TW: Implications of Abuse
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Remus stiffened and flinched at what his roommate had said. Then he realized Sirius had been watching him, first amused and now intently.
"What's wrong? What did I say? Does that remind you of your father? Geez, I'm a twat. I'll only call you Remus from now on, alright?" Sirius fretted looking upset.
"Sirius, I...you're wrong." Remus stammered unsure how to take back the casual friendly atmosphere that had appeared between him and his roommate.
Sirius grinned, perhaps thinking they were getting into another round of banter.
"I am never wrong, good sir!" The young Black bellowed pointing upward in a defiant posture.
"Sirius, I'm serious." Remus began feeling dread rise up in him. How had he let himself be so stupid?
"No, I'm Sirius!" The young Black beamed in response, looking drastically different from earlier. Remus truly wanted to keep it that way, but he could not be Sirius' friend. He couldn't keep doing this. Remus gave his roommate a weak smile, unsure what to do.
"You're never serious. Your name should be Prankster instead."
Sirius sighed with mock heaviness.
"A wasted opportunity on my parents' part, if you ask me."
"But I think we should go. The sixth years have a get-together here in about ten minutes," Remus spoke up as casually as he could manage. He hoped that using the pretend group would lead to them going back to the Gryffindor common room, where Sirius would forget all about Remus once the young Black was back in the vicinity of James Potter.
"They do?" Sirius asked, sounding curious.
"Yes." It was a lie, but it was the only way Remus could think of bringing this to an end. Well, the only way without admitting to his father's harsh physical discipline, which he wanted Sirius to forget about completely.
"Oooo, cool. Let's stay and figure out what it's about!"
Remus should have realized Sirius would take this as an adventure. Instead of deterring the boy, he had ended up encouraging him!
"I'm afraid it's something dreadfully boring. It's a wizard chess club, you see."
"Chess isn't boring." Sirius pouted.
Remus was startled by this. He liked chess, but he honestly couldn't picture Sirius sitting still long enough to make it through a game, let alone enjoy it.
"Oh, my bad, it was a book club."
Sirius grinned.
"Books aren't necessarily boring either."
"Sirius, you hate to read." Remus pointed out beginning to grow exasperated.
"That's because Hogwarts doesn't have the right kind of books. If you know what I mean." The young Black wiggled his eyebrows like this was supposed to mean something. But Remus didn't get what his roommate meant and he was beginning to panic since Sirius still wasn't leaving.
"It's an herbology book club."
"Oh well, that is boring."
Remus relaxed as he had finally succeeded. Then Sirius' eyes filled with excitement and Remus realized he had just somehow made things worse, again.
"Unless it's a front!"
"It's not a front." Remus groaned.
"It's totally a front!"
"Well, you have fun with that," Remus muttered, losing all patience with his barmy roommate.
He got up to leave, but Sirius blocked him giving him a pleading look. The complete 360 from Sirius' treatment of him earlier in the day was dizzying. If Remus was being honest, he liked it, being friendly. He could even imagine himself being friends with Sirius. It could be fun, much better than what he had been doing. Remus shook his head violently and Sirius gave him a weird look, probably thinking he was the crazy one.
"But you have to stay! I need a wingman!" Sirius whined.
"Then ask James."
"Not enough time." Sirius looked thoughtful. "Besides, this is our thing. That's kind of the point, in'it?"
"I may have gotten the time wrong, you probably do have time," Remus attempted, his voice starting to shake a little. Sirius narrowed his eyes further, clearly pondering something.
"I'm starting to think there is no club."
"There isn't." It was such a relief to destroy the 'adventure' that Remus didn't think about the consequences and problems admitting the truth would cause.
Sirius didn't get angry he just looked confused and perhaps a bit hurt.
"Why did you lie?"
"I just..."
"Come on mate, you can study later. Sal...Godric knows you do enough of it."
"That's not it," Remus pleaded, his eyes filling with tears. Why was this so hard? He shouldn't care so much about being friends with Sirius, he shouldn't want it. Because Remus did want friends. He wanted it so bad it hurt.
"Remus, what's wrong? Did I say something dumb again? I know you didn't talk about your dad a lot. Jokes aside, I really can be serious. You can talk if you want. I feel a bit better...you know after telling you...I've never told anyone else. You're the first." Sirius pointed out. There was a sort of awkward appreciation and genuine warmth in his roommate's voice that caused Remus' chest to get all tight.
"I can't be friends with you!" Remus blurted, realizing he sounded and looked panicked.
"Can't?" asked Sirius suspiciously.
"Won't! I mean... I don't want to. It's not that I can't. I just don't want to!" Remus stammered desperately.
"Yes, you do!" Sirius looked upset now, comprehension beginning to dawn on him. "This is because of your father, right? He said you can't have friends? My parents sort of said the same thing. Well, they said I could only have the 'right type of friends.' But it's close enough. Just ignore them, that's what I do."
