"Who are you? What are you doing here?" James asked them, extremely confused.

The girls looked at each other excitedly. "We wanted-" one of them began, but Peter cut them off by discreetly gesturing to them to shut up.

They all glanced at Peter, and when he blushed awkwardly, James and Remus guessed that they were probably part of Sirius's 'fan club' and told the girls to leave. They quickly scrammed.

Sirius chuckled softly as he opened their dorm door. "So, now you're ruining Peter's chances, because I ruined Moony's?" he asked them, but they didn't say anything. "Two girls? I like it. Did they come to see you, Pete?"

"Er... yeah," Peter replied.

"What are their names?"

"Elise Wimbles and Shonda something," he replied in a low voice. James and Remus glanced at each other nervously.

"Elise Wimbles? That name sounds familiar, Which one do you like more, Pete? I thought the girl with the long hair looked pretty," Sirius asked, idly. James nodded sternly from behind Sirius.

"Yeah that's Shonda," Pete replied, also nodding.

"Hmm."

A while later, Sirius went into the bathroom to brush his teeth, and James and Remus rounded on Peter. "What were you thinking Peter?!" whispered James angrily.

"You realise, if Sirius remembers who Elise Wimbles is, he will strangle you!" Remus told him, and he whimpered. Elise had been one of the many girls who had sent Sirius extremely noisy Valentine's cards last year. They would go off at regular intervals, and neither Incendio nor any other hex had worked on them. Neither could they throw them out the window, because that would be so embarrassing.

"I wasn't going to, but they paid me two galleons..." he whined and Remus gasped.

"Two galleons for what?" asked James, his face uncomfortably close to Peter's.

"They just wanted to see our dorm," Peter whimpered, backing away against the wall.

"Peter, you can't be doing this kind of stuff. Sirius will see this as betrayal," he said, disappointed.

"Swear you won't do it again, Peter. And you'll return the money. A Marauder's word?" James asked him, and Peter nodded.

"I swear," he said earnestly.

"Have you done this before?" asked James, suspiciously, but before Peter can answer, Sirius came out of the bathroom, saw them standing over Pete, and chuckled.

"Interrogating him, are we? So, what did you find out about Shonda?" Sirius asked innocently.

"Nothing much yet, Sirius," said James, giving Peter a last mean look, and walking over to his own bed. Remus walked over to the bathroom to brush.

"By the way, Moony, I've been thinking, I'm sorry about that, alright. I don't know what came over me!" Sirius said, as he watched Remus brush, from the doorway.

"I know exactly what came over you," Remus replied thickly, mouth full of foam.

"What do you mean?" asked Sirius, a bit nervous for some unknown reason.

Remus rinsed his mouth and looked up and Sirius through the reflection, still leaning over the sink. "Stupidity! That's what always comes over you! Why don't you ever think?" he asked, sounding vexed rather than angry.

"I'm sorry, Moony. I really am. Is asking Meadowes out really that important to you? Do you really like her that much?" Sirius asked determinedly.

"Why did you have to insult her like that, Sirius? You know she isn't like Bertha Jorkins!" Remus said. "Bertha had no sense of privacy."

"I know. But, you haven't answered my question," said Sirius calmly, folding his hands. He really needed to know.

Remus glared at him. Answer your question? Oh, I'll answer it…
In a split-second, Remus reached for his wand on the counter and directed the water from the running tap onto Sirius' head, drenching his hair completely.

"Nooo! Moonyyyy!" squealed Sirius and ran back into the room. The others burst out laughing.

Remus shut the tap and walked over to Sirius and threw a towel at his face. "You will apologise to MacDonald tomorrow. And make it look sincere," he ordered him.

The heard a muffled noise from underneath as Sirius towel dried his hair.

"I'm sorry, didn't quite catch that," said James, laughing.

"I said, FINE!" shouted Sirius, pulling the towel off. "It's so wet. And cold." He shivered.

"Use a drying charm," Remus told him and walked over to his own bed, supremely unconcerned.

"Drying charms over-dry my hair," whined Sirius.

"Not my problem, Sirius. Let that be your punishment for insulting her like that," Remus' voice sounded from behind his curtains.

"Was it though, Moony?" asked Sirius. "Was it punishment for insulting her, or for not letting you find out?"

"Aren't they the same thing?" Remus asked in return.

"Not really. Think about it, Moony. If I didn't let you find out whether or not Meadowes is single, but I managed to do that without insulting anyone. You'd still be mad at me, right?"

Remus pulled his curtains apart again, his expression confused. "W-what are you trying to say?" he asked uncertainly. The others looked a bit confused too.

"I'm just trying to make you answer my earlier question," Sirius explained, pointing at the bathroom.

Remus didn't know how to reply to that. He was still angry with Sirius. "I'm so mad at you, Sirius," he said. "You can't insult people like that, you'll only end up alienating everyone."

