Chapter 11
They had decided to go the simple route. At first, that was. If she said no to going on a date with Peter, then James had a backup plan. One that would woo the socks off of Marlene. It was even better than anything he had tried on Lily. Maybe if he had thought of it before, she would have agreed to go out with him. Not that that would resolve his soul-mark problem.
“Alright, lads?” Sirius greeted as he and Remus approached their friends outside of the great hall.
Remus was looking better than he had that morning and he had evidently had a shower and probably a short nap, but the rest of them could tell his leg was still bothering him. He managed a quiet ‘hullo’ to the others, probably to downplay how he was feeling, but didn’t say much else.
“Nice of you to join us,” James said. “Pete’s about to get a date for the Hogsmeade day coming up.”
“Way to go, Wormy,” Sirius clapped him on the shoulder. “Who’s the lucky lady?”
“You’ll see,” James said. He took the bundle of flowers they had found around the Black Lake from his bookbag and handed them to Peter. They were slightly wilted, most likely from James shoving them in his bag, but Peter took them and worried the stems in his hands.
“Alright, I’m ready. Now or never, right?” Peter said. He swallowed audibly then plastered on the most confident-looking smile he could muster.
“G’luck,” Remus mumbled, and James and Sirius followed, wishing him luck as well.
“We’ll wait here,” James said, pushing Peter through the large double doors. “Give us a thumbs up when she says yes.”
“Go get ‘er, tiger,” Sirius called after him, earning a few weird glances from the students who walked around them as they filtered into lunch.
The three of them watched Peter as he made his way to the Gryffindor table. They were all aware of how suspicious they looked, peaking out from behind the door, but most of the school was used to their antics anyway and didn’t pay them much mind.
Sirius did a mental cheer at the fact that the mystery girl was in Gryffindor, and he started to think about who Peter could possibly have his sights set on. It was probably a third year, maybe a fifth but Sirius highly doubted it. Peter slowed his pace and, at first, Sirius thought he was about to stop in front of Alice where she sat with a few of her roommates. They would make a good pair, but they all knew Alice and Frank had been spending a lot of time together in the last few weeks, and rumor had it they were soul mates. Sirius knew not to put too much stock into the old rumor mill, but they obviously liked each other and were most likely already dating.
Any of Alice’s roommates would be a decent match for Peter, but Sirius didn’t know much about any of the 5th-year girls. There were a lot of them, way more than the three that had been sorted into their house the following year, and Sirius had a hard time getting their names right, although there was a possibility he had snogged at least one of them.
Remus let out a confused sound as Peter walked past Alice’s group and went to the very top of the row, all the way towards the faculty dining table at the head of the Great Hall. Did he get cold feet, Sirius thought, but then he stopped in front of Lily, Mary, and Marlene.
What the hell? Lily was out of the question. There was no way James would let Peter ask out the girl he had crushed on since 1st year, and Marlene had told them all about Mary’s new boyfriend just the week before. That left—
“Oh fuck,” Sirius blurted out as it dawned on him. He pushed passed James and raced towards Peter.
“Where are you going?” James hissed after him, but he didn’t turn around. He had to stop Peter before he made a fool out of himself, and worse, destroyed both of their friendships with Marlene. There was no way she would want to talk to Peter after that, and he knew she would think Sirius put him up to it as a cruel prank after she had come out to him only a few weeks before.
“—wondering if you would go with me to Hogsmeade on Saturday.” Peter’s voice was surprisingly level and confident.
Sirius was too late.
Marlene laughed and Peter’s face fell. Sirius cursed himself for not making James tell him who they had picked for Peter to ask out. “Good one, Pettigrew,” she snorted before going back to eating her lunch.
Mary and Marlene shared a look as they both noticed Peter’s crestfallen expression. “Marls-," Mary nudged her with her elbow. Marlene swallowed and the slow realization that it was not a joke was evident upon her face. She was mortified.
She looked at Sirius as he jogged the last few steps up to them, the accusation clear behind her eyes.
