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Sharing a Room With Vernon


The cottage was small and grey and on the ocean. There were three bedrooms, each with two beds, and Mrs. Evans had Sirius put Petuna and Lily’s suitcases in one room, hers in another, and he dropped his own bag on one of the beds in the third - this meant that the girls would be sharing and so would Sirius and Vernon Dursley. Sirius wasn’t sure how he felt about sharing a room with Vernon Dursley, but he supposed it would be alright - after all, it wasn’t as though Vernon could be any more messy or loud than he was used to with the Marauders’ dormitory, yeah? So he stood beside the bed in the room and overturned his bag of things onto the bed.

There wasn’t much in there. Hadn’t packed much. Then again, Sirius Black didn’t have much to pack. There were a new pair of pyjamas (Mrs. Potter had given Sirius new ones and thrown his old ones away when she saw how short they were on him), and a new pair of swimming shorts (another gift from Mrs. Potter when she learned Sirius was going to the sea on the little holiday he was taking), a couple band t-shirts, and a few t-shirts that Sirius had fashioned himself from blank colourful t-shirts where he’d magicked words upon the fabric… He had a hat, a bottle of potion to keep from burning under the sun, the Polaroid camera, the two-way mirror, his little knife, a magazine James had given him about music and punk rock bands, and a tape with a sample song by a new band called The Ramones that had come with the magazine because the band was featured on the cover. He also had a picture of Remus.

Oh and Snuffles’s collar.

Sirius shrugged off his leather jacket and hung it over the foot of the bed, withdrawing his wand from the jacket’s pocket and putting it down on the mattress as he kicked his boots off. He quickly put his clothes into the drawer of the dresser and put the rest of his stuff on the night stand by his bed and was just sitting down with the magazine to wait for Lily to finish unpacking her things when Vernon Dursley came into the room, carrying a thick suitcase and putting it down on the bed. Sirius looked up.

“Hullo,” Sirius said, friendly. Vernon Dursley looked at him, nodded without actually speaking, and opened his suitcase, which was bursting full of stuff. Sirius looked over, “Wow you packed a lot of stuff for a week.”

“It’s always best to be prepared,” Vernon replied, and he started tucking all the clothes he had brought along into a drawer in the dresser as well. He had suit jackets and ties and nice shirts and shirts to wear under the nice shirts and three pairs of swim shorts and two pairs of pyjamas and multiple pairs of shoes, even, and Sirius thought that this boy had managed to pack more than he even owned.

Sirius asked, “Do you and Petunia go to school together?”

“No. I went to Smeltings. Graduated two years ago now,” Vernon replied, “I work for my father at --”

“Grunnings, yes, you mentioned,” Sirius said. Vernon looked annoyed that Sirius had interrupted him. But Sirius continued, “And you date Petunia?”

“Yes,” Vernon replied. “We are going out.”

“That’s nice,” Sirius said. “How did you meet?”

“A dance,” Vernon answered.

“Oh cool,” Sirius grinned, “So you enjoy dancing then?”

“No,” Vernon replied.

Sirius stared at Vernon for a long moment, waiting for him to go on, but he didn’t. Finally, Sirius said, “I love dancing.”

Vernon Dursley didn’t reply.

Sirius continued, “I could dance all night. Especially after a couple glasses of firewhiskey.”

“Of what now?” Vernon looked up.

“Firewhiskey?” Sirius said. A sudden thought occurred to him. Did muggles have firewhiskey?

Vernon paused. “Alcohol?”

“Yeah,” Sirius nodded.

“I don’t drink alcohol,” Vernon said, “You’re under age you know.”

Sirius shrugged, “That’s never stopped anyone before.”

Vernon muttered something under his breath and Sirius shifted uncomfortably because it had sounded like a dig at him, whatever it had been, and he really wanted to get along with this bloke, seeing as he was to be sharing the room with him for a week… He ran his hands over the black and white inked pages of the magazine on the bed before him, trying to think of something else to say to Vernon, but nothing came to mind, so finally Sirius just turned his focus onto the magazine completely and waited for Lily to come fetch him.

“Pssssssst… Sirius… hey Sirius… can you talk?”

Sirius looked ‘round at the two-way mirror on his night stand and saw James Potter’ face reflected in the glass.

Across the room, Vernon was looking around for the source of the whispered voice he could’ve sworn he’d just heard, and Sirius grabbed up the mirror quickly, turning it so Vernon couldn’t see it, sliding off the bed and announced, “Gotta go to the loo!” He grabbed his wand and headed out the door as Vernon muttered under his breath again - something that sounded a bit like do you expect a badge for it? Sirius ducked out of the room. James stared up at him patiently from the glass as Sirius carried the mirror down the hall and into the bathroom. “Muffliato,” he said with a flick of his wand.

“Was that Petunia’s rhinoceros?” James asked.

“Yes and bloody hell does that bloke suck the fun out of life!” Sirius replied, “Except he has a ruddy brilliant car. You should see it, James. I want it.”

James laughed. “You wouldn’t know what to do with a muggle car even if you had one.”

“I could magic it to fly.”

“That’s illegal, mate.”

“Only if you get caught.”

James laughed, “Bit hard flying it about without getting caught, though, isn’t it?”

