All the Young Dudes ( Sirius' Perspective )

Second Year : Love & Marriage

What are we coming to?

No room for me, no fun for you

I think about a world to come

Where the books were found by the Golden ones

Written in pain, written in awe

By a puzzled man who questioned

What we work here for

All the strangers came today

And it looks as though they’re here to stay

Oh! You Pretty Things (Oh you pretty things)

Don’t you know you’re driving your

Mamas and Papas insane?

 

Friday 20th April 1973

Sirius was on a roll. In the past week alone, he and James had changed the colour of all the Slytherin banners in the Great Hall (bright pink), enchanted the torches on the third floor to start sneezing whenever someone walked past (absolute chaos during passing periods), and plotted a new secret passage on the map (the switch was inside a suit of armour outside the Ravenclaw common room). James had threatened that they were going to have to seriously buckle down and focus on revising starting next Monday, but first they had decided to round out the week with a prank involving a time-delay spell and Spitting Tulips from the greenhouse.

It was an unusually warm day, and most students were outside on the grounds enjoying the sunshine, leaving the halls relatively clear. Sirius ran through the empty corridors with an armful of flowers, on his way to a rendezvous with James. They had timed everything precisely, and he couldn’t be late.

So of course, he rounded the next corner and ran straight into Severus Snape.

He skidded to a halt just before they collided, breathing hard. Snape wasn’t alone; to Sirius’s irritation, Regulus was walking right next to him. It was a side passage, narrow enough that the two boys standing next to each other took up most of the space.

“Well, well,” Severus sneered, eying the flowers in Sirius’s hands, “What do we have here?”

“Out of the way, Snivellus,” Sirius said roughly, ignoring his brother. He couldn’t risk trying to push past Snape—the flowers were delicate, and one wrong move could set them off.

“What are you up to?” Snape narrowed his eyes, “Are those for your boyfriend, Potter?”

Sirius flushed—something about the way Snape said boyfriend made him nervous and uncomfortable. “Actually, they’re for Evans,” he shot back, “Remus told me they’re her favourites. The two of them have been spending quite a bit of time together lately, d’you reckon she fanc—”

“Shut. Up.” Snape hissed, face white with rage. He whipped out his wand, pointing it menacingly at Sirius’s face—he had obviously touched a nerve.

“Oh, come on, Severus, just let it go,” Regulus interceded, sounding almost bored.

“Piss off, Reg, I don’t need you to defend me!” Sirius snapped, fumbling for his own wand as he tried to juggle the flowers.