It was said so convincingly that Remus actually considered it.
'You are the only thing in the way of making friends,' was what Dumbledore had said. So what would happen if he let himself? Could it really be so bad? Remus paused, then shook his head again. What was he thinking? Sirius wasn't a monster who could tear his friends to shreds, so it was completely different for him.
"Well regardless of if you 'want' to be my friend or not, I want to be yours, and I won't take no for an answer." Sirius grinned, still finding this all so stupidly simple.
"Sirius..." Remus pleaded, his voice cracking as a few tears ran down his cheeks. Sirius looked startled by how distressed Remus was over this.
"We are friends. That's final." Sirius insisted, not letting up, which Remus was unsure how to feel about.
"You don't understand," Remus whispered and buried his face in his hands ashamed to be crying, even a little bit, in front of anyone. There was a long silence in which Remus resisted the urge to peak at Sirius. More time passed without any sound from the usually rowdy boy. Finally, positive Sirius must have left, Remus looked up. What greeted him wasn't an empty room but a concerned Sirius bouncing on his feet doing his very best to patiently wait. His roommate stopped fidgeting when he realized Remus had finally looked up.
"Then explain it to me." Sirius urged sincerely.
Remus was shocked by how much Sirius cared. It was very strange to him that someone who had made him miserable was now so invested in his well-being.
"Why do you care so much?" Remus dared to ask; part of him just hoping to distract Sirius, the other part wanting to know. He expected Sirius to be surprised, but instead, the boy looked like he was expecting this. Either that, or when Sirius chose to use his poker face it was impressive.
"Because, before I thought you were someone you aren't and...that was wrong of me. I'm...s...I'm sorry." Sirius sounded pained, like he physically had to wrench out the apology.
"It's alright." Remus caught Sirius' stern look and frowned. "Well, it wasn't but it is now. And I...I understood why you were so upset. Well not at first, but once you showed me the letters. I just...you weren't wrong about me...I mean you were wrong that I did that but...it would be best if you stayed away from me."
Sirius crossed his arms with an extremely defiant look which was the only answer Remus received. Feeling heavy, Remus got up and went to the door hoping Sirius would let him leave.
"No matter what you say I'm going to be your friend and I'm going to convince you to be my friend too. Just you wait, Remus Lupin, I don't back down from challenges!" Sirius shouted after him and Remus broke into a run wishing all of that had never happened. He hadn't realized that he had run outside until a strong gust of wind knocked him back.
Remus moved almost in a trance, the nearly full moon taunting him high above. Then before he knew it he was standing a little ways away, staring at the Whomping Willow with apprehension. The old gnarled tree seemed to twist in on itself. Its thick bent truck gave the incorrect idea that the deciduous plant was fragile. Too soon. Remus wondered if it would be worse than his tiny little shack at home. He knew it would be drastically bigger than what he was used to. But what if that made it worse? Remus stood there under the moonlight, feeling sick as he dared to look up at the hypnotic moon.
Deep within him, deep where he didn't like to dwell he could feel the wolf howling at him. Both the wolf and moon seemed to be saying it was almost time. Remus felt his knees finally give out as they had been wanting to all day. He sunk down to the ground and gripped the cold ground with his fingers, trying to grip the earth as if that could stop the inevitable from happening two nights from tonight.
Remus sat there, his hands covered in dirt for a while. However, without his wool robe, he had to go back inside pretty quickly. He thought about going to the common room, but decided to go to the library and study instead. So Remus spent the last hour before curfew studying with more focus than he had been able to in weeks. He was content to stay in the library as long as rule-abidingly possible and wished he could have stayed longer. He knew Dumbledore would have talked to McGonagall, who would have relayed to all the Gryffindor's about the true culprit of the letters. Which meant his fellow Gryffindor knew he was innocent now.
Remus thought that would be a good thing, but when he finally slipped into the common room right at 10 p.m., he found it wasn't. Older Gryffindor's whose names Remus barely recalled kept seeking him out and trying to talk to him to get more details about what had happened to him. Apparently, most of the older Gryffindors had not yet had any idea of the letter drama until their head of house had told them. Remus was already feeling overwhelmed and all he wanted was to go to bed. Struggling to politely excuse himself, Remus was finally able to get away from the multitude of people and make his way to his dorm. It had taken longer than Remus would have expected to get the older students to give up on getting details from him and he really hoped this was only a one-time occurrence. As Remus made his way to his dorm he was dreading but expecting his three roommates to be waiting for him. Upon entering the room though, Remus discovered that the only one awake, or at least not pretending to be asleep, was Sirius. The young Black looked up and waved, beckoning him over. Remus feigned not seeing this, though it was obvious he had, and curled into his bed instead. He lay there for a few minutes before trying not to groan as he collected his PJs and attempted to go shower.
