Disclaimer- I don't own anything

Year 1

Remus crept down the silent corridors of Hogwarts, all the while looking out for Filch to come creaking down and catch him. Earlier, James had said that he thought he'd found another secret passageway, but McGonagall had caught him before he had a chance to check it out. Of course, James had run back to tell the others about it, and then said that he would be going back later, but he then found himself buried deep with essays and astronomy charts, so Remus offered. Right now, he was slightly regretting that decision.

He was pretty sure that he had taken a wrong turning at some point, and so trying to remember James' instruction would be futile. Instead, he decided to feel along the walls with his hands until he could find a classroom, to get his bearings hand caught a handle, and pushed it open, hoping it would be the Charms classroom, or somewhere he knew. Looking around, Remus felt disappointed; it was just an old classroom, with tables and chairs stacked up in the corner, no indication as to which classroom as it looked like it hadn't been used in years. Yet Remus felt that there was something distinctly off about it.

In the corner of the room there sat a magnificent mirror that was clearly out of place in the old classroom. Slowly edging towards it, he saw his reflection gradually rise up in the mirror. In the mirror, he was with Sirius, James and Peter, laughing and joking with each other. Gasping, he turned around to see if they were behind him. Had they been following him? But no one was there.

Brow furrowed, he quickly glanced back at the mirror to see that they were all there, and then looked behind him again. No one was there. He returned his gaze to the giant mirror, and to add to the surprise, saw that he looked different. He didn't have the scars that patterned his face and arms and his eyes were not the amber they had been since he was six, but instead a deep brown colour.

All of a sudden the moon began to rise in the mirror. The moon? Even though it would not be possible for the moon to be in the classroom, he searched behind and above him to find nothing but the dusty walls filled with cobwebs. In the mirror, the moon was full, and he wanted to shout out to the Remus in the mirror to run, get away from his friends or he'll kill them! Yet the four figures simply stood there, all smiling and joking with each other, not noticing the moon that had risen ominously above them.

It took about five minutes before Remus realised that nothing would happen. The boy in the mirror was not going to become a dangerous creature and kill his friends. Nothing was going to happen. But how could that be? He scoured the mirror for any clue as to what the mirror truly showed, for Remus was certain that this was no ordinary mirror. He found an inscription at the stop: Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi. It wasn't much of a clue, thought Remus, and if it was, then he couldn't figure it out. So he turned his attention back to the reflection and watched himself talk with his friends in the moonlight.

There he sat, transfixed, until a rustling behind him got his attention. Looking at his watch, he saw that he had been gone for a few hours now. Jumping to his feet, he wiped the tears that he was ashamed to find on his face and ran back to the common room, not caring if he was caught. He lay in bed that night, unable to stop thinking about what he'd seen. He had figured out that the mirror showed himself how he'd be if he wasn't a werewolf, and it was saddening for him to see how happy and carefree he was.

He didn't tell his friends about the mirror. He couldn't because they didn't know about him being a werewolf, and that may just be the clue to them finding out, if they saw what he saw. He couldn't let that happen, he liked having friends and didn't want to go back to how it was before Hogwarts, the loneliness, the pain everytime the parents dragged their kids away from him. Instead, he told them that he wanted to keep looking for the passageway that James had seen. Luckily for him, they were busy with homework, work that Remus would overlook, in order to get to the mirror that night.

As he settled himself in the usual spot, in front of the mirror to watch himself do something that he will never be able to do, he heard a coughing from behind him.

"Professor Dumbledore! I-"

"So I see you've found the mirror of erised then Mr Lupin." Dumbledore's voice didn't sound harsh, or accusing, it sounded gentle, and he had the trace of a sad smile upon his face. "Do you know what it does?"

"It shows what you desire the most." Remus had figured this out while laying in bed, as he thought about the one thing he couldn't forget at the moment. That meant that none of his friends would be able to see what he saw, and therefore wouldn't help them to find out that he was a werewold, however he was having a rare feeling of selfishness, and didn't want to share the mirror with anyone else.

"Very good, I'm impressed. Do you know what the script above the mirror means?"

"No sir, I got the first word was 'desire' but I couldn't get anymore."

"It means, 'I show not your face but your heart's desire. Now then, I strongly recommend that you do not return to this mirror. So many people have been so drawn in by it, that they waste away, or in some cases are driven mad by what they see, but cannot get."

"I can see why" Remus muttered to himself.

"Now why don't you head back to bed? I can see you haven't been getting much sleep lately." That was true. Remus' thoughts had been preoccupied with what he had been seeing, and hopelessly thinking if it could ever come true in the future.

He never told his friends about the mirror. Not because he was being selfish again, but because he didn't want them to become obsessed with it like he had. It was only after he stopped visiting it that he realised he had been neglecting his friends, and his grades had been slipping, and no matter how much he wanted to, he didn't go back to the mirror. That year anyway...

A/N: This was just a very quick thing that I wrote in about half an hour, so I know it's not the best. I just liked the idea of writing about something to do with Remus seeing what his life would be like if he wasn't a werewolf. Oh, and I put the ending like that so I could do a second chapter if I wanted to, something about Remus going back to the mirror in his sixth year maybe? Please tell me what you thought :)