Sirius made a face and rolled his eyes, annoying Remus even more, and he roughly pulled his curtains shut again. Sirius turned to look at James, but James just shrugged and walked over to Peter's bed. He could see Peter mouthing something to James from the corner of his eye. But he didn't care. He shut his curtains too and stared at the ceiling above.
His brain felt both whirry and numb at the same time. Like he had so many emotions within him, but they were so deep inside, that he couldn't understand or experience them properly. But he hadn't always been like this. Once upon a time, Sirius Black had been very good at processing how he was feeling. Very good at emoting. But a natural result of growing up in the Ancient, most Neanderthal House of Black was that Sirius' emotions were met with either bored indifference, a slap across the face, or more commonly- ridicule. No one gave a shit about what he said, and on top of that, they deemed everything he said as wrong. Constantly.
He thought he knew why his family behaved the way they did. It was because they didn't understand him. But this information didn't lessen the pain he felt when they brutally trivialised his suffering.
When he came to Hogwarts, he hid behind a well-crafted feisty exterior of jokes and pranks, but it was really a fantasy of invulnerability. But making something funny was not the same as being happy. In reality, he was insecure and had low self-worth. Friends changed his outlook a little, but after years of humiliation for expressing his thoughts, he became quite good at acting like words didn't affect him that much... that he was perfectly fine. And when you get really convincing at pretending that you're all fine, people just assume you are. Which was what his friends thought. Because he never told them how his family treated him… mostly because he didn't really know who was wrong, him or his parents. He also didn't want their pity, he hated it when people pitied him.
It was a defence mechanism so powerful, he became so skilled at concealing his emotions, that he deceived even himself, and that was the real problem. Now, his feelings ended up remote and inaccessible. Even if he did manage to delve deep and access one, he couldn't tell which emotion was genuinely his, and which may have been conditioned. It was as if he needed external validation to feel feelings, because he would constantly second guess.

He could hear James and Peter whispering, but he didn't catch the words. Soon, the lights were turned off and the other two went to bed as well. He didn't know how long he stayed like that, but then an emotion seemed to seep out. He felt very lonely and abandoned. He often used to feel this way when he was at home, but this was the first time he'd felt it since meeting the other Marauders. And the worst part was, that he didn't know he was allowed to feel it, nor did he know why he was feeling it. The sudden intensity of all this was overwhelming and his eyes filled with tears. He had to cast a silencing charm, or he would wake James with all his sniffling. Because James was a really light sleeper.
After ten, or maybe fifteen minutes, or it might have been longer, he didn't know, he heard his name being called.
But he didn't respond.

"Oh no. Sirius, what's wrong?" It was Remus. He felt him sit on the edge of his bed and gently try and turn his shoulders towards him. "Sirius. Please tell me what's wrong. Is it something I did?"

You've done nothing. It's not your fault at all, I'm just a messed-up person. The tears wouldn't stop.

"Please say something," Remus said, now checking to see if his hair had dried.

But what could he say? Even he didn't know why he felt this way. Plus, he hated being vulnerable in front of anyone, because it was looked down upon, back home. "Nightmare," he said finally, noting how blocked his nose was as he spoke.

Remus sighed and shifted his position a little. "Do you want to talk about it?" he asked, his voice sounded very near.

"No."

"Well, why didn't you go to James?" he asked, leaning his weight on him a bit. His body felt very warm and comforting against Sirius' back. But he didn't answer.

"Do you want me to leave?" Remus asked, hoping he wouldn't say yes.

"No."

"I can go and get James if you want."

"No."

"Did you cast a Muffliato, Sirius?" Remus asked. He seemed to be trying to get some sort of answer out of him. "Sirius..." Remus muttered, putting his cold forehead on Sirius' warm neck. Even the cold felt nice. Apparently Remus thought he was too warm, and he felt Remus' hand on his forehead, checking to see if he had a fever.

"I don't have a fever," Sirius told him, finally turning around without meaning to.

And Remus hugged him. It wasn't a tight hug, but it felt like the best hug he'd ever received. It seemed to completely dispel every notion of loneliness from his brain. "If this is what it feels like to hug a dark creature…" he trailed away and Remus chuckled.

Sirius shifted back a little, giving Remus more space on the bed, and Remus let go of him to move under the covers. As soon as he was comfortable, he swept Sirius' hair back and kissed him on the forehead. No one, family member or otherwise, had ever done that for Sirius before. The feeling was wonderful, and in that moment, Sirius didn't even remember who Dorcas Meadowes was. And neither did Remus.

"Love you, Moony," he said, hugging Remus again.

"Try and get some sleep, Sirius."

Sirius smiled. He'd never really understood the concept of safety that most people associated with 'home' before, but now he knew it. He felt it in Remus' arms. Remus was home.

The next morning, when Remus opened his eyes, his vision was blocked by a mop of black hair. He swept the hair away and sat up. Then he noticed it. He was hard. What the hell?!
He glanced at Sirius and thanked Merlin he was still fast asleep. He quickly got out of bed and almost ran into the bathroom.

Almost an hour later, Sirius woke up to James' voice. "-ought you had already gone down for breakfast, although it's really early... wait, your book bag is still here..haha, silly me!"

Sirius heard Remus chuckle softly. "Last night I went to check if Sirius' hair was still wet-" he began in a low voice.

