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The Minute Hand On the Clock


There were too many people milling about the Shrieking Shack for the boys to go in, so James and Sirius stood by the fence that surrounded the crooked old house, waiting for the crowd to clear off so they could see if the cloak and Map were inside. Sirius was back-to the shack, leaning against the fence, staring back off down the path toward the village. James was pacing, nervously. Sirius grinned, watching him as he went, and reached into his pocket and shook a cigarette out of a pack, flicking his wand to light the tip and brought it to his mouth. “You’ve got to chill out, man,” he drawled. “Here.” He held the cigarette out.

James took a long drag, holding it between two fingers as he walked, his fingers shaking.

Sirius shook a second cigarette out of the pack and lit that one as well. “Ah Prongsie,” he said, blowing smoke into the sky, “When did we all get to be such adults? Going on dates and choosing careers and having smokes by the Shack?”

James coughed over the second drag of smoke. “Do you reckon getting grown up gets easier the older you get?”

“I certainly hope so,” Sirius said.

“Me, too.” James drew a deep breath and leaned against the fence beside Sirius, facing the Shack, staring off at the boarded up windows. Down the fence a ways a couple of third years were looking over, whispering about the supposed ghost that lived within, their eyes wide with excitement, wondering at how they would each react if the Shack began it’s shrieking. He looked over at Sirius, whose face was calm as he basked in the fresh air. “It’s gonna go alright, yeah?”

“I already told you, Prongs, you’ve got on the lucky jacket. You’re sexy as fuck. I know for damn sure you have confidence. And when you stop trying too hard, and let yourself be… you seem to actually do rather well in talking to her. Just remember not to be an arsehole. Don’t try to impress her. Just be the idiot we all know and tolerate.”

“Thanks.”

“Yeah, anytime.”

They stood there for several long minutes, waiting, but every time one group of kids would leave, another would come to stare at the Shack, like a rotating door of wondering eyes. Sirius sighed, “We’re never gonna get a fucking break in this.”

“Yeah,” James agreed. He was just about finished with his cigarette, so he tossed it down and snuffed it out with the toe of his shoe.

Sirius ran his palm over the back of his neck, taking several long drags to completely expire the tobacco in his cigarette before giving it up, breathing out great clouds of smoke while he snuffed his beneath his boot the same as James had done. “Alright, let’s go down and get you a table at the Broomsticks and I’ll sit with you a bit before Lilith gets there… then I’ll see if Snuffles can’t sneak ‘round the backway into the Shack.”

“Alight,” James agreed and Sirius put his arm ‘round James’s shoulder and led him along the path toward the village. James took a deep breath, his stomach churning with excitement and fear as they rounded the bend and the sign for the Three Broomsticks came into view. “What makes the jacket lucky, anyway?”

Sirius said, “Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to, Potter.” He winked and ducked ahead to open the door of the pub.




Regulus was walking down the path to Hogsmeade alone. He’d come later than most of the other students on purpose, not wanting to spend the day around Barty Crouch Jr. Really, he’d been hoping he might run into Sirius and James and the other Marauders in the village and perhaps they could go to Zonko’s or Honeydukes together or something. He picked his way along the path…

Suddenly, there was a great crack and Kreacher stood on the pathway before him, crouching funnily, his arm held at an awkward angle. The old, wrinkly elf stared up at Regulus with wide eyes. “Master Regulus… Kreacher has finally found his Master alone, at last.”

Regulus stared at the elf in shock, “Kreacher, what are you doing here?”

“Kreacher was commanded to come to Master on this subject only if Master was completely alone,” the elf explained. He looked about, “Master is completely alone, he is, finally; it is not easy to be alone in such a place as Hogwarts, Kreacher has been waiting for some time now… yes.”

“Wait. You have news about Minchum, then?” Regulus asked, excited, “Tell me!”

“Kreacher asked every elf he knew, and finally he has found the location of Harold Minchum for his Master Regulus,” he drawled in his froggy voice. He stared up at Regulus with reverent eyes, “The Master’s quarry is in the quarters of the house elves of Malfoy Manor, where Kreacher and his Master left the son of Toddy and Mitzy just a year ago.”

Regulus’s eyes widened, “He’s there? At Malfoy Manor? Bloody hell. I was just there a few days ago, when the Dark Mark was pressed! How did I not know?”

Kreacher’s ears flattened. “A lot of things is happening at the Malfoys which Master might not know,” the elf informed him. “The elves, they is being mistreated, sir.”

Regulus scowled.

“And the Potters, too.”

Regulus looked down at Kreacher, “The Potters?”

