Title: She says, she says.
Pairing: Remus/Sirius.
Disclaimer: I wish.
Summary: When a wizard is "outed" to the muggle world, they like to call it "paranoid schizorphrenia". When a wizard is outed by his mother, they like to call him Sirius Black.
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Forgoing their usual owling over the summer, they then found it odd that, along with their expected Hogwarts letters, they also received a notice from the headmaster asking they report to his office before the feast. The train ride was oddly quiet and neither of them mentioned the missing presence across from them. They spread out, arms stretched across the back of seats, and closed their eyes.

It was dark when they arrived, and raining, but they ran as fast as they could up to the castle and their chests burned and their legs ached and they were out of breath when they shoved their way in to meet an oddly serene set of eyes behind a big desk.

"Boys," Dumbledore said, leaning back with his hands folded calmly in his lap, "I've received word from Mrs.Black that Sirius, regretfully, will not be returning this term."

They all looked at the floor then, counting the thick veins running off in silhouettes from their shoes.

"He is, as I was led to believe, rather sick. His mother wishes you to be informed before you find out for yourselves. I am terribly sorry."

Remus was the last to slink lowly out of the door and twist the handle painfully shut. James slowed down and Peter's brow knit together with a frown.

"Before we find out for ourselves?" James scoffed and kicked the floor, "Before we snoop, she means."

"I hardly think --" Remus started but James jumped in.

"You hardly think what? She'd do something like that?"

His fists balled at his sides and his backpack slid slowly down his shoulder.

"No," Remus shot back a little stiffly, "I hardly think -- I hardly think Mrs.Black would care to inform us if that were the case."

They came to a stop just outside of the infirmary and Peter looked nervously around.

"Are you plotting?" he asked the other boys and their lips tightened into lines.

"Well, she really is a substantial idiot if she thinks she can outwit the marauders," James grinned suddenly and Remus, almost uncharacteristcally, nodded his agreement.

"Something is definitely out of sync," he added and Peter shuffled from foot to foot.

"We're going to find out, right?" he asked, his beady eyes almost glowing, "With Sirius, I mean."

They pressed themselves against the wall as Madam Pomfrey strolled past behind them and nodded.

"Oh yes," James murmured quietly, "What did she expect? Us to give up that easily?"

--

It took two weeks for them to find out that Sirius was in a muggle hospital, and a futher three for them to find out which one. Remus had been laid haphazardly across his bed when his friends had barrelled through the door with the news and his chest still heaved from the stinging breath he'd inhaled sharply when they told him.

"But --" he argued gently, "Why would --"

And his hands shook as he sat up. He let himself balance precariously on the edge of his mattress with the sheets bunched up around him and he clung to his pillow.

"Why there?" he ground out through clenched teeth. And he could still smell him.

James let out a heavy sigh and stomped across to the window.

"Because," he commented dryly, "She is evil. A fact, so it seems, you have yet to grasp Mr.Lupin."

"I knew all along!" Peter cut in and they all shook their heads and nearly let themselves laugh under their breath.

"I don't understand," Remus said again when they'd stilled and James was stuck looking out at the grounds. He didn't turn then, but he shrugged, and Remus's hands tightened into white knots.

"I mean --" he added, and his chest felt suddenly heavy, "I mean -- it's Sirius -- why would anybody --"

"We're finding him," James interrupted and he went quiet, "We're finding him in that place, and we're getting him out."

Remus nodded as James padded his way back to the door and his cheeks were flushed with a light hue that disappeared beneath his robes. Neither of them had spent long thinking about it since they'd found out, mainly because they didn't want to, or, in Remus's case, it hurt too much. He missed warm breath against his neck when they were pressed up against the side of the couch but he didn't dare say a word.

"What if there really is something wrong with him?" Peter asked suddenly and Remus chewed on a loose piece of skin on the inside of his lip.

"There isn't," he muttered harshly, and tried to let himself get washed away in the apathy or the anger or the hatred, but his eyes still stung like his cheeks.

"There isn't," James agreed.

Peter nodded.

"Okay," he said, "Okay."

--

It was harder on a night, Remus realised, as the loose spring in his mattress bore its way up into his lower spine and he twisted and turned and wriggled. His muscles felt sore and his left hip hurt from spending too much time pushing his weight into it.

The moon pooled on the floor beside him and if he squinted through the curtains he could see it; inching closer. A tingle spread through his joints and he swallowed and sat up.

"Remus," he could remember Sirius saying, "Can't sleep, either?" and he'd smiled and Remus had smiled back. He'd crawled into bed with him a few minutes later and their eyes drifted closed as their stomachs touched, and their hands touched, and their hair folded together against the greying pillow.

"Remus," he thought he heard again but he closed his eyes tight and tried to rub the memories away with the backs of his hands.

It was well past midnight when he felt himself stalking over to Sirius's bed and letting his body collapse under the quilts. His cheek rubbed against the pillow and he sighed.

It was definitely just harder without him there at all.

--

"Mrs.Black," a woman asked gently, her thick blonde hair twisted into a tight bun on the top of her head, "I'm sorry to interrupt, but I have a few questions."

"Please make it quick."

"Well, in regards to your son," she continued, gripping tightly to a clipboard, "The doctor will need a few details before he can make a proper assessment of the situation."

Walburga Black, with her legs crossed elegantly on the shoddy plastic seats, grimaced, and her perfectly coloured lips twisted into a scowl.

"Fine," she snapped. And the nurse stuttered.

"When did these symptoms start?"

"He was barely two and he got it into his head that he could make objects fly," she said dryly and coughed politely to clear her throat, "Of course, it didn't stop there. Now he thinks he's a wizard."

She didn't laugh. But neither did the nurse. Her nose crinkled as she stood and turned.

"Will that be all?"

--

James lingered in the common room until all of the others had cleared out, pacing fitfully by the dulling fire. Remus sat on the couch, repeatedly folding the edges of pages in his book, with Peter next to him; watching.

"We have a plan," James hissed under his breath, barely after two in the morning, and the dark bags under his eyes didn't even heed a comment, "We can get him out."

Remus looked at him suddenly and the red rims around his eyes were, thankfully, cast into shadow from the thick velvet curtains obscuring the window. Peter crossed his legs and rubbed his hands together excitedly.

"Next Hogsmeade visit," James nodded, continuing; "Saturday. Next Hogsmeade we go to that place and we do whatever we can."

"How do we get there?" Remus asked and the corners of James's thinning lips almost turned into a quick smirk.

"We fly."