"Great Godric, Moony! You know, if he caught a cold, it would serve him right!" said Peter. Sirius pouted.

"No, he told me he had a nightmare," he heard Remus say. And then he lowered his voice further, "He was actually crying..."

Wow, he didn't even attempt to preserve my manliness.

"What!" James exclaimed, and he heard footsteps approach. His curtains were pulled back. "Sirius?" James shook him. "Sirius, mate."

Sirius opened his eyes and grinned up at James.

"Are you okay? Moony said you had a nightmare."

"I am fine. Great, in fact. I don't even remember the dream," Sirius said, sitting up.

Remus was watching him from his own bed. He was already dressed in his school robes. "Good," he said, grinning. "Now, it's a School day. If you don't get ready, we'll be late for Charms."

The girls were sitting further up the table than usual. James shook his head. Definitely Evans' idea. "Hi Evans," he said as they approached the girls.

"Hello," Lily replied to be polite. James looked like Christmas had come early.

"Hi MacDonald. Sirius has something he would like to say," said Remus, and James pushed him slightly forward.

Mary simply glanced up at Sirius for a moment, then went back to her scrambled eggs.

"Er…" he said, and she looked up again. "Look MacDonald, I'm really sorry," he finally said, and had the decency to look sombre.

"For what?" asked Alice, who was sitting beside her.

"For saying those things to her."

"What things?" asked Lily.

"For comparing her to other girls."

"And?"

"Um…" said Sirius.

"For calling her names," Remus whispered in his ear.

"For calling her names," Sirius repeated, and the girls smirked at them.

"Why are you sorry? You clearly meant them last night. What changed?" asked Marlene quickly.

"I didn't mean them. I didn't mean any of it, really. I was just…"

"You were just what, Black?" asked Mary.

Sirius couldn't think of anything else he could say but the truth.

"I didn't want the... er... transaction to take place." He glanced at James, he and Lily were looking at each other in the same confused way. It was almost as if they were having a silent conversation of their own.

"What?" asked Remus suddenly.

Fuck! Sirius turned to face him.

"I thought you said you liked her?" Remus asked him. The girls suddenly looked very interested in the conversation.

"When did I say that?" Sirius asked him blankly.

"Yesterday, on the way to dinner," said Remus, he looked completely put out.

"I only said she was pretty. But I just said that randomly. To be honest, I don't even think that," Sirius told him. The girls were hanging onto their every word now.

"I knew it!" said Remus. "Then why did you say that?"
Then a look of realisation dawned on his face. "It was a joke…" he mumbled, unable to look the boys in the eye anymore.

"It was at first, Moony. But we took it seriously when you were-" James began but Remus silenced him with one look. The girls were impressed.

"Had a nice little laugh, did you?" he asked savagely.

"No, Remus! Like I told you, we were all for this idea. I even wanted to set you up, but Sirius didn't think it was a good idea," explained James.

"Clearly. But you could have just told me, instead of behaving like a child!" Remus chided.

Sirius hung his head.

"What do you have against her?" asked Remus.

Sirius glanced sideways at him and realised something. Maybe I'm afraid of somehow losing you?
But he didn't say that, if felt super childish to even think it. It sounded so dumb even in his head. You are so ridiculous, Sirius!
"Well, cos she's a year above us, but that just seems silly now," he replied lamely.

"Right," said Remus, but he still felt like something was off. He glanced at Marlene, but she and Mary were smiling at each other, and nodding subtly. Lily blinked thoughtfully at Sirius, and then her eyes flicked towards Remus.

Then Peter muttered quietly, "She's looking at us," and all eight of them turned to look up at the head of the table. Meadowes and Jordan were looking over at them warily. The Prefects were always wary of the Marauders, never knowing when they would set off a prank or cause some kind of commotion.

Sirius closed his eyes and took a deep breath. If I am to redeem myself in Remus's eyes, I must do this.
He turned to Mary again. "MacDonald-" he began.

"Yes, yes, you clearly didn't mean anything you said. Now what did you want to know?" she asked enthusiastically.

"Does Meadowes have a boyfriend?" he asked without hesitating. He could see the boys from the corner of his eyes, look at him in surprise.

Mary seemed mildly surprised. She turned to Remus with a small but kind smile, and said, "No. She's single. She's actually never had a boyfriend. She's sort of… how do I put it?" and turned to Lily.

"She's sort of a... lone wolf," said Lily, and she didn't understand why the boys laughed at that.

"What?" she asked, assuming they were laughing at her.

"Nothing. Our Remus isn't afraid of a challenge, are you?" said James, clapping him on the back. Remus grinned at him.

"Well, since we've helped you, where's my muffin?" Mary asked Remus.

"Sirius will get it to you," said Remus, grinning at Sirius.

"Yes, I will," said Sirius, bowing in front of Mary. "Will my lady tell me her preference of muffin flavour?"

The girls giggled, even Lily smiled a little. "Banana is my favourite," she replied.

"Thanks MacDonald," said James, Remus and Peter at the same time, and Mary grinned.