"Sorry I'm late, I had to stop by the library." Circe says, running up to the group during lunch. She wraps her arms around Remus' neck, pulling him into a hug from behind- meaning that the back of his head is sitting comfortably in her chest. Whilst this usually would have made him blush, today it doesn't. "Hey pretty boy." The brunette says softly sliding down next to him, not missing the sour expression on his face.
"Hello." He replies halfheartedly, picking at the food on his plate and attempting to ignore the anger bubbling up in his stomach.
James, Sirius and Peter are all avoiding making eye contact with her, whilst Lily is giving the brunette a sad look. "What's going on?" Circe asks the group, noticing the tension, it's so thick that it could be cut by a knife.
"Nothing." Sirius replies quickly- too quickly- from beside her. His eyes are focused on Peter, who is squirming in his seat uncomfortably across from him.
Circe sighs, grabbing Sirius' earlobe harshly, tugging down on it. "Tell me."
"Ow. Ow. Ow." The boy winces as she continues to pull it. She releases him, causing his head to fly back up from the lack of resistance. His hand grazes over the sore spot, rubbing it gently as it slowly turns red. "Bloody hell woman."
"Are you going to tell me what's going on?" Sirius shakes his head, causing her threatening gaze to move over towards Peter, who squeaks as they make eye contact.
Circe lunges across the table but freezes when he holds his hands up in surrender. "Okay, okay." He shouts. "Moony doesn't think you actually like him and he thinks he's too ugly for you."
"Oh." Is the only thing the girl says as she falls back into her seat next to Remus. The boy's face is red as he peers down at her blank face, seeing a million different emotions flicker through her eyes. "I already know that. He's wrong of course. I'm not completely oblivious, I've noticed all the deprecating remarks he makes about himself and I'm working on it."
"He was also jealous of that Ravenclaw guy- what's his face." James adds, causing Lily's hand to slap over his mouth to shut him up.
Circe grins at the raven haired boy, before turning back towards Remus, who is now hiding his face in his hands. He's so embarrassed by what has just been said, and also feeling slightly angry at his friends for ratting him out like that to the girl he so obviously likes. "You were?" She asks happily, so much so that it causes him to snap his eyes over to her. The brightest smile she had ever worn is plastered onto her face as she looks at him excitedly. He doesn't confirm of deny this, only looking at her in shock. "You have nothing to worry about." She says, which doesn't reassure him.
"Remus," the use of his actual name catches him off guard. "I truly believe that you're my soulmate and that we are destined to be together. My only hope is that you realise just how amazing you are, how perfect you are."
He only continues to stare at her in surprise as she continues to talk. "Circe I-"
"And I don't appreciate you talking about my friend like that." James pipes up from across the table, crossing his arms over his chest. "I don't tolerate people talking bad about the people I care about- even if it's themselves."
"Okay." Remus replies quietly.
Circes notices how ill he is looking and scoops up some of the food on his plate with her fork, holding it in front of his mouth. The boy gives her a confused glance before opening his mouth to eat it. "What you doing?" He asks once he's finished chewing.
"What does it look like?" She asks, scooping up some food on the fork and holding it in front of his mouth once more. He gives her a questioning look, hesitating to eat it. "My arms getting tired." Circe jokes, making her hand tremble a little.
Remus, ever so worried for the girl, quickly eats the food. His mind is still reeling from her words as he begins to believe her feelings towards him are actually real, and not just a form of pity she has for him. "I can eat by myself, you know."
"I know." Circe replies, a cheeky smirk on her face as she uses the very same fork that she had used for him for her own food. She takes her time pulling it out of her mouth, putting Remus in a trance as he remembers that is was her fork to begin with. He flushes as he maintains eye contact with her.
Lily laughs at the two's antics, turning to James. "You know if you acted like Ce does with Remus we would have gotten together years ago." Which causes the messy haired boy to blush at her words.
He turns to Circe, who is patting a furiously crimson faced Remus' back in amusement. "Please teach me your ways."
"Not a chance, troll." The Hufflepuff responds with a snort. "You either have a talent for flirting, or you don't."
