In this, the THIRD BOOK of The Marauders Order of the Phoenix, the war seems far away as the Marauders continue to grow-up, try to recover from the losses they've suffered, and the ones they know are yet come...
While caring for Dora Potter, James...
Dora Potter lay in her bed that night, acutely aware of being the only person in it.
Although on the outside of things, she seemed to have been coping very well with the loss of Charlus, on the inside, Dora felt like she was completely hollowed out. Especially at times like this, when the empty space beside her felt like it stretched a hundred miles wide.
She put her palm squarely against a pillow she'd turned, just over where his heart would be if it was him, and she whispered, "I miss you."
She stared at her arm, at her wrinkled fingers, how they splayed over the imaginary chest of the pillow beside her. Her wedding band around her ring finger was old and the gold not as shiny as it had been the first time she'd put it on. She never took it off, not even at night these days, and she stared at it, wishing she was wrapped as tightly around Fleamont Charlus as the band was around her finger.
There were opalescent green scales already growing around her elbow, despite having done the descaling with Lily just two nights before. Four of them, she counted, and she frowned and closed her eyes.
"I have to see our grandbaby, Flea," she whispered. "I have to see. I know our grandbaby is coming soon. I have to see."
The night stretched on nearly as long as the empty space on the mattress beside her.
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(Illustration by @wolfstarmoonypadfoot - Thank you for giving this life!)
Down the hall in James and Lily's room there was no empty space on the mattress. The mattress was overcrowded, rather. Lily lay in the center of the bed, James on one side, Remus on the other, Peter squashed on the other side of James, and bulk of black fur sprawled across all four sets of legs, and an orange ball on James's chest, which purred loudly. The black bulk of fur kept lazily kicking at the orange ball, and James would catch his foot with reflexes built up playing catch and release with the snitch. Lily clutched both Remus's and James's hands in hers, and Remus's free hand stroked the head of the dog, which lay on his abdomen. Peter's fingers curled around the top edge of the blanket, head against James's shoulder, James's second arm bent up in an arch to curl over his own head on the pillow.
"How do you reckon she got the time turner?" James murmured into the dark.
"Mopsus," Peter guessed.
"Maybe one of her friends," suggested Lily.
"Dumbledore," Remus said.
The dog groaned and shifted his paw over his eyes.
"An assassination attempt," whispered Peter, "Your Aunt was mad."
"If only it had worked," Remus said quietly, "Things would be so different for us now."
