Standing outside of the painting that led to the Gryffindor common room gave me a great view of the moving staircases. I had the strongest urge to spit and see how far it would fall before something stopped it. The urge was squashed when the portrait opened up behind me. Several Gryffindors have already come out, each one giving me strange looks, but this time it was Remus.

"There you are," I gave him an amused smile to show his lateness didn't bother me.

He sent a sheepish smile back, "Sorry. The boys weren't letting me leave without some answers." "The boys" he referred to would be Sirius, James, and Peter.

I just shrugged, "You can just tell them we're hanging out, I don't mind." We started walking through the halls with me slowly leading us to the hallway where I found that secret room.

"I did tell them I was hanging out with you," Remus insisted, "they just wanted to know every detail about what we were going to do."

"Well, what did you say?"

He sighed frustratedly at the thought of his friends constant nagging, "They were trying to get me to 'admit' that we were a secret couple having meetings in the middle of the night."

I gave him a strange look, "Why would they think we were doing anything like that?"

"Ever since Sirius came back after his snogging session with some third year Hufflepuff, girls are all Sirius and James seem to talk about." Remus glanced at me, "Don't tell anyone I said this, but James has now made it a bit of a competition to see which one can snog more girls."

I shook my head exasperatedly, "Twelve year olds are so immature. No offense." Sirius was now thirteen, but he's decided to take advantage of being a teenager and chase after girls. I shouldn't say anything against that considering I'll be doing the same thing. Though I'm only twelve in the physical sense.

Remus waved it off, "None taken."

We stopped in front of the large expanse of wall. Opposite the wall was the Barnabas the Barmy tapestry. It meant I was in the right place. "It's right here," I murmured to myself. I hadn't fully figured out how the door would appear, so I decided I would try and do the same thing as I had last time.

Remus sent me an odd look when I started pacing back and forth, "What are you doing?"

"I'm getting the room for us to meet it."

I've paced a few times now but the door wasn't appearing. I didn't know what I was doing wrong. The door appeared after I walked in front of it a few times, so why wasn't it working now? I needed the room to meet with Remus in!

After mentally grumbling about needing a secret meeting room a door started appearing in the stone wall. I watched its appearance with satisfaction and Remus watched it with awe. It was the same red door that appeared before. Entering the room showed the same meeting table with four arm chairs, and a black chair at the head of the table.

"What is this place?"

I watched Remus examine the room as I draped myself onto the comfy black chair, "What do you think?"

Remus slowly pulled out the armchair to my right and took a seat, "This is amazing. How'd you find this place?"

My eyes wandered around the room as I shrugged. The lighting wasn't that great in here, but that was because the only light sources were the torches on the wall by the door and the fireplace. Maybe get rid of the torches and put some sort of light over the table.

All of a sudden the torches disappeared, making the room even darker. Remus and I shared a worried glance before we were blinded by a sudden light. We both shielded our eyes from the onslaught with shouts of surprise. "What is going on?!" Remus asked.

I had to blink spots from my vision, "I don't know." Looking around the room I tried finding the source of light, and hanging from the ceiling–right above our table–was a chandelier. It was made from four black iron bars. They connected at the top and came down in arcs. The ends curled out and wrapped around white tubes with flame shaped light bulbs screwed into the tops.

"It's a chandelier," Remus stated. I nodded in agreement. "Where did it come from?" All I could do was shrug and make undecipherable noises.

The chandelier had come out of absolutely nowhere. It made a lot more light than the two torches did, and I was grateful for that, but it confused me on how it appeared. It happened right after I thought that the room needed better light. My chair also changed after thinking it needed to be more comfortable.

"I think it changed because I wanted it to."

Remus sent me an odd look, "What do you mean?"

"Well," I looked around for something to use as an example when my eyes landed on the chair he was sitting in. I chewed on the inside of my cheek as I thought about ways to change it.

Maybe a nice cream color, and make the back a little taller.

At first nothing happened. It took several moments where my determination for the chair to turn became stronger and stronger. Before my eyes I watched as the red fabric bled into white, and the back of it stretched to cover Remus' entire back. It wasn't as tall as mine, but it looked pretty comfortable.

The moment Remus noticed his chair begin changing he jumped up and watched it from a few feet away. When it was finished he looked up at me for some sort of answer, and my victorious smile seemed to put him at ease.

"The room changes to give me whatever I really want or need," my voice was in complete awe. Magic truly was a wonderful thing.

The information seemed to amaze Remus as much as it did for me, "Would I be able to do it?"

I shrugged, "I don't know. I've only been in this room two other times. Try it out."

