the 5th marauder

6- Pranksters

Sneaking through the portrait hole, James and Sirius slipped on the cloak and went to the right, and I split off with Remus to the left. "So why isn't Pete here? I asked. "Oh- right, yeah. Well, you know him. Gotta get his full eight hours, right?" Remus shrugged. "I raised an eyebrow. Sure- yeah." He was quite tall, with long legs- and I had to walk a bit faster to keep up. "Sirius is a bit bossy." He said. "Sorry you had to come." I laughed. "Remus, I wanted to come. It makes things more interesting." He grinned. "We'll I'm glad you did. These goofs get tiring- it's nice to have someone new." "So- how often you guys do these pranks?" He scratched his head. "Oh- you know. Here. There. We've done about every one in the book. You have any fresh ideas?" I pressed my lips together. "The only prank I've ever done is hair dye in someone's shampoo bottle." "He raised his eyebrows. "You've gotta tell that story for sure." I laughed. "Wait till tomorrow- I think I'm too tired to remember anything right now." "Remus! Cat!" I heard someone whisper shout, and I turned around, seeing nothing- till James removed the cloak.

"Here we are." Remus said, motioning to a large empty painting posted on the dungeon wall. I nodded, and turned to Sirius. "So, what's the password?" Stepping up to the door, he whispered "Grindelow." The painting swung open to reveal a large common room, with an eerie green ceiling, a large black brick fireplace, and assorted green furniture. James handed me the cloak ("can't have you in trouble the first week!") and stayed outside with Remus. Sirius followed me inside, and motioned to the direction of the girls dorm. Tiptoeing up the stairs, I tried a couple dorms till I found one that was unlocked. Creeping inside, I found my way to the bathroom, past the drawn green curtains around the beds. Dropping the pill, I made my way out as quickly as possible, and slipped out the common room door. Sirius wasn't out yet. "Everything good?" James whispered, seeing the door swing open. "Perfect." I replied, slipping off the cloak and handed it to him. Suddenly, I saw something move in the corner of my eye. "Shit. Ms. Norris." James said. I looked around, finally seeing a small cat with bright eyes. Remus looked over to the cat. "It belongs to Filch. He'll be here any second- get under the cloak." He said.

James threw the cloak over him and I, and Remus glanced at the portrait door. I looked at it too, and prayed that Sirius would hurry up. Ms. Norris scurried away, and sure enough, Sirius' head appeared behind the door not a few seconds later. "Let's go- quick. Filch." Remus said. Sirius nodded and followed behind him. "Hey! You two! Stop right there." My eyes widened as I turned quickly. Filch was there, glaring right through James and I, straight at the other two. He started to walk forward, almost bumping into us. James grabbed my waist and backed up, pressing me to the wall. Holding my breath, I watched as Filch exchanged a few words with Remus, before walking away with a large scowl on his face. I heard James exhale In relief, before looking down to me with a large smile. "Fun, right?" I rolled my eyes and shoved him lightly. "Get going."

The next day, I woke up at 7am and brushed my teeth, rubbing my eyes while doing so. Hearing a knock at the door, I walked past my sleeping roomates, and past Lily's empty bed. (She woke up at 6 to go to the library, of course.) James was at the bottom of the steps, as there was a charm preventing guys from coming up. "Whaddyou want?" I asked, a bit drowsily, still in my pajamas. "Wow- not a morning person, huh?" I narrowed my eyes and reached to close the door. "No, No! Sorry." He said, grinning. "You look marvelous in the morning!" I rolled my eyes at him. "Come down to breakfast with us. I wanna be first to see the results of our prank." I sighed and tilted my head."Fine. Just let me get ready, at least. "I'll wait here." He said. Shutting the door on him, I went back to the bathroom and rushed my morning routine, slipped into my uniform and stuck a lipgloss in my pocket. Opening the door, I saw him sitting in the little chair in the hall. Now that I wasn't drowsy, I realized he must have been practicing in the quidditch pitch. He was wearing his #17 quidditch uniform, and his hair was messed up. He looked sweaty and his cheeks were flushed- "Like what you see?" He asked, raising an eyebrow. Snapping back to focus, I realized I had been staring right at him. "What? No. Just- why- what- why are you still wearing that?" I retorted, my cheeks turning red. He looked down. "Shit. Yeah. I'll go change." Following him down the hall, He crossed to the boys dorms, while I stopped in the common room, and slumped down into a chair by the window.

