Afterlife

"I suspect it's a Zonko Product!"

[[I was going to comment this in response @MiraculousPJO buttt it turned out too long so here you are]]

"Holy moly!" James whispered even though it wasn't night where he was.

"Peter's a rat so Harry won't find him," Lily told him.

"No that's not what I'm worried about. That bastard will escape for now, but look. Snape. He's approaching him."

"Jesus," Lily came over and squinted at the Map. "You have surprisingly good eyesight for someone with glasses."

"Nah, it's just the map. Sort of an intuition when things are going to go bad. I can't see anything else." James bit his lip. He'd hate to see the map fall into Snape's hands.

Thankfully, Harry muttered the words to shut it off and turned off his wand, but it was too late. Snape poked the light in his face and snarled, "Potter. What are you doing wandering the corridors at night?"

"What is he doing wandering the corridors?" Lily echoed.

"I was sleepwalking," Harry said without stuttering. Snape then immediately made a reference to James.

"I was not 'exceedingly arrogant'!" James cried in protest. "That is just simply not true. I was just plainly arrogant."

"Hey, he defended you," Lily poked him. "Harry said you didn't strut!"

But then Snape forced Harry to turn out his pockets and asked the parchment to reveal its secrets. "Ah shit," James muttered, putting his head in his hands.

"It's going to insult him isn't it," Lily stared at James, thinking this was about to take a very dark turn.

Harry was reading the insults and James was cringing, asking himself why, god, why had they been so stupid as to put that measure on the map, and then he heard the voice of-

"Professor," Remus Lupin had arrived, also skulking about in the night. Harry's saviour.

As Snape grabbed the parchment, James hissed as though he were a demon crossing over a salt circle. But then, swiftly, he passed it to Remus for expertise and his muscles relaxed. Why, why would Snape do that? Surely he would prefer to keep it on his person as a way to hold it above Harry's head? Thank god he didn't understand it fully.

"I suspect it's a Zonko product," Remus chuckled. James stared at the man who had done so much of the spell work to ensure the map was very much more than just a joke, a prank, and wondered whether it hurt to say that.

And then Harry was off with Lupin, and the map was safe with one of the original owners, the original creators, in fact. And it was painful to see Remus not smiling and looking through it, but he supposed he was with Harry. Oh, what James would do to see Remus sit Harry down and explain some of the best anecdotes from making the map. Them exploring the castle late at night, making notes of it, Peter bringing them snacks he stole from the kitchen. Oh it had been the good days. But Remus was a teacher now, and so he would probably look through it later, after he had dismissed Harry.

And that's what he did. Remus stared the map down, and tears started flooding down his cheeks and at that point, James had to stop watching, because it was just too painful.