A little one shot from second year Sirius Black's point of view shortly after discovering the truth about Remus's lycanthropy. Very fluffy/weird...yet fluffy/weirdness is coming out of my eyeballs these days though...
Oh, ye readers and lovers of Harry Potter fanfiction be so happy. Because I wrote this when I was supposed to be writing for my huge report which is due in a few hours.
And if the last line seems familiar, congratulations. You are a very smart person.
A werewolf.
Remus John Lupin was a werewolf.
He could pretend that it didn't bother him. But it did. And not just a little bit either. A lot. To be fair, he had warning. All the evidence had pointed to it. James, Peter and him all had been doing the research and investigating for months but he hadn't honestly expected this. Deep down he had always been secretly hoping it was all a big mistake and it was something else entirely.
He had been walking for some time now. It was against the rules of course to walk the school grounds at night, but he didn't care. The bottoms of his robes were damp from the wet grass and it was very cold. Up high in the inky black sky the waning moon stood out silver bright against the studded stars. He paused for a moment to stare at it, thinking again of Remus.
A werewolf.
His friend was a bloody werewolf.
He wished he had never bothered to find out, or never even became friends with him. It was a terrible thing to think, but it was no better than lying to your friends for two years pretending that you were a normal wizard just like the rest of them.
He thought about James for a moment. His best friend had been so calm when they finally came upon the truth. His friend had pushed his untidy jet black hair out of his eyes and sighed, his hazel eyes troubled, deep in thought. But after a few moments he straightened up and was his old self again- completely resigned to the fact that one of his friends turned into a terrible, murderous, beast every month. Even Peter- as timid and shy as he was, was completely resolved to the fact even if he still showed his fear about it much clearer than James did.
But it was him that was having a problem with still accepting it. Why didn't the other two get it? Remus was a werewolf ! He wasn't even human! He was a dark beast…a creature….
A monster.
He repressed a shudder. He had been living alongside a monster for two years. A half breed. It was disgusting. He thought of how his family would react if they heard the news. He did shudder then. To put it lightly, they would be furious. Remus would undoubtfully be expelled, Dumbledore would possibly be sacked, and many students would probably leave the school but he was more frightened of what his family's reaction would be upon discovering that he had been "friends" with the monster. That he shared the same dorm with Remus, he attended the same classes, and they had talked and were…friends. Merlin's beard, his mother might actually die of the shock. He could imagine her now- eyes bulging, screaming till spit was flying everywhere, looking utterly mad, screeching on about filthy half-bloods and impure wizards. His family would probably never forgive him. He'd be shunned…no, damned- till he went to another school, Durmstrang perhaps, and learnt the proper ways of magic. He'd probably never get to see James, Peter or any other of his classmates again. He'd be miserable of course, but it was his duty to tell such a terrible secret to the wizarding world.
He thought back of the past two school years…he tried to remember what his first impression of Remus was. He hadn't gotten along well with anybody in Gryffindor house for quite some time in his first year, but suddenly with an odd inward lurch of emotion, he remembered one of the first times he had actually talked to Remus
He owned a spinning top. A very old, wooden, muggle spinning top. He had found the chipped and painted top by accident one day on the busy streets of London and pocketed it before his family had noticed what he had picked up. As he laid it out on his bedroom table that night he was intrigued by how it wound up with a simple string and how it wobbled at first before it quickly spun and rotated about on the table. He had kept it for many years and when bored in his room or whenever the need struck him, he wound it up and spun it. Many times, he carried it in his pocket and for some reason clenched onto it as if it were a special amulet that would protect him from harm whenever he was being yelled or disciplined by his parents. Nobody knew about it. It was his one secret he kept from the world.
The bulling by some of the older Slytherins (including some members of his own extended family) in his first year lead to one horrible incident where after falling to the ground- they noticed the small muggle toy that had fallen from out of his pocket.
"What is THAT?" Bellatrix had sneered, toeing it with her foot.
"Give it here." He said coldly as she picked it up.
She had laughed. "Don't tell me that this dirty mudblood toy is yours?"
He stood there and said nothing. The small crowd of onlookers were staring at him. He didn't even notice a small, brown haired boy in the back though.
