A Lost Kiss

A Lost Kiss

Chapter 2: How can your allies turn into 'enemies'?

Remus watched his friend's retreating figure with a frown. Again, he needed to help get Sirius out of a tight spot that he'd gotten himself into. This was too close of a call to simply dismiss. He had to put his foot down, once and for all.

"For goodness sake, there are people half his age here!" he reasoned with himself. "He needs to quit being so bloody irresponsible."

But how?

He paused, trying to formulate a plan. Pacing up and down the hall, he watched Sirius go from the kitchen to the drawing room after breakfast. Thirty more minutes of frantic plotting and scheming gave way to a brilliant day's worth of one-man conspiracies against his unsuspecting friend.

~~~

Sirius was sitting in the drawing room watching Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny. He was trying to find out who was most uncomfortable around him. But it was becoming extremely difficult, since they were having a heated discussion about Quidditch (with the exception of Hermione, who found making S.P.E.W. merchandise much more appealing).

He was in the process of quelling his frustration by listening to Ron's review of the Chudley Cannons' last game, when Remus walked in looking very happy. He had both hands in his pockets, and he was humming a jaunty tune. The moment he saw Sirius looking at him, however, he quickly toned down his manner of glee and song to a look of pleasurable contentment.

Remus walked over to the couch where his friend sat, and gave him a pat on the back before sitting beside him. He turned to Ron and said, "Were the Cannons really that good?"

"They were rubbish," said Ginny, before her brother could answer.

Ron gave her a scandalized look. "No, they weren't."

"Yes, they were."

"NO, THEY WE--"

"Guys!" Harry interrupted. "They were okay. But how about the Tornados?"

This being said, both Ron and Ginny agreed fervently that the Tornados were absolutely terrible. Remus and Sirius looked on with expressions of amusement.

After they spent more time nit-picking the shortcomings of the Tornados, Sirius concluded that nothing else was going to happened there that was likely to help him uncover whom he had (he shuddered at the thought) kissed. He thought of going to the backyard to visit Buckbeak the hippogriff.

As he stood and turned to walk out of the room, he heard the rest of the room's occupants sniggering.

"What is it?" he asked them.

Everyone grew quiet. Sirius shrugged. As soon as he was out of earshot, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and even Remus burst out laughing.

"Blimey, Remus!" Ron asked after a few gulps of air had finally entered his lungs. "Is it April Fools or something?"

"No, Ron. Padfoot just needs to learn a lesson," replied Remus quietly.

The four gave him inquiring looks, but he just smiled secretively and said, "You'll see."

~~~

Something's wrong, thought Sirius, Why were the lot of them laughing back at the drawing room? Something smelled very fishy.

He was approaching Buckbeak when he realized that not only did something smell fishy, the stench of Hippogriff dung hung in the air as well.

"Bloody hell, Beaky!" he laughed. "This place smells sensational!"

He proceeded to clean up the hippogriff's defecation with a shovel and a pail.

After the backyard looked and smelled slightly cleaner, Sirius left bearing both shovel and pail to dispose of the offending feces.

As he was re-entering the house, he saw Kreacher pass by. The deranged house-elf was, as usual, muttering utter nonsense to itself. He heard Sirius coming along, and turned to glare at him.

"Dear master," he bowed low. "Does master need any help?"

"Thanks Kreacher. The offer's tempting, but go clean your quarters or something. Merlin knows that that place is a giant dust bunny. I can do this by myself," Sirius said with a disgusted look.

Kreacher was quick to walk away. He started muttering under his breath again. Sirius caught the words 'nutter,' 'dung-brained,' and 'pathetic.' He decided that it was for the greater good of all if he just refrained from yelling at the house-elf.

Kreacher! He was more 'subdued' today than he usually is... Sirius couldn't help but think... Yuck, what if it was Kreacher?!

It was all he could do to keep himself from barreling for the nearest lavatory and purging his stomach of all food. In all honesty, he would rather have married and impregnated Hogwarts' resident Giant Squid, than to give Kreacher even an innocent peck on the cheek.

But there's hope, he assured himself. I have until tonight to make sure that it wasn't Kreacher. He tried his best to shrug the thought away.

On his way to the kitchen, he heard two pairs of footsteps behind him thundering in perfect unison. No doubt, the owners of these footfalls were Fred and George Weasley.

As they reached the kitchen's open entrance, he heard Fred and George chuckle before both kicked him right in the behind. This sent Sirius diving straight to the kitchen floor, shovel flying somewhere to his left, and the pail overturned in midair before landing with a loud clang near the dining table.

