Sirius and I sat at the dining table, sipping our tea and reading the Daily Prophet.

James came jogging down the stairs. "Hey Sirius, hey Marlene," he said.

"Morning, James," I said with a yawn. 

"Hi there, Prongsie," said Sirius with a grin, setting down the paper.

"Lily's just sent a letter saying that Dumbledore's organizing this group to go on missions against the guy who's behind all the attacks," said James in one quick breath. "She's asking if we wanna join."

I glanced at Sirius. Of course we wanted to! 

"Heck, yeah," the two of us said in unison.

"Great," said James, running a hand through his messy hair. "I'll write back to her right now."

"Tell her that Mar-Mar says hiiiiiiiiii!" I yelled at James as he ran upstairs.

Sirius snorted. "You still have the emotional maturity of a 5-year old."

"So do you," I fired back, sipping the last of my tea and going to place it in the sink. "Sirius?"

"Mm?"

"They sent over my parent's wills last night and it says they've left me their all the money in their Gringotts vault," I said. "I think we have enough to get our own place, now. We've bothered James and his parents enough."

Sirius placed his newspaper down again. "About that... My Uncle Alphard passed last week and he's left me his house. It's quite big."

I sighed. "Sorry for the loss, Sirius."

Sirius waved it off. "I didn't know him that well- except that he wasn't one of those pure-blood driven jerks."

I nodded slowly. "So we won't have to pay for a new house?"

Sirius shook his head. "No, but we can go check the house out next week. The Ministry are doing some inspections on it to make sure nothing's wrong with the house. No infestations or anything, really. Then they're gonna give us the all the legal forms for it. But like I said- we can check it out next week."

I grinned. "Can't wait to see it."

"I can't wait either," said Sirius with a similar wide grin. "By the way," he added. "You wanna go out to eat tonight?"

I shrugged. "Sure. I'm craving some spaghetti, myself."

"I'm sure there are some good spaghetti places nearby," noted Sirius. "I'll ask James 'bout it."

"'Right," I said, standing up. "I'm gonna go send a letter to Alice. Be right back."

Sirius nodded. "You can borrow Oreo."

I raised an eyebrow. "Who's Oreo?"

Sirius chuckled. "How do you think I sent you letters? It's my owl, idiot."

I clicked my tongue. "Ah. Where's he?"

"She," corrected Sirius. "And she's in our room."

"I've never noticed her, but I'll check," I noted. "Thanks."

I walked upstairs and grabbed a parchment and quill. 

Dear Alice, I wrote.

Hope you're enjoying yourself. If you haven't heard yet, Lily's said Dumbledore's organizing a group to go against You-know-who. Sirius and I have already joined! Speaking of Sirius and I, we've got our own place! We'll be moving in a couple of weeks but I can't wait! How's it going for you? I heard you got a job at the Ministry as an intern Auror. An Auror's a hard and really quite dangerous job. Take care of yourself, Al. Write back as soon as possible. We miss our Alice so much. Happy birthday, by the way! You're 18 now. Love you, Al.

Love, Marlene McKinnon

I folded the letter and looked around for the owl. Seeing a fluttering black and white barn owl, I handed it to her and she fluttered out through the window. 

"I miss my friends," I sighed. 

A/n: hope you guys liked this chapter! Thanks for all the reads! :)

Love, Jui Weasley