- Chapter Seventy-Nine -
"It's 1 in the morning."

THE HOGS HEAD INN HAD LESSENED IN POPULATION.

The night was getting deeper. The sky was blackening further. Sensible wizards and witches who had work the next day had scurried off as soon as the clock hit 10:30, bustling about through flails of long skirts and arms going everywhere as they made their escape from the lively pub that had enraptured them for the evening. The bums that spent their days drowning in beer had settled down just a little, ordering one more drink to get them through the night.

Dancing music had slowly transitioned into long classical stretches on the violin that was played by no one, courtesy of a charm that had been cast upon the three instruments which had provided their entertainment for the evening. No body remained up and dancing apart from two young Hogwarts students that probably should've been in bed by now, but none of the patrons would snitch, not if James slipped them a galleon or two.

"Did I woo you?"

"I would say yes, but you just said the word 'woo' so no," Sherry sighed. The two were locked in a small embrace, swaying from side to side with the classical music on in the background. "But I have had fun. Even though I'm one hundred percent sure I've got blisters on my feet now."

"That's cause you went so crazy in the stamping one," James laughed, his hand gliding up and down her back for a sense of comfort for her.

"The barmaids made it look easy." Sherry defended herself, shaking her head at James' laughter as they swayed slowly. "This was actually a very good date. Thank you."

"Any time," James whispered to her, hand on her back whilst she rest her head upon his shoulder, the two of them in their moment of bliss for just a second longer. "It's almost Christmas."

"I know," Sherry smiled, her smile stretching into a grin as she held him close, her hands splayed against his back. James chuckled at the mere sound of her excitement. "I'm excited."

"What are you doing for it?" He asked, his voice turning to a low murmur as his mouth remained beside her ear; she felt every word he spoke reverberate around her entire body as though she were hollow.

"I don't know," She sighed, her voice betraying her feelings of exasperation when it came to the Holidays. As well known, Sherry didn't have the best experiences with holidays. Christmas last year she had been alone, her birthday had been when her mother didn't show up, as well as the Fourth of July.

The only holiday where she had truly been given a testament to how fun and carefree it had been, was the Halloween that had just passed, where Sherry had made the bold move to tell James Potter that he was now her boyfriend. Premature, maybe, considering that they hadn't even been on a date with one another beforehand but she liked to think that it had gone rather smoothly so far.

All of the rough patches had been before they got together, and every day James lived in guilt and despair that he had ever done the things that he had. But every day he got to look upon Sherry Opal's smiling face and wonder what he did to deserve such forgiveness; it seemed like a miracle from above, as though the goddess of timing had been trying their best to put them together at a certain point because she knew that they wouldn't last at any other point.

"Are you staying at the castle again?" James whispered to her. If she was, then maybe he would stay with her, but this time he'd give her an actual gift rather than a prank. "I'll stay with you."

"No." Sherry shook her head slowly, glancing up to him as their eyes locked with one another. She smiled unsurely at him. "I might go home. Hope's ill and I wanna spend as much time with her as possible..."

"Makes sense," James nodded, stepping back a little to twirl Sherry slowly under his arm before pulling her back to him. She had a content grin as she rested her hand on his shoulder. "Have you heard from her?"

Sherry nodded her head, her smile faltering just a little and James scolded himself mentally for asking such a question but he knew that if he genuinely didn't want to, she would curse him out and maybe punch him a little bit. But she tilted her head, huffing a little before she answered.

"Yes," She nodded her head, looking up at him. "The request for her to be transferred to St. Mungos has been denied-"

"What?"

"I know, right? Like 'we can cure everything with magic', oh except for life-threatening muggle diseases. Those, you have to suffer through," Sherry said sarcastically, rolling her eyes as James drifted his hands down to her waist, keeping her close to him as they side-stepped to the slow music around them. "It's bullshit."

"I agree," James whispered. He didn't quite know what to say, but all he could do was be a crutch for Sherry to lean on at this time; Remus had been pretty tight-lipped about everything, keeping to himself rather than reaching out. "Mungos must be busy recently...with all the injuries..."

"That doesn't mean they should let a woman die." Sherry said, frowning a little. Of course she knew that outside of Hogwarts, the British Wizarding World was slowly being ravaged by Death Eater, Voldemort's army and darkness was settling over the land. "Is it bad that I just want to ignore it all? Everything. Hope. The war. My own mom."

"It's not bad," James murmured, shaking his head, his hands squeezing her waist slightly. Sherry hummed thoughtfully, her eyes glazing over as she lost herself in her head; James leaned forward and rested his chin on her shoulder as he embraced her. "It's not bad. But also, we should be talking about it and we should be taking a stand."

"That's the Auror in you talking," Sherry smiled at him, snapping back into the reality of the cozy pub and James smiled at the glint appearing in her eyes.

"I'm gonna nail that training," James nodded proudly and Sherry grinned, pulling him tighter as she leaned up to kiss his cheek softly. "Hey, hey, don't go getting all soft."

"Can't help it." Sherry chuckled, pulling back a little as she looked up at him. "It's warm, it's cozy, it's late...I'm feeling all the love."