"You know you can change out here right?" Sirius casually pointed out sounding oddly chipper. The confusing boy was either unoffended by Remus ignoring him a few minutes earlier or not showing it.
"I haven't been able to shower in a while," Remus whispered as gently as he could, not wanting to wake up the others though he very much doubted they were actually asleep. Sirius seemed unbothered by the reference to the cruel pranks he had carried out. His roommate simply shrugged, mumbling "suit yourself." Taking this as being excused Remus hurried to the bathroom. Once there he spent a long time getting ready and was rewarded by all of his roommates being asleep when he entered the dorm room again. He knew James and Peter had actually been awake because he had heard them talking in a failed attempt to keep their voices low before Remus had turned on the shower.
He struggled to make his way back to his bed wondering if it had been passive-aggressive or just thoughtless on Sirius' part to not leave the candle lit for him. But he eventually managed and toppled into his bed with a heavy sigh. It felt so good to be sleeping in his bed without worrying about what pranks would greet him in the morning. He let that relief lull him quickly to sleep.
Unfortunately, morning came too soon. Remus had spent a majority of the night tossing and turning, then pacing off the dredges of his latest nightmare. Luckily, as far as Remus knew he hadn't woken any of his roommates up with his tossing and pacing. Still, it was rare that Remus wasn't the first one up. He groaned when Sirius pulled back his curtains and sang "Morning Sleeping Beauty" loudly.
"Few more minutes," he grumbled, yanking the pillow over his head.
This just caused Sirius to laugh and to flounce around. Apparently, it wasn't just Remus being tired and grumpy. Sirius was annoying James and Peter with his weirdly good mood, as evident by the waking boys' groans. Finally realizing sleep was a lost cause with Sirius now singing 'Here Comes the Sun' at the top of his lungs, Remus sat up.
"What even are you singing, mate?" James asked, finally succumbing to his curiosity and giving Sirius the attention that would probably end up fuelling his singing until they reached the Great Hall.
"Why James, how can you not know the Beatles? They are muggle magic, mate! Listen!"
Sirius' singing continued as he launched into several Beatle songs. Luckily, the singing was bearable once Sirius was actually trying and not just attempting to irk his roommates. Remus even found himself enjoying Sirius' awkward edition of "Don't Let Me Down." Remus found himself torn between nostalgia and sadness since his mum had often sung Beatle songs to him. She had been a huge fan. Remus reckoned he knew all the words to all their songs, but couldn't tell Sirius that. it would only further fuel the boy's desire to be friends.
Peter and James were both purebloods, and clearly had never heard the songs Sirius was singing. Only Sirius was also a pureblood. But Remus had recently decided that Sirius was a strange person even by pureblood standards. Sirius jumped around the room now singing "Two of Us." Even though their other roommates had never heard The Beatles before they both seemed to tolerate it. Peter had even taken to clapping after Sirius finished each song while James just groaned obnoxiously loud. Still, James would grin when the off-key boy began the next song.
Remus got ready behind his curtains, nearly panicking at the possibility the hyper Sirius might rip back the curtain and expose him and all his scars. As he was getting dressed, Sirius was exaggerating his disappointment in James, who had said the music was nothing special and dubbing an ecstatic Peter as his new best friend, who confessed he quite liked it.
"What say you, Remus?" Sirius asked eagerly, as he did in fact rip open the curtain. Luckily Remus was fast at changing, so he was completely ready for the day by the time his hyper roommate had reached his bed.
"They are alright," Remus said carefully, forcing himself to sound indifferent. He felt bad as his uncaring about The Beatles would have deeply appalled his mother.
"Not you too, mate! I thought you were muggle-born?" Sirius asked while shaking his head in disappointment.
Remus ignored the subtle attempt to learn more about his family and looked past Sirius, giving Peter an innocent look.
"I'm surprised you aren't in the Great Hall yet, it's already 7:35," Remus pointed out, knowing mention of breakfast would be the easiest way to end the conversation and Sirius' bloody prying!
"Blimey, your right. Come on, we need to get to breakfast!" Peter declared with almost comedic eagerness. Of course, James was nearly as eager which made Remus' plan a success.
"Come on Sirius, we can argue over weird old bands later if you fancy. But I'm hungry."
"Coming," Sirius called happily, leaving Remus to truly believe he had won this round.
Remus bent to pick his bag up while he thought Sirius went to his own bed to do the same. Instead, when Remus straightened he found himself nearly nose to nose with the determined and triumphant looking boy. Remus let out a surprised shout at his rude friend's lack of personal space and tumbled back onto his bed.
"I have you pegged, Remus Lupin. You just remember that next time you purposely change the topic. You can't slip anything past me!" Sirius boasted and then rushed to follow James and Peter out the door.
