“LOOK AT ME, I’M A STAG! HONNNK! COMING THROUGH!” Sirius ran between the three others, holding broken tree branches up to his head, “LOOK AT ME, I’M PRONGS!”
“My antlers are way more impressive than your sticks, you bloody prat!” called James, looking over as Sirius skipped about the clearing they’d found in the woods, on the edge of a long rolling hill. It was chilly in the failing afternoon sun James was working on getting a fire stoked in a circle of stones they’d collected while Remus and Peter finished putting up the tent.
“He’s been ‘round your stag a fair time, though, James,” Remus laughed. “He knows your honk.”
“I don’t honk,” James argued, looking miffed - or pretending to, at anyrate, “I chortle, there’s a difference.”
“Sounds like honking to me,” whispered Peter, whose eyes were sparkling with happiness at being about his friends again.
Sirius laughed and danced around some more. “HONK HONK I’M A STAG!”
James said, “At least stags don’t drool all about like great slobbering gits!”
Remus smirked at Peter and they tied the last corner of the tent down securely and Remus used his wand to magic the stake as far into the ground as it would go. Sirius had given Remus his leather jacket and was prancing about in just an old grey hoodie that he usually wore under the leather when it was especially cold. Remus hugged the jacket closer and sat on one of the logs they’d rolled over by the fire and Peter dove for his bags to dig out some of the food. “I brought frankfurters for us to cook over the fire!” he announced, “And crisps!” Then, with a grin he turned and held out a bar of chocolate to Remus. “And this. I brought it special for you.”
“You’re a bloody saint, Peter Pettigrew.” Remus tore open the package and broke off a big chunk of the chocolate.
“SMELL IT OUT HERE!” Sirius bellowed from a few feet away. He was holding the sticks up still, standing at the crest of the hill, staring away over the valley below with a dreamy expression about his face, “THIS IS WHAT HEAVEN IS LIKE MATES!” He breathed deep the air, “Tree sap, leaves, water, dirt, and frankfurters over a fire.”
“And chocolate,” Remus said.
“I COULD DIE HAPPY RIGHT NOW!” Sirius yelled, and his words were so loud, they echoed off the trees and mountains away off, far away. “I’M FUCKING ALIIIIIIIIIIIIVE! WE’RE FUCKING ALIVE! WE’RE THE MARAUDERS AND WE’RE FUCKING THE GREATEST LADS IN THE WORLD! THIS IS THE MOST BRILLIANT CAMPING ADVENTURE IN THE HISTORY OF ALL TIME AND THEN SOME!”
James smirked.
“Seriously?” asked Remus, laughing and chucking a bit of the balled up chocolate wrapper at Sirius so that it bounced off his back, “Stop that, you foul thing.”
Sirius laughed.
“It wouldn’t be a camping adventure without Sirius shouting fuck a few hundred times,” James pointed out.
Peter nodded, “Something would be rather missing if Sirius’s mouth wasn’t so dirty.”
Sirius threw his antler-sticks to the fire and sank onto the log beside Remus and pressed his nose to the side of Remus’s face as his arm slid ‘round his shoulders. “You love it when my mouth is dirty. Don’t you Moony?”
“Shut up and warm me up, you useless bit of eyecandy,” Remus muttered and he broke a bit of chocolate off and shoved it in Sirius’s mouth. “Here. Keep your mouth busy.”
Sirius grinned and hugged Remus closer, rubbing his far arm with his palm and chewing the chocolate as Peter gathered four long, study-looking sticks. “Let me see your pocket knife, Padfoot, I’ll make these into skewers for the frankfurters.” Sirius fished the knife out of his pocket and tossed it to Peter, who pulled out the knife end and started to whittle at the end of the sticks, peeling off the bark and bringing them to a point.
The night was falling, the orange of the fire casting a glow about them as they listened to Remus describing the creatures Newt Scamander had brought him about to see - before the Charkorais birds, there’d been many others, including several of the creatures Newt had described in his book - like the Hippogriff, a Crup, and a Jarvey.
“The hippogriff was brilliant,” Remus said, “I said hello to it real respectful like and it bowed to me and I got to pet him. We saw him before we came back from Greece. He was brilliant - gold, almost, with a long black beak. His name was Goldfeather. And the Crup was still a pup, it had the forked tail and all still. Licked my face --”
“Another dog’s licked your face?” Sirius asked, a look of disapproval on his face.
“Jealous of a Crup, now are we?” James snickered. “Doesn’t take much to get you goin’, does it Padfoot?”
The boys all laughed.
“He was a great little Crup, though, playful as anything! Newt was there to do the severing charm on his tail, as per the law, which was really sad. I liked his tail forked like it was. But Newt said it’s for the Crup’s own safety - if a muggle ever saw a dog with a forked tail like that, they’d use one of those gun things they have and kill him, most likely. So Newt said they have to do the severing charm before the ickle pup is eight weeks old.”
Sirius looked sick, “Sever his tail?” He reached to cover his bum, as though hiding his own tail. “That’s demented!”
“It’s painless, Newt promised me. He didn’t even have to put the pup to sleep or anything, just swoop with his wand --” Remus made a motion. “The pup never stopped licking my hands the whole time, like he never even felt it. And we had a brilliant game of fetch after, too.”
Sirius still looked uneasy about it.
“And the Jarvey, you lot… bloody hell, if Sirius was a Fantastic Beast…”
“Which I am,” Sirius intoned. “A fantastic beast, I mean.”
