“Hey, Moony!” I heard a
voice call out from behind me. I whirled around to see James – I
could never think of him as Prongs – jogging towards me, smiling
widely.

“Yeah?” I answered, my
attention returning slowly to my History of Magic book. James
shrugged casually – or, he tried to. I sensed his pitiful
acting immediately.

“James, don't even try to
act. It sucks.” I said, not looking away from my book. James
ignored me.

“Moony – you won't
believe this,” James started, smiling from ear to ear. I gestured
for him to go on without giving him a glance.

“Well, you know, Lily,
right?” he asked. I looked away from my book to stare at him in
disbelief.

“I've known her since our
first year, you dummy.” I muttered, then went back to my book. God,
James was so annoying. Yet funny, too.

“Well, we were at the
Quidditch match, and she went, and so after the match I went up to
her and – wait, Moony, why weren't you at the match?” James
asked.

“You know why.” I said,
teeth clenched. Why did he have to act so stupid in the middle of the
Great Hall? He knows when the Full Moon is!

James stared at me for a
second, then counted his fingers. “O-oh, sorry, Moony.” he looked
around, then continued with his story. “So, I went up to Lily after
the match, and guess what she said?”

“I have no idea,” I said,
reading my book intently.

“She said I DID A GOOD JOB!
I mean, I know I always do a good job, but -” he stopped abruptly.
Lily had heard James yelling at me from the other end of the
Gyffindor table. She grabbed Rachel's wrist and stomped out of the
Great Hall, Rachel looking dumbfounded. Whatever happiness was inside
me left when I looked at Rachel. I turned away quickly.

“Well, that lasted long,”
I told James. “About 30 minutes, actually. Probably a record.” I
turned back to my book, James looking as crestfallen as ever.

“She smiled at me! And told
me I did a good job! She said she'd never actually seen me play
Quidditch and even though she had no idea what was going on, she
thought I did great!” I nodded boredly.

“Hey, mate, don't get all
worked up about it. Just wait until the next Quidditch match, and
next time, don't scream about it at dinner,” said Sirius, shoveling
his soup into his mouth.

“You know what? I'm not
really hungry anymore.” I stood and walked off to the library,
alone.

There wasn't any empty tables
or chairs. To my despair, Rachel was sitting at the table closest to
the door. She looked up, and seeing that it was me, scrunched her
eyebrows together and turned back to her book. I sighed and walked
out mournfully.

I couldn't concentrate on my
homework. I couldn't concentrate on studies. All I could think about
was how I had embarrassed myself in front of my one and only crush,
Rachel Wagner. How she probably thought I was a freak now. So I just
went to the dormitories.

Obviously, I couldn't sleep.
So I laid there. Cried a little when I thought of what kind of
monster I was.

I barely remember Sirius and
James coming in drunk and hiccuping, hee-hawing about some dare
they'd done. Them waking me up at 11:30 and dragging me to the
Weeping Willow. Coming back more tired than I've ever been. Finally
going to sleep at four in the morning, only to be woken up again to a
day of torture, again.