Dung was everywhere. Molly Weasley was in shock for the shovel had whizzed past her (it was embedded in a cupboard a few inches from her head in only a matter of seconds from soaring from Sirius' grasp). And Mrs. Black's portrait's curtains flew open in the other room due to her loud shrieking, which was triggered by the pail's crash.

"SERVES YOU RIGHT! UNGRATEFUL SWINE! MY PRECIOUS AND NOBLE HOUSE, FILTHY! FFIIIILLLLLTHYYYY!!!"

Sirius barely registered his mother's cursing portrait or Molly's enraged expression. He was too busy giving Fred and George (who, to his indignation, were both guffawing) extremely dirty looks.

"What in Bertie Botts' buttocks was that for?!" he fumed, not bothering to stand just yet for the 'injured' effect the situation allowed him.

"We're sorry," said the twins in unison. They were stifling more bouts of laughter and did not look very sorry at all. "We were just following instructions."

"What instructions?" Sirius asked nonplussed.

The twins looked at each other. Fred smiled and said, "I assume that you have no knowledge of the aforementioned instructions..." He then took out his wand and said, "Accio note on Sirius' back."

Sure enough, Sirius felt a tug on the back of his shirt and the rustle of paper as it detached itself from his shirt and flew to Fred's outstretched hand.

Fred handed him the note that was on a piece of parchment big enough to be seen by people a few feet away. It was bewitched to flash a two-part message written in bright green lettering with an orange outline.

The first message read:

I'm a pervert. Please help me right myself.

And the second message was in unmistakable bold lettering in all caps:

KICK MY DEPLORABLE ARSE

The moment he saw the message, he knew that Remus was behind the prank.

Molly had finally recovered from her shock and was reading the note over Sirius' shoulder. She gasped in incredulity, "Who could do such a thing!" she whispered hoarsely. "And how come it says that you're a pervert?"

"Really, this is unbelievable!" Sirius replied sheepishly. He was casting wildly around for an explanation that would be feasible for Molly.

Remus will be getting a big box of hippogriff dung on Christmas, Sirius thought annoyed. He knew that Remus was trying to teach him some sort of lesson (as he so often does with most anybody he doesn't mind patronizing in his crafty Marauder way). He decided that he would play along with his friend's little plan, since he admitted that it was his fault anyway. But still, the notion of sending Remus dung was appealing. As it was, he was under so much stress already. He did not feel the need to have insult added to injury by way of having to deal with not so practical practical jokes.

"I know," he said in an alarmingly bright manner. "I must've cast a spell on myself by accident! It probably happened this morning. I was admiring myself on the mirror, you see, when I saw that there was a loose thread sticking out of my shirt. Of course, I can't have that destroying my fashion sense. I intended to zap it out, but I suppose my wand had a glitch."

In response to Mrs. Weasley's look of skepticism, he added, "My wand has been prone to working badly lately. I really must have Mr. Ollivander take a look at it. I can't just strut around with a bent wand, you know. What will people think of me?"

Fred and George looked like they would crack up again, Sirius blushed upon realizing that what he had said sounded like a double entendre in some twisted sense, but Molly hadn't seemed to see through his fib. Her eyes were narrowed in the direction of the twins.

"Have you swapped Sirius' wand with another one of your trick wands?"

Fred shook his head sadly. George said, "Whether you believe it or not, we regret to say that we had no whatsoever partaking in this particularly juicy prank. No offense Sirius. But since we consider ourselves to be authorities on mischievous pranks, we would like to say that this goes into our top 100 list of 'Best Ever Simple Pranks Compiled In A Book For Some Do-It-Yourself Fun'-..."

"That, by the way, is the title of our new book. Soon to be available at Flourish & Blotts," finished Fred for him.

Sirius wondered vaguely how they would react if they found out that Remus had done it.

He finally got up and started for the shovel that was still hanging ominously by the edge of the cupboard. After retrieving it, he reached for his wand, aimed for the cupboard's door, and was about to say 'Reparo!' when Molly stopped him.

"Let me do it, dear," she said looking nervously at his wand. "We don't want to accidentally cast a bad spell now, do we?"

"Right," Sirius said giving himself a mental kick while he re-pocketed his wand. "That's why these things happen." He gestured to the note that he still had folded in his hands. "I always forget."

With a flick of Molly's wand, everything was back in its spic-and-span state. Sirius apologized profusely, thanked her, and left hurriedly with every intention of giving Remus a colorful assortment of droppings for Christmas.

End, Chapter 2