Coming Home
Marlene’s cat, Goose, wasn’t fond of trains. That said, Goose wasn’t fond of a lot of things, namely people, namely Marlene. He let out a strangled yowl that verged on drowning out the sound of the pandemonium that was platform 9¾ at 10:58 on the morning of the 1st September. It nearly did, but not quite. Marlene didn’t think anything could be louder than the yells and whistles and clangs that emanated from this platform, the gearing up of students for another year at Hogwarts.
She grinned at the sight, but if Goose wasn’t let out within the next ten minutes, Marlene was beginning to think she might have some kind of cat riot on her hands. Pushing herself (with tremendous force) through the jostling and undulating crowd of family members waving near the train, she hoisted herself and Goose up its steps, leaving just enough time to yank (again, with tremendous force) her trunk on behind her. The whistle shrieked, the doors closed, and Marlene fell against the wall, puffing like she smoked as much as Remus. Getting to the Hogwarts Express should not be this difficult.
“Yeah, yeah, I know.” Goose continued to glare at her with unflinching yellow eyes, and hissed like the devil incarnate he was. Marlene resisted the urge to hiss back. “Go on, then. Terrorise someone else for a while.” She opened the cage, and with a swish of his scraggly tail, Goose was gone, probably off hunting some poor first year’s rat. “And good riddance,” she muttered.
“After seven years, anyone else would’ve formed at least some kind of relationship with that cat.” A voice behind her mused. Marlene turned, sighing.
“Oh, we have a relationship. He bites me, I feed him. He scratches me, I feed him. He hisses at me, and I pray he runs away for good next time.”
“Always a charmer.” James Potter grinned. Before she could duck away, he scruffed a fist on her head – a normal greeting of theirs – and she reached to do the same to him.
“Not the hair McKinnon! Please, anywhere but the hair!” James cried in mock terror, leaping out of her way before she could return the gesture, but she got him in a headlock in a matter of moments, cackling.
They both returned to their upright positions; Marlene with satisfaction, James subconsciously running a hand through his hair.
“Bloody hell, Potter, I thought we were over the hair stage. Black is rubbing off on you,” she marvelled.
“What’s this about rubbing off on someone?” Sirius called, sauntering up from the corridor, a suggestive grin on his face. She rolled her eyes at his entrance. Dramatic as usual. At least she could give him that.
“Only in your wildest dreams, Padfoot.” James blew him a kiss.
“You don’t want to be anywhere near my dreams, Prongs.” Sirius winked, raising his eyebrows as Marlene choked on a gag. This was why she preferred to spend time with –
“Marlene!” Lily came bounding up from behind Sirius, and barrelled into her, bombarding her with the scent of a flower Marlene couldn’t name and a faceful of ginger hair. She hugged Lily back, tightly.
“Save me, Lily. The boys are flirting with each other again.”
“Better than flirting with anyone else,” Lily reasoned, pulling back to take in the scene. Her eyes immediately fell to a spot on James’s chest that Marlene hadn’t noticed before, but now couldn't see how she’d missed it. Her mouth fell open, and an incredulous laugh escaped her.
“James Potter, there is no way in Dumbledore’s frazzled old mind you made Head Boy,” she exclaimed. Lily looked just as shocked as she felt, and her face worked through quite the list of emotions, before finally landing on a dread-filled resignation.
“Excellent. Potter, you’d better come with me.”
That’s when Marlene noticed an almost identical badge on Lily’s chest, that read, HEAD GIRL, in gold and red lettering.
“Yes!” she cheered. “Knew you’d get it.” A warm flicker of pride glowed in her stomach as Lily smiled. She could guess how much this must have meant to her.
“I’ll meet you later.” She sighed. “Gotta go to the prefects’ carriage.”
Sirius caught James’s eye and raised an eyebrow, canting his head towards Lily’s retreating form. James grinned back, thrilled, and turned to follow her.
“It really is never going to happen, you know.”
“Yeah, but the man can still dream.”
Just then, with pretty impeccable and reliably awful timing, Sash brushed past the both of them. Marlene watched her carry on walking. Not even a greeting, a second of eye contact, a hint of recognition. Marlene’s chest clenched, fists of anger and hurt colliding.
“Still nothing from her?” Sirius asked, also staring at their old friend walking away from them like they’d never even known each other, like they didn’t still share a dormitory, had never shared secrets in the night.
“No,” was all Marlene could reply, as she gritted her teeth against a rush of anger. It was all Sash deserved.