Every second that ticked by had Remus' face grow sterner and sterner with concentration. After a while he started looking a little constipated, and since nothing was happening I decided to stop him, "I don't think it's working Remus."

He let out a long sigh, "I guess not. But why would it work for you and not me?"

I briefly contemplated the possibility of wandless magic. My abilities were definitely improving, but I was no where near able to vanish items and conjure others out of thin air. Wandless magic also required a lot of effort to accomplish the task. It only got easier after practicing the same spell over and over again. "It must have something to do with the room."

Remus sat down in the now white chair and slowly relaxed into the cushions. Now that I knew and accepted his status as a werewolf Remus seemed to have become a lot closer to me. Sure he still spent all of his time with the Marauders, but there was a certain air of comfort that now rested around him whenever we were together.

I figured I would dive right into the conversation, "Have you told them yet?"

He shot down my question with one of his own, "Have you told Sirius who you really are?"

"That's a no, then." I sighed, "We are so horrible."

Remus sighed as well, "We aren't that bad. At least we're trying to figure out how to tell them." Just thinking about revealing his secret made his palms sweat.

I noticed his reaction, "Hey," I waited to continue until he looked at me, "there's nothing to worry about. I'll be there right next to you, confessing my own secret."

His shoulders slumped in defeat, "At least they won't look at you in disgust, and hate you for it."

"Remus," I snapped, "they would never do anything like that. They're your best friends." He continued to silently mope,so I reached over and hit him upside the head.

"Ouch!" He rubbed the back of his head, "What was that for?!"

I rolled my eyes playfully, "That didn't hurt."

Remus grumbled to himself while rubbing the back of his head.

"We're gonna have to do this eventually," I went back to our original topic of conversation.

"I know," he finally stopped touching his head, "but now they're even more busy playing Quidditch."

"Oh yeah," I mused with a small smile. Sirius he'd written in his letters about how he and James tried out for the Gryffindor team. James was seeker and Sirius made beater. He also wrote about how their practices went, and several tactics he and James were coming up with. I've had several urges to go to my own houses Quidditch captain and give away the tactics. In the end I didn't do it.

"So you boys are all busy with pranks, girls, and Quidditch. I'm busy studying," practically everything under the sun, from school work to wandless magic, "and trying to hang out with all of my friends equally."

Remus nodded, "Pretty much. None of us have much free time."

I rubbed my face with my hands, "Next year won't be any easier since we'll be given more classes."

We fell into a heavy silence that was finally broken by Remus, "What is your animagus?"

I grinned excitedly, "You wanna see?" Whether he said yes or no didn't matter because I was already getting out of my seat.

Remus turned in his seat to watch as I crouched down to all fours. I felt a little subconscious, but I had to push those feelings aside to focus on my transformation. The last time I changed was the full moon.

As usual I changed my limbs first. Then my body changed from the tip of my nose to my tailbone. All of the hair on my body was replaced by brown fur, my nose elongated into a snout, my teeth grew longer, and my joints moved to the sides of my body to allow myself to walk on four legs.

When I felt the end of my transformation I blinked my eyes a few times to get used to the change in vision. Once my eyes settled on Remus I saw his wide eyed expression. It amused me enough to give a few chuckles. It sounded odd laughing as a bear. Like breathy grunts.

"Alex?" His eyes showed his nervousness. He wasn't sure if I was still me or if my mind was now that of a bears.

After I nodded my head Remus cautiously reached out his hand and set it on the top of my head. When I didn't make any moves against him he started running his fingers through my fur. "A grizzly bear," Remus breathed, "Alex this is brilliant!"

I huffed in agreement. It was quite the accomplishment for someone to become an animagus. Especially since I was rather young, physically. I probably had an easier time since–according to Gringotts–my magical abilities were being a matamorphmagus and an animagus. Becoming an animagus was something everybody could do, but as an ability it probably helped the process.

"You still have your own thoughts." I could hear a slight jealousy to Remus' voice. He probably loses his when he becomes a werewolf.

A whine escaped my throat and I tilted my head to lick at his hand. Remus chuckled in disgust, "Oh, gross!" He wiped his spit covered hand on his pants.

Walking up closer to Remus I started nudging at his legs. He tried getting away from me and asking what I wanted, but I couldn't exactly answer him. I continued to nudge him until I was behind him, then I shoved my snout between his thighs until he was straddling my neck. He was very confused and shouting questions but he eventually fell back onto my shoulders.

"Alex what are you doing?!" I just huffed in acknowledgment and kept walking forward with Remus on his back. "Are you giving my a piggy-back ride?"

I bobbed my head with a groan, and Remus chuckled, "You're a strange one Alex," he scratched behind my ear, "very strange indeed."