Every now and then, the Marauders fandom gets upset that James was chosen to be a Head Boy when he wasn’t a Prefect.
But of course he was.
It started in the autumn of his fifth year. The fifteen-year-old marched through the corridors, feeling rather important, a badge pinned to his robes.
Filch caught him within the first five minutes. To be fair, James hadn’t tried to run. (If he had, he would have gotten away). He had no reason to. Still, the caretaker grumbled threats of torture as he dragged the Chaser to Professor McGonagall’s office.
“Pretending to be a Prefect,” Filch snarled.
“I’m not pretending you old—” James eventually broke off as he realized that there was no use shouting at the lump of clay that was the caretaker. And so, he turned to Professor McGonagall and said, “I’m a temporary Prefect for the night.”
“Are you?” she asked, with a flicker of amusement. “I don’t seem to recall appointing you as such.”
“You know, Sirius’ brother told me something interesting the other day,” James said. “Did you know that if you looked at the night sky, you could see a star that represents them both? Isn’t that strange. Look for yourself, Professor.”
And she glanced out the window and saw the stars in question. Right next to the nearly full moon. Her face gave away nothing, but she curtly dismissed the caretaker, who seemed surprised if not furious.
“Surely you want me to stay to deliver the punishment?” Filch asked.
“There will be no punishment,” Professor McGonagall said curtly. “You caught a Prefect out of bed. That’s not exactly against the rules, is it?”
James could have hugged her.
As soon as the caretaker was gone, she pushed the tin of biscuits towards James. It didn’t even need saying at this point. He grinned and took his favorite kind. She always had them.
“I didn’t even think…” she whispered. “It’s not full for another three days.”
“I know,” said James. “But he’s really sick this time.”
“He should have told me,” she said. “I would have given him the time off.”
“Yeah, well,” James shrugged. “You know Remus.”
She smiled; she did indeed.
“Did he brief you on your responsibilities?” the professor asked.
“If by ‘briefed’ you mean ‘went into a three-hour lecture on what I should or should not do’ then yeah.”
“You know that I can’t make this official,” Professor McGonagall said. “People would talk.”
“Nah, I know,” James said.
“You can’t brag about this.”
“I know.”
“You can’t abuse your privileges.”
“I know.”
“Take another biscuit.”
He grinned and did so.
“I believe you have work to do,” she said.
James gave her a mock salute and marched away. He performed Remus’ duties all night, never once abusing the power, knowing that doing so would tarnish Remus’ reputation. He performed them the next two nights as well and told a very skeptical Professor McGonagall that he was sick on the night of the full moon. (”Oh dear,” she said. “I hope your illness stagnates.”)
Truth be told, James was a Prefect almost as much as Remus was.
They were some of the only times in his term at Hogwarts that he solemnly swore that he wasn’t up to no good.
IM MAKING THIS CANON! I declare it canon!!! So be it!!!
how did jk manage to write ootp and not come to the conclusion that the only career w any true meaning for harry james potter was as a goddamn professor at hogwarts like how do u write the da scenes and say “nah he’d want to be a wizard cop”
#but it would be so perfect??? #bc it would help normalize his life so much #like there would just be this generation of kids who are like #‘ugh who cares that he killed the dark lord he gAVE US HOMEWORK OVER BREAK’ #like the beginning of every year there would be the new first years who would freak out a little #but then it would calm down #and most of the students would literally forget #until like clockwork the fifth years would have their history of magic class on the second war #and they’d all show up to DADA looking a little awestruck and everyone would be extra quiet #and harry would give this kind of annoyed sigh—except it’s fake bc he TOTALLY knew this was coming #bc binns is a bro and he totally gives him a heads up every year #and harry wouldn’t have any lesson plans for the day and instead he would just sit at the front of the room and answer everyone’s questions #but otherwise everyone would just be like ‘professor potter!! i can’t get my patronus to work! help me!’ #and like they’d go home at the end of the year or for break and their parents—who ARE still starstruck by harry james potter #would pester their kids with questions#and the kids would just be like ‘merlin i don’t know?? potter’s such a huge dork you should hear him talk about proper wand movements’ #but they would all love him #and he would feel safe and normal and utterly accepted #AND I NEED THIS IN MY LIFE (via @cinematicnomad)
Hermione Granger. Granger danger- and Crookshanks of course. Potter week prompts for “favourite character”. Honestly I think Luna or the twins are my favourite characters, but Hermione is up there. I’ve just already drawn Luna and didn’t have time to draw the twins, so here’s granger instead!
Oliver Wood was probably more excited than anyone else when the news came out that Ginny Weasley and Harry Potter were expecting a baby because DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH QUIDDITCH TALENT THAT CHILD HAS IN ITS GENES
Oliver: so like you’ve got three now, why stop there? I mean just four more and you’ve got yourself a team!
askwhathasthiscometo 