The day of the full moon was always difficult for Remus Lupin. His body had a constant dull aching, and he felt feverish and irritable. It was almost impossible to concentrate on lessons, and in a cruel twist of fate, his last lesson of the day was History of Magic with Professor Binns. The ghost had droned on in his usual monotone for fifty-six minutes not noticing that two thirds of the class were asleep.
Remus had managed to stay awake, but hadn't paid a single bit of notice to the goblin rebellion lecture. He had watched Prongs and Lily scrawling notes to one another, passing parchment back and forth unconcerned about the professor just a few feet away from them. He watched Wormtail scribble furiously for the first fourteen minutes of the class, desperately trying to keep up and eventually getting lost in a long list of ridiculous goblin names. Mostly he watched Sirius, who drew pictures of racing brooms on parchment never intended for taking notes. Every now and again the shaggy-haired boy would look up at Remus and wink, or roll his eyes, and occasionally he would scribble things like 'Do you reckon if Professor Binns got ghost laid, he would be less boring in lessons?' on scraps of parchment and pass them to Remus who would have to stuff the collar of his robes into his mouth to stop from laughing out loud.
The end of the lesson finally arrived and the Marauders plus Lily were the first out of the classroom. They dropped their bags off at their dormitories and followed the delicious smell that was wafting through the corridors to the Great Hall for dinner. Remus was suffering a loss of appetite that was typical this close to the full moon, but sat with his friends anyway. When they were finished, they bid him their usual farewells with a 'see you soon' wink at the Hospital Wing doors.
After seven years, the Shrieking Shack was as familiar to Remus as Hogwarts was. Unfortunately it wasn't nearly as fun. The room was a constant reminder of who he was once a month. The smashed furniture showed the earlier stages of his transformation; the pain of his limbs elongating always made him thrash violently. He hated how human he still felt in that stage, it meant he remembered it and grew to dread it each time the full moon came around again. The dining table and chair legs were heavily gnawed, he didn't really have any recollection of doing that but had come around from the full moon on more than one occasion with splinters in his mouth that Madame Pomfrey was yet to find a way to painlessly remove.
He sat one of the less chewed dining chairs, pointlessly trying to make himself comfortable for when the moon finally began to rise. As he waited, he was sure he could hear shuffling just beyond the door to the room, but quickly put them down to his tiredness. There were stories amongst the younger students at Hogwarts that the Shack was haunted, but Remus knew those rumours had only surfaced over his time there, and he was thankful for their naivety and how easily rumours spread across the school. Still, he couldn't help but feel he was being watched.
No sooner had the thought left his head, he was tackled from his chair and on to the dusty floor by an invisible force. He let out a yell and tried to push off the force that was now pinning him to the ground. He grabbed a fistful of material and seemingly from thin air, a head he immediately recognised appeared.
"Bloody hell, Padfoot! Is there any need?" he gasped with a mixture of anger and relief.
Sirius let out a barking laugh, and made no move to get up off Remus. "There's always a need for pranking, Moony. Maraders' lesson numero uno."
"Hilarious," he replied sarcastically. "What in the name of Merlin are you doing here anyway? You're a few hours early, and where are Prongs and Wormtail?"
Sirius pulled James' invisibility cloak from the rest of his body, and finally stood up, pulling Remus with him. "Prongs is swapping saliva with Lily, as always. Wormtail is scratching his head over today's History of Magic notes. I got bored after explaining Dingus the Disgusting's 1372 rebellion to him for the millionth time so just left him to it."
"Er, Pads? It's Dingle the Disgusting," Remus corrected.
"Whatever, it's boring. So I thought I'd come and pester you." He set the invisibility cloak down on a nearby table before kicking the legs of it to test its stability. When he decided it was safe, he hopped up on it and sat cross-legged in the middle of it.
"You know you can't be here, my transformation is going to start any minute," Remus warned.
Sirius simply shrugged. "It's barely even dusk, we've got ages yet."
Knowing his friend well, Remus narrowed his eyes. "What's going on? Why are you really here?"
"Fine, you got me," Sirius relented. "I'm feeling nostalgic, Moony! Our last days at Hogwarts are going by too quickly. Me and James have played our last Quidditch game, NEWTs are next week…this is your last full moon…" he trailed off.
Remus crossed the room and leaned against the table next to Sirius. He planted a playful punch on his friend's arm. "Padfoot has a heart, who would have thought it?"
