James entered the boys’ dorm room. He had just come back from practice and had his quidditch bag tucked tightly under his arm and his broom grasped firmly in the palm of his hand. Remus sat opposite to him on his own bed, a book left ignored and opened on a random page, while Remus was smoking a cigarette. It was his third in just the past hour. In his defense, he had a very stressful potions’ exam coming up, one which he was certainly not looking forward to taking.
“You shouldn’t smoke so much, Moony”, James started, settling his broom carefully against a wall and throwing his bag casually onto his own bed. “That shit’s gonna drive you to an early grave.”
Remus took a long drag of his cigarette and scoffed. “Then make sure I have a nice funeral, will you,Prongs?”.
James rolled his eyes playfully, reaching out to take the cigarette from Remus’s mouth and being met with a half hearted slap to his wrist as Remus dogged and kept the cigarette safely lodged between his lips.
“Just for that, I’m going to get your gravestone to say something stupid, like ‘Snivellus Snape’s biggest admirer.” He dramatically clutched his wrist as if it had been horribly wounded by Remus's vicious attack. Being around Sirius for so long had had a worryingly strong effect on James’s sarcasm.
“Oh shut it, you wanker.” Remus took another long drag of his cigarette and blew the smoke directly in James’s face, causing the unruly haired boy to start coughing wildly while Remus laughed at the whole ordeal, worries of his potions test forgotten in just a short conversation.
Past memories like that made Remus feel empty inside. All he could do was blankly stare at the two twin gravestones standing in front of him, matching surnames with different first names.
James Potter
Beloved Son, Husband, and Father.
Sitting beside it, the identical other stone read:
Lily Evans Potter
Beloved Daughter, Wife and Mother.
In all his years being friends with the Marauders, he was sure James would be the one to outlive them all. Remus would die, most likely due to his lycanthropy, Sirius would probably do something stupid and get himself killed, and Peter just didn’t have the guts to live as long as James would.
James would have lived a thousand more years, just for the sake of waking up everyday next to his wife and his child;the two people he loved so much, it probably wasn’t natural.
It didn’t matter anymore. Sirius Black, Remus’s lover and James’s best friend, had betrayed them. He’d caused Peter his death and now Remus was all alone, just as he’d been during his childhood, right before he turned 11 and was handed a ticket to years of love and friendship, a magic stronger than anything they would have ever learnt at Hogwarts.
Remus stared at the names, carving them into his memory. James Potter and Lily Potter. He had been friends with James Potter and Lily Potter, he had loved them more than he’d ever thought he’d be capable of loving someone and he would never forget them.
Reaching for his back pocket, Remus pulled out a cigarette and began to light it with a simple muttered spell he’d learnt so many years ago,settling it comfortably between his teeth. It seemed a cruel joke the world had pulled on him that he’d been the one to lose James, and not have James lose him.
“I guess you never did promise me that you'd plan a nice funeral for me, did you, Prongs?”