When Remus' heart stopped hammering in surprise he got up and followed after them. He wasn't sure how he felt about Sirius' interest in him. He convinced himself that he preferred James and Peter's friendly indifference most of the time. But Remus knew he'd be lying if he said it didn't hurt a smidgen that his roommates had left him behind.
Apparently, his roommates didn't get far though, as some older students late to leave for breakfast had cornered the boys who all seemed to take great stride in re-accounting the drama that occurred with the letters. Sirius seemed to be just as excited, but Remus noticed his fists were tight and his smile seemed just a little forced if one really stopped to notice. Remus quickly turned away as he did not want to be caught staring at Sirius a second time.
Instead, Remus took the opportunity to make it to the Great Hall without his roommates, which was a mistake. He too was bombarded once more by older Gryffindors who wanted to know what had happened. He was also ganged up on by several first years and a few second years who knew what had happened and wanted to check in on his well-being. Remus knew that they just felt guilty about suspecting him though. All of the attention made it hard to eat and later study as the pestering followed him throughout the day. So many people wanted to know what had happened that Remus was beginning to get very irritated by it.
It didn't help that the full moon was tomorrow night and the stress of it was making him restless and short-tempered. To make matters worse, Remus thought that he had gotten used to his Defense Against the Dark Arts professor slandering dark creatures whenever the students got him on the topic, but he hadn't. He found himself particularly sensitive this close to the full moon and each statement, whether it was about werewolves or not, felt like a knife in his back.
Remus' normally neat notes were angry scrawls across the parchment, and there were several tears in the page. Luckily, Remus had learned his lesson about DADA and now sat in the second row during class which meant his inner turmoil had gone unnoticed. In fact, Remus found that he prided himself on making it through the class without losing his mind. Remus thought he had handled his earlier classes well as well and was certain he would continue to do so. But then came Potions.
Potions on Monday was just a typical 45-minute class where they didn't really do much besides discuss properties. Only during double potions did they have time to actually brew. But apparently, whether they were working with the cauldrons or not, the stench of the classroom was unbearable so close to the full moon.
Remus spent the first part of the class feigning coughing, so that it wouldn't look off that he had covered his nose and mouth with his long sleeves. Despite feeling self-conscious about it, inhaling through the fabric of his sleeves helped. Prior to Potions, Remus' roommates had left him alone throughout the day. While Remus had easily avoided his roommates all day he was now stuck at a desk with Peter. Now that Peter was 'allowed' to talk to Remus, he seemed eager to do so. This meant that not only did Remus have to try to focus on what was being taught while his head pounded with the effects of Aconite, but also while dealing with Peter's currently grating voice.
All Remus could comprehend from Peter's story was something about Sirius and James breaking into the broom closet and flying the brooms when they technically weren't supposed to. To make matters worse Peter's storytelling was helped along occasionally by James or Sirius shouting from their cauldron next to them on Peter's side. On a normal day, Remus would have either politely listened or secretly found the whole adventure quite amusing. But today wasn't a normal day.
"And then we almost got caught you know but..." Peter's voice got even higher pitched and more irritating as he giggled with uncontained boyish excitement. "But James and Sirius were bloody brilliant and told the Hufflepuff prefect that they were under strict orders to catch me up on flying since I'm so hopeless... Oh, Remus, you should have seen it; they were so convincing even a prefect believed them. I reckon there's nothing those two can't do. Oh, I'm so glad we are all friends now!"
It took every ounce of Remus' years of painstakingly built-up self-restraint and patience not to scream in Peter's face. Instead, Remus gripped his quill very tightly and spoke through clenched teeth, every word jarring his throbbing head.
"Later, Peter. I'm trying to focus."
"On what?" Peter asked oblivious to the annoyance he was causing Remus.
"Obviously, on our class. Maybe if you focused your grades would be better!" Remus snapped.
Immediately he felt dreadful. That must have been the harshest thing Remus had ever said to anyone. Sure, Remus had mean thoughts all the time, but he usually never had the opportunity or boldness to speak them. However, Peter didn't seem offended. Instead, Peter shrugged, shaking it off as a friendly jibe, and grinned.
"Well, James lets me look off his homework. Plus, you know the class is almost over, Slughorn is just passing around a laughing potion. See? He's over there by...blimey, Snivellus looks even uglier when he laughs," Peter scoffed now sounding more like James who took every opportunity to insult Severus. It was true Severus looked rather unpleasant laughing, though Remus reckoned it was probably because the boy was clearly trying so hard not to.
However, no one could stop themselves against the perfectly conducted potion Slughorn had made and Lily who was next erupted into high-pitched giggles her cheeks flushed with delight. Remus realized she hadn't talked to him yet, she might have even been avoiding him. But he didn't have time to dwell on this. While everyone was distracted by the always pretty Lily Evans, he grabbed his bag and dashed for the door.