“Some people can just suck a cock,” Sirius said wisely.
She sighed. “Well said, Black. Well said.”
He nodded his head in thanks.
“Marlene! When did you get here and why wasn’t I immediately informed?” Mary’s head poked out from a nearby carriage. She came out and gave her a bone-crushing hug, and hugged Sirius, too. “Good summers?” She asked the both of them.
They both paused, taking the time to contemplate the question, before answering in unison, “No.”
Mary smiled brightly. “Guess that makes three of us. Come on, I could’ve sworn I just saw Sash walk past. That knob .” Her face darkened.
Marlene hauled her trunk to the carriage Mary came from, and grabbed Goose’s cage at the horrifying premonition that he would indeed return.
Remus and Peter were sitting in the carriage already, and the five of them all squeezed in together amongst greetings and hugs and smiles. It struck Marlene that this may be the last journey to Hogwarts they would all take together, and Lily and James weren’t even here with them.
“Well then,” Sirius announced, shoulders pressed against hers and Remus’s. “Let the final year begin.”
Dramatic dickhead, Marlene and Mary’s looks said to each other, not without fondness. Her gaze slid to the window, to the passing clusters of buildings that were slowly thinning out to fields, and as the chatter of the carriage buzzed around her, she let out a silent prayer that it would be a good one.
—-------------------------
At home, Marlene ate a lot of boiled food. It wasn’t her choice; God knows she would’ve loved to shove the lot of it in the bin and call it a day, but her dad liked to insist that his cooking talents were unmatched, and wouldn’t hear a word against them. This was why, when the Sorting ceremony had ended and the first years had all taken their seats, Marlene was probably the most excited to be back at Hogwarts than she had been since she’d arrived.
Before her, mounds of creamy mashed potatoes materialised like a small glimpse of heaven, then came the sliced roast beef, generously sized yorkshire puddings, and… Her eyes zeroed in on what she’d been looking for all along. Pigs in blankets. This was what Marlene had been longing for.
“Bloody hell Marls, don’t wait for us.” Mary didn’t sound surprised at her enthusiasm.
She made a noise of vague agreement, mouth stuffed with food already. Lily snorted, reaching for some sprouts.
Marlene swallowed her food and paused in her feasting with difficulty, just to say, “Lily Evans, you’re a monster, and I say this with my whole heart.”
“If you can’t appreciate the sprout, you don’t deserve the pigs,” Lily replied, face serious.
“I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that, so we can still be friends.”
“Or you could… Try a bite?” Lily waved a forked sprout under Marlene’s nose.
The putrid stench hit her nostrils almost immediately, and she spluttered in outrage.
“Step too far there, I think,” Mary said. “Trying to end Marlene’s war with sprouts is probably more hopeless than knocking some sense into the boys’ heads.”
The boys in question turned as one ( God, they were scarily similar sometimes), expressions ranging from, Hey! to, Fair enough.
The latter belonged to Remus, who turned to Marlene. His plate was marginally more empty than hers, a miracle he always seemed to pull off. Even knowing the depths of her own appetite, she didn’t think anyone could ever beat Remus Lupin’s ability to eat.
“Study group again this year?” he asked.
Lily and Marlene nodded straight away, but Sirius interrupted, looking horrified.
“Please do not discuss studying at the dinner table.” He said the word like it pained him immeasurably. It probably did. “We’ve just got back! I don’t even want to think about NEWTs until we’ve got at least three life-changing pranks in the bag.”
Marlene and the girls collectively groaned.
“Just please warn me before they happen,” Mary ordered. “Last year’s little swimming session was really awful for my hair.”
“Couldn’t get the seaweed out for weeks,” Lily agreed, grumbling.
“‘Little swimming session,’ she says, as if it wasn’t the greatest prank this castle’s ever seen,” Sirius cried.
“The Prewetts’ alarm one was pretty good, though,” Peter mused, looking up from his roast dinner. “I still hear those bells in my nightmares sometimes.”
“Wormtail, please do not measure our pranks against the Prewetts’ little jokes. They’re simply not on the same scale.” Sirius frowned.
“That’s besides the point,” Lily interrupted. “Remus is right, NEWTs aren’t going to be as easy as OWLs. We’ll need to get on the books as soon as we can.”
Silently, Marlene agreed, although it was accompanied with an inward sigh. She liked getting the good grades, but the thought of studying… not so much.
