Forever Ago

Chapter 3: Meeting Friends

The Marauders currently were trying to sneak back into Gryffindor tower, without Filch catching them. This task would have been impossible if not for their magic map, which they were currently consulting.

"Alright the coast is clear. Filch is stalking around the dungeons and none of the other teachers are out. Come on," James whispered. Peter laughed nervously and the four marauders tiptoed quietly down the empty halls. The only sound was the Marauders footsteps quietly slapping the purple carpet. Sirius decided to break the silence.

"The map takes all the adventure out of this. Where is the risk, the excitement, the danger?" Sirius whispered dramatically.

"Oh, be quiet Padfoot. Do you want to ruin our chance of winning the house cup? Again?" Remus chided gently. James just rolled his eyes.

"My dear Moony, I'm hurt. Are you suggesting I would do anything to jeopardize our chances at winning the house cup?" Sirius joked. He then wiped away an imaginary tear. Both James and Remus rolled their eyes.

"I will be extra careful just for you," Sirius whispered in a mock serious voice. He then turned into a big black dog and ran to the corner of the hall. He vigilantly looked all around and pretended to sniff the air for invisible foes. Then, he stalked around the corner corned all the while trying to look in every direction. Peter caught on to the game, transformed into his rat form, and started running down the hall like he was trying to prevent someone from following him. He would zigzag at random and vary his speed to try to confuse anyone who would dare follow him. Remus and James chuckled appreciatively.

"You know, I don't think Sirius will ever grow up," Remus grumbled, trying to hide his amusement. Sirius started bounding up a rickety old staircase, one they knew lead to Gryffindor tower. Wormtail, afraid Sirius would leave him, sprinted towards Sirius, jumped, and lightly bit on to Sirius's tail. Sirius continued as though nothing had happened, but started to wag his tail frantically.

James laughed quietly, and the two of them had to run to keep up with their friends in their animal form. They dashed up the narrow staircase, popping out of a secret passageway near the Fat Lady. Sirius and Peter turned back into their human form in a blink of an eye.

"Ah, that was just like the good old days. I could practically smell the adventure," Sirius panted wiping his brow.

"The smell you're referring to is the smell of a sweaty dog," James teased.

"Oh yeah," Sirius grumbled feigning anger. He then lunged at James in a not-so-sneaky sneak attack. James stepped to the side, and Sirius crashed to the floor.

"Owww, that hurt, Prongs," Sirius whined.

"Calm down both of you, we don't want to wake up the whole Gryffindor tower," Remus admonished. Peter looked around nervously.

"Yeah, can you imagine the look on Lily's face if she found us here," James said.

"What? Afraid of your girlfriend?" Sirius teased and stood up.

"No, course not! But, I think it would be a good idea to make sure we won't run into anybody on the way up to the dormitory." James examined the Marauder's Map. "Sirius what did you do to the map?"

"Huh? Nothing! Why, is something wrong?" Sirius asked curiously, peering over James's shoulder to get a closer look at the map. Remus and Peter gathered around too.

"It says there's a 'Harry Potter' up in our dormitory. I don't have any relatives named Harry. Well, that I know of, and my family is small," James stated. Remus started muttering spells to see if the map was malfunctioning or if Sirius had made any 'modifications' to it.

"I don't see anything wrong with it, although it could be a Preconfundus charm. But, I bet Padfoot hasn't even heard of that charm, have you?" said Remus.

"Nope," Sirius responded.

"It tricks magical items into showing something as true, when it's actually false or visa versa." A dreamy look appeared on Sirius's face, clearly saying he was scheming up a way he could use this spell. Remus rolled his eyes tugged on his sleeves.

"Er, shall we go see who this 'Harry Potter' is?" James suggested. If Sirius said he didn't do anything to the map, then James believed him: Sirius liked to joke, but he wouldn't lie to a fellow Marauder.

