Chapter Seven

James found himself in the awkward position of being the sole form of communication for Sirius and Remus while Remus was in the hospital wing. Even when he got out on Tuesday, James was still conveying…not messages exactly since they weren't saying anything to the other directly, but information. Both were desperate to know how the other one was doing without having to find out for themselves.

Remus was using his favored hiding spot, the prefect's bathroom, which James as quidditch captain had access to while Sirius did not. And when the other prefects, quidditch captains and the head boy and girl wanted a bath, Remus hid in the library at the work table right in front of Madam Pince's desk, assuring his absolute solitude.

Peter had mostly figured out what had happened on his own. No one really wanted to tell him the details, as they were a bit worn out from dealing with each other. So Peter suffered the silence indignantly, and loudly complained that Remus should just forgive Sirius already…whenever Remus wasn't actually around of course.

James didn't think Remus was waiting for an apology though. He didn't seem mad…more like he was defeated. There was something missing from him lately, which was to be expected, but it still wasn't pleasant to see.

Remus was harder to read than Sirius, who was pretty open about being worried he'd permanently ruined their friendship. He hadn't had another burst of hateful speech like the first night, for which James was grateful, but he was still communicative. Remus was a bit trickier, since he was private about these things and, James suspected, nursing a broken heart on top of it all.

After James had finished telling Sirius about how Remus was almost completely healed ("Yeah, he didn't look as peaky in class today"), he grudgingly set off for the prefect's bathroom to chat with Remus. He knocked on the door and waited for his friend to tell him it was him and that he was fully clothed. However, that didn't happen.

"Just a minute, I'm almost done."

James felt his face color. It was Evans. Before he could string together a coherent sentence explaining that he didn't actually need the bathroom, Lily walked out in her pajamas carrying a small basket of toiletries.

"Oh, hullo Potter. All yours."

"Er…I was actually, um, just looking for-"

"Remus Lupin?" She supplied. He nodded. "He's got detention tonight with Kettleburn. He didn't tell you?"

"No. Didn't say anything." Neither James nor Sirius were taking Care of Magical Creatures, but Peter was. He might have said something. "What'd he do to get detention?"

Lily tilted her head to the side, a mischievous, appraising look on her face. "I'll tell you if you let me know why he's been hiding in the bathroom all week. Everyone's really curious about it. He only does that when he's mad at you lot, and it's never lasted this long before."

"Sorry Evans. Not my secret to share."

"He's okay though?" She asked, looking genuinely concerned.

James made an iffy motion with his hand. "I'm working on it."

She nodded her approval. "Good. I like Lupin, even though he keeps appalling company. Tell him I'm thinking about him, will you?"

"Sure." James started walking back towards Gryffindor tower, and Lily fell in step beside him.

"Fine, I'll tell you about the detention."

"I didn't ask." James gave her a funny look.

"Exactly. Plus you've kept your eyes in polite places."

"You're wearing flannel pajamas. It's not exactly a silk nightdress or anything."

Lily laughed. "Okay, fine. I'm a bit curious too and I'm hoping that if I tell you something, you'll be a bit friendlier towards me. Now, in class yesterday, Severus was whispering something to Remus while professor Kettleburn was going over my homework with me. Then, next thing I know, Lupin had punched Severus in the face."

"Remus did that?" James asked, startled. Remus was fairly good with hexes and jinxes (defense was his best class), but his fists…then again, James had never seen him try. It wasn't like him.

"Yes he did. Not five feet from a teacher."

"Wow."

"That's not all," Lily said. "He pulled his wand on Severus and threatened to hex him into oblivion if he did anything to Sirius Black. Severus won't tell me what's going on, but I had been under the impression that Lupin was mad at Black. And I have no idea what Severus was planning to do, but one of my other friends in Slytherin caught him flushing potions down the loo this afternoon, so I think Lupin scared him out of it."

James couldn't help but grin. Lily rolled her eyes, but she didn't look that upset. "Sorry," James said quickly, and wiped the grin off his face. Much as he disliked Severus, he'd finally realized being nasty about Lily's friend wasn't going to get him anywhere with her. "Just glad to hear Remus is standing up for himself."

"Standing up for Black, more like," Lily corrected.

They'd gotten to the portrait of the fat lady. Lily gave the password, and the two scrambled through the portrait hole together. Someone made a wolf whistle.

