Sunday 4th March 1973
Sirius tried to delegate research assignments regarding animagi magic to both James and Peter—they needed to make sure that they got everything exactly right before brewing the potion, or else they could end up as strange half-human half-animal mutants (which, according to accounts of animagi-gone-wrong, was a very painful and very short existence). But as March approached, their attention turned to other, more immediate matters: namely, Remus Lupin’s birthday.
They would have planned something anyway, but since Peter had promised a surprise, Sirius wanted to make sure that they delivered. The weekend before their friend’s birthday found them lying on the floor of the common room next to an abandoned game of exploding snap, brainstorming.
“We could map some more of the castle?”
“No, we did that last year.”
“Well, what if I asked Madam Hooch—”
“No quidditch, James, we already agreed!”
“Honeyduke’s?”
Sirius rolled his eyes in exasperation. “We go there every week! It has to be a surprise, something he’s not expecting!”
They all fell quiet, thinking. James stared at the fire, which cracked with sparks in the grate.
“Oh!” He sat up, “I’ve got it!”
“What?!” Peter and Sirius asked, enthusiastically, in tandem. James grinned.
“Fireworks!”
“…what?”
“Let’s set off fireworks! Come on, we’ve been wanting to try out those new lettered ones from Filibuster’s, what if we wrote ‘Happy Birthday’ or something?”
Sirius scratched his chin, thinking. “Yeah…yeah, that’s brilliant! It would have to be at night, though, to get the full effect.”
“Midnight! We’ll wake him up at midnight, and then we can—er…sing happy birthday?”
“And what, go back to sleep?” Sirius frowned; James shrugged.
“We can do something else that Remus likes? Maybe a prank?”
“Yeah…” Sirius lay back down, thinking, “It should be something Remus would want to do. Something he likes.”
Peter snorted, grumbling, “The only thing Remus likes anymore is revising. And food.”
James laughed. Remus had promised Peter that he’d quiz him on History at dinner, but he kept trying to talk around bites of food, and eventually Peter had just told him to stop. The smaller boy was still a bit annoyed about it, but James and Sirius both thought it was hilarious.
“Hang on,” Sirius said, a slow smile creeping across his face, “Peter—that’s it!”
* * *
Saturday 10th March 1973
YOU ARE READING
All the Young Dudes ( Sirius' Perspective )
ФанфикAll the Young Dudes by mskingbean89 written from Sirius' POV, All credits for this story goes to rollercoasterwords on ao3. *THIS IS NOT MY ORIGINAL WORK. *THE ORIGINAL AUTHOR OF THIS STORY IS ROLLERCOASTERWORDS ON AO3.
