James had always considered himself a loud guy. From the time he came out of the womb to now, 17 years later, in his last year of Hogwarts. He was loud and energetic and it didn't go well with everyone's taste, but that's how James was and he wouldn't have changed it any other way.
Today James was quiet.
James being quiet meant that something was wrong. James' roommates knew that now.
The only moments James was quiet was when he took care of himself. Or in other words: when he was sick or that he was not feeling good for another reason.
The first time James had been quiet was when he broke his arm when he was seven. He'd been climbing a tall tree in his backyard and he fell. He wasn't very high up. But it had been enough for him to fall on his arm and break it in half. James hadn't cried for the first seconds before he had freaked out when he saw the state of his arm. He'd tried to hide it from his parents then but it got too much and the next thing he knew was that James was in the hospital being gently lectured by his mum about how he shouldn't hide important things like that.
James never really took her advice. He'd tried, but the guilty feeling that tightened his heart each time was telling him otherwise. James didn't need to bother anyone when he could take care of himself, by himself.
That day, James woke up because of Sirius. That was the first sign which told him something was wrong. James was usually waking up before Sirius . As everyone did, because Sirius Black wasn't a morning person, at all. Contrary to James, who was usually waking up with the sun and was an awful ball of energy. James could still remember trying to wake Sirius up for their morning Quidditch training, he also could remember the feeling of the pillow hitting his face, in full force. But today Sirius was awake, before James.
The second thing James noticed was wrong was when he tried to drink water. He did drink it, but his throat was sore and was hurting when he swallowed. As soon as the water went down, James got this awful feeling of nausea going up his stomach. He took a deep breath in and tried not to think too much about it. James felt like shit. He opened his curtains and got blinded by the sunlight coming through the windows making him aware of the nagging pounding in his head that would probably bother him a bit later in the day
"You alright there, Prongs?"
Peter was playing chess with Remus, and seeing Remus' face, was winning. James slid his glasses up his nose before answering.
"Yeah? I'm good." James put on his usual grin.
"You're up late today" Remus pointed out with a raise of his eyebrow.
Damn you, Remus Lupin.
"Just wanted to sleep in." He shrugged, Remus and Peter seemed to believe him because they didn't make any more comments.
The whole morning was unbearable. James managed to not have a breakdown and scream in pain in the middle of class because that would be embarrassing and that stupid headache wasn't worth it.
His stomach grumbled as he and his friends were on their way to the Potions classroom. They were chatting and James was only half-listening but Remus slowed down so they were next to each other and handed him one of his emergency chocolate bars. James gave him a small smile but quickly declined it with the good enough excuse of not being hungry, that his stomach was simply making noises because it was digesting what he had eaten for breakfast. James had not eaten anything, feeling too nauseous to do so, but Remus didn't know that.
Potions wasn't that bad, at first; but then, the smell of the ingredients they were brewing for, god knows what, potion had made James nearly throw up and he's had to bite on the inside of his cheeks the whole class while distracting his mind from the nausea going up his throat.
Snivellus had pissed him off, but Sirius had talked back instead of James, which had gotten him another detention from Slughorn. James would have said something if it wasn't for the fact that the loud noises inside the classroom were making his ears ring and if he simply had just unclenched his jaw, the breakfast he did not eat would have ended up, at best, in the cauldron, or at worse, on the tiled floor of Slughorn's classroom.
James knew his friends had noticed he wasn't being like the typical James Potter would. But they didn't say anything about it, neither did they treat him differently, and James was glad they didn't; so at least he could pretend everything was alright.
Because everything was fine ! James had just caught a small cold or something and it would go away quickly.
Nothing to worry about.
James Potter was doing fucking great.
It got worse.
Today was also Quidditch practice day. It was usually in the morning, but James, because he was James Potter, had left the pitch to the Hufflepuff team this morning, exceptionally. So the Gryffindor team was training in the afternoon, which was fine.
It had started well, despite the continuous ringing in his ears and the pounding in his head that felt like it was moving down his neck too, James had managed (as usual) to lead his team for practice today.
He brushed aside the concerned glances he was receiving from Marlene, Sirius and probably the other members of the team and James put his captain demaneor on, the one he always had when playing and practicing. As well as the rest of the team, James quickly flew on his broom for basic exercises.
Everything was better when he was flying. James loved the thrill that came with it, he loved feeling free and he loved the comfort. Just him, his broom and his haunting thoughts no one would ever hear about.
They all had ways to distract themselves, to find comfort in different things. James knew that after the years spent sharing a dorm with his three best mates.
Sirius liked to lash out on people when he was upset, he liked the thrill that came with raging emotions, he felt that freeing. But Sirius also liked smoking with Remus in the quiet hours of the nights when no one was awake.
Remus on top of his smoking habits, dived himself in a book he had already read, a book where he knew the end, no surprises, no plot twists he didn't know about; James wasn't that much of a reader, but he'd read enough fantasy books to understand the feeling Remus was seeking for in reading.
Peter was quiet. He often was but James knew his childhood best friend and he could recognise the differences in the silences Peter had. Whether it was the ones where Peter was jumpy as soon as he was talked to, or the ones where he would stare off in the distance completely lost in his thoughts, and he would come back suddently and ask to play a board game together, all four of them.