“Charlus and Dora Potter, yes, Master, they have been brought to sit in the quarters with Minchum and they is not doing very good, sir. The Malfoy’s old elf, Eliaphod, he says that they is expecting Charlus Potter to be dead soon in the conditions they is being kept. Eliaphod says dragon pox is to blame and has been very carefully trying to disinfect the quarters, Master Regulus, but it is a danger that they will all catch the disease.”

Regulus’s throat tightened. “Are those James Potter’s parents?”

“Yes, Master Regulus,” Kreacher answered, “The Dark Lord has been searching for the Charlus Potter for sometime. He defied the Dark Lord’s followers long ago and has stopped many of the Dark Lord’s biddings. And the Dark Lord is not very pleased with James Potter, either, after the freeing of the dreadful brat Master has sent Kreacher in helping with!”

“And you’re sure they’re at Malfoy Manor?”

“Yes, Kreacher is sure Master Regulus… Kreacher has been punished for talking to Eliaphod about it.” He held up his arm with a little wince to his nose.

Regulus knelt down, “Come here Kreacher, let me heal you.”

The elf crept closer.

Regulus held out his arm and Kreacher reluctantly laid his arm into Regulus’s palm. It was striped with deep lashes, a couple deep enough to expose a bit of bone beneath the split skin and Regulus’s stomach twisted uncomfortably. He gently waved his wand over the little arm and the skin stitched itself up - a bit clumsily, but it was better than it was before, and Kreacher looked up at him thankfully. “Kreacher is forever in debt to his Master Regulus,” the elf breathed, bowing to Regulus.

Regulus stood up and dusted off his knees, “It’s not a problem, Kreacher… but I need you to help me again in return. Can you?”

“Anything for my Master Regulus,” Kreacher replied. “Anything he requires of him, Kreacher will do.”

Regulus nodded, looking about. “Can you bring me to my brother? He’s here in Hogsmeade somewhere.”

“Yes, Kreacher can do that for you, Master Regulus.” And the elf held out his palm for Regulus to take… and with a crack, they disappeared from the path.

They reappeared a moment later in a clearing with another great crack and Regulus stumbled away from the elf as they landed there. He caught himself on a fence and he looked up to realize he was on the edge of the yard that overlooked the Shrieking Shack, without a single person anywhere about them. “Kreacher, Sirius isn’t here,” Regulus said in accusing tone.

Kreacher looked around, his ears flat to the back of his head, nervous, “But Kreacher has disapparated to where Sirius Black is…”

Regulus looked around… and that’s when he saw it. The big shaggy black dog, just a small way away down the fence, digging its way under. He stared, jaw dropped, his heart racing. “Snuffles?” he called.

And the dog turned and stared at him.




James sat in the Three Broomsticks, his hands folded over his lap, biting his lip. He’d shifted his weight several times, glancing at the clock over the bar as the long hand approached the twelve on the clock and the time when Lily Evans was to arrive neared. His stomach got queasier and queasier, and when the pretty young barmaid Rosmerta came ‘round to inquire after his order, he asked for two butterbeers in iced mugs with straws, and Rosmerta went and returned with them… The glasses condensated in the warmth of the room and still he waited… the minute hand crawling to the twelve… and past it… on to the three… the six… the next hour ticking by, and James drank the two butterbeers himself, and he stared at the clock… and he waited, looking around desperately.

“Anybody sitting here?” asked a bloke from another table, motioning that he wanted to take the empty seat across from James. “Yes - yes she’s coming. She’s coming. Sorry.” He waved his hands, panicked, almost knocking over the glasses in his haste.

He pulled the chair closer to him so the mistake wouldn’t happen again and when Rosmerta returned, he ordered two more butterbeers and looked up at the clock again. It was nearly one. Perhaps he’d misunderstood when she intended to come. Surely she’d be there anytime now… anytime now…

And James Potter sat, looking about, waiting… waiting…

...and waiting…

...slowly feeling stupider and stupider…

...slowly realizing that she really wasn’t coming, that she’d changed her mind or else had never really intended to come at all… perhaps she’d played him, perhaps it was her idea of getting him back for being a bully, and she’d never meant to come at all...

(Oh what a fool he’d been! Falling right into her sick little trap! Letting him count down all those days, letting him sit there and tell her all his feelings - a great load of things he never should’ve said to her ran through his head, a million things he wished he’d kept inside…)

...and finally he let someone take the chair and he left his galleons for Rosmerta among the empty glasses that cluttered the empty table, and he hurried to swing Sirius’s jacket over his shoulders and he left the Three Broomsticks, stumbling over the door jamb on the way out in his haste.