"Ew, god no!" Lily laughed. She did turn to wave at James before heading up to the girls dormitories though.

James managed to keep the dazed grin off his face until he was safely up in bed.

So…Evans cared enough about them to notice when they were fighting. She even liked Remus enough to be okay with him punching Snape in the face. Maybe he had some hope with her after all.


James' high spirits from his rare good conversation with Evans evaporated almost instantly the next morning. He woke up to the sound of Remus hurriedly scurrying from the room while Sirius stared longingly after him, looking a bit dazed and lost while holding a pair of socks.

"Better finish getting dressed Sirius. Maybe we can catch him at breakfast," Peter suggested.

"Doubt it. Bet he just grabs a handful of toast and runs off again," Sirius muttered darkly. He did finish dressing rather quickly though, and didn't wait for the others. He threw some things haphazardly into his bag and then bolted out the door.

James and Peter headed down to breakfast together at a more leisurely pace, discussing their friends. "Wish Remus would just forgive him already," Peter said with a long suffering sigh. "I know Sirius was a bit of a prat for telling Snape to go into the tunnel, but really enough's enough. Remus is just being dramatic."

"Pete…it's more complicated than that."

"Well I think they're still being more difficult than they need to be. Wish everything'd just go back to the way it was."

James couldn't argue with that.

When they got to the great hall Remus was nowhere in sight and Sirius was getting chewed out by professor McGonagall for something. Unfortunately for him, he was yelling right back at her and she didn't seem to appreciate it.

"That'll be a week's worth of detentions then Mr. Black, and if you continue in this vein we'll have you sitting detention every night for the rest of the year! I don't think I need to remind you how thoroughly ashamed Gryffindor house has been of your reckless behavior!"

James quickly hit Sirius with a charm that silenced whatever retort he'd had for that. McGonagall strode back to the staff table, nostrils still flaring angrily.

Peter edged around Sirius and sat down to eat, but James stormed right up to him. "What the hell was that about? Detention for a week? When are you going to practice quidditch?"

Sirius tried to yell at him, but he was still silenced. Tony Paglia jumped in though. "That's what had him yelling at McGonagall. Apparently he's been banned from playing quidditch, and no she doesn't care if that means we've got to get a new beater trained up before the match with Hufflepuff. What the bleeding hell did you do anyway and why'd you have to get caught? Selfish asshole."

Sirius threw a rude gesture Paglia's way, but he didn't see it. He'd already stalked off to the other end of the table to sit with Evans.

James turned to Sirius, absolutely furious. "They pulled you from the team? Oh my god. This is not happening. I'm not a player short, my social life hasn't devolved into absolute hell, and when I wake up for real this morning everything will be perfectly alright just like always."

Sirius waved his arms angrily and pointed at his mouth. James took the charm off and slumped into a seat for breakfast.

"Ava Davies is pretty good on a broom and she gets along with Kamala. You'll probably be better off with her than you were with me anyway," Sirius said darkly.

"Not the point Sirius. We've still got to train the new player, and if they've never flown with the team before…we're going to get flattened."

Sirius shot out of his seat. "You think I'm happy about this? Fuck you Pothead!" And he stormed out of the hall.

Peter watched him leave, then turned to look at James. "Suddenly I'm very happy I dropped Potions."

"Oh don't look so smug. You've still got to sit through Transfiguration with the three of us first."

"Oh…yeah. Fun fun."


Sirius' anger with James didn't last very long, but such was James' love of quidditch that his persisted a bit longer. However he didn't actually enjoy shouting matches with his best friend, so he kept the conversation away from quidditch and the others followed his lead. He did throw Sirius a withering glare as he exited the common room with his broomstick that evening for what turned out to be a notably awful tryout for the team's replacement beater.

Turns out all those competent beaters he'd picked Sirius over were bitter, or just didn't want to play for a captain who favored his friends. No one halfway decent tried out, least of all Ava Davies, and he was left with a skinny third year named Malcolm Lester who was the least horrible of the lot.

When James trudged back into the tower in a foul mood once more, he was a bit startled to see Remus sitting in the common room. He was only doing homework at one of the tables, but it was a rare thing lately to find him somewhere other than the bathroom or the library. Evans was sitting the next table over working on a Care of Magical Creatures essay, and when James passed by he overheard them discussing their prefects duties.