“Oi, Wormy! I need your help up in the dorm,” he said, trying to ease the tension as he threw an arm around Peter and dragged him away from Marlene, who was now as red as a tomato. “Now,” he added for good measure.
Sirius pulled him out of the Great Hall and then dragged him and James up the multiple staircases to the tower. Remus followed at a distance behind them, internally cringing at what he had just seen.
James tried to speak up, tried to wriggle out of the grasp that Sirius had on the back of his jumper, but Sirius just shushed him and pulled him along.
“Marlene?! You chose to ask out Marlene?” Sirius fumed, slamming the dorm room door behind him as they entered the room.
“Why not,” James argued. “She’s smart, funny, good at quidditch.” He counted all of the good qualities he was listing on his fingers. “And” he added triumphantly, “she fits in perfectly with the Marauders. We all get along with her!” He looked around to each of them as if he was daring them to disagree with his logic.
“No, just no.”
“What’s the big deal?” James asked, his voice raised in frustration.
“The big deal is that it’s Marlene!”
Peter sat down quietly on the edge of his bed. His neck was slightly flushed but he otherwise had recovered from the embarrassment quite well, he just didn’t like when his friends talked about him like he wasn’t there.
“So? Lily laughed at me the first few times I asked her out. Wormy will just have to keep trying until she says yes.”
“That’s the worst advice I’ve ever heard,” Sirius groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers.
“That’s what I did with Lily,” James countered.
“Evans doesn’t like you, mate.” It was harsh and Sirius regretted the words as soon as they left his mouth. Remus positioned himself so that he could jump between them if needed. His leg be damned, he wasn’t about to let them duke it out in the dorm room. But Sirius’ words didn’t seem to phase him, or he just didn’t let it show on his face.
“That’s not true. She said she was just starting to fancy me, before, ya know,” he waved his arm in front of himself, meaning she might have given him a chance if it wasn’t for his glaringly obvious soul mark.
“She said that?” Remus cut in, whipping his head in James’ direction.
It had caught Sirius off guard too. Why hadn’t James said anything? He sighed, “Sorry,” he mumbled. It’s not like James knew, he was just trying to help out Peter. “Just anyone but Marlene, ok?” he said finally.
James looked like he wanted to protest like he didn’t understand why Sirius was being so adamant, but Peter spoke up before he got the chance to do so. “I don’t even fancy Marlene,” he squeaked.
“Are you kidding me?” Sirius threw his arms up in frustration. “James you didn’t even ask him if he liked her?”
“Why didn’t you say anything, Wormy?” James asked, ignoring Sirius.
“I thought I might start to fancy her if we went on a date,” he shrugged.
James sighed. “Alright, Wormy, looks like we need to go back to the drawing board.” Sirius crossed his arms and refused to look at them even as they left the room. “Let’s go down to the common room and let Padfoot overreact in peace.”
Remus turned to Sirius as soon as they could no longer hear the other boys’ footsteps on the stairs. Sirius’s skin prickled under the weight of Remus’s questioning gaze, and he went to the bin of records they had, his back turned to the other, rifling through their collection in order to have something to do with his hands. He could tell Remus knew that he knew something and wasn’t saying it. Maybe the other two would be content with the excuse Sirius had given, but Remus was too clever.
“Padfoot?” Remus asked slowly.
Sirius ignored the obvious question in Remus’s voice. “Which do you think is better? Led Zeppelin II or Led Zeppelin IV? He held up the two records, trying desperately to change the subject.
“Padfoot?” Remus asked again, craning his neck to look directly into Sirius’ eyes, ignoring his attempt to change the subject. Sirius could tell by the look he gave him that he knew.
“Personally, I think Led Zeppelin II is better, but Led Zeppelin IV has Black Dog on it,” he said, diverting his eyes.
“Sirius is Marlene…” he trailed off, but Sirius got the gist of what he was asking.
Sirius groaned, plopped down on the edge of his bed, and covered his face with his hands. “She’s going to kill me,” he mumbled to himself.
