Disclaimer: I'm doubting J.K. Rowling's mother ever told her she was loosing her computer if she didn't start writing her own stuff, so since that is why I haven't posted in a while, I can't be her. Not that my mother could or actually ever would take my computer from me, I did start writing something that is completely mine to shut her up, and it's really intriguing so I've been spending any time I could doing that.

A/N: Not only am I writing my own thing, but I also have a new FanFic going (Remus/James) if that pairing interests any one. All I can say for this chapter is, one more excuse for not posting is this chapter is not a fun one, please don't hate me.

Chapter 21

January 1978

But I didn't choose a complicated lifestyle, I had somehow convinced myself of this thought. That it had been forced on me, and that I was never given the choice to befriend Sirius and Remus, that I hadn't chosen them to be mine, they just were. That I hadn't really been given the choice of what to do that night, my friend that I would gladly give up my life for was in need, and once the need had been sated I was always willing to satisfy it when it came back. I had actually convinced myself that because I was breaking the law, that I had "fallen in love", and yes I used air quotes when I said it now, with two males I had to give up my parents. I had myself convinced that the loss of my mum and dad was able to be blamed on Sirius and Remus.

And that was why I had spent the moment we had gotten back to school with Lily. I didn't even speak to Remus and Sirius in the corridors, or in the Great Hall. I didn't sit with them in class, and I had become a lot more affectionate with Lily. Telling her that I loved her in the middle of the corridors, and the classrooms. Making a show of it when I dragged her into a broom closet for a quick snog. Sure she tried to talk to me, to get me to explain what was going on, but I convinced her there were other things she wanted to do instead. Oh, and then when the day was through, and I knew Sirius and Remus were asleep, I still crawled into bed with them and whispered the truth before falling asleep. I always made sure I was awake before they were, and if I needed more of a lie in, then I crawled into my old bed for it.

I saw it when they looked at me that I was hurting them, but I was hurting myself. My parents had died and I allowed myself to be convinced that because of this I was allowed to hurt someone myself. I knew it was wrong, and the part of me that knew what love was, that knew that I loved my pups, beat me up inside everyday. I thought that snogging Lily senseless was the answer to getting that voice to shut up. I thought that not talking to Sirius and Remus, that treating Sirius like any other player on my team, would make that voice shut up. The truth was that it only shut up when I was laying with my arms wrapped around my pups.

Then the day came that I couldn't blame my mistakes on anyone but the true culprit, myself. I was the one that had that day planned from beginning to end. I was the one that knew it was wrong, though so did she, but really I was the one that shouldn't have even gone there. It was Lily's birthday, it was also a Hogsmeade weekend, and I had the whole day planned. We were going to have breakfast together in the Great Hall, go see whatever shops she wanted in Hogsmeade, have lunch at the Three Broomsticks, maybe finish some shopping, and then I was going to show her a room only the Marauders knew about.

I had the Room of Requirement set up perfectly after a few times of walking back and forth in front of it, and lead her inside just after dinner. I had made her keep her eyes closed, and as I shut the door I told her to open them. There was a fire and a couch with some cookies, oatmeal-raisin because I knew they were her favorite, on the coffee table. In the corner was a bed, with rose petals all over the place.

"James," Lily said as she turned to look at me with the same look she had been wearing for the past month when I knew she was about to say something about the pups. I pulled her towards me, but she put a hand on my chest to stop me from kissing her. "No, I don't know what is going on with you, I don't know what has been going on all month but this is wrong. It's not that I don't want you to have my virginity, it's just...You already have someone's virginity, and isn't his enough?"

"His?" I asked acting disgusted. "Lily, baby," the voice in my head that is usually on a constant chant of "Sirius, Remus, Sirius, Remus," decided at that moment to scream, "THAT ISN"T REMUS!" As though I had no business calling anyone baby but Remus. "I messed around with a guy, alright two of them, but do you actually think that meant something to me?" Even as I asked the question, my stomach twisted into knots. "I'm not a poof," yes I am, and damn proud of it, "I just needed to get my priorities sorted out, and I should thank you for being so patient with me as I did that. The loss of my parents just made me realize what I really needed in this world, you. I just want you." Liar, liar, liar.

In order to get the voice in my head to shut up, I pulled Lily towards me and kissed her enough that her senses were gone. Girls were nice, girls were soft, girls had curves. Like the one at the crook of their neck, that I kissed after I had trailed my lips across her jaw. Like the perfect swell of their breasts that I brushed my hand against when I had removed her shirt. Like the smooth bump of their hips that I ran my hand across after I had tugged her pants down.

