Chapter 3
The three sixth year boys entered the common room and James shook his shaggy hair, sprinkling Sirius and Remus with loo water.
"Thanks for the lovely perfume," Remus commented sarcastically. James replied with a pat on the back. Looking confused, something caught his eye on the notice board.
"What the bloody hell…" James ran up to the board, grimacing at the sight of the large poster, displaying his mother…as a baby…in a dress. He didn't like seeing early pictures of his mother due to a very embarrassing, traumatic experience last time she showed him photos of her when she was seventeen. His mum has smiled proudly smug as she displayed him photos, protesting how 'hot' and 'groovy' she was, asking disturbing questions of 'do you think I was cute?' and saying 'I was gorgeous wasn't I! Your father couldn't keep his hands off me!'
He was scarred for life, along with the broom closet event.
A lot of confusing questions were going through James' mind, wondering how exactly this photo had gotten on the notice board in the first place. Only one name came to his brain.
"Padfoot, you nutcase!" James exclaimed.
"God," moaned Sirius, "I put up a missing poster for a friend and what do I get? Grief."
"That's because you put up a missing poster for a person who wasn't missing," Remus pointed out.
"I am not lanky!" James suddenly burst out loud, as he'd just read the 'detailed' information along with the photo.
Sirius snorted, grabbing one of James' gangly arms, watching it flop after being dropped from shoulder height. "Your arms remind me of...runner beans."
"Great detail," Remus noted.
James glared at them both. "I'll have you know that girls love my untamed hair," he said slickly. Sirius and Remus erupted into sniggers.
"I suppose girls love the piece of chewing gum stuck in your tresses then?" Remus questioned.
James looked confused, reaching a hand to his hair, but Sirius had already beaten him to it.
"OOW!"
Sirius had clawed a hand to his head, ripping a blob of chewing gum that had somehow managed to get wedged. Sirius had pulled a little too forcefully, along with pulling out some of James' hair in the process.
"Oh, you twat!" James clutched what was left of his hair. "I can feel a bald patch!"
"Don't worry, mate. Haven't you seen that wizarding hair spray stuff? Its hair in a can!" Sirius said amazingly. "You spray it and hair comes out! Its like, whipped cream...but with hair," he added.
"Right..." James gave Sirius an odd look. "I wonder how exactly gum got on my head in the first place," he said with suspicion, glaring at the culprit.
"Uh, the gum fairy?" Sirius suggested.
James rolled his eyes. Turning back to the poster, he ripped it off the notice board. To his horror, the same poster was underneath it. He ripped the other identical poster off. More to his horror, the same poster laid underneath that one. "What the-" James muttered, pulling off poster after poster of the same bloody poster.
Eventually James' hands were heaped full of the same photo of his mother as an infant. "How many posters did you stick up?"
"It's a spell," Sirius explained. "It never ends."
"Oh great! Everyone thinks my mother is me! That's an odd sentence," James commented. "Are you a deluded? How could you think my mother was me? She's wearing a dress, for Christ's sake!"
"Sirius will now explain his theory of your fetish for wearing women's clothing," Remus predicted to James.
"You have a fetish for wearing women's clothing," Sirius said predictably. "The red dress, James! The one with the tassels!"
"What are you on about?"
"Actually, Sirius, he wouldn't know about wearing the dress because he was too hammered to remember," said Remus.
Sirius nodded understandingly whilst James remained confused. Abandoning ripping the never-ending posters off the notice board, he jumped on one of the common room couches, lying relaxingly and looking at Sirius who it would seem had a plan to get his red jelly bean; other wise known as Lily Evans.
"So, Padfoot, explain the plan."
"I have many plans, many great plans. Just like I have many great looks," Sirius grinned, modelling his posing face to his friends.
"Cut to the chase, Sirius," Remus said tiredly, joining a seat next to James.
"Well, you know all girls love that 'sensitive guy' crap, right?"
James frowned. "What exactly do you mean?"
"If you're talking about James Potter being a sensitive guy then you are insane," Remus said. James scowled at him.
"No way!" Sirius said. "I'm talking about girls liking guys who are like, poofs, who say poetry and stuff to them."
Remus slightly glowered at Sirius' opinion of any guy writing poetry obviously being gay and called a 'poof'. However, Sirius did seem to have a surprisingly good starting plan.
"Well, James, it's a opening," Remus said, an idea suddenly springing to him. "You could write poetry to Lily. Or recite poems to her. She'd love that. I have some books I could give you-"
"No, Moony, no!" Sirius butted in. "James could never read, or write poetry. He can barely write his own name."
