Chapter Twelve

Sirius' POV

Sirius received no visits for the remainder of the week. He was just fine with that; he needed some time alone to recover. However, he also wanted time to talk to Remus. He'd been trying to piece together the story, but was coming up with very little. He found that no memory past the day that he broke up with Remus was accessible. This made him slightly frustrated; why couldn't anyone tell him? If not Remus, why not James, Peter, or Lily? Surely they all knew what had happened.

He was informed that he would not be well enough to take the N.E. this year, which posed a slight problem. In the end, he agreed to study over the summer and take the exams a month into it.

Studying during the summer. This would be new.

It bothered him that he didn't know what he wanted to do with his life; at the moment, he worked part-time at the Leaky Cauldron in the summer. Would he just have to keep that?

James had been talking for a while now about becoming an Auror. At first Sirius thought he just wanted to impress Lily, but James took it seriously and asked Sirius for advice.

"What should I do?" he asked him. "I want to become an Auror, but I don't know."

Now would be the perfect time to do it, Sirius thought, what with the Death Eaters running amuck. They needed Aurors more than ever now.

Remus just sulked when the topic turned to careers; surely, nobody would want to hire a werewolf. It panged Sirius to see Remus like that, especially because he knew it was true.

"We'll all get a flat together," he promised everyone, "we'll all get a flat and share the money until he can make enough to live on our own. Sound fair?"

Everyone agreed to it.

James, Peter, and Lily came to visit Sirius several times after that. But not Remus. Never Remus.

At first, Sirius had pestered them about him. They would tell him that he was too busy studying, but after a while, whenever he brought up the subject, they'd just talk over him.

Something was seriously wrong.

"Can I write a letter?" Sirius asked a Healer one day.

"Sure, kid," the Healer said, and he left to provide Sirius with a piece of parchment and a quill.

"Holler for us when you're done," he said. "We'll send it off."

Sirius stared at his piece of parchment, suddenly at loss for what to say. Deciding to start on the basics-the stuff they could comfortably talk about-he started his letter.

Moony,

Hey mate, I haven't seen you in a while! Exams must be kicking your butt, huh? Ah, well, how're you getting along there at Hogwarts? Does anyone miss me? Do you miss me?

Sirius paused, then scribbled out that last sentence.

I'm actually recovering quite well. The Healers said I'll be out in a couple of weeks. I'll be missing the N.E. , though. They told me I'd have to make them up in the summer.

But hey, I didn't write this letter to have a friendly chat. We have something serious to discuss, and since you can't seem to be able to do it in person, I thought that by letter would make it a bit easier for you.

From what I've gathered, the last memory I have is the day I broke up with you. Everything past that draws up a blank. So I need to know; did we get in a fight, and I just got the worst of it? Or did something else happen?

I can tell that this is seriously bothering you, and it worries me, mate. You really sound like you're beating yourself up about it. The others don't talk about you much, but when they do, it doesn't sound good. I'm slightly confused about the whole thing, and I just want straight answers.

Sirius

After reading it over a couple times, Sirius decided that it was stupid, and he crumpled up the parchment and tossed it across the room. Suddenly, he was angry with Remus; why couldn't the bloody prat just tell him what happened? Yeah, it might've been terrible, but their relationship-whatever relationship they had after the brake-up, Sirius didn't know-what going down the drain, and it was worrying him.

And yet, he thought he knew what was going on. Since Sirius broke up with Remus-something he shouldn't have done-they got in a fight and it ended rather badly. It was the only thing that could've happened. The only thing that would've caused Remus to act like this.

When the Healer returned, he asked, "Hey, when am I allowed to visit my friends?"

"Not for a couple more weeks, sorry," he said, and exited the room.

"Wait!" Sirius called. "Wait, one more thing!"

The Healer turned around, looking slightly annoyed.

"Can you send a letter for me?"

He grabbed a fresh piece of parchment and hastily scribbled,

We need to talk.

He'd know who it was from.

"To Remus Lupin," he told the Healer, rolling it up and giving to him.

"I'll make sure it's sent," the Healer said, walking off.

Sirius leaned back in his pillows and began to wait.

Remus' POV

Remus was curled up in an armchair, desperately trying to finish homework that was due the next day, when there was a tap on the Common Room window. Upon seeing an owl sitting on the windowsill, he heaved a sigh and thrust the window open. Glancing around, he untied the scroll from his leg.

There was no name on the letter.

Curiously, he peeked. It was rather short. Nobody'll mind, he thought, ripping it open. Reading the four words upon it, he instantly knew who it was from.

Sirius' POV

"Mr. Black? There's a visitor here to see you. Remus Lupin?"

"Have him come in." Sirius propped himself up and tried not to wince in pain. Remus strode in, eyes on Sirius the whole time. He threw himself into the chair beside the bed. Then, they both started talking at one.

"I'm sorry I was being such a prat-"

"It's all my fault, I'm so sorry-"

Both men stopped and blinked at each other.

"You first," Sirius said, just as Remus said, "Sorry, continue."

They stared at each other some more.

"We got in a fight, didn't we?" Sirius asked boldly. Remus gulped and lowered his head.

"Yeah."

"And now you're beating yourself up about it." Remus looked at Sirius, eyes hollow and pleading. It broke Sirius' heart to see him like this.

"It was all my fault-it was so close to the full moon-I couldn't contain myself-I was just so mad-"

"Whoa, wait," Sirius interrupted. "Do you mean to say that-that… you attacked me in werewolf form?"

Remus looked away.

Slowly, everything began to fall into place. The scratches…the bite marks… Of course! It was near the full moon! Sirius almost felt like kicking himself. How could I be so stupid as to not realize that?

Remus cleared his throat and Sirius realized he had been glaring at the covers of his bed.

"I'm sorry," Remus whispered.

"Don't be… It was probably my fault, I was probably acting like a complete git."

"We both kind of were," Remus said, cracking a small smile.

"Don't stress about it," Sirius said. "Honestly. I'm recovering fine. Why didn't you want to tell me? Did you think I would hate you?"

"Something along those lines," Remus muttered.

Of course Sirius wouldn't hate him! Just because they got in a fight didn't mean that they had to hate each other!

Sirius realized that Remus was crying.

"This is all so stupid," he said. "If we didn't play that stupid Spin the Bottle game, none of this would've happened."

"Not true," Sirius said softly. "That game didn't make those feelings appear; something would've happened sooner or later to make us realize that we liked each other. This would've happened no matter what."

"Thank you," Remus said.

"What?"

"Thank you for not getting mad. Thanks for…thanks for everything. Thanks for giving me the best month of my life."

With that, he got up and left. Pausing in the doorway, he turned and gave Sirius one more sad look before leaving.

Well, this is the end of my already written chapters, so updates will come a bit slower.