The Marauders - Order of the Phoenix - Part One

A Professional At It

James, Sirius, and Remus sat together is one of the exam rooms at St. Mungo's. Sirius lay dramatically across the bed as James perched against the window sill, clutching his side, and Remus sat on the edge of his seat, jiggling his knee with pent up anxious energy. Sirius's feet were on the wrong end of the bed, his head hanging off the side James and Remus were on.

The mediwitch that had seen them had quickly given James a dose of potion that would repair the bruising in his ribs. The potion had a peculiar feeling; it was as though a thousand tiny needles were stitching together something deep in his chest. James's face was puckered into a wince. 

Sirius, however, had been a harder nut to crack for the poor mediwitch. Remus had described the sparks that he'd seen  strike Sirius, and given details about how he'd reacted - falling to his knees in the street and staring blankly ahead for some time after the spell had struck him, coupled with the short term memory issues and the even-more-reckless-than-usual behavior he'd been exhibiting. The mediwitch had given Sirius a full examination, using her wand to check his eyes and a spell which made a sort of ribbon of wispy smoke that she drew from his ear, like a muggle magician with the colorful scarves from his sleeves. She'd hummed as she'd looked the strand over, then bottled it up, and declared she would return.

Near to twenty minutes had passed since she'd left.

Sirius looked between James and Remus. "Can we leave yet? I'm bloody bored."

"You're staying until that witch comes back with your results," Remus said firmly.

Sirius's eyes flashed to Remus, then looked to James for support, but James's eyes were closed as his ribs felt even more squirmy and stitchy than they had the moment before. Sirius looked back at Remus. "I've already told you, I'm fine."

"Then why is the fact that you told me you're fine the only thing you seem to remember for longer than five seconds?" Remus demanded. He felt bad being cross at Sirius, but he was exhausted - from having gotten no sleep, from the fight and the emotions of walking through the aftermath, and from the aggressively reckless display of behavior from Sirius. Sirius was exhausting on a normal day, but this version was near to thrice as tiring as the usual Sirius was.

Sirius didn't answer the question, instead he continued his refrain. "Bored, bored out of my mind, I tell you. We could go and have a bit of fun now the fight's over. We could go and get breakfast some place. There's a really groovy little haunt that ol' Bil and I went to, not far from here, and they have the most brilliant --"

"Sirius." Remus's voice was firm.

Sirius sighed heavily and moved so that his head was on the bed properly and he was staring up at the ceiling instead of Remus. He pursed his lips in frustration.

"We can get breakfast after they've gotten your results, Padfoot," James spoke up, "Right, Remus?" James's voice was a bit pinched. 

"Yes," Remus agreed, "But we've got to get the results first."

"Fuck the results," Sirius said. "How about we go now and get breaky and then after we've stuffed ourselves good and full of bacon and toast we can come back for the results."

"'fraid it doesn't work that way," James grunted.

Remus nodded, "Besides, I know you, Sirius, and the moment you've gotten your belly full of bacon and toast you'd refuse to come back here as stubborn as anything."

Sirius had indeed been thinking that Remus might just forget about coming back, being so caught up in the fun of being out and about with his mates, and then by the time he remembered, Sirius would have proven to him that everything was alright... Sirius didn't reply to Remus, his guess was too dead on the mark to have much of an argument anyhow.