McGongall looked at me with a questioning expression as I was standing in front of her office table inside the now empty classroom. I blinked my eyes multiple times, waiting for her answer to my puzzling question.
"You made an excellent essay about this when you were gone, why are you so interested in the matter now, if I may ask, Miss Blue," she finally answered.
I sighed and moved closer to the table. "It's just that I'm curious, whether there will be any affection for maybe doing the steps in a different order, or only holding the leaf in your mouth for 27 days instead of 28?"
"You are not going to attempt to become and Animagus, are you not?" suspicious echoed from her voice, almost making me want to give up.
I moved my hands together and looked into her eyes. "No, of course not. It's hardly possible for an experienced wizard to turn into an Animagi, so it would be even harder for a student. But you see, we have the O.W.L.'s next year, and I'm thinking about really giving my all to Transfiguration, for I might want to become a professor in the future," I lied out.
But this seemed to sink in perfectly with her expectations. "Well in that case, of course I'll answer to any of your questions you might have in this matter," she smiled and asked me to sit down, which I easily did.
She waved her wand and then suddenly had a blue coloured book in front of her. "This might be the best book for this matter, we don't use this for teaching anymore, but you can have it for now. It tells you about all the steps and about all the required ingredients on making the potion. But it also has the warnings in it," she started making eye contact with me again. "You see, becoming an Animagus takes a long time. A month only for keeping the leaf in your mouth and then on top of that preparing the potion and making sure that there will be a lightning storm. And even if one is successful with the whole process, I takes a lot of time to be able to turn into an Animagus without ones wand."
"So you must follow all the steps, for it to be successful?"
"Absolutely. Not to mention that every Animagus must be legal, for the Ministry of Magic to be able to keep on eye at you," she explained.
Oh well, rules are meant to be broken.
"But read into it, it's quite fascinating. That's how I became an Animagus during my professor training," she mentioned, handing me the book. I smiled and quickly put it into my bag.
"Well thank you very much professor. Bye now!" I said and was about to leave.
"How has Mr. Lupin been? Okay I assume?" she asked, stopping me on my tracks.
I turned to face her once more, before nodding my head slightly. "He has recovered well, although the trauma is much more worse than what...we expected."
"Naturally yes...I shall have a talk with him when he is ready to return to his studies. And good luck with the Quidditch practise, I'm quite pleased to see our team doing so well."
"Thank you professor," I said and finally took my leave from the classroom.
My feet kept on moving as I was deep in my thoughts about the knowledge I had just gotten from McGonagall. I finally found my way to the Gryffindor common room portrait and smiled at the fat lady. "Scorpion's eye," I muttered at it. She smiled back and simply moved her hand aside, letting me into the maroon colour room.
Some students were doing their homework by the fire and it hardly took me any time to notice my six friends studying in one corner of the common room. I started to make my way towards them and smiled at Lily who was the first one to spot me. "Why did you leave behind? Is everything okay?" she asked, making room for me on the couch. The others finally noticed me as well. I ignored Sirius' eager look and just smiled at Lily.
"All is fine, just had to ask one thing about some homework," I quickly explained and took out the blue book professor had gave to me, handing it to Sirius. "This was the book you asked for, right?" It seemed as all the others turned to look at what was happening, shocked by something.
"He reads?" Alice asked without thinking about me, making me burst into fits of laughter. A deep blush crawled onto his face as he quickly put the book into his bag. "Ha-ha-ha, very funny. Yes, I do read and actually take some subjects very seriously," he defended himself.
"Really? I didn't know you were serious," Marlene said, and even though I was disliking her more and more every day, this did no good to my giggles. The others started to laugh as well, which made Sirius very annoyed. "Why am I even friends with you dorks?" he huffed.
"Because without us you would be all by yourself, sulking by the Black Lake," Lily grinned, patting his shoulder in a sympathetic manner.
"Thank Evans," Sirius made a face at her.
"Come on Black, I think it's time for us to go tease the house-elves again," James grinned, gaining an excited look from the boy, and a not-so-approving gaze from Lily. He just flashed her a smirk and stood up from the ground where he had been attempting to study. Sirius soon followed his lead and so did Peter. "See you girls around," Sirius winked into Marlene and Alice's direction, gaining giggles from them. He then nodded towards Lily and lastly looked straight into my eyes. For some reason, my heart decided to jump a little, making me gulp uncomfortably under his stare. "Oh and here," he said and suddenly handed me a piece of parchment, which I quickly hid inside my fist, not letting Lily see it.
"Bye," James grinned, and the three boys left the common room with that. And also with that, all the girls turned around to look at me with questionable expressions.
"Do you have something to tell us?" Marlene snarled, making me narrow my eyes at her, which she just simply ignored.
"What do you mean?"
Lily pushed my side a little, making me look at her instead. "Is there something going on between you and Sirius?"
This sudden question made my cheeks automatically feel hot. "What?!" I screamed, gaining angry stares from the students trying to study, quickly calming myself down. Lily grinned as Alice just laughed at my reaction. "You are blushing, you know that right?" Lily kept on teasing.
