“Phew!” Sirius exclaimed emerging later in the day from greenhouse three. He brushed dirt from his hands onto his clean black robes. “It was so hot in there today!”
“Yeah.” I muttered back. For late October it was unusually warm and it was sweltering in the greenhouses.
“That darned plant got me!” said Peter, removing spines from his arms. “I’m bloody lucky that it was only a baby dart-plant!”
“Yeah” I mumbled.
“James. You okay?” Remus asked.
“Yeah” I mumbled.
“James!” Sirius yelled thumping me on the back. “Oi, James! Heloooooo, are you in there?” he asked into my ear rapping his knuckles on my forehead.
“Yes, I am. Go away Sirius, that really hurt!”
“What's the matter with you James. You were really quiet all through Herbology, it one of the only lessons that we’re allowed to talk in but you don’t. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing Moony, I’m just really tiered, that's all.” I muttered back. Well it was a half-truth.
“Oh, okay if you’re sure.”
“Of course I’m sure Peter! I think I know myself better than you! Leave me alone!” I snapped back, more forcefully than I’d intended. Peter evidently took offence and stomped off - he couldn’t take things lightly.
“What did you do that for James huh?” Remus asked “Okay so sometimes he gets on your nerves, sometimes he gets on all our nerves but there's no need to snap at him okay? I’m going after him - see if he’s okay?” he said turning and walking after Peter.
Sirius and I walked on in silence for a while. Then he turned to me.
“James okay, spit it out. The others have gone now, so there's no point in lying, I can see straight through them.”
“Um, no thanks Sirius. I’m okay - really.” Sirius was right, I couldn’t lie to him, I known him too long. “Oh damn you Sirius, why do you have to know me so well?” I asked smiling.
“I dunno. I wonder about that myself sometimes. So are you gonna tell me?”
“Yeah okay. But I need to tell you in private... I dunno when that’ll be, what with Remus, Peter and Lily always about...”
“You can tell me in transfiguration. Remember?” He asked seeing the bewilderment on my face. Professor Telgar was a great teacher but she rarely let us talk in her lessons. “Oh James, brain like a sieve, brain like a sieve.” Sirius muttered shaking his head. “Remember? Oh don’t bother. I’ll tell you. Okay you and me, we’re really good at transfiguration, and we managed to do the work she set straight off while the rest of the class are still mucking up. So she’s going over it again today and has given us the period off - to do research. Well we can take some books from the library and go up to the common room which will be nice and deserted.”
“Oh yeah, I remember now.” I said, perhaps a little too late. Sirius slapped is head in disbelief.
“We’ve got lunch after too, so we can nick some stuff from the kitchens and sit up there till Potions this afternoon.”
We made our way up to the common room, staggering under the weight of the huge volumes we’d borrowed from the library and the huge plates of food the house elves had insisted upon giving to us. We somehow managed to get into the common room and flopped down in some seats by the window.
“So James, what was it you were going to tell me.” Sirius asked reminding me of our previous conversation and tucking into a chicken mayo sandwich. I may have a memory like a sieve but he sure doesn’t.
“Well I dunno there isn’t that much to tell - well not what actually happened anyway. But I fell all confused and strange...”
“Just get on with it Prongs and stop waffling!”
“Well ermm you know last night...when you’d all gone up to bed and I was still doing my charms essay...”
“Yeeeessssss”
“Well it was really late and I had just about fin- well given up when Lily Evans came in. Well I didn’t know it was her at the time, even if I had I wouldn’t have done anything coz she’s been acting really strange around me lately. You see that’s why all this is really strange, you know what I mean...?”
“James!” Sirius exclaimed swiftly cutting in “How can I possibly even try to understand what you mean when you keep going off the subject?”
“Oh sorry Sirius. Well Lily came in, crept up behind me then put her hands over my eyes and said ‘Guess who’ I really wasn’t in the mood for anything other than sleep so I told her to go away and started walking up the stairs. Then she told me not to go, I asked her why, and said that if she wanted to say sorry then I accepted it but I really needed to go to bed. She kept telling me no, that she really need to talk to me so I gave in, turned around and she, she... Well she ran up the stairs, kissed me and ran away again!”
“Wow!” Sirius muttered looking shocked. “Is that all that happened you didn’t...?”
“No Sirius! What do you take me for? I don’t steal my best mates girlfriends! I didn’t even kiss her back.”
“Wow!” Sirius repeated.
“Yes, I know ‘wow’ but what on earth am I going to do about this? Come on Sirius, I haven’t told you this just so you can say ‘wow’ over and over - I need advice, what do I do?”
“Ummm, well don’t tell Remus.”
“Oh gosh thanks Sirius, but I’ve already told him! Geez, what kind of idiot do you take me as? I need help Sirius, this isn’t a joke.”
“Okay okay. Well I think that were making far to big a deal about all of this - but,” he continued seeing I was about to cut in. “Look James, I think you’re going to have to ignore all of this. I mean did you see them together today at breakfast? Oh no you weren’t there, well they were smitten. I hate to say this James, but it could have just been a dare or something. I don’t know. You’re just going to have to forget this, I mean if this happens again...well that’s different, but you’re going to have to let this one blow over.”
“Yeah I guess so...” I tucked into a sandwich, not wanting to talk further. “So about the Quidditch match next week against Ravenclaw...”