“Get on the books,” James repeated to himself, nodding. “That’s very wise. A very wise expression.”
Lily rolled her eyes, but Marlene knew she didn’t really mind. James had grown out of his ‘dickhead stage’, as they liked to call it. Now it was just harmless, but still sort of pathetic, pining. After all the years spent with James on the Quidditch pitch, training and drilling each other, she’d grown more fond of the over-stimulated chaser than she’d ever say.
“Well, don’t get too distracted, Potter. It’s not just Head Boy you’ve bagged this year.” She grinned at him, raising her eyebrows.
Chest puffed, James shifted his robes to reveal another badge, hidden in its folds. It read, Quidditch Captain , in capitals, emblazoned with two crossing broomsticks.
“Nice one, James!” Sirius exclaimed, punching his arm. He leaned back, as if he was taking in James from a new angle. “Frank Longbottom really got to you, didn’t he?”
“Frank Longbottom got to all of us.” Mary’s eyes glazed over.
Murmurs of agreement came from around their area. Marlene couldn’t help it: she looked down the length of the Gryffindor table, searching for a certain face. She found her almost immediately. Sash was sitting near the far end of the table, talking with people Marlene didn’t really know, laughing like she hadn’t a care in the world.
Watching her, Marlene couldn’t help but remember that night in fifth year, staying up until midnight with sweets they’d snuck from someone’s unattended Honeydukes supply in the common room. They’d giggled and talked about Frank bloody Longbottom the whole night, and Marlene had gone to sleep smiling, because she knew nothing would stop them from being friends, ever. She’d believed that nothing could’ve taken that understanding from them, until it was gone. Until she was left adrift, as expendable as a bronze knut forgotten in a back pocket. She turned away.
Remus caught her eye across the table, a silent, Everything okay? written on his features. She nodded and smiled, but a wave of discomfort rose in her stomach that anyone had even seen her looking for Sash. She hated knowing how insecure it made her appear: lost and unmoored, even right next to her friends.
Enough of that. Marlene had already decided before she came that if Sash was going to carry on being like this, ignoring the same old rusty swing set that had collapsed under them both, then it wasn’t up to her to fix it.
Marlene turned back to her food with vigour, only to find it had been replaced with an empty plate, an array of puddings spread across the table, mounted on platters. She didn’t even feel disappointed at the loss of her pigs in blankets. This would do just fine.
“Hey Marls, how's Dylan?” Lily asked. Marlene had invited them over for a week or two in the holidays, and as always, her little brother had been looking forward to seeing Lily the most. He’d been disappointed when she hadn’t been able to make it.
“You’re still not forgiven,” she told Lily. “And don’t think I have either. You should’ve seen the look on his face when I had to tell him you weren’t coming. It was like denying Sirius of his precious Prongsy boy .” She mimed a hand over her forehead.
“It hurts to even think about,” Sirius sniffed, hand on his heart. James clasped his other hand from across the table. Idiots, the pair of them.
Lily ignored them, which was wise. “I wish I could’ve come,” she said, sincerely.
“I know, it’s okay. I’m sure France wasn’t that much worse.” Marlene grinned.
“Wine, cheese, bread. Don’t get me started on the peaches.” Mary let out a sigh, eyes wide and wistful.
“Mary, I’m not sure French peaches are a thing.” Peter furrowed his brow.
“Sure they are, if you’re looking in the right places,” Mary said, winking. Everyone groaned. “I’m right!”
“You have an excellent peach, Mary.”
“Why thank you, Sirius.”
Now it was Marlene’s turn to watch Remus. He’d been pretty quiet the whole dinner, but he was always sort of unpredictable like that. It was one of the things she liked best about him; he could be a listener as well as a Marauder, or whatever that meant.
His expression didn’t really change, though she thought she saw a minuscule tightening in his jaw. It was something she’d come to notice a lot in fifth year when Mary and Sirius were dating, although that was well over now, thank God. It had been a tough time for all of them.
Come to think of it, he did look more tired than usual tonight, dark circles under his eyes pronounced in the candlelight. He was stifling a yawn even as she watched, looking away from Sirius seeming more forlorn than he probably realised. She understood that when you were tired, old hurts came out from their hiding places more easily.
Dumbledore stood up, and the chattering hall drew to a stop. “Excellent feast, excellent,” he began. “And welcome, all of you, to another year at Hogwarts. The night is old, and we are young.” At this, Marlene caught Remus’s eye across the table, and they made the same face. Dumbledore was anything but young. “Let us rest whilst we can.” A strange dismissal, but Marlene had come to accept Dumbledore’s eccentricities.