"Love?" James raised his eyebrows teasingly, wiggling them at Sherry as she furrowed her eyebrows and then went over what she had said. Even though their confessions had been varying degrees of emotions, the two of them hadn't so casually made such a bold statement. "Shit, Opal, no idea you felt so much for me,"

"Shut the fuck up," Sherry cursed him and he felt his heart swell at the familiar language falling from her lips. James laughed, dipping his head down in search for a kiss. "No, I don't wanna kiss you now."

"Come on," He chuckled, winding his arms around her waist, leaning in as she laughed and pushed at his shoulders, playing defiance. "Kiss me."

"No!"

"Kiss me!" His laughter was booming, disrupting the little peaceful bubble they had found themselves in as their voices rose above the soft music and Sherry rolled her eyes, pressing a soft and quick kiss to his lips. "Thank you."

"Bitch."

"Jerk."

•*•*•*•*•

James Potter entered the Gryffindor Boys Dormitory late that night, grinning to himself proudly as he tried to sneak back into the room and back into bed without waking up any of the others. The room was dark, all the thick curtains and quilts making the room look darker than it was; there was a cascade of moonlight filtering through the window and shining upon the hardwood floor that James pattered across toward his bed.

In order to keep quiet, he had removed his shoes and socks so that he didn't make too much noise against the hard floor. Honestly, it did surprise him that the others were asleep, given their usual habit of not sleeping until early morning and then having to wake up with minimal hours of sleep.

But he supposed it was once in a blue moon.

That was until the darkness of the room became a little lighter and James whirled around, eyes settling on Remus. Remus was in his bed, in his pyjamas and munching on a small bar of chocolate. In his wand light, that had added an extra shine to the room, Remus' scars were much more defined and in fact a little beautiful. Even though James hadn't been doing anything wrong, he became frozen as though he was in headlights at the sight of Remus.

"It's 1 in the morning," Remus commented, tilting his head at James, his eyebrows furrowing a little. James nodded his head, running a hand through his messy hair. "Did I not tell you to have Sherry back to her dorm by eleven?"

"You told me, Louis told me, Oliver threatened me," James nodded, his worried smile melting into an excited grin as he grabbed his pillow from his own bed and came to sit on the edge of Remus' bed with him. "We just got carried away in Hogsmeade."

"I know," Remus said, staring at James. Despite trying to play the role of the intimidating family member of Sherry's, he couldn't help but smirk at the happiness on James' face. "You've got a little-"

Remus gestured to the side of his face, eyes twinkling. James muttered something under his breath as he went to wipe at his cheek, thinking it was just cream from where he and Sherry had raided the Honeydukes cellar on the way back to the castle, but when he brushed his thumb over his cheek and brought it back, there was red smeared over him. After a moment, he grabbed Remus' lit wand and walked over to the mirrors.

Staring back at himself, was a disheveled boy with red kiss marks all over his cheeks, stained by Sherry's red lipstick. James groaned, but a wide smile was on his face as he laughed a little and turned back to Remus, who did not look impressed.

"All we did was kiss, I swear," James raised his hands in defence.

"That better be true, James," Remus sair as James came back and handed the wand over to its owner, sitting back on Remus' bed as they chuckled with one another. "Except I'm deadly serious. You don't sleep with her until after you've been together six months, okay?"

"I don't have any plans on sleeping with her anytime soon, Remus-"

"Why not? What's wrong with her?" Remus replied, furrowing his eyebrows at James who widened his eyes and gaped cluelessly at Remus, stammering endlessly. The werewolf before him just burst out into laughter. "I'm kidding. But seriously James...you know what she's been through."

"I know." James nodded his head, frowning softly as he looked down at his lap.

"But lucky for you, I actually like you," Remus patted his best friend on the shoulder. James smirked, looking at him before he wrestled him into a little headlock.

They were both messes of little laughter as they wrestled a little, James locking Remus with his arm around his neck as he rubbed his knuckles into Remus' hair, grins on both of their faces. Remus pushed James off of him, groaning and cursing as the two boys laughed. Despite the allegiance Remus had with Sherry, it was nice that the two of them were still best friends, even if James' girlfriend was his best friend's weird sister thing. They didn't really have a word for what Sherry was to him.

After Remus had surrendered and James had let him go, the two of them had settled into casual conversation where James recounted their night. Remus grimaced when James would get too lovey-dovey , but smiled when he mentioned the activities they had done which were so pure and inocent that Remus couldn't fault James in the slightest. In the end, James proclaimed he was going to bed.

"Night, mate," James clasped Remus on the shoulder as he got up to shed his clothes, getting into his pyjamas instead. "Love you."

"Love you," Remus grumbled back, putting his wand out as the dorm darkened again and James shuffled as he climbed into his bed, getting comfortable as he took his glasses off. "And James?"

"Yeah?"

"Hurt her and I rip you limb from limb and feed you to the werewolf colony down in Cardiff." Remus mentioned. A tense silence followed between them, nothing but the sound of Peter's snoring around them as James froze up. "Goodnight!"

•*•*•*•*•

A/N: MY FAVES