Disclaimer: I'm not JKR; no ownership, etc; no moneymade.
Second Childhood
"Thanks all the same," said Remus Lupin quietly, "but I'm not feeling un-juvenated."
His Potions partner, Peter Pettigrew, stared at him. "What?"
Remus sighed. "It's a Rejuvenation potion, yes? Well, I'm not feeling un-juvenated. Therefore, I shouldn't have to be the one to test it."
The Potions Master, Professor Virgate, had an unpleasant habit of making students personally test the potions they created. Not coincidentally, he stocked a large number of antidotes, though he used them only in cases of actual poisonings.
"I tested the Forgetfulness potion last week," said Peter.
"I know," said Lupin sadly. "If it'd worked, you wouldn't remember, and I might've gotten out of this one."
Peter wrinkled his nose in annoyance, then peered into their shared cauldron. "Well, it's the right color, anyway. Carnation pink."
"I'd feel a lot better about that if I didn't know that most carnations are dyed."
Peter folded his arms across his chest.
"Fine, fine," muttered Lupin. He raised his hand. "How much are we supposed to drink, Professor?"
"Half a flask."
"Yes, Sir." Remus carefully measured the amount, stared at it for a moment, then drank it down as quickly as he could. Across the room, he saw James Potter testing the potion that he and Sirius Black had created. Jamey stood still for a moment, with Sirius watching him intently; then the bespectacled boy began grinning widely. He started bouncing up and down in place. Remus stole a look around the room: almost everywhere he looked, people were starting to smile more, to laugh, and to fidget happily.
Clearly, the potion he'd created with Peter hadn't worked.
"How do you feel?" asked Peter.
Remus laid his arms across his chest in precisely the same pose as his class partner. "How do you feel?"
"You're the one who drank the potion."
"You're the one who drank the potion," echoed Remus.
"Stop that!"
"Stop that!"
Peter's eyes widened in surprise. Remus tried to imitate the gesture, but found himself strangely dizzy. And closer to the ground. And…
Frustrated. He looked around. Strange people everywhere. He wanted Mr. Bear-Bear. Where Mr. Bear-Bear? Where mummy? Where da?
He threw back his head and shrieked.
It was Remus' shrieks, and not Peter's frantic cries for the professor (those were far too common) which brought the crowd around their worktable.
"An interesting effect," said Virgate, "which should wear off in a day or two. Can anyone tell me what Messrs. Lupin and Pettigrew did wrong?"
"Not enough mayfly," volunteered a Slytherin student.
"Yes, indeed, Mr. Snape. Well done. Without the maturing effects of the short-lived mayfly, the Rejuvenation potion becomes a De-Aging potion."
From his vantage point a foot and a half off the ground, Remus Lupin screamed in anger. Where Mr. Bear-Bear?
"Oooh," cooed one of the girls, "he's so cute!" She reached down to pick him up, but was pushed out of the way by Lily Evans, who was herself feeling a bit flush from her (properly prepared) Rejuvenation potion.
"Out of the way, Bulstrode," said Lily angrily. "He may temporarily be a toddler, but he's still a Gryffindor. We'll take care of him, thank you very much." The Slytherin girl gave an unhappy whimper.
Lily lifted her fellow Prefect off the floor, and cradled him against her shoulder. He quieted down. He slung one arm around her neck, and grabbed an alarming quantity of red hair in his free hand. He tried to shove it in his mouth. Lily clucked her tongue at him, and gently disentangled her hair. She picked up the one of the ends of his tie, and put it in his hand. He sucked on the tie instead.
"Professor, may I please take him back to our Tower?"
"You may." As Peter started to gather up his friend's clothing – all Remus still had on was a now-oversized shirt and the tie, which was quickly becoming coated with drool – Virgate continued, "Has everyone tested their potions? Excellent. Class is dismissed."
Lily had by now acquired a small band of Gryffindor girls, who were all cooing over Remus. One girl had grabbed a chubby foot and was tickling him. Remus hiccupped at her.
As the students filed out of the dungeon classroom, Sirius pulled a happily bouncing James aside and whispered two words: "Full moon."
"Bloody brilliant!" said James, and went sailing after the other Gryffindors.