“I’m not going to tell anyone,” Remus said, trying to pull Sirius’s hands away from his face. Then, in a whisper, “Does she? Like girls?”
Sirius didn’t know why Remus was being so persistent. Couldn’t he understand that it wasn’t his business to tell, and wasn’t his response, or lack thereof, a good enough answer? “I don’t know,” he snapped, the frustration he had felt towards James now pointed at Remus. “Do you?”
Remus raised a single eyebrow in a way that Sirius found infuriating. “Do I like girls?”
“Yeah, do you?” Just drop it, he told himself. But it was hard to stop himself once someone got him going. It was the same at home, too. Walburga would set him off and it was like he couldn’t control himself even though he knew she would hurt him, would hurt Regulus, if he didn’t stop running his mouth.
Remus just stared at him, confused as to why Sirius would ask him such a question. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have pried,” Remus said finally.
“Well, are you going to answer the question?” They should just drop it.
Remus shrugged. “I haven’t really figured that out yet. Does it matter?” He motioned between the two of them, as if to say, why would it matter if we’re soul mates? It wasn’t lost on Sirius that it was the first time Remus had openly acknowledged their soul mate status since his birthday, but he wouldn’t let that distract him. Of course, it mattered. It mattered to Sirius, at least.
Sirius shot a pointed look at Remus. It was a defiant and obnoxious look, and it made Remus huff in frustration. “So, what about you then?”
“No,” Sirius said shortly.
“No as in you don’t know, or no as in you don’t like girls?”
“I don’t like girls.”
“But you’ve kissed girls before,” Remus said, referring to the phase he had gone through at the beginning of the year, where he had snogged a new girl each week. He didn’t even know why he did it. He knew at the time that he was gay; he had no interest in any of the girls he snogged, but it was just something to do— something to make him feel normal. He wasn’t about to explain that to Remus, though, not when he was making him so mad.
And it wasn’t even that many girls, he fumed inside his head. Everyone blew it entirely out of proportion, just to have something to talk about, most likely. After a few weeks, he even started hearing that he had snogged girls he had never even talked to before. He still did it though, he wasn’t sure why, all the way up until his birthday.
“I have,” Sirius confirmed. He didn’t elaborate— he didn’t have to explain himself if everyone was just going to believe whatever they wanted anyway.
Remus looked like he had to bite down a wave of— something. Anger, most likely, from the look of it. Then he took a deep breath through his nose, then another. “I’m sorry, I’m being an arse,” he said finally.
“It’s fine, let’s just drop it,” Sirius said, but they both knew it wasn’t fine.
“No, really,” Remus said. “I get it, ok. I’m not going to say anything to Marlene or anyone else.”
“I know you’re not.”
“Really. I’ve had my suspicions about her for a while, so she never has to know you told me. If it comes up, we can just say I guessed, which is sort of true.” Remus sat beside him, brought his hand up to Sirius’ bicep, and rubbed his thumb in a circular motion, comforting. Sirius thought he should pull away but couldn’t bring himself to do so and instead felt the anger drain from him. “It’s just,” Remus started, then paused. Sirius recognized his face as the one he wore when he was trying to collect his thoughts. “It’s nice to know there are more people like us,” he added finally.
His words washed over Sirius, and he immediately understood. There weren’t a lot of gay people at Hogwarts, that he knew of. Just the two of them, Marlene, maybe James (though James’ parents had gotten a little too into the muggle hippie movement a few years back and taught him not to care too much about gender, so Sirius wasn’t sure if he really counted. Besides, he was so gone over Lily that Sirius was sure he hadn’t given a spare thought to any blokes). He was sure there was more. There had to be more, right? But no one was really open about it.
So, he couldn’t blame Remus for being excited. He thought back to when Marlene came out to him, when they came out to each other. Then he thought back to the hospital wing on the morning of Remus’ birthday. He had been looking for any sign that Remus was upset about his soul mate being a bloke. Sirius didn’t see any. Both of those times, with Marlene and Remus, he felt the sheer and utter relief of not being alone.
He wanted to tell Remus all of this, instead he just said, “I know what you mean.”