"You don't think he might be dangerous, do you?" Peter asked, trying not to look too concerned. This time it was Sirius who rolled his eyes, annoyed. Nobody bothered to answer Peter. They walked in through the portrait and up to the seventh years' dormitory. There was an extra bed between Sirius's bed and Remus's and a boy about seventeen years old sleeping on it.

"Who do you think he is?" whispered Peter.

"Don't be stupid Wormtail this must be Harry," Sirius replied slowly as if talking to a rather dim child. Remus took out his wand and lit it. The dim bluish hue revealed a skinny boy with light brown messy hair. His face had a couple of freckles, but altogether he looked very average.

"Let's wake him up. I want to talk to him," whispered Sirius excitedly.

"Nah, how would you like to get woken up in the middle of the night?" said Remus.

"But, I want to know who he is," Sirius whined looking around at everyone with puppy dog eyes.

"I hate to say it, but I think we should wait until morning to talk to him. No sense in getting him on our bad side," James said with a hint of regret. Remus looked surprised at James's maturity, Sirius looked sulky, and Peter kept quiet as usual.

"Awww fine, but, I wonder why he's here. I've never seen him before," Sirius whined.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

I woke up the moment they walked into the dormitory. I've been an extremely light sleeper ever since. . .never mind. I tried to keep still and look like I was asleep while they watched me. I'm not sure why I pretended to be asleep, but I wasn't ready to face them yet. Seeing my mom was hard enough, but this wasn't only my dad, this was Sirius, the man who died for me, this was Remus, one of the few people who understood me, this was Pettigrew. Wormtail. The man who betrayed my parents. The man who brought back Voldemort. The man who took away my parents. The first man I ever intentionally killed.

I was seething with anger and my heart was pounding. I need to prepare, before I talk to Wormtail, or James. My anger took me by surprise. Hermione would say I was I was being temperamental. Maybe I was, but I was definitely too angry with Wormtail to talk to him right now. I would face them in the morning; maybe it would be easier to face them when they were tired. I don't think Sirius was ever a morning person, not that I ever had the chance to find out. I tried to get back to sleep.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Sirius was studying Harry very intently, much too curious to go to sleep. The way Harry was laying Sirius could just barely see Harry's face. Remus started snoring softly, an indication he had fallen asleep. Out of the four Marauders, Remus was the morning person. He was the first to go to sleep and the first to wake.

"Um, Sirius? Are you really going to go to sleep with a stranger in our dorm?" Peter asked nervously.

"Sirius, leave the kid alone, please, just go to bed," James pleaded, his voice uncharacteristically stern.

"Awww, come on James, I promise I won't wake him up, just let me get a closer look," Sirius persuaded. Peter got up from his bed and walked over to Sirius who stood at the foot of Harry's bed. James, knowing he was never going to get any sleep until Sirius's curiosity was satisfied, grudgingly tosses the covers aside and got up from his bed.

"Maybe we could open up his trunk, that would tell us who he is," Peter suggested.

"Yes, let's look through all his stuff," came Sirius's sarcastic response. Peter, missing the sarcasm, muttered a standard unlocking spell "Alohomora." Instead of the trunk popping open, it started spitting black liquid all over Peter, the ink hissed as it struck his skin. Peter squeaked and danced around looking like he was trying to jump out of his skin. Sirius and James jumped back wildly, flailing their arms, trying to avoid getting hit by the ink. Surprisingly, the ink only hit Peter.

"What happened?" shrieked Peter just as Harry sat up.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

"Trinitritus. Stay out of my stuff," I said coldly. My parents were fools not to realize that Wormtail was a spy. He was willing to search through a complete stranger's trunk, but they didn't recognize his dishonest tendencies.

"Hey! You're awake," Sirius exclaimed excited. I glared at everyone in the room. I couldn't do this. The mere thought of Wormtail alive made my blood boil, let alone him talking with my father, and breaking into my trunk. How could I talk with Wormtail, the man who betrayed my parents?

"Sorry about them, I tried to get them to leave you alone, but some people can't control their curiosity." James gave Sirius and Peter a pointed look.

I sighed feeling exasperated. Things were going badly. I decided I had better make an effort.