“I s’pose.”

James said, “So you made it to the sea, that’s cool. How is Evans?”

“Good. Mrs. E is really nice. She made sandwiches with roast. Not as good as your mum’s, of course, your mum is the Queen of the Roast, but fairly decent. And it had pickles on it, too.”

James made a face. “I hate pickles.”

“Well these were very good pickles,” Sirius replied.

“All pickles are bad pickles, Sirius. It’s part of their inherent picklehood,” James replied. He paused, then, “Has Lily said when I could come visit yet?”

“No,” Sirius replied.

James looked disappointed.

“I’ll let you know when she does.”

“Alright.” James sighed. Then, “I got an owl from Remus right after you left. He’s made it to Veigler’s castle alright. He says the castle’s in need of a lot of repairs but they’ll do alright and he’ll send us photographs. He said to tell you have fun at the sea and to remember you promised a postcard.”

Sirius nodded slowly.

James sighed, “Anyway, I won’t keep on bothering you or anything. Mum just had told me to check you got to the sea okay. She was worried about the muggle car. She thinks muggle car accidents are more common than they are, kept worrying you’d blown up or something. So I better go tell her to relax.”

Sirius smiled, “Tell her I said that Mrs. E drove verys safely and the muggle car ride was brilliant.”

“I will. Bye Padfoot.”

“Bye Prongs.”

Sirius tucked the mirror into his pocket and looked around the little bathroom, then washed his hands with soap that smelled like coconuts and limes and he pressed his palms to his face when he was finished, smelling how lovely they were, and walked back down the hallway. He ran into Lily Evans and she raised an eyebrow as he smelled his palms. “What are you doing?” she asked him, laughing.

Sirius held out his palm, “Smell my hands, aren’t they delightful?”

Lily laughed and smelled them, “Fancy soap?”

“Fancier than any soap the scourgify produces,” he said.

Lily smiled, then said, “Anyways, I was just coming to get you. Mum found there are some bicycles in the car port, do you fancy going down to the boardwalk and seeing what’s there? It’s not far, she says. There was a little map on the counter in the kitchen.”

Sirius said, “A bicycle? I don’t know how to ride a bicycle.”

“It’s easy, I’ll show you.”

“Alright then,” Sirius replied, and Lily smiled and they stopped into the bedroom he was sharing with Vernon so he could put on his boots and Lily waved at Vernon and he nodded silently back, still unpacking his stuff. He’d covered the top of the dresser with things and still had more things to go. Sirius kicked on his boots and slung the strap for the Polaroid camera around his neck. Lily waved goodbye to Vernon, who nodded again, and they were out the door and running ‘round to the carport.

There was quite a lot of things in the port - including firewod, though it was no where near cold enough to justify needing a fire. There were two bicycles, sure enough, one was red and one was yellow and Lily took the yellow one, which Sirius was glad for - he liked red way more - and they rolled hem into the paved driveway. Lily said, “Bicycles are a lot like motorbikes, except they need to be pedaled.” She climbed onto her bike, using her tiptoes to keep it steady.

Sirius did the same, and he gripped the handlebars tightly,

“Alright so basically, you push yourself off and it’s a bit wobbly at first, keeping your balance, but you’ll get the hang on it. Then you put your feet on the pedals and you push. They sort of go in a circle, see ‘cos you’re basically spinning the wheel with your feet. But the brakes are both up here, you squeeze this silver handle thing here and that’ll make you slow down or stop.”

Sirius murmured all the things she’d just told him, “Alright,” he said.

‘Ready to give it a go?” Lily asked.

He nodded.

“Alright, let’s go then!” Lily pushed away, putting her feet smoothly onto the pedals as she went, circling back at the end of the car park to loop back and check how Sirius was doing.

Sirius was just pushing off and his bike wobbled a bit. He was reminded of the motorbike in the hallway that very first time that he and James had driven it and how Filch’s face looked - all perplexed and flabbergasted. He laughed and put his feet on the pedals, but he couldn’t find them, so he looked down at where his feet were and managed to turn the bike, hit the stones that lined the driveway and tumbled onto the grass.

“Are you alright?” Lily asked, pedaling over to Sirius.

“I’m alright,” he answered, standing up and dusting off, “Reckon I need practice.”

Lily laughed, “Don’t worry, you got further than I got the first time I rode a bike,” she answered. “Of course, I was also like five.”

Sirius upended the bike and climbed onto it again, “Doing this? At five years old? I knew you were a bloody genius.” Sirius winked.

It took a few more tries but soon enough Sirius Black had figured out how to ride the bicycle and they set off down the road, Lily clutching the map from the kitchen counter in one fist, the ocean roaring to their left, the breeze whistling through tall yellowing grasses over high sand dunes to the right, and Sirius breathed in the salty air.

“Evans,” he said.

“Sirius?”

“I need to b uy a postcard, it’s very important.”

“Alright, I’m sure there’ll be postcards at the boardwalk in one of the little shops.” Lily answered.

Sirius smiled, “Excellent.” He paused, pumping his legs so they were riding side-by-side and he said, “You’ll need ot take a photograph of me doing this, too, just so you know.”

Lily laughed, “I will.”