A/N: Thank you very much for the kind comments, I do my best to please. There's not much to say about this update other than whether people want me to keep putting little snippets of flashbacks from Remus or not, I feel like they're a bit of a cop-out as they're really easy for me to write, but I also feel that they're important in explaining why little Remus is as scared of things as he is and there's not much written about his pre-hogwarts years. Feedback?

The end of the lesson finished, and Remus packed his things away quickly but clumsily, his mind preoccupied with worrying about his imminent meeting with the headmaster. He had a vague idea that it was probably something to do with his lycanthropy by the hushed voice the professor had spoken in, he realised during the lesson that Professor Merridew was keener to shout or reinforce his words with magic than talk softly. James and Sirius were also both painfully aware of the latter point, still limping slightly from being forced off their chairs.

"I can't believe he did that, the blokes a nutter!" Sirius ranted irately as they squeezed through the classroom door, pushed along by the exiting crowd.

"Your response was almost worth it though." James pointed out, much to Peter's annoyance. "Oh shush Pettigrew, it's just a joke."

Peter spluttered, trying to form a coherent retort but was too flustered and being slightly shorter than the other boys, crushed in the exiting swarm as they joined the masses of students in the corridor. He tried to speak to James, but he was deep in conversation with Sirius, reminiscing about the events of the lesson. Remus had his fingers crossed in the pocket of his cloak, hoping that they wouldn't get on to the topic of his summons to the headmaster, whatever questions they were going to ask him he knew that he wouldn't be able to answer, either because he didn't know, or because it was too close to admitting that he was a werewolf. Of course though, his hoping was futile.

When the crowd thinned out a little Sirius grabbed Remus by the sleeve and pulled him in line with him and the messy haired boy so that he was between them. "Now that meddling Merridew isn't around, what does Dumbledore want with you?" His tone wasn't deliberately accusatory, but to Remus' ears he might have well been snarling and spitting in his face.

"I have no idea," Remus said slowly. "I think my parents said he might want to see me..." He said vaguely, offering up a little more information, hoping that it would satisfy their nosey needs and stop them for pushing for more detail.

Again, his hoping was futile. Remus was starting think that he was truly cursed, everything that he hoped for, no matter how simple was always dismissed. The age old lament of 'why me?' kindled a fire in his chest and his jaw hardened as James' opened. "Why's that?"

There was a pause as Remus pondered what lie to make up. "I don't know. They didn't say." In the end he just claimed ignorance, making a mental note to think something better up by the time he got back from Dumbledore's office and could give them a satisfactory answer.

He tried to slip back into his usual place behind them, but they weren't finished with their questioning yet and pulled him back, James on one arm and Sirius on the other. He tried to curl inside himself as they did so, recoiling from the physical touch. He didn't feel threatened physically by them, but mentally he was screaming, panicking, begging to be let free; to be able to run away until his lungs seared and his legs failed him. Physical restraint, no matter how good humoured, troubled him beyond comprehension being associated in his mind to some of his most terrible transitions ever.

Remus was around eight years old. It had been just less than a year since he'd been affected with lycanthropy and his parents were still trying to work out the safest way to deal with his monthly transitions into a snarling, muscled and bloodthirsty werewolf. This Full Moon they were trying restraints, and Remus had found himself strapped to the wall of the cellar in specially designed iron manacles, designed so that even as he transformed into his alter-ego he would still be held tightly and unable to claw or bite at himself and definitely unable to break free.

"Good luck sweetheart." His mother said softly, in those days still as caring as she'd been the day that he'd been born. Maybe even more so. "You shouldn't hurt so much in the morning."

Young Remus nodded, although deep inside he doubted the truth in her statement. Even at that young age he had been forced to age quicker than his peers, he knew that it would be best to just agree with her, not to fight and not to cause a tantrum. For one it would only make him more violent in his transition, and would only pain his mother. He didn't like to see her cry. That upset father too, more than anything, and he'd spent a lot of the time bothered lately, feverishly working away in his office. Almost too much time to ever see his son other than for brief encounters over the dinner table. Little did he knew then that it was the start of their relationships decay, in another year's time he would barely even speak to him, even though he no longer worked day and night to try and find a cure for his son.

