Chapter 9: Exploding Snap and a Full Moon
Finally having gotten a decent Beater, the Gryffindor Quidditch team's first week of practices had been more wonderful than any they had ever seen. Their strategy was simple: score enough points so that when the other team's Seeker caught the Snitch, they'd still win the game. They had yet to show their skill on the pitch, however, because after the first week of practice it had begun to rain.
And rain.
And rain.
James was trying and failing to concentrate on his potions essay. His eyes kept drifting to the window and staring out at the unrelenting downpour, wondering if it ever planned on stopping. Finally, in a fit of frustration, he threw all of his scraps of parchment at a group of first years. They looked rather annoyed by the interruption, but willingly gave the scraps back when he asked for them a minute later.
He was bored out of his mind. He didn't feel like going anywhere, but he didn't feel like staying where he was, either. Spotting Remus, curled up and reading a book near the fire, he decided to go talk to him, as Peter and Sirius were nowhere to be found. Presumably, they were out pulling the pranks and doing things that, as an authority figure, James was finding to be increasingly impossible.
"Hey Moony, you're smart," he said darkly. "D'you think rain can cause madness?"
Remus looked up from his book, as though he'd been waiting for someone to interrupt him.
"Your guess is as good as mine."
James threw himself on a sofa nearby, ignoring the two girls who were already sitting there.
"I'm dying," James said pathetically. "I can't play Quidditch, I can't pull pranks, I can't even do homework!" He ground his fists into his eyeballs. "Do you hear what I'm saying, Moony? I've actually got time for homework, but I can't do it!" He looked over at Remus, who was watching him calmly. "Well? What should I do?"
"Have you written to your mum lately?"
"Moony, my mum? My mum?"
"She isn't so horrible."
"Except when she's pairing me up to get married and going to parties and getting a new maid. Which is pretty much all the time."
"Did you want to play a game of exploding snap?" one of the girls next to him asked. It took him a moment to realize that she was speaking to him.
"Er--who are you?" James asked uncomfortably, looking her over.
"Hestia," the girl said boldly, as though her name was something she was quite proud of. "Hestia Jones, third year."
"Er-well--"
"Marlene and I were wondering if you wanted to play exploding snap." James looked and saw that the blond girl next to her was Marlene McKinnon, the one who had giggled a lot when he'd been changed into a chicken.
"Hestia!" Marlene had gone rather red in the cheeks. "Be quiet!"
James looked from one to the other, slightly bewildered.
"Er--I guess I could--"
"Excellent!" Hestia said briskly, "Marlene, why don't you get the cards?"
Marlene nodded and quickly went to get them, looking very embarrassed. James marveled at how the third year seemed to have such control over someone four years older than her. Meanwhile, Hestia had turned to Remus.
"Come along now, you should play as well."
Remus raised his eyebrows at her.
"Miss Jones, are you sure you want me to--"
"Oh, cut the Miss Jones shit, I'm not a baby. Come play!"
Remus and James exchanged looks. Somehow, the word 'shit' had seemed misplaced coming out of a girl who was just under five feet and didn't look like she'd celebrated her tenth birthday long ago. Remus sighed, put his book down, and joined them on the sofa. By the time Marlene came back, Hestia had started a full-on tirade about the Gryffindor Quidditch team.
"And honestly, what's wrong with that Seeker? What's his name…Gavin Gudgeon? Yes, that's what it is, anyway, he's complete shit, he's bringing your whole team down."
Hestia seemed to get joy from adding `shit' to every other sentence, James noticed. He was starting to find it enormously entertaining, even though she was managing to insult everything about his team. Remus just looked shocked.
"Budge over, Hestia," Marlene said, sitting back down. "I'm sorry about her," she added, looking at James apologetically. "She's very bitter about Quidditch. She's always wanted to be on the team, but her parents won't let her have a broomstick."
"Which is complete shit," Hestia said darkly. "Shut up now, Marlene. You're depressing me."
"How is it--why do you let her--" James didn't know how to ask Marlene why she let the small girl tell her what to do, and Marlene, who was now shuffling the cards carefully, smiled and said, "Ask her."
"It's because I'm dating her brother Charlie," Hestia said. "God knows I'm the only one who'll put up with his shit."