The ginger girl laughs heartily at her friend's teasing. She likes her boyfriend, she really does, but his flirting had always been terrible- not that she minds now that they're together because she likes him for him, but his horrible flirting with her had delayed them getting together for years. James pouts as Circe and Lily continue to laugh at behaviour.
-
In the evening, Circe once again finds herself sneaking down the school corridors in her animagus form. The boys had offered for her to join them and sneak down to the tree with them under the cloak, but she knows that it is already crowded for space in there and she would rather die than let one of them hold her as a cat. She preferred going by herself anyone, choosing to arrive in the Shrieking Shack after Remus had gone through his transformation rather than before like the other boys did.
The werewolf is already raging around the small house, after the emotional turmoil he had gone through earlier in the day it is completely unsurprising. The dog and the stag are trying to calm Moony down, whilst the rat remains shaking in the corner in fear of being stepped on. Once Circe releases a quiet meow, the werewolf stops in his tracks, his nose twitching as he tries to smell out where the cat is. Shadow begins slinking around the house, staying out of his line of sight as he attempts to find her- find his distraction from harming himself a good thing.
It takes a while but the wolf finally corners her in one of the downstairs room. His scalding hot breath hits Circe, as he lowers himself down to gently rub his head against hers. Shadow purrs happily as he does so and when he lifts his head back up, now towering over the small animal, he looks rather playful- rather than destructive like he had been beforehand. All of the animgus' release a breath of relief as he waits for them to play with him.
However, when Padfoot approaches them his face turns viscous once more. Remus' feelings over protectiveness and jealousy from the morning must have also been transmitted over to the werewolf. He hovers over that cat protectively, daring one of them to try and approach them. Moony had always been a lot more gentle and caring towards Shadow, compared to the rest of them, never really caring for anyone getting to close from her. But tonight he seems to be even more protective of her than he had been the past two nights.
Prongs, Padfoot and Wormtail all retreat to the corner of the room, not wanting to anger the werewolf any further. Once they do so, Moony picks up Shadow by the scruff her neck and into the next room over- not caring for his friends' presence.
He releases her once they are 'safely' in the bedroom and hops onto the worn down bed, curling up into a hall. The cat only looks at the werewolf in amusement, a sort of laugh- if that were possible- escapes her throat when his head props up from its relaxed position and begins searching for her.
The cat runs over from her spot on the floor and hops up onto the bed. She smoothly slides in next him, his body curling up into a foetal position around her. Moony sighs, relaxing as he soon drifts off to sleep, one of his massive paws pressing the cat into his chest.
When Remus wakes up, he panics when he feels the heaviness in his chest- worried about the damage he had done to himself during the night. When he lifts his head up, an amused laughs escapes his throat upon seeing the small black cat curled up on top of him. His friends, who had hardly slept because they were worrying the whole night for both Remus and Circe, hear his laughter from the next room over and come running into the room. "What were you doing in that room?" He asks in a hushed whisper as to not wake up Circe who is happily purring.
"Moony forced us to remain at a distance the whole night." Peter replies, feeling slightly jealous of how much the werewolf had taken to the cat- especially they had spent every full moon with him since the beginning of their fifth year.
"Oh Merlin, did I hurt you?" The sandy haired boy asks in a panic. James shakes his head, which earns a sigh of relief from Remus. "Why isn't she waking up?" The cat, who is now being held tightly in his arms release small, quiet snores as she snuggles into his warm, bare chest.
"She's probably just tired." Sirius laughs as his friends concern for the animagus, who looks at peace in Remus' long arms. "Just give her a little shake, that'll surely wake her up."
The taller boy just shakes his head, not wanting to interrupt her much needed rest and instead motions for them to leave. When Madame Pomfrey comes to take him back to the castle she is confused by the black cat which is snuggled up to the boy but she ultimately doesn't question it. Unable to take her back to her own dorm Remus takes Circe up to his.
He place her in his bed and as he too is feeling rather tired from the long night he snuggles up next to her.
A/n sorry for the small delay but I have been drained from work. I had tried to start writing a few times but ended up struggling, and I still kind of dislike this