Something occurred to James as he went up to the dorm, and it didn't cheer him any. If they didn't fix this mess soon, there was a distinct chance that Remus might actually gravitate towards a new group of friends. James gave himself a little shake. No, that wasn't really terribly likely…for starters Remus didn't want anyone else to realize he was a werewolf, and a new group of friends would put it together just as they had.

Plus James really didn't want that to happen.

Sirius was lying flat on his bed with his hangings open, having a sulk from the looks of it. James shot him a glare before putting his broom away.


A few days passed with no forseeable break in the pattern. Remus continued avoiding his friends, but he started spending more time in the common room and less in the bathroom and library, having noticed that Sirius wasn't overly eager to confront him. Every now and then he caught Sirius staring at him, but as soon as their eyes met they both looked away.

Remus wasn't sure how Sirius felt about things, but he for one was lonely and miserable. He wanted to fix things, and knew the only way they were going to do that was to talk about what had happened, but every time he even thought about doing so his throat got tight and he started trembling. He'd come to the conclusion that, despite what had seemed to be six years of solid friendship, Sirius must hate him. He just couldn't think of any other reason why Sirius would send Snape, who loathed Remus more than ever now that he'd confirmed he was a dark creature, to the Shrieking Shack while Remus was transformed. The end result was to make Remus miserable, therefore Sirius couldn't actually care about Remus.

He'd probably just become an illegal animagi for the romps and the adventure. He'd probably never cared about Remus at all.

"Remus, can I talk to you for a second?"

Remus paused in shoving his books and parchment back into his bag to regard Lily Evans with a confused look. He pried his thoughts away from self pity and offered her a weak smile. "Course you can. I'm free till Potions. Everything alright?"

"I was going to ask the same thing to you."

"So this isn't about our prefectly duties then?"

She fixed him with a wry smile. "Fraid not. I, er, noticed that there seems to be a bit of trouble in your clique. I know it's not really my business, but it has sort of touched some of my clique…and, well, I just wanted to make sure you're okay."

Remus chewed on his lip, considering her. He'd noticed some time ago that Lily Evans was an incredibly clever girl. Not only was she clever, she also had a strong sense of discretion. And she was also friends with Severus Snape. He started to wonder how much she already knew about what was going on between him and Sirius.

His careful silence seemed to make her nervous. Lily let out a quick breath, darted her eyes around, and then forced out a quick whisper. "Look, Severus hasn't told me-"

"You talked to Snape about this?"

"Actually, we're not speaking at the moment. Er, let's go somewhere a bit more private, shall we?" She grabbed his arm and steered him from the Care of Magical Creatures classroom. Remus followed her along the corridor.

They passed an incredulous looking James and Sirius on their way up a staircase. By the time James had recovered enough from the shock of seeing his unrequited love dragging along his friend to say something, Lily had pushed Remus into the prefect's bathroom and slammed the door.

"Right, I know that Severus did something stupid. He was in the hospital wing overnight last week, and he wasn't jinxed this time because your idiot friends would have been bragging about it. Sirius Black has gotten a load of detentions, and he hasn't said why. That's not like him. And Severus has been called up to Dumbledore's office three times in the past week, which makes me suspect he's in trouble too."

Remus nodded. There was no arguing with her observations. He only wondered what she thought she was accomplishing by confronting him with this.

Lily paused for a few seconds, her brow furrowed, green eyes shining with concern. "Look…I've noticed that Potter is bouncing back and forth between you and Black, and that you and Black have stopped talking. I know it's not really my place to get involved. I'm barely friends with Severus anymore, and I've never been much more than an acquaintance with you, but despite your horrid friends, I do like you Remus. I was glad you got picked to be prefect with me, and I like working with you in Care of Magical Creatures. So…if you need some company until you can get this mess worked out with your friends…"

"That's really nice of you Lily, but…well there's still a lot you don't know. I don't think you'll ever fix your friendship with Snape if you get too friendly with me," Remus admitted. He hadn't even noticed the two weren't as close as they'd used to be, and considering what she'd picked up about him he felt a little bad about it. "I think it's rather assured that he's never going to come round about me now."

"So he knows?"

Remus frowned. "Knows what?"