Once Remus was in the common room, he attracted a great deal more attention than usual from his schoolmates. The throng of girls, in particular, increased to include representatives from all seven forms. A pillowcase was produced, and fashioned into a nappie. Plates of mushy food were acquired. Sirius produced – in what he thought was a particularly nice piece of magic – a gold baby spoon for Toddler Remus to eat from. (Evans thought he was showing off, of course, but most of the other girls thought it was sweet.) The girls took it in turns to feed him, and Sirius noted with interest that Remus' dislike of peas had apparently started early.
"Right," said Sirius when the toddler started to get cranky, "it's his bedtime." He picked Remus up and tried to take him upstairs. This was not met with popular acclaim.
"He needs a bath."
"He'll get one."
"What do you know about bathing a baby?"
"I'll ask Madam Pomfrey."
"What if he cries?"
"I'll tickle him."
"What if that doesn't work?"
"I'll ask Pomfrey again, all right?"
"What if he needs to be changed?"
"Then I'll definitely bring him back down here to you."
"What if – ?"
"Ladies, please." He cradled a now-drowsy Remus against his shoulder and headed for the staircase back to the dorms.
"Black!"
He turned back. "What, Evans?"
"You'll come get us if you need help with anything."
It wasn't a request.
He took the stairs two at a time.
James was dancing. Even when Sirius managed to engage him in prolonged conversation, he didn't stop moving, swaying.
"He needs a bath," Sirius announced.
James pirouetted. "So bathe him."
"You do it."
"He's your boyfriend, Paddy."
"Precisely. I can't bathe him."
"What are you talking about?" demanded James, doing a little jig. "You bathe with him all the time. Merlin, sometimes it's all I can do to get you two out of the shower!"
"My point exactly. Look, if I want to have any kind of carnal desire for my boyfriend after this whole ordeal it over, that means that I have to avoid looking at his wee bitty willy, all right?"
James stopped moving briefly, to gape at him.
"Don't you get it, Jamey? It'd be traumatic! Now bathe him!"
"Not a chance. But I have an idea."
Before Sirius could stop him, James had skipped out the door and was halfway down the stairs. "Oh, ladies," he called into the common room, "Ickle Remikins needs a baff!"
James backed up quickly as there was a general rush for the steps.
"Gryffindors, please!" A strict, stern voice cut through the crowd, and for a moment James thought McGonagall had come in. But no, it was only the Head Girl, a six-foot-tall blonde whom Sirius had nicknamed (without her knowledge) the Viking Princess.
"I will assume the burden of bathing the child as part of the duties of my office," she said gravely. By the time she passed James on the stairs, she was grinning broadly.
"How'd he get strained beets there?"
"Where?" Sirius asked. He was in the bathroom, but refused to face the scene of The Bath. In the dorm room, James was happily skipping about in circles; Sirius had retreated to the bathroom when James started singing.
"Under his arm."
"Not a clue."
There was the sound of a thin stream of running water.
"Um, did he – ?"
"No, I turned the tap on. I'm not going to put it on full blast, am I?" Then: "Ooooooh, who's got a cute widdle outsy!"
"WHAT?"
"His bellybutton, you prat. It's an outsy." The Viking Princess gurgled at Remus, who gurgled back.
Merlin, I hope he doesn't remember any of this, thought Sirius.
The bath over, Sirius discovered James hopping around on one foot and talking to a second-year girl who'd come up to their room.
"You shouldn't be here," said the Head Girl to the twelve-year-old sternly.
"I brought him some clothes," said the girl. She held out a toddler-sized tee shirt and coveralls. "My mum's a seamstress," she said, "and she taught me how to Transfigure dolly clothes when I was just a kid."
Sirius made the Head Girl dress Remus, too. Then, mercifully, she left, taking the newest member of Remus' fan club ("Ooooooh, he looks so sweet in the coveralls! Wait'll I tell Mum!") with her.
Night was starting to fall; Sirius decided it was time he got Remus to the Shrieking Shack. He balanced Remus against his hip, and started down the stairs.
The common room was filled with girls. Every Gryffindor girl was seemingly crowded in there; Sirius saw quite a lot of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff colors, too.
A girl squealed. "There he is!"
Sirius ran back upstairs.
James bounced over.
"He's damned cute."
"Merlin, Prongs! Not you too!"
"What are you on about?"
"You haven't seen them assembled down there, have you? I've never seen so many girls in one room in my life. And they're just… watching. Waiting. I went down to there, and they just – stared at me. Silently. I was afraid they were all going to jump on me at once and peck my eyes out."
"Quit being melodramatic, Padfoot."