Yes, girls were nice, girls were soft, and girls had curves. I refused at that moment to think about how much nicer boys were, how they were hard in all of the right ways, and they had these lines in their bodies that drove me crazy. I was a bisexual, I could appreciate the feel of both bodies. It was just that smooth and soft didn't have the same exact effect on me as slick and hard.

Later that night I was sitting on my bed, not crying. I was not crying as I thought about the fact that I had just had sex with Lily. I was most definitely not crying when I compared being in a wet, tight... you get my point, to being inside of Sirius or Remus for that matter. I was definitely not crying when I thought about the fact that Lily wouldn't even cup my cheeks let alone put her finger in me to complete the cycle. Nor was I even thinking about the fact that I had eaten her, and she said something about sucking me was demoralizing and what not. It wasn't that it wasn't good, it was. It just wasn't them. And no, I wasn't lying when I said I wasn't crying, I wasn't, I just wanted to.

My face was resting in my hands when I heard the chuckles, because they hated when I said giggles, that I used to be the cause of. I knew from the way they were laughing that they were probably locked together at the lips and Sirius was rubbing parts of Remus I longed to be able to brush with my fingertips against. When I heard another sound coming from Sirius, I knew that Remus had done his tongue thing right on Sirius' neck, and it made me want them. It was my fault, I had convinced myself of that bullshit. I had left them in the dirt, and I had slept with Lily. It was my fault I didn't get to have them.

"Oh," I heard Remus say sharply. I wasn't looking up. "So you're just going to sleep in your own bed tonight, not pretend like you didn't sleep with us." I looked up at this.

"Look at him," Sirius snarled, "acting like he doesn't even know what we're talking about. Thinks we are actually asleep when he crawls in with us. Maybe next time we should do what I've been telling you to do for the past week."

"What?" Remus asked looking away from him. "You couldn't sleep if he didn't sleep with us anyways, so I don't want to hear your bullshit."

"Maybe for the first night or two, eventually I'd get used to it." Sirius argued.

"I slept with Lily," I said, and I don't even know why I did. It could have been that I just wanted them to stop arguing. It just slipped out. Their heads spun back to face me so quickly they had to have gotten whip lash.

"Well look whose figuring it out." Sirius said in mock pride. "Today yeah?" I nodded. "See, you don't wait to tell us something almost a year later, or months later, you tell the first day. Good boy."

"Except," Remus argued. "He's only telling us because he regrets it. If he had enjoyed it, he would have continued doing it, behind our backs."

"Oh, probably not," Sirius corrected. "He'd probably have no issue doing it in front of us. I mean he snogs her senseless and tells her he loves her in front of us, why not add that as well."

"I wouldn't do that to you," I said in the same small voice I had used when I told them I had slept with Lily.

"This conversation might be about you Potter," Remus snapped, and I recoiled at the use of my last name, "but we are not talking to you."

"Yeah, A," Sirius added pointing at his self, "B," he continued pointing at Remus, "C," he pointed at me, "you're way out of it."

"How about I skip D, and E's my way in." I dead-panned.

"F," Remus continued, "skip a bunch of letters, U."

"I just wanted you to know," I said. "It's not like I was going to try and sleep in your bed tonight, I so don't deserve it. I'm not even going to tell you I love you, because even though I do, you won't believe me. You have no reason to. I'd say I'm sorry, but it would probably just be a waist of breathe. So, you know, now I'm going to bed." I pulled my curtain closed, and slipped under my covers. I heard their curtain close and nothing more.

"God Potter," Lily said as I walked into the common room the next morning. She slammed her hands against my chest, and added, "you're such an arsehole." With that she stormed away.

For the next week that was my life. Lily tossing me dirty looks and refusing to talk to me. Sirius and Remus not even looking at me, and definitely not talking to me. I deserved it, I wasn't sure what Lily's problem was. She was free to go when ever she decided she wanted to. If me not kissing her, or me kissing her even though she knew I was sleeping with Sirius and Remus wasn't too much for her, then she could stay. If me telling her that I loved her, though she knew it was not the same way I loved Remus and Sirius wasn't too much for her, then she could stay. If I was sleeping with her, but she knew that I really only wanted to be with Remus and Sirius wasn't too much for her, then she could stay. The moment it got to be too much for her, she was free to leave.

There's this thing about being popular at Hogwarts, even if your friends are good at keeping the truth, the other students come up with theories. The more theories there are, the worse your reputation gets slung through the mud. When your supposed girlfriend, and your two best mates are pissed at you, it gives the theories fuel. So for the next week I would get shot looks, even though no one knew why they were mad at me, and get asked questions, that I refused to answer. I found a copy of Said the Lion with my picture and an article about why the people I cared for most in the world were mad at me. It was ridiculous, included something about a hornsnack or something.