His mother blew him a kiss and exited the door, and Remus heard the slam of the bolts sliding home into their locks. "One... two... three... four..." he counted softly; it was almost a ritual for him, "and five." She slid a heavy oak beam across the door shutting it firmly closed. Remus could just about hear her heading up the steps out of the cellar and the scraping of the slab being placed back over the hole in the pantry floor. He knew that she would lock that door too. At first it had just been the slab that had kept him in, but as he grew so did the werewolf inside him, becoming more and more hungry for the taste of human blood on his furry lips. Then they had started bolting him in, and for the first few times his mother had stayed the other side of the door, thinking that she would provide reassurance, but in werewolf form it only crazed Remus more, and he'd try to break through the door to reach the human who's scent filled his nostrils and made his jowls drip with saliva.

The Full Moon seemed to take a long time to rise that night, and by the time it did Remus was aching all over. He remembered nothing from the moment he started to turn under the influence of the Full Moon; he never did, but in the morning he came to in total agony. Both of his wrists were red raw, the same with his ankles. His head hurt, more than it usually did following a transition, and although he'd not been able to inflict any bites or scratches to himself the pain in his wrists and ankles – where he'd been manacled – was unbelievably sore. At the time he'd thought that it had been from the iron clasps still around his joints, but they discovered later that with his unnatural werewolf strength he'd managed to snap bones in both of his wrists as well as badly cut and bruise the back of his head. They could only assume that it had been from smashing his skull against the brick wall during his bloodlust, Remus was just fortunate that werewolf skulls were thicker than human ones, otherwise he might not have been alive to wake up in the morning.

The next month the manacles hung empty on the wall.

Remus fought to stop himself panicking as the memories of that transition flooded back. He tried to keep his voice calm and steady, "G-guys, can you get off me?" They seemed not to hear him. "Get off will you?" He snapped, wrenching his arms out of their grip. "Thank-you!"

James stopped and turned on him, angry. "What's your problem? First you have some huge secret about your scars, then you disappear for over half an hour, you've got some mysterious meeting with the head and now you're freaking out because we touched you."

Blood flooded Remus' cheeks; he supposed he hadn't been the most amicable person to the three boys who he had hoped would be his friends. He ran a scarred hand over a scarred face and sighed, his shoulders drooping. "I'm sorry James. And you, Sirius." He paused for a second and then caught sight of Peter. "And Peter."

"We don't need you to be sorry, we need you to trust us with whatever's going on and stop running away."

Remus looked at his hands, and struggled to think what to say. This was a pivotal point, he didn't want to lose the closest things he had to friends, but neither did he want to admit the truth. He didn't want to lie either, but he couldn't see any other way out of it. Maybe if he told them the same lie that he told Lily then they would believe it and not want to push him further encase they upset him and made him do something bad. He felt awful at thinking that, he didn't want to use guilt to stop them saying anything bad to him, he wanted honesty, but he was living in a world where the only way he could survive was through lies and deception. And he would have to get used to it.

"It's a-awkward. I've done some things..." He pulled up the sleeves of his robes slightly, looking furtively around for anyone who might be watching. "I did them."

There was a sudden clamour of voices, all saying different things, in different tones and with different emotions behind them. The loudest was Sirius, "Merlin's beard, are you mental?" followed by James, "Is that all?" And then Peter's pathetic, "B-but why would y-you..." followed a moment after.

Remus looked at Sirius and snorted, "Yeah I guess I am." Tactfully he ignored the statements from the other two boys and continued walking, thinking, and realising that he hadn't actually told a lie. Not yet at least, and they might not pry too much, he might not have to tell them a lie, he might just have to deliberately not tell them the whole truth, like the part where he wasn't human when he hurt himself.