Eye of the Serpent | HP MARAUDER ERA [2]

Chapter Thirty-One

It seemed as though James was going through multiple different emotional stages at an alarmingly fast rate due to his being banned from playing in the first game. He had experienced anger, frustration, denial and sadness so far.

All throughout practice, rather than mounting his broom to instruct the team how to proceed without him, he seemed to have given up completely as though we couldn't possibly win without him there; he was lying on the ground on his back with his eyes closed tight. He didn't even seem to care that insects were probably crawling into his messy hair and getting tangled there as a result of him lying in the grass. The only thing James seemed to want to do for the rest of the time was mope.

Meanwhile, Sirius had basically taken James's place as captain and was initiating the practice. He was trying his best to mimic his best friend's coaching style, but it was clear that he was slightly uneasy and worried about James—his eyes continuously darted to where James was lying on the ground.

Once Sirius had gotten the rest of the team to run over a few drills and do certain exercises (especially in order to train up our newest member), he gestured for me to fly over to him.

Stopping midair in front of Sirius, I gave him a suspicious look upon seeing the mischievous grin on his face. "What? What are you thinking? What did you do? How many rooms did you blow up?"

"Why does everyone always assume I'm blowing something up?" he asked, his smirk deepening.

I rolled my eyes. "Just tell me what you did or are going to do."

He pointed at James, who was now sitting up in the grass, but was still squeezing his eyes shut. "I'm going to try to lighten the mood a bit by giving little Prongsie a scare."

"Sirius, I don't think he's in the mood right now."

"Who cares? The only thing that matters is that I'm in the mood to scare him."

"But he's really vulnerable right now-"

"Exactly."

With that, he flew away.

"No, Siriu—" I began, before sighing and muttering to myself, "Ugh, why do I bother? He's just going to do what he wants anyway. Always, I swear, he always does the wrong thing at the wrong time. Idiot."

Even though I definitely thought it was a bad idea to scare James when he was feeling all fragile, I'd be hypocritical if I didn't admit it would probably be funny to see. So I watched Sirius land on the grass as gracefully and quietly as possible. He tiptoed towards James, watching him rock back and forth on the ground with his head in his hands. (He was such a drama queen.)

Suddenly, he roared at James, who immediately screeched and fell backwards onto the grass.

"Sod off, Sirius," said James, shoving a laughing Sirius away from him. "I'm not in the mood."

"See?" I interjected, strutting forwards to poke Sirius in the chest. "I told you he wasn't in the mood. You really should listen to me more since I'm always right! Ugh."

He turned to me. "Yes, of course!" said Sirius sarcastically, rolling his eyes. "I forgot that you're right about everything, your royal highness! Let me just lean down to kiss the very ground you walk on—"

As he leaned down to my feet, I pretended to kick him in the face. "For Merlin's sake, you're making me sound like Voldemort or something."

"Well, I mean, I see some resemblance—ow! Ouch," he hissed when I hit him
on the shoulder. All the while, his grin never slid off of his face. "I meant—I meant—you're way too pretty to resemble Voldy, Muzzlema—"

"Both of you, shut up!" James yelled. "I can't tell if you're joking or actually arguing and I'm too upset to make the effort to tell the difference."

"Awww," Sirius cooed, giving James a sympathetic gaze. "Poor Prongsie... Don't cry."

James swore. "I'm not crying!" he snapped. "I'm going to kill you."

"Woah, woah, woah... Chill, don't kill!" I said, using the phrase he had once told me in Potions class when my knife had been pointed towards him. Sirius sniggered at that.

"I can't do this," James said, shaking his head. He grabbed his broom and mounted it, hovering just a few inches off the ground so that his feet were just skimming the grass. "I'm leaving."

"But what about practice?" I demanded. "What about winning? Come on James, you're being childish. You need to help my brother out, to train him."

What I really wanted to tell him was that he ought to deflate his huge head and that the Gryffindor Quidditch team's fate didn't rest solely in his hands, but I feared that telling him so would aggravate him even more.

"I'm leaving," he repeated, shifting himself on his broom. "I hate both of you."

"No you don't, you love us!" Sirius called after him, still grinning maniacally.

James, however, was not amused and continued flying backwards, just a few inches off the ground. He was floating further and further away, speeding up and not looking where he was going. He muttered angrily under his breath, but his words were lost in the wind.

"James, would you watch where you're going?!" I hollered at him, watching him narrowly miss hitting a tree. "You're going to bash into a tree and die!"

"Do you think I care anymore?!" he called back. "Let the Whomping Willow take me, please—"

By that point, I was completely annoyed at him. Everyone had a bad day once in a while, but he acted ridiculously when things didn't go his way.

"Hey, Sirius, can you get the Bludger and Beater's bat?" I asked him, crossing my arms over my chest.

He tore his gaze away from the rest of the team as they carried on practicing without us. ('Practicing' was a loose term... They were basically playing Monkey in the Middle with the Quaffle.) Sirius narrowed his grey eyes at me. "Why?" he said, dragging out the word to emphasize his suspicion.

"Someone needs to knock some sense into his head," I said, nodding at James, who was now speeding past the Quidditch pitch, still not looking where he was going. "Better me than you. I'm sure you'd go easy on him."

He burst out laughing.

Suddenly, I noticed just where he was headed and gasped. "JAAAMES!"

But he turned around too late, and by the time he looked just where he was headed, he couldn't stop. I would've used a spell to stop him, but it happened much too fast and so all I had time to do was squeeze Sirius's arm, my mouth hung open in horror. There was a feminine scream and a frantic yell, and suddenly, someone was knocked to the ground. From that far away, all I was able to see was a flurry of long, dark red hair.