"Don't worry about it. Er, by the way, you might want to wash that liquid off. It's designed to stain the skin, so I'll know who tried to break into my trunk," I stated. Peter squeaked like a girl, and ran off to the bathroom.

"My name is Sirius Black, that was Peter Pettigrew, and this is James Potter. Who are you? And why are you here?" Sirius was obviously dying to know more about me.

"And I'm Remus Lupin," Remus said appearing by my bed. Remus was always a light sleeper and that racket would have woken up a hibernating dragon.

"I'm Harry, Harry Smith." Sirius's opened his mouth to reply but James shot him a cautioning look and mouthed 'not now' to Sirius. Sirius shut his mouth and motioned for Harry to continue.

"I used to be home schooled, but my parents decided to let me come to Hogwarts this year. So that's why I'm here now," I mumbled. Great, the only time I'm ever going to get to talk to my dad I'm going to lie the whole time.

"You were home schooled? That must have been awful. If I didn't have a chance to get away from my family, I'd go mad. My brother's in Slytherin, so I don't have to see him much. Why didn't you come at the beginning of the month? " Sirius exclaimed. I glanced at James but couldn't think of anything to say. I couldn't announce the truth. I realized they were waiting for me to answer Sirius's questions, so I forced out a reply.

"My, er, my family, well you see, we always go to Romania to see the dragons the first two weeks of September, so that's why I didn't show up on time," I said lamely. They seemed to except my explanation.

"Oh, well you have a lot of catching up to do. You've missed out on years of pranking. We'll just have to help you catch up," Sirius announced.

"Er, yeah,"

"Maybe, he's not into pranks. He could be the studious type," Remus said hopefully. This was all very overwhelming. Yesterday Sirius, Peter, and James were dead and now I'm having a conversation with them. I ran my hands through my hair trying to wake up and get a grip on the situation.

"Wicked scar, how did it happen?" James asked.

"What?" I asked. Dumbledore must not have disguised my scar. I was so distracted I didn't check before to see if the scar was still there.

"The one on your forehead that looks like a lightning bolt," Sirius supplied.

"Um, well, you see, when I was little I was attacked by a dark wizard. I've had the scar ever since." That was true I just didn't say which dark wizard gave me my scar. Luckily, Peter walked back into the room at that moment and distracted everyone; ink still stained his face and clothes.

"It won't come off. Don't you have a potion to remove it?" Peter whined.

"No," I answered glaring at him. "Do you normally break into strangers trunks?" I snapped.

"Erm, well you see, the thing is I was--"

"Don't bother, I know you were just curious, no need to start off on the wrong foot," I said trying to keep the coldness out of my voice. There was no reason to alienate my dad and Sirius by attacking their friend. Besides I didn't want to act suspiciously, by being unreasonably mean. Or have my dad and Sirius think I have no sense of humor.

"So tell me, do you like Quidditch? Of course you do. What's your favorite team and do you play?" Sirius said, wisely distracting me. I laughed; it was good to see Sirius so healthy.

"Yes, I love Quidditch. Um, my favorite team is the Chudley Cannons, and I do play Quidditch, but I haven't played much since I was thirteen," I answered.

"You like the Chudley Cannons!" James exclaimed in excitement.

"Why don't you play Quidditch any more?" Sirius asked.

"I've been. . . rather busy with other. . . stuff since then. If you don't mind, could we finish this conversation over breakfast? Because I'm dead tired."

"Yes, don't worry Sirius and Peter will let you get some sleep. Won't they?" James prompted.

"Um, yeah, goodnight," Sirius answered clearly unhappy he hadn't learned more. Peter nodded nervously. The four Marauders left Harry and went to their own beds.

It wasn't easy falling asleep for the second time that night; images kept running through my head. The look on James's face when I said I liked the Chudley Cannons. Peter covered in ink. Peter trying to break into my trunk. The look of shock on Wormtail's face as I killed him. Sirius asking me about Quidditch. Sirius falling. . . Sirius falling beyond the black veil. . .