Sirius punched him back but said nothing in his defence. He rested his head on Remus' shoulder, and the pair sat side by side in silence for a few moments. Of course the thought had crossed Remus' mind that this would be his last time going through a full moon with the comfort and protection Hogwarts provided him. He had no plans of where to go from school, going back and living with his father wasn't an option-living withanyone wasn't an option; he couldn't put another person's life at risk. The thought reminded him of his surroundings, and company.
"Come on," he said, nudging Sirius' head from his shoulders and heading over to the door, "it's time you left. You know it's not safe for you to be here now."
"I love it when you use your bossy voice," Sirius quipped back, not moving from his crossed-legged position on the table. Remus simply raised an eyebrow at him and pointed at the doorway.
"Come on, you know me, Moony, I can't resist getting myself into trouble." Sirius grinned wickedly at him in a way Remus had seen him do far too often lately.
He could never understand how a mere shifting of facial muscles could promise so much. It was a smile he usually reserved for girls he wanted to catch off guard, who would in turn flush varying shades of pink and dissolve into fits of giggles with their nearest friends. For Remus, it only ever caused a sense of confusion mixed with a stirring in his stomach he hadn't felt before.
"You'll get more than a detention if you stay much longer," Remus mumbled stupidly.
Why did he feel so nervous? This was Sirius he was talking to. Sirius, his best friend for the last seven years. Sirius, his best friend whom he spent every day with. Sirius, who was slowly moving closer to him, his eyes smouldering…
"Sirius, I…" he whispered pointlessly. His body, heart, and mind were not going to stop what was about to happen.
One gentle brush of fingertips on Remus' cheek was all it took for him to give in completely. It was his lips that crashed down onto Sirius', his hands that ran through Sirius' hair that felt every bit as incredible as it always looked. Sirius responded with equal enthusiasm, pulling Remus' hips closer to his.
Sirius' experience with kissing was obvious in the way he applied just the right amount of pressure to the kiss, and the expert way his tongue teased Remus'. For Remus, it was his first but it was so familiar that they could have danced this dance a million times before.
For once in his life, Remus was fighting with a different kind of animal inside himself. He gave into the new animal completely, letting it push Sirius against the creaking, rotting walls of the Shrieking Shack. He felt it purr when Sirius broke away from the kiss only to trail stubbly kisses along Remus' jaw before gently biting his bottom lip and then kissing him again.
Reality came crashing down on the pair in the form of a sharp, shooting pain down Remus' spine that made him jump back from Sirius and yelp in pain. His transformation was beginning.
"Moony," Sirius gasped. "I have to-"
"GO!" he yelled back. "Get out of here!"
"See you in an hour or so," Sirius said with a wink as he headed back to the passageway, James' invisibility cloak tucked under his arm.
It was years before either of them spoke about that night again. NEWTs and leaving Hogwarts seemed to take up all of their thoughts, and they were rarely alone together. After that came The Order, of course as soon as they got wind of the group, they wanted to be a part of it. It took some persuasion on Peter's part but, as always, he went along with what the other three wanted.
Remus sometimes found himself staring at Sirius, usually in the longer of the Order meetings. He would study each new line on his friend's face that seemed to appear the deeper into the war they got. He knew that when Sirius was stressed, he would push all of his hair from his face and then tug at the back of it, frowning all the while. Remus loved that the twinkle in his obsidian eyes never faded, no matter how difficult things got, and it always seemed to shine brighter when Sirius caught him staring.
Not long after James and Lily had gone into hiding, Remus was sent on a mission for the Order. Fenrir Greyback was a new recruit for Voldemort and his Death Eaters, and since Remus had spent so much time amongst his kind lately, Dumbledore had asked him to track Greyback's every move.
On the night of Halloween 1981, the mission led Remus to the North of England, to an old wizarding village that had long been abandoned by respectable magical folk, and since inhabited by the lowest of wizard kind; hags, ghouls and werewolves. He had cast some protective charms over one of the least run-down buildings that would alert him to intruders, and was settling down for the night on a lumpy and extremely questionable mattress with a foe glass by his side and a book in hand.
He was just reading about Magda Mandori's discovery of Mandrakes when a loud warning alarm began ringing in his ears. He dropped the book and leapt up, grabbing his wand from his robes as he did. He silenced the alarm, and positioned himself behind an armchair that was spilling its innards onto the floor around it. A figure appeared in the doorway and before he had even taken note of whether his intruder was male or female, he pointed his wand at them and yelled, "Expelliarmus!"
