Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter! Sirius-ly!

Chapter Eight- Rose's story

Rose sat on her bed; salty tears reached the corners of her mouth. It was the time for last lesson of the day. There was a soft knock on the door; Rose guessed it was probably Lily.

"Leave me alone," she managed to choke out. The door opened and Rose was surprised to see Leila.

"What?" Rose found herself asking, sounding harsher than she'd meant to.

"You lost someone." Leila said, sitting on Rose's bed beside Rose.

"How- what- why would you-" Rose sighed. Leila knew she was right. "My mother."

Leila hugged her.

"What was she like?" she asked softly.

"She was great. She was a muggle but she was always fond of magic." Rose gave a tearful laugh, still hugging Leila, "she would cook and clean the muggle way and dad would do little tricks with magic for her and she'd laugh and think it was really fascinating." Rose sighed, another tear rolled down her cheek, "She was always there for me. She gave advice and she helped me out and always knew what was wrong. She loved my dad; she'd do anything for him. But then when Josh… w-when Josh…" Rose faltered.

"What happened to Josh?" Leila asked softly.

"I-I can't tell you." Rose said, her voice squeaky.

"Don't worry, I won't tell." Leila reassured her. Rose took a deep breath.

"In my first year, Josh's seventh year. In the Easter holidays, Josh went outside to get some firewood and… well, it was a full moon…" Rose faltered again. Leila nodded calmly.

"He was bitten." She said. Rose nodded.

"My dad was terrified of his own son. Mum didn't care though. I didn't care either, Josh was my brother, my big brother, who always stood up for me and looked out for me! It wasn't his fault that the wolf got him!" Rose sniffled. "My dad kicked him out, but Dumbledore saved him, he gave him a place to go to transform. You know the whomping willow? There's a passage from there that leads to the shrieking shack. It's been haunted ever since!"

"But what about your mum?"

"She was angry at dad, but she stayed with him for my sake. I kept writing to my brother and in the holidays that just passed, he asked me if I wanted to come and stay with him for a few months. He said I could stay at the Leaky Cauldron on full moon nights so he wouldn't be anywhere near me. 'Course dad didn't know… but halfway through my stay with Josh we got an owl. My mother was found dead and my father badly injured. They'd been attacked by the same wolf that got Josh… my dad will be a werewolf if he survives. He'll never let me stay with him, he thinks it's too dangerous for me to be anywhere near a werewolf."

Rose let Leila go and wiped her eyes.

"I'm sorry to dump this all on you…" she sniffled.

"No. It's Ok, the best thing to do is to just tell someone everything, even if they can do absolutely nothing about it. You just gotta get over it, move on, find something better to focus on! It was the same for me when dad died," Leila looked down.

"Who'd you tell?" Rose asked.

"My aunt Catherine. And James… sort of. It's good to tell a guy, you know, get a slightly different perspective." Leila trailed off, "So you think you'll be Ok?"

"Yea… I think I'm gonna go find Remus."

"Are you gonna tell him about all this?"

"No. I think I'll leave it for a while. I'll tell him another time. I think I'll tell Lils though."

"Ok."

"Hey and, thanks a lot Leila."

"That's Ok. We couldn't have you off the planet now could we?" Leila gave Rose the Potter grin and Rose gave Leila her warm smile.

"Seeya later."

"Huh? What? It's in the kitchen!" Leila said, faking looking startled. Rose rolled her eyes. Leila laughed, "Seeya."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Remus collapsed onto his bed and closed his eyes, thinking of Rose. He remembered when he'd first met Josh Phillips, Rose's brother. And how he'd told Remus that he didn't use his real surname.

xXx FLASHBACK xXx

Remus headed down to the hospital wing, feeling bad about lying to his friends. Madame Pomphrey was waiting for him with a seventh year boy.

He had dark brown, longish hair, tanned skin and dark blue eyes. A white scar ran across his face from just underneath his eye, across his nose and ending underneath his ear.

"Good evening Mr Lupin." Madame Pomphrey said.

"Err, hello Ma'am." Remus said, shifting his shoulders in the hope that some of the pain would go away, instead his shoulder blades caught fire. He flinched and doubled over.

The older guy watched Remus sadly.

"This is Josh Phillips." Madame Pomphrey said, gesturing to the older guy.

"Actually I get called Josh Price now, since my dad kicked me out…" Josh smiled at Remus, it was a crooked smile due to the scar. Remus tried to smile back but it must have come out as a grimace. Josh winced suddenly and fell to his knees, clutching his face.

"Are you Ok?" Pomphrey asked, Josh nodded. Pomphrey turned to Remus, "Mr Lupin, Josh was attacked by Greyback in the holidays, this is his first transformation. I trust you can both make your way to the willow. You are half an hour early of course."

Remus nodded, a few moments later, Remus was leading Josh across the grounds, both of them shaking slightly.

"The first time's the worst… apparently." Remus said reassuringly to Josh.

"What do you mean by apparently?" Josh asked, his voice hoarse.

"I don't remember my first, I was too young." Remus replied.

"How old were you?" Josh asked, amazed.

"Four." Remus grimaced and reached for a long stick as they approached the willow.

"Who bit you?"

"Greyback." There was a silence as they prodded a knot on the trees trunk and moved towards the passage.

"So your dad kicked you out?" Remus asked.

"Yea, he said it's too dangerous for my younger sister." They dumped their bags at the end of the tunnel and climbed into the shack, heading up to the main room.

"Oh. Does your sister go to Hogwarts?"

"Yea, she's great, she's like my mum. She doesn't care about me being a werewolf… but my dad doesn't want either of them in danger so…"

Then the moon rose and both boys collapsed

xXx FLASHBACK OVER xXx

Remus had become good friends with Josh but had known him for so long as Josh Price that he forgot that he had a former name.

Since that night, both boys never really spoke to each other about their families, Remus would never had dreamed that Josh's little sister would be Rose.

But why was Rose so upset? Surely something couldn't have happened to Josh, and Rose never talked about Josh, never saw him for all Remus knew. He shrugged it off, she'd come through. He trusted her.

And Rose didn't care that Josh was a werewolf. She didn't care! So would she care about Remus being a werewolf?

Remus smiled to himself, Rose wouldn't care, her brother was a werewolf, so why should it be a problem that her friend was.

He decided that he'd tell her. Not at the moment, she was too out of it right now. But he'd tell her.

One day.

A.N- And that's another chapter gone! More coming soon!

Next chapter: Chapter Nine- Quidditch Trials

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