shiny red plastic booths and dry, heavy tongues

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February 1, 1980
2:29 pm
Room 131
St. Mungo's

Anneliese was slightly trapped. Sirius wrapped around her would have been the ideal circumstance to wake up with any other time, but Callaway was too anxious to talk to James to enjoy it for a second longer than she had already been awake.

She pushed her chin into her chest to look down at his strong nose and shaped brows, all features as relaxed as a kitten curled up in a morning patch of sun. There would be no waking him until he wanted to be woken up, no doubt in at least an hour.

Still, her stubborn nature forced her to try one last time.

"Sirius," Anneliese hissed, shaking his shoulders. "Wake the hell up- oh my god."

Black shifted in his sleep, rolling his arm further onto her stomach and unintentionally pinning her down even more. Callaway felt like an avalanche had buried her in a warm, familiar pile of boulders.

Anneliese gritted her teeth and propelled her shoulder over to the other side of the mattress, releasing her torso. She wiggled her legs until her foot strained far enough to hitch onto the iron frame of the bed, finally tugging herself free.

Callaway staggered back, slightly off balance as she stood up. Sirius was still asleep, oblivious to the motion all around him.

Anneliese smiled slightly at the tranquility keeping his features resting, more amity in his expression than she had seen him sleeping with in a long time. She pulled a blanket over him and kissed him on the top of his head before quietly exiting the room.

Across the hospital, another boy was taking the much less peaceful route on the way to finding his senses.

The world was a blur of bright lights and colorful blobs. His hand fumbled to his right, aimlessly swinging around open air before landing on solid wood. He winced as he heard himself knock something over, but was satisfied once he caught onto his glasses he was nearly blind without.

The world came into focus as he slid on the circle frames, details sharpening. There was a sling on his left arm, harnessed around his shoulder. His entire right arm and shin were wrapped in white cloth bandages, no doubt the enormous patches of charred and seared skin slowly healing.

He forced himself out of bed, sidestepping to find a mirror. Someone had gotten all of the ash and rubble out of his hair. Now it was only as messy as it was usually.

The only damage to his face was a bandage across the bridge of his nose, but his neck and shoulder both had splotches a shade lighter than usual. The Healers couldn't get rid of all the scarring, and he had gotten the worst of the explosion, not her.

He was just grateful he hadn't lost a limb, a leg, or his life.

The door soundlessly opened as he pushed it forward, chilly hospital air hitting his bare arms and pushing against the tank top he had been wearing underneath his button up shirt. He ignored the Healers and other patients giving him odd looks. He was only looking for one person.

Her voice called out from behind him, telling him that she had been looking, too.

"James!" Anneliese exclaimed, walking as fast as she could without her splitting the skin on her leg again. "James, come on. I just barely got out from being trapped by Sirius, it's a miracle my Healer didn't come in and see me-"

She had around the same amount of damage as Potter, minus the scars on her neck and shoulder. Bandages all around her knuckles and wrists had been added.

St. Mungo's had given her light blue sweatpants, a rosy t-shirt, and white socks. They were soft and clean and smelled like how Anneliese imagined clouds would with a trace of laundry detergent. Her hands were bare, but her hair was somehow still pulled back into a tight bun.

"I know, I know," Potter said, both of them rushing into the nearest open room and locking the door behind them. "So what are we going to do?"

"I don't know," Callaway said anxiously, their urgency kicking her fully awake. "I saw everyone in the waiting room on my way here, I've never turned around that fast. They didn't see me. Peter's just sitting there, like-"

"Like he's actually one of us," James fumed, pacing furiously across the shiny floors and readjusting his perfectly straight glasses. "As if he didn't almost kill us by blowing up a car that we were getting into-"

"Woah, what?" Anneliese asked, startled by the depth into which Potter was agreeing with her here. "I didn't even say anything about him being the one to blow up the car-"

"I know you didn't, but I can feel that he did," James said passionately, just as much emotion in his voice as ever despite just waking up after being in an explosion. "I've been having these feelings since the middle of December when you showed up with that locket and Peter kept trying to make you seem bad, I just thought I was-"

"Going crazy," Callaway completed hastily with a nod. "That's exactly how I felt when I was first figuring it out, too. But now I know for sure."