"That you're a werewolf?"

Remus gaped at her. "Wait, he knows that, but how do you know that?"

She made that wry smile again. "I didn't know for sure until just now, but I've guessed it. Come on Lupin, we've always taken Defense Against the Dark Arts and Care of Magical Creatures together. I've noticed the regularity of your absences, and I put it to a timeline. Considering how much more Severus cared about your mysterious disappearances than I did, I'm surprised it took him so long to figure it out. I mean, we're the master potion brewers. We always pay attention to the moon phases."

"He didn't really figure it out, he was told. But wait, you…you're not upset? You've been keeping the secret for me?"

Lily nodded. "At first I was a bit bothered. I mean, I am muggle born so I've had to learn how things work in the wizarding world, and initially everything I knew about werewolves came from horror movies. But then I thought about it, and I realized that Dumbledore wouldn't let you come to school with us if there was any harm in you, and you happen to be one of the kindest boys I've ever known. Well, when you're not around your idiot friends anyway."

He smiled at that. "Thanks Lily."

"Not a problem. I was tempted to tell Severus a few times, but I noticed that there's a lot of prejudice against werewolves, so I held my tongue and I'm glad I did."

"Me too. He, er, hasn't exactly taken the news well. I think if it wasn't for Dumbledore he'd have told the whole school by now and I'd have to leave."

"How'd he find out? Who told him?" Lily asked. Remus hesitated, and before he'd even decided if he wanted to tell her Lily put it together on her own. "Black. Black told him, didn't he?"

"Er…kind of."

"Kind of?"

"It's a long story, and not one I'm keen to go over again." Actually, it was a rather short story. The love of his adolescent life and betrayed his deepest secret, ripping his heart out in the process.

"That's fair. Well, I think I've said everything I need to, so I won't detain you any further in the bathroom. See you in Potions."

"Yeah, bye Lily."

Lily headed out into the corridor first. Remus waited a few minutes, though he didn't think it would help any. Sure enough, when he finally walked into the corridor it was to find James and Sirius waiting for him, Sirius looking a bit awkward and James in a comical state of shock.

"Why'd Evans haul you into a bathroom just now?" James asked.

"For a quick snog," Remus couldn't help but say with a smirk.

"Oi! I thought you liked blokes," James snapped, clearly missing the smirk. Sirius let out a loud snort, then went back to staring uncomfortably at Remus.

"Not so loud," Remus hissed, mindful that they were in a not-quite-deserted corridor. "And I do, but I haven't ruled girls out. Anyway, I was teasing. We weren't snogging, she just wanted to talk to me."

"Oh. Was it about me?"

"No James, it was not about you."

"Are you sure? Did she mention me at all? Girls are crafty you know, like, maybe she was asking you some out of the way harmless sounding thing, but she was really wondering something about me…?" It was a bit pathetic, how hopeful he looked.

"Good lord Prongs!" Sirius clapped a hand over his mouth to hide his terribly unmanly burst of giggles. Remus laughed too, and for a moment things felt the way they always had. Then their eyes met and the moment was gone.

"Well…I'll be up at the library until Potions. See you later," Remus mumbled before trudging off.

James, completely oblivious to the tension, called after him. "You still haven't told me what Evans wanted with you!"

"Bye James!"

Sirius grabbed James' arm once Remus was out of sight. "Remus knows you know he likes boys?"

"Hm? Yeah…what?"

Sirius made an exasperated noise. "I'm the one who told you he liked boys, dipshit! That means he knows I talked about it."

"Sirius, I really don't think that would be the biggest violation of his confidence you've committed recently," James said. Sirius was glaring daggers at him. "Besides, Remus told me himself. Well, kinda. It was in the hospital wing the morning after…er, yeah, and he was crying and I guessed something and he nodded. So he knows I know."

"What'd you guess?"

"…stuff."

"Prongs."

It was James' turn to glare. "Listen Sirius, maybe last month I'd have told you, but with what just happened I think it's a good idea to start respecting Remus' secrets. Okay?"

Sirius looked like he'd been slapped. "Y-yeah. Alright. I'm gonna…gonna go. See you at Potions." He took off as well, leaving James standing alone in the middle of the corridor.

"Well, Potions is going to be just lovely this afternoon!" He said brightly.