“...he would be a Jarvey.” Remus said, “The thing spoke nothing but foul language for a good ten minutes, then went off to eat a gnome that happened to be going by! Looked like a long ferret. Newt said he didn’t know why the Jarvey speaks foul language but apparently the do all over the world. Whatever the local language is, that’s the language the Jarvey speaks in, too, and it’s just curse after curse…”
Sirius grinned. “Sounds like my sort of creature.”
They laughed and laughed and then started comparing what sorts of Fantastic Beasts they’d most like as pets.
“I would’ve said a dragon but after being wet willied by one in Cairo, I’d rather think not,” Sirius said.
Peter said, “I wouldn’t mind a Crup, actually. I’ve always wanted a dog.”
“You’ve got a dog,” Sirius said, meaning himself.
Peter laughed.
“I’d want a Gryffin,,” announced James, “And I’d name it Godric.”
“How original,” laughed Sirius. “Think that one up yourself, did you?”
James threw his empty crisp bag at Sirius.
“Oi, what’s with throwing all your rubbish at me?” he laughed as he deflected the bag into the fire, making it twist and turn the flame green for a moment from the inks burning off.
They pulled out firewhiskey later on, Peter had brought some in his bag, knowing Sirius’s preference (“YESSSS, WORMTAIL, YOU’RE A GOD!” Sirius had shouted, to which Peter had laughed, “I’m a saint for chocolate, and a god for whiskey!”). They drank from the bottle, passing it around and taking it in turn to tell scary stories. James told the tale of his infirius, including the bit Maryrose had told him about the little girl falling from the cliffs, but he embellished it, making up a whole load of elements that Maryrose had never mentioned and parts to the struggle of pulling his ankle away that never happened (most of which were fragments from nightmares he’d had, if he was being honest). Sirius made up one about an old man chased by death through the forest until he’d found a way to outsmart death by playing a trick on him. Remus’s was about a woman who haunted picture frames and stole people who looked into her frame through into a painted world of two-dimensional horrors.
Peter shivered through each of their stories and when it came time for his he cleared his throat and squeaked, “Well mine’s an old muggle story. It’s about these four boys who go camping in the woods --”
James smirked to Sirius.
“-- and they’re sitting about a campfire, very much like the one we’re around right now. Except the forest they were in was a haunted forest, and they didn’t know it until they’d made camp and settled down for the night and they were talking about the fire and they heard something in the woods… an eerie sound, far off in the trees…”
And as though on cue, there was a cracking branch and Remus jumped to look around behind him, where the sound had come from, Sirius catching him by the shoulders with a laugh, “Moony,” he said, “Obviously Peter’s just done something to spook you. C’mon Pete, out with your wand.”
“I didn’t -” Peter said and his eyes were wide.
James laughed, “Probably just a fox or something. Go on, Pete.”
“Well it’s sort of ruined now ‘cos I actually was supposed to do something to spook you but the woods too care of it for me,” Peter said, a bit breathless, still peering off between the trees behind Remus.
James snorted, “Well bloody hell that did backfire on you, didn’t it?” He grinned and took a long swig off the bottle of firewhiskey before handing it off to Sirius, who offered it to Remus first, but Remus shook his head and Sirius took a long enough sip for the both of them.
Before long, James and Sirius and Peter were talking loudly, laughing, while Remus murmured now and then, asleep against Sirius’s chest, his face glowing in the firelight. Sirius smirked as Remus gurgled something about jabberwockies and Sirius announced, “I think I’m going to take this one inside, let him sleep.”
“Alright,” James said, and he watched as Sirius scooped Remus up in his arms and carried him away into the tent.
Peter poked at the fire with his stick a few times, then drew it back and skewered a few marshmallows onto the end of it. He looked over at James, “You want some?” he asked.
James shook his head, “Blimey no. Thanks, Pete. I’m stuffed. I ate so many frankfurters…” He leaned back against the tree behind him and propped his head up with his arms against the bark, his eyes staring up at the stars hanging over the valley before them as Peter cooked his marshmallows. “Happy Birthday, by the way, Pete,” James said, looking at him. “I don’t reckon we ever got around to that did we?”
Peter shook his head, “I got everything I wanted. Being with you lot.”
“Well… still.” James sat forward and grabbed his bag, which was sitting a few feet away, unzipping it and reaching in. He pulled out a package, wrapped neatly in colorful paper and tossed it over to Peter, “It’s from all three of us.”
Peter picked the box up, and James took the marshmallow stick, turning it in the flames so Peter could open his gift without burning his treats. He untied the string that held it shut and unfurled the paper to reveal a box. Opening the box up, he found inside was a photo of the four of them, taped to the top of a red leather journal.
“Look on the back,” James instructed.
Peter lifted the photo.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY PETE YOU’RE GETTIN OLD LIKE THE REST OF US NOW LOVE YA PADFOOT
You’re a great friend and we all think you’re brilliant. Happy Birthday, and many, many happy returns, mate. Your friend, Moony.
Pete, thank you for being one of my best friends. You are brave and strong -- I know you don’t hear that enough, especially from us. But I always think it, even when I haven’t said it in a bit. Happy Birthday. Prongs.
Peter clutched the photo to his chest and lifted the journal out of the box, ruffling through the blank pages, thinking of all the memories he’d fill it up with… starting tonight, with this one they were making right now…
“I hope you like it,” James said.
“More than anything,” Peter answered and he hugged the picture even harder.