Remus smiled a smile that told Sirius they didn’t have to talk about it anymore, that Remus was done pushing. “And Led Zeppelin IV is definitely better than Led Zeppelin II.”
They shared a laugh until Remus trailed off with a sigh. It was then that Sirius realized how tired he looked. He had laid down in the few hours after they got back from the hospital wing before they went down to meet James and Pete for lunch, but Sirius knew the pain in his leg, especially after the trek up to the tower wouldn’t let him rest properly.
Sirius reached up (they were still standing so close, when did they get so close?) and traced the deep-set line under Remus’ eye. “Tired?” he asked.
Remus shrugged and shook his head. “Don’t want to sleep all day,” he explained.
“We missed lunch.”
“We did, though I think we should steer clear of the Great Hall.”
Sirius agreed. He would have to talk to Marlene eventually, but it didn’t have to be right away. She was definitely going to chew him out about the whole ordeal, for not sparing her from the embarrassment of being asked out in front of the whole school. Hopefully, she would believe that he had nothing to do with it. Fat chance, he thought. Merlin, what had James been thinking?
“Kitchens?”
Remus nodded. His hand lingered on Sirius’ arm for a second. He squeezed lightly before rising to his feet.
…
A Week Later
“Let’s go already,” Marlene complained. She stood against the dorm room door as she waited for Mary to put the finishing touches on Lily’s outfit.
“Have some patience, Marls.”
“I knew I should have done you last,” Mary shook her head. Mary had insisted on getting them each ready for their trip to Hogsmeade. Fashion styling was her new calling, as she put it. Marlene had no idea where she even got the idea from.
Marlene had to admit she had a talent for it, though. She had dug a pair of light-wash jeans from the bottom of her wardrobe for Marlene to wear. These used to belong to my sister, but you can have them, Mary had told her. They fit like a glove. Once Marlene had put them on, Mary took a pair of cuticle scissors to one of the knees and made a slit in the fabric, then pulled until the edges frayed. She made her wear one of the white singlets she usually wore under her school shirt and a maroon top that was to be left unbuttoned. Mary even took some of the buttons from her school bag and fastened them above her breast pocket. She felt like herself, but better, somehow.
Mary’s efforts with Lily had been a little more collaborative. Mary had wanted her to wear a skirt with a green silky top with flowy sleeves, but Lily had said she wanted to wear the new bell bottoms her mum had bought her over the holiday. So, they compromised, and Lily wore the bell bottoms with the top Mary had picked out.
Mary herself looked straight out of a fashion magazine. She wore a suede mini skirt with a gaudily patterned vest over a white top. Her tights were an entirely different color from the vest and skirt and the whole outfit didn’t seem like it should work, but it did. She looked great.
“Alright, we’re all ready to go now,” Mary announced.
“Finally,” Marlene huffed. She held the door open for the other two and Mary stuck her tongue out at her as she passed. Marlene just rolled her eyes and followed them down the stone steps to the common room.
“’ Morning ladies,” James called out to them as they emerged. “Off to old Hogsmeade village?” James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter had commandeered the majority of the sitting places in the common room, taking up more room than necessary for just the four of them. Not that it mattered much since most of the school would be spending the day in Hogsmeade.
James was laid flat on one of the couches, his head tilted back over the armrest as he peered at the three of them upside down. Remus sat in one of the armchairs with a book propped up against the armrest and Sirius sat on the floor before him, almost leaning against his legs. He was sitting as close as possible without actually touching him. The sight was sickeningly sweet. Just sit in his lap already, I know you want to, she thought. They both lifted their heads with a smile as James called out to them.
Peter, who sat in the armchair opposite Remus, very pointedly did not look in her direction. Instead, he lifted the morning edition of the Daily Prophet that he was reading so it covered his face and pretended to be too engrossed to talk to them. Marlene ignored him despite the sorry looks that Mary and Lily both shot in her direction. She wasn’t about to let Peter make her feel bad because he was too much of an idiot to know She Was Not Interested in him. And she never would be.