"Yes I can!"
"You spelt your name wrong in Transfiguration!" laughed Sirius. "You left out the letter 'r' at the end of 'Potter'."
"That was because," James started bitterly, "I was writing my name and was on the letter 'e', then you decided to knock me out with your shoe."
"Because you stole my quill!" Sirius prompted.
"Can we get back to the subject," Remus cut in. Sirius looked blankly at him. "Poetry," he reminded.
"Oh yeah. As I was saying, before Mr. Illiterate interrupted me." James boldly stuck up a finger at this comment. "Prongs could recite his own poetry to Evans. But we know he sucks at writing so a spell should help him along."
"What kind of spell?" Remus said suspiciously, not at all liking to the idea.
"You know how all the greatest poems rhyme…"
"Actually, no," Remus argued. "Some of the greatest poems don't rhyme."
"Yeah they do!" Sirius protested. "What about 'Humpty-Dumpty'?"
"That's a nursery rhyme," James corrected, chuckling whilst Sirius reddened.
"Same thing," he said dismissively. "Anyways, I know a spell to make whatever James says rhyme. Instant poetry out of that big gob of his!"
James glowered at the description of having a 'big gob'.
"You cannot be serious!" Remus frowned, thinking the whole idea was completely absurd.
The word 'serious' was a deadly word to use around Sirius Black. Sirius knew that saying the pun 'Yes, I am Sirius' right now would result in the slam to the back of the head by Remus Lupin. Sirius knew that Remus would not sincerely like him saying this over-used pun.
"Yes, Monseiur Lupin, I am Sirius," he grinned.
Slap. That was the sound of Remus' hand connecting with Sirius' skull.
"Dirty werewolf," Sirius said clutching his head. "That was uncalled for."
"Padfoot," James said, "I'm not so sure about this spell."
Sirius groaned exaggeratingly. "Don't be a pussy, man."
"I am not a pussy!" James snapped in annoyance. "I just don't want to be cursed by you. I don't want to end up with something sticking out of my arse. Again."
"That was one time! And you only had that shower head up your butt for two hours. Christ."
"What spell did you intend to get in the first place?" Remus asked. "I'm guessing you didn't actually ask for a shower head to be stuck in that particular place. I'm also guessing you didn't want anything remotely related to a shower head."
"I asked for a cleaning spell," James said bitterly, rubbing a hand over his buttocks, remembering the horrific moment.
Sirius grimaced. "Don't feel yourself up in public, Prongs."
"I can't believe you dragged me out of a toilet for this," James said sullenly, going back to his depressed state. "I'm going back to Myrtle's bathroom. Actually, I think I'll go to the Prefects. It's a lot cleaner and smells of lavender."
Remus smirked. "But you don't know the password."
"You told me it yesterday."
"Bugger," cursed Remus.
James was about to storm from the couch and sulkily stomp away to continue drowning himself in a toilet -this time a clean one- but Sirius had forced him to sit.
"What are you-" James began, but stopped when Sirius pointed his wand at him.
"Sirius," James began anxiously. "Don't you dare-"
"Melodio!" Sirius called, a shining light streaming from his wand and shooting towards James' mouth. James gaped, which wasn't the most sensible move if he didn't wand the spell to go into him, but nonetheless carried on gawking in shock. The light swiftly shot into his mouth and down his oesophagus. He gulped it down with a slight wince on his face, as if he's just swallowed a spoon of cod liver oil. He breathed heavily, whilst Sirius and Remus gazed at him for a reaction.
"Oh my God, what did you do? My brain's all muddled and that tasted like poo," James sang, and quickly looked disgusted at the sentence he'd spoken.
"Bloody hell," Remus said unpleasantly. "He sound's like an extremely bad rapper. And I'm not talking about Christmas," he clarified as Sirius had suddenly brightened at the mention of 'rapper', linking to Christmas, linking to presents…
"Say some more stuff, Prongs," Sirius said eagerly.
"My name is James Potter, I am a Sex God. My hair is erotic and I have a great bod," James blurted out flowingly.
"An extremely bad rapper," Remus repeated again. "On drugs," he added.
Sirius jumped up and down in excitement. "Say something about me!"
"Your name is Sirius Black. You are on Crack. Your face is not in tack. All you do is yack. You're something I want to whack. You have no ball sack-"
"Okay, that's enough," Sirius cut in, getting thoroughly depressed by the second and not liking his poem very much.
