"Peter, wait!"

Lily tugged her jumper closer around her torso as she followed after Peter. It had started drizzling lightly outside and the alley was speckled with puddles, the stairs leading up to the flat slick with rain. Peter was by the gate that led out to the street already, but he paused when she called his name and waited. If it had been any of the others, he wouldn't have held up - but for Lily, for Lily he would wait.

But he wouldn't let her touch him, he thought. He didn't need anymore of them stealing his thoughts and feelings like Sirius had been doing lately.

She rushed across the alley to him and when she'd caught him up, he started walking again. She followed him out of the alley and across the street to the park, his eyes downcast, both of them silent. She hugged herself against the damp air and glanced over her shoulder at the lights in the windows of the flat. They got to a particular bench that Peter had recently started sitting at to read and wait for Oni Lamm, and he dropped down onto the damp wood, laying the Grindelwald book down, not really caring if it was damaged or not. He sighed and leaned back, staring up at the overcast sky and feeling the water droplets fall on his cheeks. Lily stood before him, not wanting to sit in the rain water that hadn't phased Peter at all.

"I'm sorry that you feel so out of place among us," Lily said quietly. "I didn't know you felt like that."

He kept staring up at the sky.

"It's not been any of our intentions to hurt you, Peter," she added. "At least I know it hasn't been mine or James and I very much doubt that Sirius or Remus were ever out to hurt you, either. You're our friend and we all love you very much. Just like you love us."

Peter looked at her, his eyes sad. "I'm just not..." he paused, trying to think of an adjective, but there was none that seemed to cover all the ones he meant, and so he finished his sentence, "...enough."

"Oh Peter," Lily said, "You are enough."

"I never have been. I'm not athletic enough, I'm not funny enough, not brave enough, not smart enough, not kind enough, not creative enough, not bold enough, not patient enough, not strong enough, not quick enough, not -- anything -- enough. The rest of you are so talented and witty, so strong and brave and loving and funny and good looking and then there's - there's just me. Compared to James, for example, I'm rubbish."

Lily shook her head, "Peter, why are you comparing yourself to anyone?"

"Everyone else is."

"We aren't," Lily said. "We love you, Peter, because you're you. It isn't a competition."

Peter stared at the sky without speaking. Then, after a long pause, he said, "I just want to be memorable for something, something besides being the fat kid that followed around after James and Sirius in school."

"Peter you're so much more than ---"

"Excuse me?" 

Both Lily and Peter looked up. A young man and a woman had walked up without them noticing, seemingly appearing out of no where. The young man had been the one who had spoken, interrupting Lily. He nodded at Peter, "Very sorry," he said, "I can't help but notice your watch there, it caught my eye, and - see, my own watch here... very old piece... needs winding and I haven't the time. By chance do you have the time so I can wind up?"

Lily stared at the strangers. The woman smiled shyly at her, lingering a couple steps behind the young man.

"Uh - yeah - yes, sure," Peter said and he looked at his watch, "It's - it's half eleven."

"Ah yes, very good," the young man grinned and turned to look at the woman, "Half eleven already! Can you believe it. Seems like it was only just five-o'clock, dunnit?" and he laughed.

The woman laughed, too, "Time flies when you're having fun, they say."

The young man bent to pat Peter's shoulder. "Thank you such a lot for the time, I do appreciate it." He grinned, and then backed away, and, without any further chatter, both the man and woman hurried away back the way they'd come.

Lily stared after them for a long moment until they'd disappeared 'round the wall of the park and were gone from sight. Then she turned back to Peter. She was about to comment on how odd the encounter had been, but she saw Peter's melancholy expression and realized she hadn't yet finished comforting him. She sighed and sank onto the bench beside him then, regardless of the rain water that dotted the wood. She would have taken his hand, but he quickly scootched away so she couldn't.

"Peter, you're so much more than just someone who follows James and Sirius around. You're as much a Marauders as any of the other three are. You're so good at divination and you're smart, I know you don't think you are but you are - not just anyone could've become an animagus like you have done and at the age that you lot did that! You're powerful, too. And brave. You're the smallest creature of the lot of you, yet you still go and do the full moon nights, you're still so helpful and caring and you always bring the food that everyone else forgets or to cheer people up. You never are out of licorice wands for Sirius or chocolate for Remus and you always have such cheerful little words of encouragement for James. Your smile is so precious. I love your dimples. And you always bring me home things I need - sometimes without me even asking for you to, just because you noticed we were running low on something. You're thoughtful. You're not the loud boisterous noise of James and Sirius, sure, or the Remcyclopedic smarts of Remus, but you're not rubbish compared to any of them."