"And in return I put up with all of Hestia's…stuff, because she thinks she's too good for the other third years," Marlene said, not looking up.
Hestia flipped her black hair over her shoulder.
"I am," she said matter-of-factly. "Have you met the bloody idiots? No, wait--have you looked at them? Monkeys, the lot of them."
"Are you sure you're thirteen?" Remus asked. Hestia gave him a pointed look.
"Why the hell would I say I was thirteen if I wasn't? It's not like I like being the only third year in a group of seventh years."
Marlene finished shuffling the cards.
"Stop feeling sorry for yourself," she said quietly. "I thought we were playing Exploding Snap."
Hestia rolled her eyes at her.
"Marlene's tired of talking about me because she'd much rather talk about you two," she said, giving Marlene a wicked smile. "Honestly, all day it's `Oh, isn't Remus a dear?' and `Oh, Sirius and James were just wonderful in the Quidditch game today'. She even talks about that bloody prat Peter, how she feels bad for him and how he has depth that nobody bothers to discover."
Marlene had gone a deep red.
"Hestia!" she said in a strangled voice. She turned to James and Remus. "It isn't true, I never--not that I don't think you're nice and you're good at Quidditch--I mean--" James felt bad for her; she looked like she was about to cry, and it was even worse because he found the whole thing rather funny.
"It's okay," he said. "Really, it doesn't bother us at all, does it Remus?"
"Not at all," Remus said quickly, shaking his head. He looked a bit embarrassed as well. Hestia surveyed her handiwork with satisfaction, then turned back to Marlene.
"Well, let's start!"
"You and Charlie were made for each other," Marlene muttered as she put the cards down.
"He certainly likes to think so."
The rest of the afternoon was spent playing Exploding Snap, eating sweets that James had gotten from their dormitory, and watching Marlene be utterly humiliated by Hestia. It was Hestia who finally ended the afternoon by saying, "Well, mates, it's been lovely, but I'm in a right mind to snog Charlie senseless, so I suppose I'll see you later."
This caused Marlene to start choking on a chocolate frog and for Remus to look extremely disturbed. James laughed until he couldn't breath, and reflected that perhaps his afternoon had not been an utter waste after all.
***
Soon after that day, the first full moon of the school year came about. After Remus had been taken to the Whomping Willow and the common room was mostly deserted, Sirius, James, and Peter slipped under James's invisibility cloak and out of the tower.
"Hello, who's there?" the fat lady squawked. They ignored her, and she continued to shout after them long after they had left.
They glanced at the Marauder's Map every once in a while to make sure that they didn't bump into anyone, and soon they had gotten down to the Entrance Hall and out the double doors. Once they had walked past the greenhouses, Sirius whipped off the cloak and said,
"Bloody hell, can't we just change now?"
Peter looked at James.
"Do you think we should? I mean…"
James looked at the both of them, and then nodded.
"Yeah, it's fine. Everyone's gone to bed anyway."
Sirius grinned.
"Excellent."
Peter still looked unsure, but began to transform anyway.
James concentrated on a large, graceful shape with antlers and wise eyes. In a second, almost as though he had slid smoothly into a different skin, he had changed into Prongs. He stomped the ground with a joy he hadn't expected. `Welcome home', the form seemed to say to him, and he felt at once the sense of freedom it was providing him.
A bark to his right alerted him that Padfoot and Wormtail were ready as well. Calmly, Prongs bowed his majestic head and allowed Wormtail to scamper up. This could be considered a loss of majesty for anyone other than Prongs, but if there had been any witnesses, they would get a distinct impression that the rat was highly aware of the extreme honor he was being given by being able to ride upon the stag.
Padfoot barked impatiently. `Come on, come on, let's go get Moony!'
They rode into the night, the full moon shining pale upon them and soaking them into immortal silver beasts. The Tree, even, with its flailing branches, seemed to have a grace bestowed on it by the night's spell. Prongs always managed to forget all that he suddenly noticed as a stag, and so every time they went to the Werewolf, he was reminded and fascinated anew.
Wormtail darted forward and pressed the knot at the bottom of the tree. Good Wormtail. Even if he was small, he was indispensable.
