Chapter Text
Peter had been searching for a signature cologne for almost a year, and so far, he had been quite unsuccessful. Until one day, he smelled it. It was only for a moment, but that was all the time he needed to know that that needed to be his scent. He didn’t know who or what it came from, but now that he smelled it once, he would be able to recognize it anywhere.
He couldn’t stop thinking about the cologne all day, and all night, which only brought more frustration. He could imagine an exact replica of the scent, yet he couldn’t find it throughout the castle again. He could ask a fellow marauder, or one of the girls, but what would he say? Say that he found a cologne that he couldn’t describe? He didn’t really have any faith that he could describe it well enough, or that any of them had a good sense of smell, except for Remus. Tomorrow, Peter will start recruiting people for Project Find That Cologne.
……………….
The next day, Peter asked Remus about his cologne situation before breakfast.
“Remus?” Peter asked politely, “how good is your nose?” Remus replied with a blank stare, making it obvious that he had woken up maybe 5 minutes ago.
“Peter, it is WAY too early for this, just tell me what you need,” Remus answered. He did have a point, though, it was only 7:30, and they both had been woken up at 5, while James “quietly” got ready for his Quidditch training, so it would make sense why he would be tired, especially considering the full moon is coming up soon.
“Well, um, so you know how I’ve been searching for a cologne for a while?” Peter said, nervously.
“Yeah, you won’t shut up about how you can’t find one,” Remus teased.
“Rude,” Peter replied, “but you might have your chance for me to shut up,” Peter watched as Remus’ face lit up.
“So you mean you might finally talk about something else?! Like literally anything!?” Remus exclaimed, “what do I have to do to help?”
“Well, you see, I haven’t exactly found it yet,” Peter replied. He saw the happiness on Remus’ face vanish as quickly as it had appeared, leaving him back in his original, sleep-deprived state.
“Aw, man, you got me so excited, and you haven’t even found it yet,” Remus said, walking away.
“Wait, Remus,” Peter called, “I smelled exactly what I need in the hallway, if you could help me find who has it, and get them to tell you what cologne they wear, then I can finally be ‘interesting,’” Peter says, half jokingly. He knows that most of his topics of discussion are cologne-related, but that's what most of his thoughts were as well, so it’s not like he could think of anything interesting to say.
“Peter, of course I’ll help you look for it,” Remus replied, “but what does it smell like? This was the part Peter was dreading. He doesn’t know how to describe the exact smell to Remus, but he did say he would try to help him find it.
“Well, um, I guess if I had to describe it, but, um, it smells sort of, like, woodsy, I guess? And it also, um, smells like, cinnamony, and maybe a little appley? I don’t know, that’s the best I can do,” Peter says, “Sorry, I can’t explain it well,”
“That’s fine,” Remus replied, “I can do my best to help you, and your description wasn’t actually that bad, consider the whole werewolf thing helps me pick out things like that,”
“If you think you find the person, you can just find out their name, I can ask for the cologne,” Peter said.
“M’kay, I can try,” Remus says, “but I’m mainly helping just so you will FINALLY stop talking about it,”
“That’s fair,” Peter says with a grin.
…………………
After he asked Remus, he also asked James, Sirius, Marlene, Lily, and Mary. Now that he had 6 additional people to help his cologne-finding mission, he felt hopeful that he would finally find it. To be honest, he wasn’t very confident in the cologne-smelling abilities of most of the people he asked, except Mary would be stopping at nothing to help Peter.
“I know how hard it is to find a signature scent,” Mary said, “it’s one of the things that’s unknowingly difficult, y’know?”
“I never thought that I would struggle so much with finding a cologne, I mean, I always just use the ones my parents would get me, but they never really smelled like me, y’know?” Peter admitted.
“I KNOW right!?! I’m SO glad that you trust me to help find this cologne for you,” Mary said excitedly.
“Thanks for helping me! I believe in you! I bet you have some secret talent that helps you find stuff, I swear, everytime someone loses something, it’s always you who finds it,” Peter says.
……….
Peter lived the rest of the week rigorously searching for this mysterious cologne-wearer, hoping that just this one time, he will get lucky and find it. And he had spent the whole week disappointed at the fact that he couldn’t find it. But then, like an angel, he saw Mary hurrying over, bringing good news of the cologne.
“Peter!” Mary hissed, “Peter, I think I found him!”
“Seriously!” Peter exclaimed, jumping up from his seat, “who is he?”
“I didn’t get his name, but he has blonde hair, blue eyes, and he’s about mid-height. I think he’s a Ravenclaw, but I could be wrong,” Mary said, “He’s in the library right now, I can show you who I think is the owner of the cologne you need.”
“Thank you so much! Can you show me now?” Peter asked.
“Of course! Let’s go!” Mary exclaimed.
Peter rushed to the library with Mary by his side, showing him to the corner of the library the boy was in. Peter went behind the mysterious boy to pretend to search for a book, and it hit him. The scent. It was the cologne he needed, and now, the information was within his grasp. For a few minutes, Peter just stood, still pretending to search, waiting for the correct time to ask about his cologne.
When Peter felt the time was right, he tapped the boy on his shoulder,
“Hey, what’s your name?” Peter asked, feeling a strange amount of confidence.
“Oh, um, my name is Gilderoy,” he said, confused, “Why do you need to know my name?”
“Sorry Gilderoy, but what kind of cologne do you wear?” Peter asked curiously.
“Oh, I don’t know, my mom gets it for me,” the boy responded.
“Okay, but, like, what does the bottle look like?” Peter questioned.
“I seriously have no idea, my mom gets it for me,” Gilderoy repeated.
“But do you know what shape the bottle is at least?” Peter interrogated.
“I have no idea,” Gilderoy said once more.
“Do you know the color of the box?” Peter asked
“No, can you stop asking about my cologne?” Gilderoy asked.
“Okay, Okay,” Peter said, “now that we're past the cologne, what shops does your mom go to normally?”
“This is clearly still about my cologne,” Gilderoy said.
“No, I’m simply curious about the whereabouts of your mother, that’s all,” Peter lied.
“Sure you are,” Gilderoy said, before falling silent.
“Gil, what color is the cologne?” Peter said.
“I don’t know, and don’t call me Gil,” he replied.
“Ok, sorry, but when di-”
“If you don’t stop asking me, I will get you kicked out of the library,” Gilderoy snapped. After this light threat, Peter walked up to Gilderoy and whispered,
“But, come on, where did you get it?”
Gilderoy stood up and walked towards the front desk of the library, and fell into a conversation with the librarian, appearing quite annoyed. They both came back to where Peter was standing, where the librarian told Peter that he needed to leave the library, as he was causing “too much of a distraction to the people who need the quiet.” If you can’t study with a little bit of pestering about where you get your cologne, you don’t deserve to study. And if Gilderoy had just told him the name of his cologne, he wouldn’t be in this position to begin with.
This whole ordeal led Peter walking back to the common room, knowing one thing: He will stop at nothing to learn the name of the cologne of this mysterious “Gilderoy.” And when he says he will stop at nothing, he means nothing.