Peter turned his head so he was looking up at her beside him. "I just want to be remembered."

Lily said, "No matter what, Peter, I will always remember you."

The rain was picking up, getting a bit harder, and Lily looked up and saw James coming across the road, his wand turned to an umbrella, free hand shoved into the pocket of his jeans as he trotted across the pavement and into the park, splashing through puddles.

"Here comes James," Lily murmured.

Peter sat up and turned to look at James's silhouette coming through the dark.

James came to a stop before them, "Hullo," he said. "I -er- heard the rain pick-up and I didn't want you lot to catch cold." He fumbled for a moment, glancing down at his trainers, the color contrasting against the damp pavement under his feet. He looked back up at them and his nose crunched with concentration as he said, "Pete, we were only worried about you is all, you know? Not - not really angry, just - worried. I mean, we - er - we gotta keep each other safe, yeah? And that book, it's - there's some real conflicting stuff in there. Easy to be caught up in what Grindelwald has to say. Easy to lose sight of what he really stands for if you listen to his buttered words. Yeah?"

Peter nodded, though he thought - how would you know? James had never read the book. James didn't know. He was assuming he knew what was in there, assuming he knew what Grindelwald had to say. Believing what culture and time had served up to portray Grindelwald in a particular manner - wasn't that true? James had probably not even known Grindelwald had a book until Remus showed it to him, Peter was willing to bet. And by his attitude toward it, even Remus had never bothered to read Grindelwald's words.

You'd think, Peter thought to himself, that someone like Remus Lupin would know what it was like for others to judge the book by it's cover - to assume the worst of the monster.

"Why don't you lot come back inside?" James asked. He looked at Lily specifically as he suggested it, his eyes flitting to her belly, worried what might happen if she got sick.

"Yes, let's go get warmed up, Pete," Lily said.

Peter nodded and got up, following James and Lily back across the street and up into the flat, still feeling just as bitter as he'd done when he'd left in the first place... just a bit better at hiding it off.

None of them noticed the book had vanished.

"You're insane," the woman hissed to the young man as they turned the corner of the park gate. Her shorter legs took two steps for every one of his strides. "They could've noticed you taking that and then what?"

The young man let the brown hair on top of his head melt slowly back to it's bright blue and he reached into the coat he wore and withdrew the Grindelwald book, still damp from the bench. He pushed it into the woman's arms. "We had to do something- if it stayed there, who knows what would've happened? You saw in the memory how James kept looking at it? His family has a history of listening to this wanker's propaganda. There's a spell that draws the purebloods into listening woven into every page of that book. It's very dangerous - they've only just started studying it at the Ministry somewhat recently - how Grindelwald managed to bewitch so many of his followers."

The woman stared at the book.

"Not to mention, if Peter's track is accelerated... what happens to Harry?"

"What do you mean?"

"Harry might not even be born if things continue on at the pace they've been, don't you see? If he reads that book and gets betwixed much more... next thing you know, he's joining the Death Eaters a whole year ahead of schedule and instead of Halloween 1981 being the date we're up against - which is already closer than I care to think about, by the way, already enough of a challenge to navigate into given all the attempts Ottalie has made at this point - we can't have that being accelerated any more by Peter being caught up in whatever dark magic is laced throughout that thing."

The woman looked up at the young man, "Alright, that makes sense."

"Of course it does; it's something I said," the young man said in a cocky tone. He looked at what was a very, very old watch indeed - leather with a scratched face - and murmured, "Speaking of Ottalie, we've got to get back, she was quite adamant that we all get there for the meeting on time and we're cutting it rather close already."

The woman nodded and tugged a gold chain about her neck as the young man bent down and ducked his head into the loop of it. She tucked the book under her arm and grabbed hold of the trinket that hung from the necklace, spinning it in her fingers and --

The pair vanished, taking the book with them.