Padfoot lead them down the tunnel to the door through which they could hear Moony, already fully transformed and snarling. Wormtail squeaked, afraid as he always was at first, and even Prongs stepped a hoof back. However, Padfoot's tail was wagging, and he bounded forward. `Moony, Moony, let's play!' he seemed to be saying, though all he was doing was panting excitedly and occasionally hitting his tail on the dilapidated furniture. Moony growled, and Padfoot growled back. Mildly impressed at the dog's gumption, Moony stopped growling and started to sniff the air. Cautiously, he approached Padfoot, and Padfoot, with uncharacteristic calm, allowed him to do so. Then the werewolf began to wag his tail, and he and Padfoot started to play wrestle.
Prongs and Wormtail, seeing things have been made safe, came forward as well; Prongs making sure the door was shut behind him. After a few exhaustive minutes of fighting, in which Moony nearly managed to rip Padfoot's ear off and Padfoot had successfully managed to gnaw on the werewolf's arm, they stopped and Moony began to investigate Wormtail and Prongs. Prongs warned Wormtail with a look to remain calm, and Wormtail managed to do so, though barely.
They played for a while, though the exact time couldn't be said (a stag had no concept of time, really), until Moony approached the door and whined, scratching at it. Padfoot and Prongs looked at each other. It was something they approached each time as a hard decision. Padfoot's eyes were wide--`let him out, let's play, come on Prongs!'--while Prongs remained stoic and unsure. Wormtail used to give his opinion on the matter with a few well thought out squeaks, but they always ended up doing what Padfoot wanted, so he had eventually given up adding his input at all.
Soon enough, Moony was let out, and at once his demeanor changed. He was no longer acting light hearted and playful as he was before--he was wary and alert. He was on the prowl. Wormtail quickly climbed back on Prongs' back, and then they were bounding through the night, simply enjoying the freedom of the wind and the emptiness and the sense of liberation at the lack of human structure. It was impossible to tell if they had only been out there a second or their whole lives, and they reveled in it. They didn't seem to find it tiring in the least. On the contrary, their animal forms were thanking them for allowing them to stretch out their legs.
Then something went wrong. Moony, who they had thought they were keeping a good pace with, began to lope towards Hogwarts castle, at speeds much faster than the ones they had been at a moment before. Wormtail leaped from Prongs' back, sensing that he would have to be running much faster than the rat was comfortable with, and after quickly making sure he hadn't broken any bones, Prongs and Padfoot bounded toward the werewolf.
Moony had almost reached the greenhouses by the time they were able to overtake him. Padfoot veered right as Prongs took him from the left, and after Prongs knocked him down with his powerful hoofs, Padfoot leapt on him and wrestled with him, as though to scold him for his behavior. For a moment, this caused Moony to snarl agitatedly, until finally he closed his eyes and began to whine. Slowly, Padfoot got off of him, and Prongs nudged the battered werewolf, probing to see whether he could make his way back. Moony managed to get up on his own, albeit a little shakily, and they made their way back to the Willow.
Wormtail was waiting for them, the tree already frozen. Wearily, all energy having been evaporated from the short escapade, they made their way back into the shack and spent the rest of the night sprawled across the floor, sleeping. Before dawn, Wormtail woke up Prongs and Padfoot, and they silently left through the passage, leaving Moony to sleep fitfully until Madame Pomfrey came to retrieve him as Remus. They snuck a bit farther away from the castle so as to be sure that they wouldn't be seen by Hagrid or anyone else who might chance to be about, then transformed back into boys.
Sirius was the first to speak.
"Well, that was fun."
James shot him an incredulous look.
"Fun?"
"Yeah. It gave me an idea, as a matter of fact."
"Unless it's the cure to lycanthropy, I don't want to hear a word of it."
Sirius didn't say anything.
"I want to hear it," Peter ventured.
"I'm sure you do. You'll see soon enough."
James watched the thin sliver of light rising on the horizon.
"Come on," he said, pulling the Marauders Map from his back pocket. "Sun's almost up, and I don't know about you, but I'd like a few hours of sleep in a real bed."
Sirius and Peter murmured their agreement, the soreness from the night's escapades and sleeping on a hard floor suddenly seeming much more obvious, and they fetched the invisibility cloak from by the greenhouses. Then they headed back to their dormitory, somehow effortlessly managing to avoid Filch and Peeves.
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