"Let me see it." Said a burly Slytherin 6th year by the name of Rodolphus Lestrange.
Bellatrix held onto it though as the Slytherin boy pulled it from her. The string broke.
"Oops." Bellatrix sneered. Rodolphus and several of the onlookers laughed.
She tossed it to the ground and Sirius knew what she was going to do right before she did it. She stepped hard on the wooden top and he heard the fragile wooden piece crack.
It had hurt him. It had hurt him worse than the hexes and the insults that he had endured from them that year and for the life of him he could not figure out why a simple muggle toy would cause him to actually fight back tears.
When the gang of Slytherins left and the crowd dispersed, Sirius stood there quietly, staring down at his broken and damaged top. It was beyond repair and yet it was with difficulty that he turned and convinced himself it was a stupid muggle toy and he didn't need it anymore.
He had left it in the dirt where it was and went about the rest of the day in stony silence. He went to bed late that night, staring up at the top his four-poster bed feeling miserable before finally drifting off to sleep.
He woke the next morning and rolled over only to see his toy top perched neatly on top of his bedside table.
It had been repaired with what looked like some strange muggle glue and a new neatly knotted sting that wasn't as frayed as the old one. It had been repainted and was a new shade of bright red. Sirius had looked about the dorm where the others were getting up for class but not one of them glanced in his direction. He pocketed it and changed quickly, looking around at all of their faces as for some clue to who repaired his top.
He might never have found out who the boy was, if he hadn't seen the small smudges of red paint on Remus Lupin's wrist as he ate his breakfast.
When he confronted Remus later in the common room, the small brown haired boy was sitting behind an enormous book completely engrossed.
Sirius stood there awkwardly for a moment before softly clearing his throat.
The boy's eyes shot upwards and he looked frightened for the smallest fraction of a second before realizing who it was.
"Hullo." He said quietly.
Sirius nodded in reply. "You fixed my top." He said shortly.
"Yes. I did." The boy said slowly. He didn't ask how Sirius knew it was him or why Sirius was asking him.
Sirius stared. "Why?"
The soft, brown eyes looked confused. "I don't know. It was broken, so I fixed it."
Sirius continued to stare. Remus waited for him to say something but oddly didn't seem intimidated by him like most of his other fellow first years. He just seemed…patient.
"Thanks." Sirius said, and even though the word was so unfamiliar, it felt good to say.
Remus gave him the smallest of smiles. "Your welcome." He said quietly before burying his nose behind his book again.
It had been the first time he had had a decent conversation with a fellow Gryffindor. He didn't understand why Remus would bother fix his broken top; it was a reason as strange and mysterious as to why he, himself had clung to the top for so many years.
Though he was friends with James now, Peter and Remus were his friends too. And though the spinning top was never mentioned again between them, Sirius never forgot about it. He knew Remus well now and knew that by nature he was a soft-spoken, gentle, caring friend.
And now also, a werewolf.
It didn't fit. If he hadn't done the research with James and Peter for the past few months, he would have laughed at the very thought. Remus Lupin, the boy who silently went out of his way to help everyone regardless of age, house, or any other discriminating factor, could not be a werewolf. Werewolves were violent, ruthless and merciless…
And yet he was. Sirius wondered how it had happened. He'd find out in a few hours. James, Peter and him were going to confront Remus that very night. They were waiting for him now probably- but he had to go on the walk. He needed to come up with a final plan of what he was going to do. A huge part of him was screaming for revealing the secret to everyone, to save those that didn't know the truth. That a monster was walking the same halls as they were. It would be his duty now to tell everyone. It was only right afterall…anybody else would do the same…He'd probably be damned to hell if he didn't….
He stared up at the silver moon and with a sigh, put his hands in his pockets.
His hand grazed something familiar and he knew before pulling it out what it was.
The small, red wooden top lay in his palm, the moonlight casting a strange light on it, making it look as if it were the colour of blood. He looked at it and remembered the small boy looking up at him from behind his huge schoolbook. And as he felt all of his confused, jumbled thoughts and feelings gently slide into place, he finally knew what he was going to do.
He looked up at the silver moon again and let out a small laugh.
"All right, then." he declared loudly. "I'll go to hell!"
fini