Disclaimer: I own nothing.

WARNINGS/Author's note: This chapter is very random - it's not really even a chapter, really. It is made up of three random scenes which show how Remus, Sirius and James get their nicknames. I wanted to somehow incorporate the boys' nicknames into the story, but because this obviously isn't cannon, I had to think up my own way. So yes, I admit it's rather random and odd but hopefully you like it! Although Lily is in on the names, she doesn't get one herself (since it's the boys' thing) and she's fine with it! Peter will get his later.

Thanks to my beta amberbelle and for all your reviews. You guys are awesome! Enjoy!

Chapter Ten: Moony, Padfoot and Prongs

Sirius was on one of his walks, casually strolling the leafy streets of Abilene, when he rounded a corner and recognized a hunched figure a few meters away from him. Remus was sitting on a park bench, reading. Grinning wickedly at such a perfect opportunity for troublemaking, Sirius silently crept up behind the intensely concentrating boy and bent down, putting his mouth close to Remus' ear. He took a deep breath and shouted the first word that came into his head - very loudly.

"EPIPHENY!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

"AAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!!" Remus flew three feet into the air and landed on the ground in a scrambled heap. His heart beating wildly, the boy stared up at Sirius's figure, which was bent-double and convulsing slightly. He realized that the black haired boy was laughing at him.

"What the fuck, Sirius? What the hell did you go sneaking up on me for? I didn't even hear you! I swear you had - like - padded feet or something," he ranted, extremely annoyed and rather disgruntled.

Sirius, who had during this time somewhat controlled his laughter, looked down at the boy still lying on the ground. Then he made a show of inspecting his right foot.

"Nup, sorry mate, doesn't look like they're that padded to me. I must just have super-quite feet," he said seriously, then flashed Remus a wicked smile.

Remus glowered at him. "Ah, shut it."

Sirius took the liberty to look mildly offended, the vision ruined by the laughter in his eyes.

"Fine then, if you're going to be like that, I'll just say I do have padded feet."

Remus, whose heart was slowly returning to a normal speed, glared up at him some more, though only half heartedly. He took the hand Sirius was offering him but wasn't expecting to be pulled up as fast as he was. As he felt himself propel forward, Remus placed the palm of his hand on Sirius's chest to avoid crashing bodily into him. The material of the black haired boy's shirt was soft and silky and he could feel the muscles of the boy's chest through the thin fabric. Blushing slightly, Remus quickly took his hand away and looked up at Sirius, who was giving him a peculiar look. After a moment, the look passed and the ex-Durmstrang student released his grip on Remus' hand and upper arm, which the auburn haired boy hadn't noticed he had still been holding.

"Where's James, anyway? I thought he'd be with you," asked Sirius as Remus collected his book, which had fallen to the ground.

"Nah, he wanted to go to the library or something."

"James, in the library!? Never!" cried Sirius.

Remus laughed. "I reckon it's got something to do with Lily."

"I see. Well, Mr. Lupin," said Sirius suddenly, changing the subject. "Let your dear pad-footed friend walk you back to your humble abode." He gestured in the general direction of the Lupins' house.

Remus, already headed in that direction, put up with Sirius' antics. "Well, my dear pad-footed friend, I'll let you walk me home if you promise not to use your 'padded-feet' to scare me again."

"Agreed!" cried Sirius in a theatrical voice, and the boys shook, grinning at each other.

They walked home, and from then on, Sirius was also known by the name Padfoot.

Remus was leaning on his front fence, staring off into the distance.

"Who are you thinking of?" asked a grinning Sirius, who the auburn haired boy had not noticed come up beside him. Startled out of his thoughts, he looked around wildly for a second before noticing Sirius leaning on the fence next to him.

"What? Nothing. I'm not thinking about anyone," he said a little too quickly.

"Yes you were! You were thinking – no – mooning over someone. You were mooning!" he said triumphantly, as if coming up with the appropriate word was a big deal.

