cage, likely showing off.

"I'll take him." I said to the shop owner, taking the cage off the shelf.

"Done."

I paid the shop owner and left, glad to be out of the presence of such a strange woman. The prefect closed his paper and threw it on the closest bench as I approached.

"Have everything yet?" I was betting he was regretting becoming a prefect right about now.

"Yep. All done." The owl hooted in response, then hid his head under his wing contently.

It took no time at all to return to Hogwarts. The prefect definitely was done being in the snow and cold, and I was starting to feel my fingers numb as we raced up the steps and through the clock-tower courtyard. The prefect left for the Great Hall as I made my way back up to the common room and dormitories, all my bundles in hand. By the time we had returned, only Jeanne was in the dormitory, and although she looked at me strangely with an owl cage in my hands, she didn't question or comment. I set the cage down on the nightstand and took a seat on my bed. For a few moments the owl and I shared a stare until I finally broke it by reaching for the cage door. The owl was as content on my arm as he was in his cage, and I was beginning to feel overwhelmed by the fact I had an owl. A real owl.

"What are you going to name him?" Ronnie came in from the bathroom and was watching me stroke the bird's feathers.

"Socrates, I think." I said, remembering my political science teacher from back home. Socrates had been his favorite philosopher, and that interest had been passed to me. "Socks, for short." The owl hooted his consent again, and with a nod of my head, I stood up and opened the nearest window.

"Alright, Socks. I'll come for you in the owlery when I need you." With that, Socks opened his wings and took off into the afternoon sky, gliding around to the west before flapping his wings out of sight.

I had an owl.