The Marauders - Order of the Phoenix - Part One

The Howling House

"You lot have done quite a lot here since I've last been," Remus said. He leaned against James's shoulder as the pair of them walked through the house in Godric's Hollow. It looked so different. "Honestly you've done a really, very good job of it."

"I'm glad you think so Moony," James said, proudly. "Hopefully Evans agrees."

It was just the pair of them for now - Sirius and Peter had both needed to work until the afternoon, but James arranged his schedule carefully so to have a few hours alone with Remus Lupin. After all, he did still have loads of questions about Ned Veigler that he needed to ask Remus as he worked on the Marjorie Grant case. He figured what better time?

Sirius was sure to be knackered off that James didn't wait to bring Remus to the house - especially to the special space they'd made for full moon nights. The last time Remus had been was the day they had begun the nostalgic tunnel dig for full moon nights and it seemed about a thousand years ago now. In his spare time, James had been at the house a lot, especially as the wedding drew ever closer.

He couldn't wrap his mind on how close it was to the wedding... how soon it was that Lily would see the house for the first time.

He hoped she would like it.

"You reckon Evans will like it?" he asked Remus. Remus had better taste than Sirius, he thought, he could trust Remus's opinion on this more than he could trust Sirius's.

Remus chuckles as he answered, "Yes she will."

"What're you chuckling for?" James asked.

"It's just - d'you reckon you'll ever call her anything besides Evans?"

James looked confused, "Whyever would I do that? Evans is her name."

"For now it is," Remus shrugged.

"What?"

"Well a bit better than a month and it won't be, will it?" Remus pointed out.

James stopped abruptly on the stairs, a look of shock on his face. "Blimey, that's right."

Remus raised an eyebrow. "Don't tell me this is the first you've thought of that."

"I reckon it's the first its sunk in that way at least," James countered.

"Sorry," Remus chuckled at the perplexed look on James's face.

"I suppose I'll have to call her something else then."

"I suppose so."

They walked down the steps, James thinking, and over to the place where they'd made the tunnel. "It'll feel odd," James said, still hung up on the conversation, but Remus was staring in awe at the finished tunnel mouth.

They'd made it to look like the entry way to a home, with a real door, and on the floor there before it was a welcome mat that read WIPE YOUR PAWS on it with a load of paw prints all around. Remus laughed and smiled. "Oh you lot --"

"Sirius made that," James said, pointing at the rug.

"Of course he did," Remus laughed.

James opened the door and revealed a tunnel beyond, stretching off into the earth beyond the basement walls. There were lights.

"All the better to see what it is we're about to trip on," James said.

Remus was smiling.

They walked, far but not anywhere near the distance the tunnel at Hogwarts afforded them. At the end, they came to another nice door and on this one Sirius had hung a sign that looked like a cross stitch pillow in design, but read HOWLING HOUSE with little wolves instead of hearts. There was a basket of dog toys beside the door and Remus laughed again.