"He woke you up too, then?" Remus stepped out of the boys dorm, leaning back onto the couch. "Yeah, Isn't it wonderful?" He shook his head. "So, did you love being a marauder last night or what?" I turned to look at him. "How did that become your name? Marauders. You don't think it's silly?" I smiled to him. He laughed and put his hand over his face. "Yeah, it's a bit obnoxious, isn't it?" I nodded and laughed along. His hair was just the color of caramel when it hit the light. Just then, Sirius lugged down the stairs, a wide smile on his face, looking just as awake as ever. "Beautiful day, Is it not?" He exclaimed, patting Remus heartily on his back- causing him to cough and nab Sirius in the nose as a retort. "HEY! Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed, then." Remus rolled his eyes and lay back again. "So, Cat. Ready to see the outcome of our little plan?" His eyes glinted evilly. I shrugged. "Are you sure it'll work?" He shook his head at me. "tut tut. don't be a downer. I got those bubble bombs from a very reliable source." "So Zonkos, right?" he nodded. "Wait- I only know about it from pictures. How did you get down there? We haven't had a hogsmeade trip yet." Sirius and Remus exchanged a nervous glance, so quick I almost missed it. "Hey- I saw that! How'd you get down there?" Sirius shrugged. "Oh- just James' cloak." I narrowed my eyes at him.

Luckily for those two, James walked in, finally in his uniform and followed by Peter. "Hope you're not having too much fun without me." He said, grinning. Sirius rolled his eyes and got up. "Let's go then! I don't wanna miss anything." Following the four boys out the portrait hole, we went down the steps to the great hall and sat at our usual table. I started buttering a piece of toast when suddenly, there was a very loud commotion in the hallway outside the room- involving lots of yelling and arguing. Immediately, we rose from the table and hurried out the door. Bustling groups of students in green ties were clutching their robes and hair desperately, turned purple head to toe. McGonagall was speaking to one, so I tried my best not to laugh. I heard the words "bubbles" and "horrible" before we hurried back to our seats, trying our best to look innocent. "What did the pills even do?" I asked, looking over to Sirius. "It turns into a flood of bubbles once it gets wet- and they stain purple when they pop." The entire group was grinning widely. "first prank of the year, success!" He said, reaching over to high five James. Finishing up our breakfast, we hurried to class, unbothered by the mobs of slytherins in the halls.

Reaching the end of the day, I followed Remus to the library to study. At that point, all of the slytherins were returned back to their normal state- courtesy of professor Slughorn, who'd whipped up a large batch of some kind of potion. Regardless, McGonagall was still on the hunt for the culprits- which put the Marauders on the spot as the obvious answer. They'd been promptly avoiding her outside of class, which was not the easiest feat. They were reduced to eating their days lunch in the abandoned girls bathroom, with some girl ghost with an oddly high pitched voice. I'd been spending my day with Mary- mostly, and Lily. Sitting down at a table, Remus stood by the shelves, flipping through charms textbooks as I retrieved my Transfiguration parchment from my bag. "Did you get started on the paper on transfiguring animals yet? I couldn't figure out how to turn that teapot to a dove." I asked him, rummaging through my things for a quill. He shook his head. "I've never been the best at transfiguration- that's more James' thing." I shrugged and laid out my things on the desk. Pulling a book off the shelf, he walked over to sit next to me. "Speaking of- did McGonagall lay off on the investigating yet?" He shook his head. "I reckon they'll get found out soon enough. Dunno about you though, unless they can be traced back to us." I tilted my head. "Maybe we'll just have to hang out without them for a bit, huh? So we won't get connected." I said, looking down to my paper. He said nothing back; but I could swear I saw him smile to himself out of the corner of my eye.