"How?" Potter asked. It wasn't a challenging question to test her honestly, it was just curiosity.

Anneliese reflexively stopped herself. It was much easier to just agree with James than it was to present her own knowledge, the knowledge that was in danger of getting her sister killed and was the premise of so many secrets and blackmail.

He saw her expression and knew that there was no way she was going to tell him anything surrounded by so many witches and wizards, even if the door was shut.

"Alright, come on then," James sighed resolutely, holding the door open for her. "Let's get out of here."

"What?" Anneliese asked, but she was already out into the hallway.

"We just have to get out of the hospital without any of them seeing us," Potter said, walking quickly and tucking his hands into his issued light purple sweatpants. "It'll be easy, right? Just like sneaking around Hogwarts."

"At Hogwarts, you had the invisibility cloak," Anneliese pointed out, straightening her necklace. "And in case you haven't noticed, we are currently extremely visible."

"Yes, but I am a Marauder and you have lost an enormous amount of points for your house at not one but two schools in the best way possible," James said, letting a grin take over his sunny features. "Which means that we- Dorcas."

Potter tugged the back of her shirt towards him, pulling both of them against the wall of a corner.

They leaned forward slightly in unison, two heads poking out and watching Meadowes and Mckinnon walk by, a cup of coffee in each of their hands.

"Told you we still got it," James winked cheekily, and Anneliese rolled her eyes with her exhale.

Several passerbyers blinked a few times in confusion while others unashamedly gawked at the two kids walking down the winter London streets in a tank top, t-shirt, bandages all over their bodies, and just socks on their feet.

"We look ridiculous," Anneliese muttered, turning them down the block to get out of the direct line of sight of St. Mungo's as quickly as possible. "Like-"

"We just escaped a hospital?" James asked with a smile, and Callaway's argument faded. "Yea. Let's go get some food. I'm hungry as hell."

"Isn't that a little dangerous?" Anneliese asked, but was still walking alongside him. "Considering the last time we ate, you know. We got blown up."

"Yes, but I don't plan on reporting either of us to the Death Eaters like Peter did," Potter said, tone taking on an air of seriousness that he shook off. "Besides, you know how these things work just as much as I do. Attacks aren't back to back. They're when we're not expecting them."

Callaway agreed, and motioned to go into a small storefront with a glass door and bright yellowish orange painted letters reading Saffron Diner.

They slid into a shiny red booth, teeth relieved of their chattering when they both ordered a mug of hot chocolate.

"Alright," Anneliese sighed, eyes looking at the door in paranoia. "Let's just get right into it."

Potter nodded, leaning forward and taking a long sip. Callaway laughed softly as his face wrinkled in a wince from scalding his tongue. He was as impatient to drink the cocoa as a seven year old after a snowball fight.

She shook it off.

"Okay, so, the day Peter got back, the day of Regulus's funeral. You know how Regulus and I worked very closely, on more.. private things that we didn't share with others? And how Regulus was a Death Eater? And how he came to your old place that one Christmas when I was stabbed? And how he was poisoned at Hogwarts?"

James nodded again after gathering all of the memories from the crevices of his mind to the very top of his thoughts where they could see the day again, mildly confused how all these things from so long ago were related.

"Well, when he went back to Grimmauld Place after all of that, he wasn't a true Death Eater anymore," Anneliese explained. "He was a spy for Dumbledore. He found out that Peter was also a Death Eater, which he is, and he assumed that because he was a member of the Order, he was a spy for Dumbledore as well."

"But he's not," Potter hushed, starting to understand. "Oh no."

"So Regulus went to Peter, revealing himself as a spy, thinking that it was safe," Anneliese nodded, tone mirroring his expression. "Reggie figured out pretty fast Peter wasn't good at all, but before he could say anything, he was-"

"He was poisoned," James finished in awe, looking up from the gooey marshmallows to Callaway. "Peter poisoned him. But that makes so much sense-"

"I know," she nodded again. "And when Regulus woke up, he knew that I knew. We worked together on catching him for over a year, the year he disappeared. One night, my notebook was stolen, the one with all of my spells and all of my evidence against Peter. Guess what also happened that night?"