"I'm not being melodramatic! How the hell are we supposed to get him past the throng down there and to the Shrieking Shack tonight? Do you think any of them would let us take him for an after-curfew stroll in the chill night air? Because I can think of one Prefect – redhead, name of Evans, possessive bird – and one terrifying Head Girl who'll stop us, even if no one else does." He leaned in close. "But believe me. They will stop us."
"Fine. So we keep him in the dorm overnight."
"Are you mad?"
"He'll be a puppy, Sirius. How bad can it be?"
"Your parents never let you have pets, did they?"
Peter excused himself from helping, saying he'd prefer to sleep in the girl-infested common room. Sirius rather thought that was why he wanted to sleep in the common room, but didn't say anything.
Sirius cast a silencing spell on the dorm room, and James stayed in one place long enough to put up an Imperturbable Charm.
The evening started badly. Remus suddenly began to throw a tantrum. As Sirius held him, trying to comfort him, the squirming, screeching child suddenly began to twist in ways that had nothing to do with normal human movement. As James watched on, appalled, the body of the little boy cradled in Sirius' arms reshaped itself into that of a wolf pup.
The puppy had been exhausted at first, and just whimpered. Sirius tried to comfort the pup, but it snapped at him. Then Padfoot gave it a try; the puppy accepted attentions from the older dog. For once, the wolf didn't attempt to establish its dominance.
A still-untransfigured James ("Ungulate hooves on a stone floor? I think not") perched atop his bed, watching, and bouncing lightly on the springs.
"Awwwww, Puppy Moony thinks you're his daddy," he said sweetly to the large black dog. Then Puppy Moony began sniffing around Padfoot and, finding something he liked, started suckling.
James laughed so hard he nearly fell off his bed. "Merlin! He doesn't think you're his da, Paddy, he thinks you're his mum!"
Padfoot batted the pup away from his nether regions, and inside the dog Sirius worried briefly about what kind of bruising he was going to have. Puppy Moony's little teeth were damned sharp, and the pup didn't have a sense of control.
The evening got considerably better. The pup's energy increased; so did Padfoot's sense of humor. When Puppy Moony suddenly went into a chewing frenzy, Padfoot carefully put his jaws around the scruff of the pup's neck, lifted him gingerly, carried him across the room, and set him down on Peter Pettigrew's bed. He then barked at the puppy, saying, "There, chew things that smells like that."
Puppy Moony, who on some primal level associated Peter with the strange disappearance of Mr. Bear-Bear, chewed everything he could get his teeth on.
The moon set around four in the morning: the play-wearied pup changed back. This time it was worse, because after Remus Lupin became human again, the potion began to wear off. He grew back to his normal age and size: bones, body, and limbs twisted yet again. James and Sirius were both relieved that their friend was unconscious for the last transformation.
Sirius cradled his boyfriend in his lap again, grateful for the return of the familiar body. He caressed Remus' cheek gently; his lover's eyelids fluttered, then opened.
"We're in the dorm room, lover," said Sirius softly. "I'll get you to your bed."
"Mmmm. Your bed," whispered Remus, "it smells like you."
"Okay, my bed," said Sirius gently. He stood slowly, lifting Remus up with him. Then he caught the other boy in his arms, scooped him up, carried him to his bed of preference, and tucked him in. He lay down next to Remus protectively, curled his body around the other boy's. He much preferred his boyfriend at his proper age; later in the day, when Remus was stronger, he planned to show him just how much.
James, now free of the potion's effects, went down to the common room to let Peter know he could have his bed back. The Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff girls had gone, but a number of Gryffindor of girls, Lily Evans among them, were still camped out.
"Potter? Is something wrong?"
"No. Uh – the potion's worn off, is all."
From somewhere in the half-asleep crowd came a moan of distress. "I never got to hold him!" As Peter trudged past him on the stairs, James heard another complaint: "But I owled my mother! She's sending baby-bath soap!"
"He might still take you up on that offer," James said brightly, and was rewarded with a cushion thrown in his face.
There was a desperate cry from upstairs, and Peter re-appeared above him.
"What did he do to my bed?"
James winked at the startled girls. "Peed on it, don't you know," he said cheerfully. He tossed the cushion gently back into the crowd, turned, and started pushing Peter Pettigrew upstairs again.
"Next time you make Remus test a potion in class, Petey," said James sweetly, "Make damn sure it's not the full moon."