“I think I might have an early one tonight,” she announced, finishing off her plate of profiteroles. “I’m dead tired.”
“Yeah, me too,” said Remus, as she’d hoped.
They stood to beat the prefects beginning to usher the first years to the common rooms, and made their way out of the hall together. Sirius watched them go.
“How was your summer?” Marlene asked.
Remus paused. “Interesting,” he finally said.
“Care to elaborate?” she teased. She wondered if Remus even intended to be so mysterious all of the time, and suspected he didn’t.
He just smiled a smile that told a thousand secrets and that was more for himself than for her, and said, “Not as interesting as yours, I bet.”
Marlene snorted at that. “Oh yeah, hanging out with my ten-year-old brother all day. Really intriguing.”
“I don’t know,” he mused, “kids’ wisdom is something to behold. One time, I overheard my nephew talking to his imaginary friend, who was apparently persuading him to eat a sponge. It was actually very convincing.”
“Number one; your nephew is probably right. Number two; you have a nephew? Since when?”
“Oh, about five years ago.”
Marlene put her face in her hands. Remus Lupin could be an absolute menace.
“Sounds like he and Dylan would get along. He told me last week how much he wished soap bubbles were edible. I’m not convinced that didn’t stop him from eating them.”
“Hardcore. I vote we keep them apart at all times, or our bathroom cabinets might get cleared out as snacks.”
“A wise decision,” Marlene conceded. She had missed this. “What’s his name?”
“Louis,” Remus replied. “He’s my older brother’s kid.”
“Louis Lupin?” Marlene grinned. “Has a nice ring to it.”
“Still better than Remus.” He shook his head. “What were they thinking, calling a child that?”
“I like it!” Marlene protested. “It’s kind of… regal.”
“Who exactly are you trying to convince? You or me?”
“Pardon me, my liege.” Marlene stopped in the corridor to sweep into a bow.
Remus shoved her, a grin curving the corners of his mouth, finally. “You’re worse than James, sometimes.”
“ That’s just rude.” They both snorted, just content to be in each other’s company again. Marlene was reminded of the time they’d sort of dated in fourth year. Well, they’d gone out to Hogsmeade once, and both decided they much preferred each other as friends. Then, a year later, Marlene had begun to notice the way he looked at Sirius, and wondered if the reason it hadn’t worked for him had gone a bit deeper than that. As for her, she loved Remus, but just not in that way. It was as simple as that.
“Head Boy.” Remus was shaking his head with fondness. “Even I don’t know how he managed that.”
“So little faith. Maybe he’ll even win over Lily this year.”
They both pondered this for a second, then decided in unison, “Nah.”
“Never gonna happen.”
Turning the corner, they came up to the portrait that led to the Gryffindor common room. They’d somehow managed to beat the first years despite dawdling along at a snail’s pace through the near empty corridors of the castle. That was the advantage of having lived here for seven years, she supposed. Finding the secret shortcuts was much easier.
Just being back in the common room was soothing. Relief washed over her as she took it in again for the first time in eight weeks or so, to see it was exactly how they’d left it. Home.
Collapsing on the sofa in front of the fireplace, she sighed. “It’s good to be back.”
Remus took the armchair next to her, closing his eyes and leaning his head on the arm rest. Marlene watched as he fell asleep as quickly as the drop of a hat, and clumsily chucked a nearby blanket over him. It was almost incredible how fast he managed it.
She stared into the low flames, content to lie in the silence that was broken only by the crackle of the fire and Remus’s slow breaths, before the inevitable rush of the rest of the incoming Gryffindors would begin.
A line of poetry sprang to her mind that took her by surprise. Home is a safe, a calm retreat, to rest the weary soul. She couldn’t remember where she’d seen it before, or the rest of it, but she did know that when she’d read it, she’d thought of being here. She closed her eyes.
“What will we do with these two?” Lily’s voice. She opened one eye to find two green ones looking down at her and Remus, who was still sound asleep. Marlene realised with a start she must have slept, too. The common room was littered with a few other drowsy students, and the rest of her friends, spread out in various positions before the fireplace. How long she’d been out, she had no idea.
James and Peter were on the floor, engaged in a conversation that involved both Quidditch and puddings, it seemed. Lily and Mary were sitting next to her on the sofa, shaking their heads at Marlene’s bleary-eyed look. Sirius was in the armchair opposite Remus, quiet for once, stealing glances at him. They were as subtle as a whistling kettle, and neither of them even knew it.
