The Years We Were Alive: Year 1

More Birthdays

March 9, 1972

"I made this for James, for his birthday," Lizzie showed Sirius a drawing Lizzie had done on a piece of lined notebook paper.

"Woah! That's great Lizzie, he'll love it," Sirius shook his head.

"I think I might do it again on parchment, so the lines aren't there,"

"No, he'll like it how it is," Sirius stared in amazement. They were staring at a quidditch drawing Lizzie had made of James on the Gryffindor Quidditch team winning against Slytherin.

"It looks so realistic Liz," Sirius praised.

"Thanks," she smiled, "I have no idea what I'm getting Remus though, maybe some chocolate,"

"You two are chocolate fiends," Sirius chuckled deeply in a way that it moved his whole chest.

"Yeah, probably chocolate," she thought about that bond she had with Remus. It was so centered around chocolate it was hard to believe, but they both adored the stuff. Most people like chocolate, but Remus and Lizzie could eat metric tons of chocolate. As well as their meals. That was what they had most in common. They both ate an extraordinary amount of food while staying physically the same.

Well, Remus was growing taller, rapidly. All the boys were. Lizzie had been 4'9" when she left for Hogwarts, and she was not a measly 4' 9 ½ ".

"I guess I should have thought of Remus' first, his is closer,"

"Yeah, I mean, I haven't really thought about it yet though," Sirius shrugged.

"I just kind of got the idea," Lizzie shrugged, "then drew it,"

"I've never seen anything you've drawn before,"

"I don't really show people, it's usually just for me,"

"What changed your mind?"

"Someone saw one of my drawings of ingredients I made for potions and told me that I should draw more,"

"Well yeah! It was really good!"

"Thanks," Lizzie smiled at Sirius with genuine happiness in her eyes. Sirius was good at giving compliments. She wasn't the best at receiving them though, she felt her face growing hot with blush.

***

"Happy Birthday!" all the marauders but Remus had assembled and yelled at the first person to walk through the door. They were glad it was Remus.

"Thanks, and now I know where you lot were," Remus grinned. He had walked out of their room and right at the assault.

"Have a good one," Lizzie smiled at him while pulling the strap of a cheap birthday hat under his chin. Then she looked him in the eyes and grabbed his hands. He looked at her in confusion. Right into her sincere eyes. She pulled her hands away and there were two Hershey bars in his hands. Lizzie was thankful that her brother sent her care packages occasionally. She didn't know when she would get muggle chocolate otherwise.

"Thank you, Liz,"

They had all gotten together without Remus to figure out what they would do. They didn't have too many ideas, but they finally concluded that Remus wouldn't want anything big. They decided that they would treat it as any other day. A lot like what they did for Lizzie. They did something that she wanted to do, but nothing crazy.