Chapter Twenty Eight
Sirius crept through the silent hallway, feeling his way cautiously through the darkness. James had taken the cloak so he couldn’t risk lighting his way with his wand and the inky gloom of the castle at night blinded him as effectively as an Instant Darkness Bomb from Zonko’s. He had been working on his Herbology homework when James had slipped out of the portrait hole and he hadn’t come back since then. Now it was nearing midnight and Sirius knew that James had scheduled a Quidditch practice for the next day; he had a fair idea of where the idiot had gone and if he was right James would need to be reminded of the time.
He pushed the heavy door open as gently as possible and slipped into the dark classroom. Moonlight streamed through the windows, chequering the stone floor of the abandoned room with pools of light. Sirius headed towards the other end of the room where he could see James sitting with his legs crossed, his hair illuminated by the moonbeams and the rest of his body painted an unearthly pearl. Just behind him lay the Cloak in a crumpled silver heap, pooling on the floor like tangible moonlight. “Prongs?” he said, his voice echoing in the empty room. “You need to come back to the common room. It’s getting late and you have Quidditch practice tomorrow.”
“In a minute,” James said.
Lily’s red hair fell over her shoulders in waves, the smile which stretched her lips into a glowing crescent moon whose light was reserved for James and James alone illuminating her face; the few freckles which grazed her delicate skin sat on her nose like tiny snowflakes, imperfections which made her perfect. As she looked at James her emerald eyes lit up, love igniting a flame in their depths, flickering in the light as she gazed at him, looking as if she wanted to preserve him and keep him with her forever. James’ eyes travelled down to their entwined fingers, her slender hands anchoring him to her, just as his traitorous heart anchored his soul to hers.
James raised his hand to his reflection, tracing it lightly with his fingers, grazing their tips over Lily’s lips. “She’s so beautiful,” he whispered to himself, forgetting that Sirius was standing there.
“Nah you should probably come now.” Sirius reached where James was sitting and looked at the mirror that they had discovered in their second year; James, absorbed in watching his reflection, didn’t notice Sirius’ double take as he saw who stood opposite him. “Don’t tell me you can see what I think you can,” Sirius said, shaking his head in mock disapproval once he had gathered his wits about him.
“What do you think Padfoot? Did you think that I wouldn’t?” James asked, a slight smirk curving up one corner of his mouth.
“I must admit that I was hoping you’d see something which was a bit manlier,” he said with a bark of self deprecating laughter.
“What do you see then Padfoot?” James asked curiously as he stood up.
“Oh I don’t need a mirror to tell you what I see,” Sirius said, his voice a disconcerting mixture of sadness and happiness. “At first, when I first found it, it was the four of us, all together but we were old-”
“We were old?” James exclaimed in surprise as Sirius half smiled. “Yeah… you looked terrible mate, had hair sprouting out of your ears and everything,” he teased. “We were all grinning and waving with our families around us and we were friends even then but now… Now-” Sirius broke off, his eyes feasting on the sight before him, the image which the mirror was showing him making ecstasy explode inside him, a smile flitting across his lips as he reached out, his fingers following the same journey as James’ a moment before. “Now I see all of us but Cassie is there as well and she’s always smiling, always laughing and she looks at me,” here Sirius turned to James, his eyes imploring his best friend to understand, “and in her eyes I can just see so much love and it makes me so happy but I’m scared at the same time, you know? Is that really my heart’s deepest desire? To have Cassie love me? Because it’s terrifying that I love her so much that she even invades the damned Mirror of Erised!”
“Calm down Padfoot,” James said, leading Sirius away from the mirror, “you think that I’m not scared too? Because I am; I’m scared stiff,” he admitted. “You all think that because I’ve loved Lily for so long I- I don’t know – that I find it normal but the truth is that it’s completely the opposite. I’m so scared Padfoot, I’ve loved her for so long that it’s become a part of me and I don’t know what I’ll do without her. Sometimes I find myself wondering what life would be like if we ever got married and I like the idea; hell I love the idea! But there are still times when I look at her and see something else to love and I just… I don’t know but it’s tearing me apart.” Here James leant his head against the wall, shutting his eyes as he tried to conjure the words to sum up how he felt out of nowhere; he was startled from his thoughts by a loud laugh and, turning his head sharply towards Sirius, he shot him an enquiring glance. “What’s so funny Padfoot?”
Sirius just grinned as he fought to keep himself under control and answer James’ question. “I was just thinking about how I told you to be manlier and now look at us,” he laughed heartily. “Merlin you were destined to fail though Prongs.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well that stupid idea of yours to stop talking to Lily… It was never going to work. Once something’s in the bloody Mirror of Erised it’s probably a sign that what you feel is at least a little bit serious.”
“You never know Padfoot; it could have changed if I’d succeeded. Surely there’s one point in every… non-relationship when they’re what would make you happiest. Why do we get over some people and not others?”