She caught herself looking around for Sash, before remembering. It was a crash of hurt and resentment all over again. She wished she didn’t care, wished they’d never even been friends in the first place, if this was all it had become.
“Hey,” Lily said. “You alright?” This was the second time in one night she’d done it - been caught looking for her. Before she could stop it, the same wave of discomfort rose in her stomach at Lily’s question, and her face burned. She was perfectly fine. She didn’t need Sash. She had the people she cared about right here.
Marlene sat up and smiled, even though her insides felt completely drained. “Of course. Just sleepy, I think.” She made a show of yawning and stood up, careful to avoid James and Peters’ legs, sprawled out on the rug. “I reckon I’ll go to bed.”
“Okay,” Lily replied, voice betraying a hint of uncertainty.
Before she could say anything else, Marlene smiled again. “Night, everyone.” A chorus of good nights followed her upstairs.
It was only when she’d reached the door to her room that Marlene realised her mistake. In her rush to escape Lily’s questions and furrowed brow, she’d brought herself right to the person she had been hoping to avoid. Whether either of them liked it or not, Sash and Marlene still shared a dormitory, and if she wasn’t in the common room…
Marlene sighed heavily, but it was too late now to go back down. Besides, it was her room just as much as Sash’s. She had every right to be there.
Praying she’d gone to bed already, Marlene flung open the door, and immediately wished she hadn’t. Sash was still up, sat on her bed with the curtains open, reading the book of poetry Marlene had lent to her in sixth year, and had never got back. She’d presumed it had gone missing.
Anger rose in her like steam off boiling water. How could Sash pretend she didn’t exist, and still read the book she’d given her? How could she sit there after everything and act as though nothing had even happened? Marlene fumed. Sash didn't even look up.
That was it. “That’s my book,” Marlene stated stupidly. She collected herself. “I’d like it back.”
She wasn’t sure if she’d imagined the slight tensing in Sash’s shoulders when she’d spoken, but she must have, because Sash looked up with all the leisure in the world, as carefree as she’d been at dinner, and said, after long seconds of deliberation where Marlene could feel her pulse race, “Oh, I hadn’t realised.”
Closing it, Sash held it out for Marlene to take, daring to look her in the eyes. Marlene wanted to break something. She snatched it out of Sash’s hands, hating how her fingers burned when they brushed hers. Hating how Sash acted as though the book wasn’t the most precious thing Marlene owned, and how it had felt like a confession when she’d given it to her.
Pushing that thought down with force, she turned and went out of the room, not caring that she’d left the door open, not caring that a lump was rising in her throat. How was she expected to share a room with Sash when she couldn’t even look at her?
Not even thinking about where she was going, just letting her feet carry her, Marlene charged upstairs, flight after flight. She climbed right to the top, forcing out her anger with each step as exertion and heavy breathing, tiredness all but forgotten. She wasn’t even sure who she was angry at anymore.
At the top, she yanked open the door that few people knew about, hiding amongst a tapestry of a woman before a flaming moon, head tilted back in a flowerbed. She didn’t even pause to admire it like she usually did, just stormed outside onto the roof.
Not many people knew it, but at the top of the two staircases of the Gryffindor common room, identical doors hid behind the two complementing tapestries leading to a paved path woven amongst the rooftops. Even Marlene wasn’t sure of the extent to which it led; it splintered off in different directions at every turn, and still managed to stay hidden from eyesight of the classrooms whose windows it meandered by. A secret footpath, only for those brave enough to follow it.
Marlene paced along her most well-walked path, the one that led to the turret overlooking the greenhouses. She couldn’t bear to sit in that silent, haunted room with Sash, and was much too riled up to show her face in the common room again.
She walked until she could feel the last dregs of frustration petering out of her body, clashing against the cool September air. She didn’t want to think about Sash, about anything at all, so she just walked, silencing her thoughts with every line of poetry she could remember, reciting fragments in her head that made no sense on their own, but did their job of distracting her.
She reached the turret in record time and flopped down, completely worn out and still clutching the book. The swaying plants in the greenhouses waved their hellos, and the glowing flowers pondered her state of misery, curious and unable to relate.
She looked at the stars instead, their fires blurring through her eyes, knowing the tragedies they hid would bring her more comfort than anything else could.
It was going to be a long year.