"Who's mooning?" asked James who had come out of Remus's house.

Oh God, thought Remus.

Sirius grinned and pointed at him. "He was!" he cried. "Remus was mooooning over someone."

"No, I wasn't!" Remus said insistently as James made on 'ooooing' sound, normally heard from young girls. God, I hadn't looked that pathetic had I? he thought desperately. He had indeed been thinking about someone. He'd been thinking about – well – about Sirius- but not in that way, he tried to persuade himself. And I defiantly was not mooning. Remus Lupin does not moon.

"Aww, come on, who was it?" James asked, while Sirius repeated, "Remus was mooning, Remus was mooning," in a sing-song voice.

He made the mistake of looking at Sirius, who grinned and winked at him, and caused him to blush. Thankfully, a second later Remus spied Lily coming down the street and called out to her.

"Lily! Come save me from this awful pair!" he cried dramatically.

James, on hearing the name of his beloved, automatically stopped pestering Remus, his hand shooting up to ruffle his already unruly hair.

Sirius had also stopped singing, but was still looking at Remus with a silly smile on his lips, as if he knew exactly who the auburn haired boy had been thinking about. The Gryffindor tried to ignore him.

As Lily came up, she frowned at James and Sirius. "Stop annoying Remus," she said.

"And hello to you too," said the ex-Durmstrang student.

Lily rolled her eyes. "Hello Sirius, Remus, - James."

James grinned widely. After the other night, the red head had begun to call him by his first name and it thrilled him to no end. "Hey, Lily," he said.

She turned to Remus. "So, we were supposed to go to 'Penelope and Amber's' remember?" she said.

"How could I forget?" he smiled. "Hang on, I'll just get my coat."

When he returned he saw that Sirius, Lily and James were talking amiably. Remus smiled to himself. He was glad that Lily had stopped being so hostile towards the black haired boy.

Ten minutes later they were seated at one of the small round tables of 'Penelope and Amber's Ice Cream Galore'. Lily was at the counter, ordering their ice-creams.

"Remus, I have decided to call you Moony," said Sirius suddenly.

"You have?" Remus asked slowly. He stole a look at James who was looking worriedly at him.

"Yup. I have a nickname so I though someone else should have one too. And because you were mooning before. And you look cute when you moon." Remus would have blushed at this last statement if he hadn't been preoccupied thinking of the irony of his new name.

"Well, it certainly fits," he said quietly. Sirius noticed an unidentifiable emotion cross over Remus's face and saw him glance at James who was looking extremely worried. Sirius frowned.

"Look, I'm sorry if you don't like it, I don't have to call you that if you don't want."

"No, no, it's fine really," said Remus, giving Sirius and James a reassuring smile.

At that moment, Lily returned, carrying a tray of ice-creams and soon the matter of Remus's new nickname was forgotten.

***

James was glad that he hadn't had to punch his new friend in the nose for choosing such a weirdly fitting name. Granted, Sirius had no idea about Remus's condition and the extreme irony of it all, but he still felt annoyed at him for making Remus upset. When Lily arrived with the little glass bowls full of delicious looking ice-cream, however, the matter was forgotten and they enjoyed the rest of the afternoon talking and laughing in the small bright ice-cream parlor.

Over the next few days, Remus's nickname stuck and the group picked up on calling both Sirius and Remus by their respective nicknames. James became convinced that he also deserved a nickname.

"So guys, I need a nickname too," said James, three days after the 'birth' of Remus' new name. He and his companions, Sirius and Remus, were sitting in a small coffee shop on the corner of the main street.

"I mean, since you two have one, it's only fair that I do too."

Sirius and Remus grinned at each other and rolled their eyes at the stubborn and child-like musings of their friend. Remus knew James wasn't being selfish; he just wanted to be included.

"Alright, mate, what do you want to be called?" asked Sirius.

"I don't know! We just have to come up with one."