James was flying and he probably should have stopped when black spots appeared in his vision, yet he didn't, searching for the comfort he's always found in flying. It felt different. James rubbed his eyes to try and get rid of them, his body having a full body shiver.
Fuck, not now... He was struggling to even think, the feeling was the same as when he would get up too fast and lose his balance and his vision would darken for a second, but it wasn't going away.
"Prongs, you good?"
James wanted to cry. He knew he probably looked stupid right now, sitting very still on his broom, his fingers were tingling and James was pretty sure he couldn't feel his legs anymore, he was also pretty sure it wasn't from the cold. He was struggling to stay upright, his body going into fight or flight.
Maybe if he fought the bad feelings a bit more, it would go away eventually, it worked before. James didn't understand why it wasn't right now. The bad feelings always went away if he pretended he was fine for long enough.
James managed a smile, it probably didn't look very reassuring because Sirius just frowned and seemed even more concerned.
"I'm fine Pads, just a bit tired–"
James didn’t finish his sentence before he blacked out.
"James!"
Sirius was screaming. His best friend was falling at a rapid pace and Sirius was screaming for him, too far away to catch him.
Someone, (Sirius didn't care who right now, he just wanted to make sure his best friend was alright), had casted a cushioning charm. Sirius didn't even think before he flew to the ground where James Potter was laying, eyes closed.
And Sirius had seen it all. The way James had been off all day, the slight slur in his voice whenever he was speaking, the way he hadn't talked back to Snivellus, how pale his lips had looked all day, his quietness. James Potter hadn't been James Potter today and Sirius had known it since he first came out of the bathroom that morning and saw how James looked like he was going to puke. And yet he hadn't done anything about it, thinking that James would talk to him, or to their friends if something was wrong. He hadn't, and now he was paying the price of being quiet.
James Potter who was lying unconscious on the grass and Sirius Black who felt like he had just lost his light.
James woke up in an uncomfortable bed. His whole body felt like jelly and James' nausea had never felt worse. Before he could throw up all over himself and the white sheets covering him, someone put a vomit bassin under his chin. James finally threw up.
He hated every second of this. He was holding on for dear life to this bassin and praying it would stop. When it finally did, the bassin was moved away and someone wiped James's lips and face with a damp cloth. It was probably the best thing James had been feeling all day.
"Small sips." A voice James knew but didn't recognise yet, told him. The voice sounded soft and nice, James decided to trust her and took what she was handing him. It was a small vial with a potion of some sorts, James sipped on it.
"How are you feeling?" The voice asked then, she had a motherly tone. It made James miss his mum.
James grunted as an answer and there was a warm hand on his forehead. "Your fever went down, this is good." She said calmly before James felt her move. His head was still very much not all there but he was pretty sure she was talking to someone. "You have visitors. Call if you need something."
There were footsteps leaving and footsteps coming closer and soon enough James was faced with three blurry pairs of eyes.
James must have squinted because he felt the scarred hands of Remus put his glasses up his nose.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?"
"Sirius-"
"No, he's right James."
Oh, they were mad. This was not good. James could handle one of them being mad but allthree? James would rather die. James started silently praying someone would get him out of there, his friends were scary.
When he saw the tears in Sirius' eyes, James knew he wasn't going to die, but he felt even worse.
"You scared us so badly, you can't even imagine."
Peter had said that. James wanted to look at him, to turn his eyes away from his best friend's tearful ones but he couldn't. James was the cause for those tears and his heart was breaking in his chest, his words caught in his throat and for the first time in his life, James Potter was speechless.
"We knew something was going on with you, you were so–" Sirius made big movements with his hands as he tried to represent what he meant to say. "-not you." He ended up sighing.
"We've never seen you so quiet, Prongs." Remus finished. His voice had a soft rasp to it; it made James feel almost comforted. "We didn't want to push you to talk to us, but we thought you would have."
"When you passed out, I just– I was so scared! Marlene threw a cushioning charm so you wouldn't–"
die.
The word stayed stuck in Sirius's throat and James took in a sharp breath, not wanting to think about the worst.
"But I'm okay." James tried to reassure.
"Don't do this James. You always do this." Peter snapped and James flinched at the tone of his voice, he'd never heard Peter talk like this.
"Sorry..." James whispered quietly.
"Sorry, I shouldn't have said it like that." Peter apologised quickly before he sighed.
"Don't try to hide yourself, James. Really. You're hurting yourself." Remus, the voice of reason (sometimes), said then with a small sigh while Sirius sat on James' bed and held his hand. "Just talk to us, okay? And if you don't, we'll notice it because you know we will. And we will push you until you snap at us and word-vomit everything. Deal?"
James gave his best friends a smile, this one was genuine.
"Deal."
"Boys, it's time for you to go, James needs rest." Madam Pomfrey's voice could be heard further away from James' infirmary bed.
The three of them complained, because of course they did. But they winked at him and James smiled.
They'd come back, as they always did.
And that's exactly what happened, later that evening, when James was met with the same three pairs of eyes that had hid under the cloak, it was nobody's business but theirs.
And yes, maybe James was still sick, he wasn't really alright right now; but one day he would be. He was sure of that.