Wack-A-Harry (A Harry Potter Fanfiction)

Eight

Update for week May 24 through May 31. Sorry for the late update. Things got really busy really fast. You'll get another update next week, on top of A Foul Place Is Where I Love You sometime probably this weekend.

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Fortunately for Lily, James, and Sirius, the next Potterwatch broadcast was to take place that night. James, the ever-patient person he was, had taken to paint and scowling at the Weasleys' radio ever five seconds. Lily herself wasn't much better off, as though each moment that passed put Harry in more danger.

But Sirius ... he was by far the worst off.

Lily knew enough about Sirius's childhood to understand that 12 Grimmauld Place had to hold very few happy memories. Every time he entered the house, it seemed to press an invisible weight on his shoulders—and she knew that didn't have much to do with the haunted house aesthetic. Lily had only stayed there one night and it already felt trapped; she couldn't even begin to fathom what it must have been like for, lively, energetic, teenage Sirius to have grown up here with the kind of people that owned this house. A prison without barred cells.

And Azkaban ... for twelve years ...

Lily blinked back the burning in her eyes. It seemed like every second since she'd woke in that coffin gave her something else to try and wrap her mind around. First being dead and alive again, then Harry, Sirius, Peter, the war ...

The past sixteen years of impossibilities becoming reality.

Just thinking about it made her anxious, as if she might drown in it all. There were so many things she needed answers to, but she shoved it all aside. Harry. Find Harry, get him to safety, and she could deal with everything else later.

Still, the topic of her son alone had an impressive amount of baggage with it. Lily had slowly begun to piece together the person he'd become with what little information she'd been given. Something—whether it was the look on Sirius's face every time someone mentioned Harry  or the vagueness of Ginny, Fred, and George's descriptions of him—told her that there was a lot of vital information that she didn't know. And a dark voice whispered in the back of her mind that it was the Prophecy, or something to do with it.

Lily sucked in a shuddering breath, emerging from her sea of thoughts. If they had to wait around before they could know what to do next or where to go, then she might as well get a few more questions answered in that time.

"There's still so much we don't know," she said, cutting through the silence. "I don't even know where to begin, or how I should act ..."

"Yeah," breathed James, offering her a weak smile. "Parenting: For Dummies didn't have a section about what to do when you die and come back to life to find out your son is on the run from a genocidal maniac."

Sirius snorted. "Really? Not even a footnote? See, I told you! You should've gotten She's Having a Baby and I'm Having a Panic Attack instead."

James's smile warmed, and Lily's chest tightened at the sight of it. "As if I'd ever trust a book recommendation from you, Padfoot. I'm still not entirely convinced that you can read at all."

Sirius stretched his arms over his head, a pleasant smile of his own taking root. "Ah. Well, that's why we have Moony."

As if someone had flipped a switch, the room suddenly stilled. The air left a bad taste in Lily's mouth as the nickname clanged through her. Sirius froze, his arms still stretched above his head, but his face had fallen, his grey eyes stormy and distant.

"We thought it was him," said James quietly, his own face pale and sickly.

They all knew what he meant.

Sirius's eyes were squeezed shut as he slowly lowered his arms. "I don't know where he is now, either." He hissed a curse between his teeth. "Time hasn't been kind on him, either. Last time I saw him, he was holding back Harry ..." He trailed off, seeming to have been speaking to himself more than anyone else.

Lily opened her mouth to ask what he meant by that, but thought better with f it at the last second. Sirius had his face an baggage to deal with, and she needed to remind herself of that. Lily could see the same question if n James's eyes—now taking up a dark, muddy brown—but he seemed to be thinking along the same lines as her when he said, "We'll find him, too, and apologize. Even though I'm not sure if an apology would ever be enough."

As much as it hurt, Lily couldn't help but agree.

Sirius sighed heavily. "It's been fourteen—sixteen—years, and I still feel shitty about it. He was very forgiving, but it didn't exactly make me feel any better. You know werewolves have it tough, especially lone ones."

Lily presses her face into her hands, unable to look at him any longer. Remus was as much her friend as he was theirs, and she could only imagine what the world had done to him after all these years. There was another thing to add to the bucket of problems.

"He's still in the Order, though, right?" asked James's voice.

"He was two years ago," said Sirius bitterly. "But with how much everything else has changed since then, I would take that information with a grain of salt."

The conversation dissolved back into silence, the only sound an invisible clock ticking in her mind.

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Sorry it's so short, but like I said: I plan to update AFPIWILY this weekend and this story again next week.

Please comment and thanks for reading!