Ever the loyal daughter, Anastasia Black is focused on pleasing her parents and holding the together the crumbling relationship between her brothers. At first, she does not think the scarred and quiet Remus Lupin will put a rut into these plans. Tha...
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The four Marauders walked the streets of London, shopping for Christmas gifts. Peter and Remus were trying with all their might to keep James and Sirius in line, both of whom had never seen muggle London in all its glory. Somehow, Remus had convinced Lily and Mary, both of whom were muggleborn, to join the boys in their shopping. James was now indebted to him for as long as he lived.
Sirius had still been talking about a motorbike he had seen ten minutes beforehand, Peter answering all his questions with a laugh of disbelief.
"Yes, you have to fuel it!" he said, exasperated. "It's called petrol- it's found underground and they have to mine it up." He kept a hand on Sirius' wrist to stop him from running off.
"Where do they get it from?" James asked, almost running into a telephone pole as he looked up at the buildings rather than in front of his face.
Peter looked to Remus for help. "Britain gets a lot of theirs from the Middle East. The States and the Soviets have some too."
"Huh.... oh! I see the girls!"
Fortunately, Lily's bright auburn hair had made her easy to spot among the crowd of shoppers. Mary was pulling her away from a window that she was intensely staring into.
"Thank Merlin for you girls! These two have been talking our ears off for an hour!" Peter gestured to the taller boys behind him.
And so, the six students galavanted about one of the many shopping areas in London, pulling James and Sirius away from nearly everything abnormal to them. They had been particularly interested in the televisions that were displayed in passing shop windows.
"I need your help, Lily," Remus said as they all walked into some sort of boutique. Mary and Peter had dragged James and Sirius to find a gift for Euphemia.
"Go on."
"I wanted to find a gift for... a friend of mine."
"Does this friend," Lily started, already eyeing some of the assorted items on a nearby table, "happen to be Sirius' sister?"
All the color drained from his face. "How'd you know?"
"Well, all three of the boys were teasing you about a girl, and it didn't take long to figure out who you were sneaking off to the library with. You're lucky I did your rounds for you, Mr, Prefect." She smirked triumphantly at him as she had just figured out his biggest secret. "Anyone else and you would have been the talk of Hogwarts!"
"She's just my friend! I thought it would be nice if I got her a Christmas gift." Remus' convincing sounded weak even to himself, and Lily evidently thought the same. She grabbed his arm before leading him to another section of the store.