They had a ridiculous amount of papers and books littered across the coffee table, and to the untrained eye, it would look as if they were deep into their studies, but Marlene knew better. She spotted James’ playbook flipped upside down on his lap, so they had either been talking about quidditch or planning a prank. They did have a game coming up in two weeks, but that wouldn’t explain why Remus or Peter were there or why James was so obviously hiding the contents of the book from her and the girls. So that meant they were planning a prank.
“How’s the essay coming along?” She decided to ask Sirius instead of calling them out. She had been furious when Sirius tried to talk to her after the ‘Peter asking her out’ incident. He had sworn up and down that he didn’t put him up to it and didn’t even know about the whole thing until it was too late. He had looked so close to tears that she said she would forgive him, but only if he did her transfiguration essay for her. She would have forgiven him anyway, but it’s not like he needed to know that.
“Great, almost done,” he said, lifting the scroll of parchment in front of him. Marlene nodded in satisfaction. She knew he would get her a good mark on it— he was infuriatingly good at most subjects without even trying.
So, she wasn’t mad at him anymore, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t still planning to get revenge. Maybe she could pay someone to ask out Lupin in front of him just to see how pathetic the look on his face would be. She shook the thought from her head, that would be too cruel, even for her. She would have to think of something else.
“We are on our way to Hogsmeade,” Mary answered. “Care to join us?”
“No, we’re going to stay in the castle today,” James answered.
“You’re not going at all?” Lily asked incredulously.
“Nope,” James said, and they all shook their heads.
“Well, why not?”
“We’re a bit tired of Hogsmeade,” Remus explained.
“Yeah, if you’ve seen it once you’ve seen it a thousand times,” Sirius added.
“This is only the fourth time we’ve gotten to go this year,” Lily argued.
“It’s the last Hogsmeade trip before summer,” Mary said, not understanding why anyone would turn down the opportunity to get away from the castle, even if it was just for an afternoon.
The guys just shrugged.
“Alright,” Lily said, with a hint of suspicion in her voice. She gave Remus a curious look, but he just smiled at her like he didn’t know what she was on about. “I guess we’ll see you lot at dinner, then.”
“See you then,” Sirius called out.
“Say hello to Madam Puddifoot for me,” James joked, making the girls groan as they turned to leave the common room.
“Hey, Lils?” Remus called after. She turned to look back at him, one foot out of the portrait hole. He had his hands pressed together like a prayer and a pleading look on his face.
Lily sighed. “Chocolate frogs or chocolate wands?”
“Frogs,” Remus answered. “Thanks, Lils.”
“You’re welcome,” she sighed.
Mary yapped all the way to the village and even continued as they made their way to Scrivenshaft’s so Lily could stock up on quills before exams started. Marlene was starting to feel like she knew more about Mary’s boyfriend than she knew about herself. His favorite color was green, he loved Italian food, he played something called footy, whatever that was.
“Aren’t you afraid your mum is going to read his letters?” Marlene had asked after she had recounted the latest letter he had sent her.
“I’m more afraid of Dad reading them, to be honest,” she laughed.
“Maybe you two can come up with a secret code for when you’re feeling saucy,” Marlene teased.
“That’s not a bad idea, actually,” Mary snorted.
The shopkeep gave them a dirty look as they laughed aloud in the quiet store. They gave her an apologetic smile and then drifted to the back of the shop after Lily, who had gone to pick out some new stationery.
“Lily, what are you doing?” Mary asked as Lily started to push one of the smaller shelves away from the wall and peered behind it.
“I know those boys are keeping something from us,”
“What are you talking about?”
Lily ignored them and went back outside, not even looking around at the quills or stationery, which she had said was the main thing she wanted to get in Hogsmeade. She went around the side of the building, into the alleyway, and started moving around junk and debris that had accumulated over the years, or however long it had been since someone had taken the time to clean up the alleys of Hogsmeade. “Not here,” she mumbled to herself. “Must be over by Main Street.”
She walked away from them, as if they weren’t even there, her eyes combing the streets. Mary and Marlene followed anyway, all the way to the Three Broomsticks.