"I don't like this, not at all. All I see in my mind is rhyming couplets; it's driving me up the wall. And I sound retarded speaking like this! Oh God, help me out of this abyss!"
Remus and Sirius laughed hysterically, finding James' demented sentences amusing.
James was not at all pleased. "This isn't funny. My hair is all gummy," he commented, rubbing a hand to his chewing gum mixed tresses.
Remus and Sirius cackled some more.
"You can't rhyme every single word. There must be one word that you can't rhyme," Remus said curiously.
"Nope, he can rhyme anything," Sirius informed. "Say any word and he can do it."
"Yellow," Remus offered.
"Mellow," James replied quickly.
"Banana?"
"Drama."
"Freaky?"
"Peaky."
"Underwear!" Remus said triumphantly.
""You're-a-pear," James answered.
"What? That's not a word! That's three words!"
"It's a word if he says it quickly out of his mouth," Sirius argued.
"What? That makes no sense. You can't-"
"Look, it's Evans!" Sirius said, pointing to the displeased Lily walking down the staircase, unfortunately coming towards them. James' eyes popped out of his head at her sudden appearance and tried to take on a casual pose involving leaning casually on a table lamp. Regrettably the lamp shade toppled over, making James look like a clumsy arse- which he was. Lily stormed over to James whilst Sirius and Remus watched in curiosity.
"Potter! I-" she began angrily as she folded her arms, but stopped as she made a quick sniff in the air towards James.
"You smell like a toilet," she declared.
"Uh, thanks very much. I'd eat you for lunch," James rhymed. Remus shook his head tiredly as Sirius gave James the encouraging thumbs up.
"Excuse me?" Lily scowled, not liking to be told she would make a great meal. "Look, Potter," she began madly, "I was trying to do my homework and some small midget in fuchsia came into my dorm, asking me if I'd seen you, you which is apparently a 'missing person' and a possible victim of homicide."
"Your lips are like plump leeches, kiss me any day. Your cheeks look like peaches, I'd devour with no dismay," James said blissfully.
"What are you on?" Lily thought James must be high on some new wizarding drug; giving side affects of talking terribly in rhyme.
"Evans, ever since you moaned my name, I just can't get you off my brain!" James chorused.
Lily immediately reddened at the mention of the broom closet incident. "I told you that was a slip of the tongue," she gritted through her teeth.
"A slip?" Sirius joined in the conversation. "Oh James! Jaaaaames," Sirius mimicked, swirling his tongue in the air, pretending he was Lily kissing Derrick.
"Shut up, Black!"
"He's on crack," James added, not able to control his mouth with the ridiculous things he was saying.
"I'd have to agree with you there," Lily said bitterly, "but that's beside the point!" She poked James in the chest. "I don't want members of your midget fan club storming into my dorm and disturbing me! Others do have homework to do, unlike you who just sits on your pompous arse whilst Black worships the ground you walk on, Lupin corrects your grammar and Pettigrew gapes at your useless talent of catching a golden ball!"
"Oh Evans, my darling, your hate is simply charming. You're just using reverse psychology! No need for an apology!"
"Oh, go to hell, Potter!" Lily screamed, fed up with his sentences of nonsense.
"This isn't going so well," Sirius murmured to Remus who sighed in response.
As if on signal, the arrival of James' search party through the portrait of the Fat Lady somehow made everything turn from bad to worse. The fuchsia coloured squad of first years, led by Peter, ambled into the common room, their eyes suddenly landing on the missing person: James Potter. As James was comprehending when this new fashion trend had evolved, and how much pain Sirius would go through when he ripped out his intestines and strangled him with them, the first years suddenly ran towards him; nets raised highly in their hands.
"AAARH!" James screamed, as the herd of small students pushed him to the floor and trampled on him. Each party member raised their net high, capturing his head. He shrieked as he was blinded with netting.
"PETER!" James yelled annoyingly, the apparent captain of catching James' head, and also the first to swing his net to James' skull.
"We caught him, sir!" the first year with the twitching eye reported to Sirius, raising his hand with obedience. The black-haired girl awarded with the whistle blew on it unenthusiastically.
"I can see that," Sirius replied, whilst he and Remus were looking on in amusement. Meanwhile, Lily laughed manically.
"Hey," a first year spoke, pointing to the red head who was clutching her stomach with laughter at James' expense. "She must have kidnapped him!" he suddenly concocted.
Instantly, Lily stopped chortling. "What?"
"Get her!" A small student ordered, raising their fist in the air.
Lily shrieked as the first years attacked her, causing her head now to be covered in nets. She lay on the floor, toppled over by their sudden impact.