"Well, Sirius and I got ours sort of spontaneously. I mean, we didn't plan it, they just came about. Maybe we should just wait for something like that to happen," said Remus reasonably.

Seeing the look of dejection on his friend's face, Sirius quickly put in, "but we could still think of some… if we think of something really good then you can have that."

James smiled. "Cool."

They sat in silence for a while, trying to come up with some names.

"Well… you play Quidditch, so how 'bout – 'Quaffly', or something… or, or, 'Snitchy'," ventured Remus.

Sirius snorted and James looked at him in horror.

"Well it's not like you two are coming up with anything!" Remus huffed.

At that moment a ruffled and extremely irritated-looking Lily stormed into the coffee shop.

"Remus! Where the hell have you been!?" she cried, coming up to their table.

"Um... right here," said Remus slowly, wary of the famous Evans temper. He was glad that it hadn't yet been unleashed in full force that summer.

Seeming not to hear his answer, she slammed a book on the table and cried "Look at this! Look at this!"

The book she was referring to didn't look in top shape. It appeared that someone had dumped a mug of coffee on it, then proceeded with a glass of orange juice, a jar of soy-sauce and finished with a bottle of coke-a-cola.

Remus grimaced.

Lily, still fiery eyed and fuming, pointed at it – quite unnecessarily.

"I found it in the library like that. I really needed it for my potions essay and now it's completely ruined and they don't have another copy!"

James looked at the book and then back up at Lily. "Chill Lils, it's only a book. Anyway, now you have a good excuse not to do that stupid essay," he said.

Remus, knowing Lily's temper, felt that that hadn't been the smartest move for James to make. Lily rounded on him.

"Shut up, Potter! And don't call me 'Lils'," she spat. Gathering the destroyed book into her arms she looked up again. "And can't you do something about your hair!? You look like you have bloody antlers," she all but yelled.

With that, Lily stormed out of the coffee shop, leaving many curious customers in her wake.

Sirius and Remus looked at each other and burst out laughing.

James glared at them. "What's so funny?"

"Well, you see mate, it's sort of true," said Sirius around his laughter.

As James self-consciously attempted to flatten his hair, Remus calmed down enough to say, "Don't worry about it, James. Lily doesn't really mean the things she says when she's angry."

"Yeah, well…" said the dejected looking boy.

Sirius suddenly made a sound of exclamation.

"That's it!"

"What's it?" asked Remus warily.

"James' name."

"Oh, yeah," said Remus, cottoning on. He thought a moment. "You know, deer have antlers."

Finally realizing they were talking about his possible nicknames, James said, "No way! Deer's are too… feminine."

Remus gave him a funny look but said, "Fine. Stags then."

They lapsed into contemplative silence.

"Hoofy!" Sirius exclaimed excitedly a few minutes later.

Remus and James looked at him as if he had grown an extra head.

"I'm sorry, what?" asked James in disbelief.

"Never mind," grumbled Sirius as Remus chuckled into his coffee.

"How about Zip?" asked the auburn haired boy five minutes later.

"Zip?"

"Well, stags run fast and you zoom around on your broomstick like a madman."

"I don't think Zip really fits," said Sirius, giving James an appraising look.

The three boys continued to talk, laugh and exclaim upon various possible nicknames for James before an hour and three cups of coffee later, they settled on Prongs.

A/N: So? Was it OK? Not too lame? I'm actually posting this as a mini birthday present to myself since I'm turning seventeen in about... 42 mintues :D Although, technically I don't get an actual birthday this year. Thanks, world! So, to any of you fellow leap year babies out there - HAPPY NON-BIRTHDAY! Have fun turning whatever and a quarter!

In other news, I forgot to mention last update that I have added a new oneshot to my collection! Any Harry/Draco fans out there who haven't taken a squiz, please do!

So, finishing up, please make my fourth and a quarter so much more special and leave a review! I thrive off of them :)