The Life that Never Lived ? (Philosopher's Stone)

HALLOWEEN

After passing the baby to Remus, Sirius began his chapter with high spirits, but before he could start there was a familiar clattering in the kitchen. Lily got up to go in and check on it, calling out to the others, "It's Click, he's back with Peter's response."

She came back in with a bright orange screech owl perched on her shoulder, who was clicking his beak in excitement.

As she walked over to the perch over in the corner, she told them, "he said he would try and come by tomorrow morning. Here you go boy," she crooned as she deposited Click from her shoulder next to his water bowl.

Hickory came stalking back into the room, bright green eyes watching the bird, dark brown fur on his tail twitching in excitement, but none of the adults seemed to take notice. The two pets chased each other about all the time, but neither had ever harmed.

"So, has anyone thought how to go about explaining this to him?" James asked, waving about the room unnecessarily.

"Slowly," Lily said, plopping back down beside Harry, "we didn't take it very well at first either, so I would suggest keeping those two out of the room at first," Lily said, gesturing first at Harry, then at Sirius.

"Hey," he yelped, "what does that mean?"

"You know exactly what that means," she responded, "you are tactless."

Sirius huffed and grumbled a bit before reading.

"Still a slimy git, that Malfoy" James muttered.

"No," groaned Lily, picking up a pillow and burying her face in it. So there it was, instead of backing off when coming face to face with danger, her son just wanted to keep going.

The four boys though were quite pleased, the three adults unable to deny that they certainly wanted Harry to go have some more fun, though preferably away from that dog.

"Most likely both dangerous and valuable," Remus said. "There not exactly exclusive."

Harry and Remus shared an amused smile as they said much the same thing, Sirius deciding against making a crack about repeating commentary.

"Can hardly blame you for being glad of not having her around," Sirius agreed. Remus may have been a bit of a know it all in school, but he was never boastful about it like Hermione clearly was.

"What's this wonderful opportunity for payback then?" Remus asked, starting to lean around Sirius to read for himself.

"Budge off," Sirius snapped, pulling the book closer to his chest, "or I'll put you back in that armchair."

Remus raised a challenging brow at him, unable to hide his disbelieving smile at such a threat, but allowed Sirius to keep going for now.

"His broom," all three boys said with confidence.

"Well that was the most blatantly rude thing they could have done," Lily sniffed.

At Harry's confused look she explained, "Really, it probably would have been easier for Professor McGonagall to get it personally, and then take it up to your dormitory later. Giving it to you in the middle of the Great Hall like that was like rubbing it in that you got to break the rules."

"Calm down Lily," James scoffed, "you're reading way too much into this. So what? As soon as the school saw Harry on the pitch, they would have known he'd be the new Seeker, which is a huge deal. Getting a broom isn't really that big a deal in comparison."

Lily still disagreed, but as she couldn't do anything about it now, she let it go.

"Okay, that was too little too late," Remus agreed with the absurd bit in the note about him not opening it at the table.