James initially shrugged, but then started to think about it more. Anneliese watched as his expressive features revealed the moment of his conclusion.

"Regulus was killed," Potter said in a hushed tone. "So- Peter killed Regulus-"

"Yes," Callaway nodded, pleased that he was drawing the same conclusions as her. "And then the day of his funeral, he came back. The day where I asked to talk to him alone? I.. I was confronting him about it."

Anneliese left out the part where she had been planning to kill Pettigrew.

"But he knew I was going to," she continued. "And he already had a plan on how he was going to prevent me from telling yall and.. and it's been working."

James set his cocoa down now, every ounce of attention leaned forward onto her.

"He found out where my sister lives," Anneliese said, tongue burning just as much as Potter's from his drink even though she hadn't touched her own mug. "And he.. he threatened to kill her if I said anything. Along with Violet, Mitchell, Cliff, and Qu- and Cliff. That's it. That's why I haven't said anything until now. I'm sorry."

James just stared. Callaway slumped back in her seat. She knew it was a lot, and the speed at which she told him the information had been brutally efficient.

"I don't know if I want to go kill Peter right now or if I want to warn everyone more," Potter sighed eventually, rubbing his forehead.

"Well, do you want to go kill Peter right now or warn everyone more?" Anneliese asked with light unhelpfulness. "It's a rather simple solution."

"Hah," James said dryly, but he was smiling. The smile faded. "You know, I think it would hurt more if I was surprised. But I'm not. I'm so fucking sad that I'm not disappointed. You know? I just thought that.. I don't know what I thought. Definitely not this."

"I understand," Anneliese said softly, but didn't say anything else. She could hear it in his tone that he had more to say.

"I just.. I just can't help feel like so much of this is my fault," Potter said, avoiding her gaze. "Peter and.. Peter and Lily and I being targeted."

James stifled a sob. Anneliese blinked in shock.

"Maybe if I.. maybe if I hadn't been so damn persistent since my first year on getting her to like me then she would be with some other guy and she wouldn't have to go through all of this," he said weakly. "Maybe if I had tried a little less, you know? And Peter. I always could have been nicer to Peter. I'm just not as kind as you and Alice, I just.. I know it sounds awful, but it's just not who I am. I can't- my mun and dad always tried, but- I.. I just.."

Potter took a deep breath in an attempt to regather his composure that had been scattered like ashes in the mind, flimsy bits of grey settling into the cold ground. He brought himself to look back at Anneliese.

"What if this is some form of punishment for being a piece of shit my whole life?" James asked, eyes wide and plainly scared. "Karma?"

Callaway felt his misery, his pain leaking into her. A fissure formed in her heart. She knew what it was like to blame yourself, and she knew how awful it felt when no one gave you any reassurance that it wasn't your fault.

"First of all," Anneliese said quietly. "Despite what your ego may be telling you, I don't think Lily ending up with another person would have been the issue. I think it's a possibility that whoever she was with would be the father of the child in the prophecy. It's not a you thing to create the savior baby, it's her."

"Jeez, thanks," Potter scoffed, wiping a tear from his eye. "A with the brutal honesty."

"Of course," she nodded sincerely, taking it as a compliment. "Also, everyone can always be nicer. There is nothing you could have possibly done to justify what Peter is doing to us. Don't make that your fault as well. It's just wrong, James."

He let her words flow into him like the gentle current of a brook, warm sunlight reflecting against the water in her smile. She had that quality about her, that soothing demeanor that she could convince you of anything with if she altered her tone and expression in just the right way.

"And finally, Prongs, believe it or not, but you aren't a piece of shit," Anneliese said emphatically with a small smile, and he laughed slightly. "I'm smiling because I can't believe I'm having to tell you this. You're the best quidditch captain we could have asked for, an amazing, incredibly loyal and stupid friend. You love Lily. Do you even realize how hard it is to love someone like that? To be capable of that much goodness? Just that in itself says enough about you to make the whole karma thing completely irrelevant."