He heard a clattering on the bare floor that told him he had hit his target. He prepared to send a stunning spell next but a voice he would know anywhere stopped him.
"Merlin's pants, Moony! Some way to greet your best friend!" It was Sirius.
"Padfoot? What the hell are you doing here?!" he yelled. And then, "Wait! Don't come any closer. If you're really Sirius, what was the first detention we got at Hogwarts?"
"Pfft, easy," Sirius smirked, "James and I wanted to plant dungbombs in the girls' toilets and you followed us in to stop us. McGonagall caught us and we all had to clean the Hospital Wing vomit buckets by hand."
Remus laughed, lowered his wand and ran forward to greet his friend with a hug. It had been at least a month since they had seen each other last. "Not that I'm not happy to see you, but why are you here? Did Dumbledore send you? Is something wrong?"
Sirius shook his head, his hair flopping as he did; it had grown since Remus saw him last. "No, no, everything is fine. Dumbledore doesn't know I'm here. Marlene told me where you were and I just thought I'd come and say hi…"
There was a false note of confidence in his voice that didn't go amiss. Remus eyed him carefully. "You thought you'd come and say hi?" he asked sceptically. "What's really going on, Sirius? You shouldn't be here, you're putting this mission at risk."
"I know, it's just…" Sirius bowed his head to look at the floor, his hair falling forward into his downcast eyes.
"Just?" Remus prompted quietly. He could see that whatever his best friend was thinking wouldn't be easy for him to say.
"I hate this, Moony," he finally said. "I hate that we're all so far away from each other. I hate that I can't see James and Lily whenever I want. And Harry! He's probably forgetting who I am as we speak. Pete's a nervous wreck these days too, I can't stand what this stupid war is doing to the people I love."
As Sirius spoke, Remus felt a lump grow in his throat and tears form in his eyes that threatened to spill and never stop. He had known Sirius long enough to see past his bravado in the tougher moments life had thrown at them, but this was only the second time he had ever seen him without a trace of it. This time caught him off guard every bit as much as the first.
"Sirius," Remus whispered, the lump in his throat aching. Sirius continued to look anywhere but into the olive-coloured eyes of his best friend.
"Sirius," he said again, this time a little more firmly. When Sirius still did not look up, Remus took his hand. "Please look at me."
His plea worked, and when Sirius finally lifted his head, Remus was shocked to see his eyes brimming with tears.
"Please don't, Sirius. Don't think those things. Of course Harry won't forget you, do you really think that James and Lily would let that happen? Prongs will be driving Lily mad constantly waving your picture in that little boy's face, in fact, I wouldn't be surprised if he had covered the nursery walls in your picture. I know things are hard now, but they're all for the best in the end. We need to be apart to keep fighting for the Order, it's the only way we'll ever be rid of Voldemort for good, you know that. As for Wormtail…he'll be fine, he's always been frightened of his own shadow. We have to show him how to be brave, which is why you shouldn't be here. He needs you."
Sirius nodded, rubbed his eyes, and then abruptly began to smile. "Do you remember our last full moon at Hogwarts? I snuck out to see you then too…"
A smile tugged at the corner of Remus' mouth at the memory. Of course he remembered it; he had thought about it so often since then. Sometimes that memory was the only thing that got him through the more difficult transformations.
"I thought you'd forgotten," he replied, barely audible.
"Never."
Sirius pulled his hand free from Remus' gentle grip, placed it on the back of his neck and pulled him close, their lips meeting in the lightest of kisses. He pulled back for just a second; long enough to gauge Remus' reaction, before kissing him again with much more passion. They could have been seventeen again, with nothing more to worry about than being given separate detentions. They weren't in the midst of a war, putting their lives at risk every day in various Order assignments; they were hiding in the shrieking shack, kissing for the first time. A moment or a lifetime could have passed by the time they broke apart from their embrace; Remus knew nor cared which.
"Stay with me," he pleaded.
Sirius smiled, not a flirtatious grin, but still one loaded with promise. He pulled Remus by the hand over to the mattress on the floor where the two lay down. Remus fell asleep shortly after, his head resting gently on Sirius' rising and falling chest.
He was woken sharply what felt like moments later. The first thing he noticed was that Sirius was gone. The second thing was that Albus Dumbledore was the one who had woken him up. The twinkle in the old blue eyes had gone out, they were red and tear-filled and Remus knew in that moment that something was seriously wrong. He leapt up off the mattress and grabbed Dumbledore by the shoulders.
"What? What is it?"
"I'm so sorry, Remus. It's James and Lily…"