I smirked a little. "And you don't blush whenever someone mentions a certain Potter to you?" This made her cheeks immediately gain a pink colour from mentioning James. This time I laughed with Alice as Lily was trying to calm herself down. "I-I do-don't like Potter!"
"Keep on telling yourself that, it's so obvious!" Alice grinned.
Lily huffed and crossed her arms. "Oh come on girls!" she whined.
I took her into a tight hug. "James is a git, I hope you know that," I questioned, gaining a gentle chuckle from her. "Oh I do."
"Well I think Sirius is quite handsome," Marlene suddenly implied, making us all turn towards her with furrowed brows. "What? He is, you cannot deny that."
No I can not deny it.
But as I looked at the expression on her face, that she had when talking about Sirius, my heart started to feel tighter. But why did I feel...annoyed? She was only implying her admiration towards our friend, there's nothing bad about that. Except, she didn't seem to be talking of a friend... but rather of a crush.
But why did her talking about her crush, make me feel in such a way. I mean, why would I be jealous about something like that?
"Actually," Alice started, gaining our attention. She was also blushing a little. "There is this one boy...in Ravenclaw that seems to have taken an interest in me," she muttered, making all of our jaws drop.
"Who?!" we all asked in harmony, ignoring the new annoyed glares from other students. Alice quickly tried to hush us down, giggling a little at our reaction. "I won't tell you his name quite yet...but he's a year older," she muttered, her eyes beaming at the thought of him.
I started to smile. "That's great Alice, I'm happy for you."
"Me too," Lily smiled, taking Alice's hand into hers. "I hope everything turns out great."
And at that moment, I couldn't help but wonder how it would be like. To have a crush on someone that would also answer the feelings. To have that fluttery effect to your stomach and heart, making it feel like that was the only person for you. That's how it was between my parents. My mother didn't care about blood purity or about how much money someone had. She fell deeply in love with my father, and it was just pure luck that they were both pureblood people. I wonder what it would be like, to share my feelings about someone to my mother...because I would never have that.
Just then I remembered the piece of parchment in my hand, and sneakily looked at it, when the girls were asking more questions about Alice's admirer. The note was written in a beautiful handwriting, making me remember how Sirius' mother had made him learn to write in a nice handwriting, since he was the heir to the Black family.
"Meet us in the Shrieking Shack at midnight, make sure to come alone."
I shook my head amused and let out a deep sigh. I guess I won't be sleeping much tonight.
**
Blue light was making it possible for me to find my way inside the pathway. I was following the directions James had once showed me. It didn't even come as a shock to me that the Marauders knew almost all the passageways this old school had...but it kept me wondering, how many passageways there were that they had no clue about.
Maybe one day in the future, there would be far greater prankster attending this school, than the Marauders. Maybe they would know something that the generation before them knew nothing about. Maybe they would bring all the pranks into a different lever.
At last the long stairs were in front of me, and quickly I climbed them up, realizing that I was finally inside the Shrieking Shack. There was layers of dust everywhere and the place looked lifeless and gloomy.
"Boo!" James shouted, making me jump to the side and pointing my wand towards him. He shot up his hands in defense.
I groaned and held my hand against my beating heart. "Merlin's beard! You can not do that!" I snapped, gaining a gentle chuckle from him. "Sorry." I glared at him one more time, before following the laughing boy into a room, where the rest were already waiting for me.
"What took you so long?" Was the first question I was met up with. I furrowed my brows and looked at Sirius. "Well sorry if I had to figure out a way to sneak out from the common room without anyone noticing, thanks for giving me so little of time by the way."
He sneered and then made me look at Remus who was standing next to him, leaning against an old nightstand. He was looking a lot better already, but he still had the dark circles underneath his eyes. He looked at me, the expression of not agreeing with something, on his face. "Did you get out from the hospital wing?" I muttered.
He just nodded his head and then chuckled tiredly. "I was gone for a few days and then I come back to this? What were you thinking?"
My feet automatically moved me over the room towards him. I took his hand into mine and looked straight into his eyes. "I want to help you," I expressed.
"You'll be putting yourself in danger," he groaned, trying to let go of my hand, but I wasn't giving in to him. He studied my eyes confused, before relaxing a little bit. "You know I don't care about that...besides, we all want to help you and if becoming and Animagus is the way to do so, I'm more than happy to take the risk of getting hurt."
"She's right," James quickly said and also moved closer to us. He was looking at his friend, while a calm smile was shining on his face. "You have had to suffer alone for so long...it's time for you to share that struggle with someone," he continued.
"We are here for you," Sirius muttered, also smiling at his best friend.
Remus looked over to Peter, furrowing his brows even more. "Even you, Peter?"
The shy boy bit his lip and held his hands together. "Anything for my friends," he confessed at last, making me smiled relaxed.
Remus let out a shaky huff as he thanked everyone with his eyes. Then he turned to me and questioned our intentions. "So, what happens now?"
A smirk appeared onto my face as I took out the book I had received from professor McGonagall. "We hold a leaf in our mouth for a month, prepare the Animagus potion and wait for a lightning storm."
"Yeah I mean...that sound durable."