Her smile faded slightly. James noticed her few seconds of silence, and looked up from the laminate floor towards her. She stared at him forcefully with her next words.

"And believe me," Anneliese said firmly. "If anyone would think you're a bad person and deserved or caused this in any way, it would be me. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

"Yea," James nodded quietly. "Yea, I do."

"Good," she said. "So we both are very clear that there's only one person in this whole ordeal who has any kind of karma coming for them."

"Peter," James nodded, grateful for the graceful closing of the subject and the calming of his worries. "So how are we going to deliver it to him? We can't let him know that I know unless you want your sister and friends to die."

Anneliese leaned back, that glint in her dark eyes Potter had learned to be wary and enthused by at the same time. She blinked, and James couldn't know if he had imagined it.

"What do you think?" she asked, almost a challenge.

"I think.. I think that we can't let Peter come with us anymore," James said slowly, struggling with what to do. "Do anything with us, I mean. We can't let him know anything if he's just going to keep setting us up for traps, we just can't-"

"But then he's going to get suspicious of us," Anneliese countered. "And he's going to think that I did something to hint yall, because he doesn't know that you know."

"Alright, then let's just not do anything for a while," Potter said, but his voice was unsure and hesitant as if one wrong step would send him plummeting off a cliff. "It's a way to protect ourselves, and.. and-"

James swallowed forcefully, holding his head in his hands and cutting himself off.

"I don't know," he whispered. "I just don't know."

"Well, I do," Anneliese said firmly, his chin drawing back up to her at the reassurance in her tone, the powerful confidence. "And I've been thinkin about it for years. We have to catch him in the act in front of everyone, James. They're not all going to believe us without proof. We have to make it unquestionable."

"So.. so like frame him but not really frame him because he actually did it?" Potter asked with tense grooves between his brows before blinking a few times in understanding.

"Set him up, James," Callaway sighed in summary, massaging her forehead. "Set him up."

Sometimes talking to James was like talking to a six year old with vocabulary issues. She really needed Lily to get him to read more.

"That's the word," he nodded, sheepishly adjusting his glasses, that constant habit that could express a dozen different emotions depending on the circumstance. "And how exactly? When? We don't have access to all of the Death Eater's plans for when they're going to do what, and it's not like we can just waltz into a meeting and point our fingers at him."

"No, we can't," Anneliese agreed. "But I've been doing some research and.. and I think I know how we can end this once and for all. It's going to be risky, but if we pull it off, it'll all be worth it. You're going to have to trust me, and I know you already do."

"What is it?" James asked, nodding in confirmation that Callaway had all of his confidence. He trusted her just as much as he trusted that the sun would rise every morning.

Anneliese took in a deep breath.

"There can be two Secret Keepers."

Potter blinked.

"What?"

"Good lord, the amount of time you have said the word "what" with an o instead of a ha in the middle is making me loose all of the brain cells it took to come up with this plan," Anneliese groaned, tilting back her head in exasperation. "Yes, there can be two Secret Keepers."

"And you want Peter to be one of them?" James asked and Callaway nodded. "But how does that even work? Would it even work?"

"Like I said, risky, but yes," Anneliese nodded. "So here's what would happen. Whenever you and Lily decide to go into hiding when Harry's born- don't look at me like that, we both know it's inevitable- you're going to tell Dumbledore that you want both of us as your Keeper to make the spell more secure."

"And how exactly does it make the spell more secure?" Potter asked.

"When a Secret Keeper dies, or in this case, if one of us was killed prematurely, then the protection and secrecy of whatever they were keeping dies with them," she explained. "So if it was only Peter and he died, Voldemort could find you easily."

"But if there are two of you and one of you dies, then we're still protected," James nodded, starting to understand her train of thought. "Got it."

"And I'm assuming that Dumbledore will want to make a safe house for the Keepers," Anneliese continued. "I won't take him up on that, but Peter will. So

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