“Lily,” Mary said when she had gotten fed up with her inane search for whatever she was looking for. She put a hand on her shoulder and spun her around. “Lily, what are you doing?”
“Listen,” she looked around to see if anyone was listening then pulled the girls in closer so she could tell them what she had been up to. “I think the boys have been here more than three times this year,” she whispered conspiratorially. “I think they’ve found some sort of secret passageway so they can come here whenever they want.”
Mary and Marlene shared a look, then burst into laughter. “Of course, they have, Lily!”
“You guys knew all along?”
“Yeah, it’s been obvious for years now.”
“It has?”
“Yeah, how else do you think they always seem to have whatever they want whenever they want?”
“But you’re not going to find a hidden tunnel behind Gladrags.”
Lily deflated. “How do you suppose we find it, then?”
“You can probably weasel it out of Lupin,” Marlene offered. “He seems fond of you.”
“Or Potter,” Mary wiggled her brows suggestively. “He’d tell you anything you wanted.”
“Yeah,” Marlene joined in. “For a kiss.” Marlene made a kissy face at her that made Mary crack up even harder.
Lily folded her arms over her chest. “I’m not asking Potter,” she bit out and stormed past the two of them and into the Three Broomsticks.
“Sorry Lils,” Marlene said as they followed her in. “Drinks on me.”
“Oh, alright,” Lily said. “If you insist.”
The pub was packed with Hogwarts students and a couple of locals, but they were able to find a free booth towards the back. Marlene stood in line while the other two went to claim it before it got snatched up by someone else.
Marlene ordered three butterbeers from Madam Rosmerta and levitated them to the table. They technically weren’t supposed to do magic outside of school grounds, but Hogsmeade was so close to the school that no one ever got caught by the ministry, and all of the shop keeps seemed to turn a blind eye as long as you were spending money in their stores.
As she approached the other two, she overheard a snippet of the conversation they were having. They were unmistakably talking about the nightmare that had occurred the week before. “…I know, poor Peter,” Lily was saying.
“She should have just gone out with the poor bloke.”
“I don’t like Peter,” Marlene said, setting down the pints with more force than was necessary, making some of the butterbeer slosh onto the table.
Lily winced at having been caught, but Mary, always the boldest out of the three of them, just looked her right in the eye. “We know you don’t like Peter, Marlene.”
“Why would I go out with him if I don’t like him then?”
“Okay fine, but you could have at least turned him down gently.” Lily nodded her head, agreeing with Mary. Even Marlene agreed. She shouldn’t have laughed in his face, but she really did think it was a joke at first. That was until she saw the flowers gripped between his hands and Sirius running up to whisk him away. Then she really really thought it was a joke, but one played on both her and Peter, so she never had a chance to apologize.
“I don’t see what you have against Peter anyways,” Lily said. “He’s nice.” Mary and Lily both looked at her, expectingly. She didn’t know what to say and of course, they wouldn’t understand her point of view because they had no idea she was a raging lesbian.
I should just tell them, she thought, right now. It was impulsive, sure, but she didn’t want to make a big deal about it, and there wasn’t much they could do about it in the middle of the Three Broomsticks. She would tell them, and they would just have to drink their butterbeers and Marlene would have it over with. She didn’t want to think about it too hard because then she would worry about what they would think. Would they be upset about having to share a room with her if they knew?
She took a deep breath. “I don’t like Peter because I’m—"
She stopped as she felt a presence behind her, followed by the scent of a strong after-shaving potion. Snape. What the hell was he doing here?
“Lily, a word?” Snape all but demanded, his voice deep and monotonous, then walked toward the door expecting Lily to follow behind him.
Marlene had lost her chance.
Fuck off, Mary mouthed behind his back and flipped him the bird. They had both expected Lily to stay put and ignore his request, but to their chagrin, she wiped at the foam on her mouth with a napkin and rose from her seat.
Marlene and Mary shared a hopeless look— they knew they wouldn’t be able to stop her from following that arsehole.