"Get off me!" she screamed, trying to push the swarming small people away. They were oddly like irritating flies. "You can't do this! I'm a prefect!"
"And I'd like to shove this whistle up his arse," the black-haired first year replied, pointing to Sirius and swinging the whistle around with her finger. "But apparently I'm not allowed. Life's a bitch, isn't it?"
Lily was about to snap back but a net whacking her in the mouth disrupted the action.
"Explanation to the nets," James ordered, but it wasn't as intimidating with the fact that his head was currently smothered by something animal catchers carried. "Or what will follow will be threats," he spoke dangerously.
"They are your search party," Remus explained, "organized by one Sirius Black."
"I'm gone for TWO HOURS and you send a search team!" James said in disbelief. "I'd like to say I'm flattered but I think it's just obscene. And I'm not just referring," he spoke," to the shirts that are disturbing."
"Was it really two hours?" Remus asked Sirius, thinking the period of James' absence had seemed longer.
"Come to think of it, I think I did see James two hours ago stealing Evans lingerie from her dorm," Sirius realised.
"So that's where it went!" Lily tried to shout, but her voice was muffled by nets.
"The fuchsia is rather blinding," James commented, reddening and trying to avoid the subject of Lily's undergarments as he squinted through the nets, looking at the first years fashioned in their bold t-shirts. "Sirius, you will get a hiding," he threatened.
"I'm sorry, mate," Sirius chortled. "I just can't take you seriously when you rhyme!"
James groaned in frustration. "Tell me the reverse spell or you're going to hell!"
"Can you actually guarantee that though?" Sirius questioned. "Do you have connections with the devil?"
James gave him a glare that purely said 'I am the devil' instead of voicing it, knowing if he did then the warning would be undermined by a cheesy rhyme that would follow.
"AARGH! Get off me, you little dwarves!" Lily bawled, not one of the wisest things to say if she wanted the first years to stand up from their current status of sitting on top of her so she wouldn't escape. "I am a prefect!" she exclaimed again.
"Yeah, yeah," the ebony haired girl replied in boredom. "And I'm Albus Dumbledore," she retorted.
"I did not kidnap James-bloody-Potter so remove your backsides! Before I tell Professor Mcgonagall!" Lily commanded.
The violent first years looked at Sirius for a confirmation of getting off the girl.
"Oh sure, you can get off her," Sirius said casually, as if he'd just spotted her in the room. The group made a noise of disappointment, but obediently stood up from sitting on Lily, most gratefully a chubby boy whose bottom was placed firmly on Lily's cheek. She finally lifted the dozens of nets that had been suffocating her and stood to her feet looking highly wrathful.
"You are all insane," Lily declared, throwing the handled nets to Sirius who toppled over, toppling into Remus who then toppled into Peter, which then caused a chain reaction as many first years toppled over in the process.
There was a lot of toppling.
Lily gave James a dirty look and stomped up the common room staircase, slamming her dormitory door shut.
"Can we go now?" a first year asked, raising her hand politely as she yawned.
"Sure," Sirius replied, his face currently head-first into the common room floor of carpet. "You're all dismissed."
The first years cheered and removed their t-shirts, luckily wearing shirts underneath or the removing of clothing would turn into something disgustingly pornographic. They threw their t-shirts to Peter, whose face was suddenly bombarded with fuchsia. The small students then retired to their dorms.
"Do you think we could sell those shirts at one of those muggle car-boot-sales?" Sirius asked.
"No, I want to keep them," Peter said with eagerness.
"Okay, sure you can, Wormtail."
The three boys got to their feet -Peter's hands full of t-shirts- and were about to make their way the common room stairs when an indignant shout was heard.
"GUYS, LITTLE HELP HERE!" James demanded, head caught in the nets and helplessly rolling on the floor like a flobberworm. "OR BE PREPARED TO BE KICKED IN THE REAR!"
"Did you hear something?" Sirius gave a mock expression of curiosity. "For a second there, I thought that guy Willy Shake-a-spear had walked into the room," he laughed.
"Shakespeare," Remus corrected exasperatedly. "William. Shakespeare," he sighed.
"I don't care about a guy who can 'shake his spear'," James yelled, "All I want is some help here!" He yelped as he rolled into a table and a stack of books knocked over and tumbled on his head. He abruptly blacked out.
"He did not shake his spear, he…oh never mind," Remus gave up.
The boys walked over to the passed out James and tried to uncover him in the mountains of butterfly-like-nets.