Then one day in early February I had gone outside, just to escape the looks that haunted me wherever I went. I had gone down to the lake, the same spot Sirius, Remus, and I had found during the spring where we could be alone and yet we didn't have to be locked up inside our dorm. There were rocks on the back, and even though it was the middle of winter, I was still skipping them.

"You realize that the lake is frozen, right?" I heard Peter's voice call to me after I had been outside for a while.

"Yeah, I'm trying to see if I can break the ice if I hit it hard enough." I said in a dead voice.

"How's that working?" He asked, and my lip twitched for a minute.

"It's not." I answered, a little bit of life coming back to my voice. "Don't you hate me?" I asked, looking back at him for a moment while I found another rock.

"No," He replied. "That's the thing about being your brother, I'm not allowed to hate you. I can press your face into your own shit if I want to, and I can make the whole world think your a jackass, but I can't hate you. And see, the fact that you have been sleeping alone for the past week, something you haven't done in almost a year and a half, that pushes your face into your shit more. Then your girlfriend, or at least supposedly your girlfriend, won't even talk to you in class, so everyone hates you even more. That only leaves me with one other option."

"What's that," I asked, again reached to gather a rock.

"Supportive," He answered with a shrug, "so, how are you Prongs?"

"The men I love won't even look at me, and my girlfriend won't talk to me, I'm dandy." I dead-panned.

"Why, why'd you do it?" He asked, and I turned to look at the sky. We would probably get snow that night.

"I was horny," I answered truthfully. He made a little sound, but I beat him to what he was going to say. "I know, it's not a good enough reason."

"Why haven't you talked to them for a month? You wouldn't have had a reason to be horny if you did?" Peter pointed out to me. I took a deep breathe, and turned to face him.

"I had somehow convinced myself that I had no choice in whether I wanted to be with them or not. I've told you, when I first met them, something in me knew they were mine. They belonged to me, and when Remus told us he wanted us, or you know demonstrated it, I again felt like something in me was forcing me to show him he was mine. I feel like I don't know who I am unless I am Prongs, and I have my Moony and my Padfoot. We're inseparable, we find ourselves in the other. I don't know if it's healthy." I explained. Peter was silent while he listened.

"I want you to do something for me, and then I'm going to explain something to you. Think you can handle that?" I nodded. "Kay, close your eyes," I looked at him strangely but did as he asked. "Clear you mind, take a few deep breathes. Stop laughing, okay. You're on a cliff, you only have one rope. On the edges of the cliff are Lily, and Sirius and Remus, you only have time to save one set. Take a deep breathe, okay exhale, now tell me who you save."

"Sirius and Remus," I said after pausing. We'd done the same kind of thing before, but we always had to answer the first option that popped into our minds. He was showing me that even with the pause, I would answer the same way.

"Okay, keep your eyes closed, you're in Hawaii. Who do you take on the romantic getaway?" Again I paused, took a deep breathe, and exhaled.

"Sirius and Remus." I answered, I had a choice but it wasn't necessary. I knew who I wanted.

"Now, last one." Peter promised. "You're told you can never have sex again, but you can grow old with either Lily, or Sirius and Remus, who do you grow old with?" Again, I breathed in and out.

"Sirius and Remus, we'd still be able to get ourselves in trouble." I said as I opened my eyes. They were who I would save from dieing, they were who I'd take on a romantic getaway, they were who I wanted to live with.

"So you see now, you have a choice, you just don't need it." Peter explained. "Now, that thing I was going to explain. You know my family, my mum, brother, sister, dad and I are all really close right?" I nodded, the Pettigrews were inseparable. "Well in my fourth year, dad left. They were separated for nearly a year, and my dad did all the things he never really got to do, because they got married right out of school yeah? I see it like he cheated on mum, so does she, but we've forgiven him. He told her before he left that he didn't feel like Drew Pettigrew, like his identity was Drew and Ramona Pettigrew. When he came back he said that he still felt that way, but he found out after twenty years of marriage, it should feel like he isn't just Drew Pettigrew, because he isn't, they are Drew and Ramona Pettigrew."

"So what you're saying is..." I started, but was interrupted when two figures walked around the tree.

"We are the Marauders, and we are yours, and the three of us belong together. We can't change it, that's just the way it is." Remus took the words right out of my mouth. "It's not that you don't have a choice, you just don't need it." I laughed at how well he had always been at reading my mind.

"I'm so sorry loves," I said when I sobered a second later. Sirius and Remus nodded their heads. I wasn't quite forgiven, but I was going to be allowed back in their bed.

A/N: I know, I know. How dare I let him sleep with anyone other then Remus and Sirius? I say, blame him, he's the one that had convinced himself of some pretty messed up stuff. Tell me what you're thinking, and if you want to read my other fic it's called Lost, it's a romance between just Remus and James.