Sign of the Times

three

The next day was Care of Magical Creatures Day, or so that's how the boys advertised it to Remus. It seemed that he no longer recalled the timetables or even what any of the classes were in the first place.

It was a Friday, meaning that they only had three classes, but for longer times, Care of Magical Creatures being one of them. Sirius was a little iffy about bringing Remus, strictly because of all the dangerous creatures their professor brought in to show them. But Remus was excited and there was no way he could say no to that face.

It was sad, really, because he acted like he'd never been to this class before.

On their way across the grounds, little Remus was up ahead, all bundled up, holding James's hand by a finger. He had his little mittens and earmuffs, a coat and a Gryffindor scarf tied around his neck. The rest of them were bundled up too, of course, but not to the extent that Remus was. It was all Sirius's doing. He wanted to make sure Remus was extra warm.

Sirius stayed behind a bit to walk with Lily, for he wanted to talk about Remus. "He can't remember any of his classes?" She questioned. Sirius shook his head, frowning.

"But classes are so important to him!" She exclaimed.

"I know," Sirius answered, digging his fists deeper into his pockets. "And the full moon is in two days."

Lily looked pained. "Do you think he even remembers he's a werewolf? I mean, if we're going off of his five year old memories and mentality merging with and even overtaking that of his seventeen year old self as it seems to be doing, then how do we even know what all he's aware of? Because in that timeline, he'd have only just been turned months ago. He might not even know very well yet. He's too young to know what it all means."

They walked in silence as Sirius digested all that Lily said. "I can't decide if him not knowing is a good thing or a bad thing. On one hand, it's a whole lot more confusion and fear and pain he doesn't understand, but on the other, it's blissful ignorance. Look at him, he's so happy," Sirius said, pointing ahead to where Remus was tugging on James's finger to look at the cloud he was pointing at.

"I dunno, Sirius. We'll just have to figure it out as we go, I suppose."

When they finally reached the area set aside for Care of Magical Creatures class, Remus wandered back over to Sirius, breath fogging in front of him and a shivering mess. Even as a teenager, Remus was always so cold.

So Sirius picked him up and tucked him into his own jacket and sort of bounced him around as they listened to their professor tell about the Billywigs that were flying around the students' heads.

Remus reached for one. "Look! Look! Ooooh it's preeeetttyyyyy."

"No, don't touch that," Sirius reprimanded quickly, spinning Remus away. The last thing he needed was for Remus to get stung by a billywig and levitate away.

Remus pouted, shoulders slouching in disappointment. "But it's pretty," he said sadly.

"I know it's pretty, Rey, but you can't touch it."

Remus didn't want to stand by him anymore after that and instead defected to Lily and James.

"Tough luck, Padfoot," said James as he patted Sirius on the shoulder. "Should've let the tot touch the billywig."

Lily overheard and playfully whacked his arm. "That's a stupid idea and you know it," she scolded, holding Remus's hand.

James just chuckled nervously.

Remus forgot that he didn't like Sirius pretty quickly.

On the way back inside the castle, James and Remus argued back and forth about magical creatures.