“I don’t know.” He accompanied this simple statement with a shrug. “It beats me. If you ask me though your plan is stupid; you should just talk to Lily and maybe you’ll get what you’ve waited for for so long. It’s not like you two hate each other anymore. If you asked me I’d probably say you’re destined to be together, however stupid it sounds. I don’t know why so don’t ask me but it just feels like you are. Although I suppose someone as stupid as you could still cock it up.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“No worries,” Sirius said as he slapped James on the back. “Anyway we should probably head back; wouldn’t want to endanger Gryffindor’s practice tomorrow by being dead tired and falling off your broom – that definitely wouldn’t go down with the ladies.”
“Might mean that I avoid another disaster like the week before Valentine’s Day though,” he muttered with a grin. “What happened to all of your female admirers? Last year you were practically swamped with girls.”
“Oh I er… might’ve told anyone who asked me that I liked someone but to go and ask you instead,” he admitted without even a hint of remorse as James aimed a swipe at his head.
“You little git!” he cried. “I nearly ended up hiding in the boys’ bathrooms because of that!”
“Yeah wish you had; I was going to get some boys to ask you out as well,” he smirked. “Show you that you’re not safe anywhere.”
“Oh trust me Padfoot, that I know,” James said seriously as they headed back towards the door, leaving the mirror behind. “It’s one of the reasons that bloody mirror scares me so much; I mean… I’ve never really wanted anything: I’ve always had family, great friends, good grades… money. I could have had anything and I chose Lily. Course there’s nothing at all that I regret about that – except the fact that it’s damn near impossible for me to succeed with her – but when I see her in the mirror… What I’m trying to say is that I don’t want to lose her. I’m not stupid, I’ve heard some of the things that people said about her – we both have – and we both know what’s happening out there… Well just imagine that we did end up together; all I can think of when I think of that is me coming home one night and finding her dead. I mean my family’s one of the biggest bunch of blood traitors around, imagine if Lily managed to keep her head down but was killed because she was with me. We both make each other more of a target. And then I sit there and go ‘Screw it’ because I want to be with her. It’s just so hard.”
“That it is Prongs. That it is. This probably won’t be of any help to you but I say screw it. You’re both targets anyway and it’s better to be together for a bit than always wonder what could have been. It’s not like you can’t defend yourselves; hell if anyone’s a target it’s me. I bet Bellatrix already has plans to get me once I leave school. In fact if you think about it we’re all targets. Not one of us is going to go over to Voldemort’s side because we’re all more than likely to stand against him openly; that alone pretty much marks us for death. Well you’re the prized son of a family of blood traitors; Lily’s a Muggle-born so down for ‘cleansing’ anyway; I’m the blood traitor son that defected and abandoned my family, plus I managed to get an actual insult aimed at You-Know-Who before I left; and Cassie’s the daughter of two blood traitor Aurors that openly stand for equality and oppose him, one of which was going to become Head of the Department. Oh don’t forget: Moony’s a werewolf and Peter’s our friend so that poor sod is doomed just by knowing us.”
“Bloody hell everyone we know is down to die,” James breathed.
“Well I know for sure that if I go I’m going to take you down with me,” he laughed. “Look, I’m not great at this soppy stuff, really you need Remus and his weirdly accurate insight into the female mind, but this is what I say: once we get out there it’s a war. They’re not going to discriminate; they’re just going to kill anyone who stands in their path. As I so wonderfully pointed out everyone we are close to is a target in their own right and they’re Gryffindors; none of them are going to stand idly by and let this tosser gain power. We can’t stop what’s going to happen unless we’re prepared to fight and maybe to die, that’s pretty much what we talked about back in the common room and we all agreed. Ah I’m not phrasing this very well,” he muttered, half to himself. “Look this war isn’t the end of all things, not by a long way. I reckon it doesn’t feel like it now, and it won’t feel like it while we’re out there, but life does go on and it must end at some point so why should we put our lives on the sidelines because of it? That’s pretty much what Molly and Arthur said to me when I saw them… They approached it differently of course and I’m not suggesting that we all elope. Basically what I’m saying is this: we might as well do what we want to and stay as safe as possible.”
“I just couldn’t deal with the guilt of getting her, or anyone, hurt because of me Padfoot.”
“Neither could anyone else mate. We’ll all just have to watch our backs and keep each other safe. Beside Lily turning up in the mirror isn’t a bloody death sentence. You never know, you could get married and have seven children for all that thing knows; it tells you what you want, not what’s going to happen in the future.” He sounded so calm about it that James began to believe him. Of course this war wasn’t the end of the world and of course Lily wasn’t going to die just by being with him. They walked through the dim corridors in silence as they both collected their thoughts and they had nearly reach the portrait hole when James finally said, “I’m sorry about that Padfoot; think it’s just tiredness and the late night. I don’t know but it must be something; my mind’s just gone everywhere today and I’m not thinking straight.”
“It’s this bloody war Prongs. Hogwarts used to be the safest place in England and the whole thing’s messing with my mind. People disappearing, Muggles murdered… It’s horrible.”