Sirius watched from Mcgonagall's window as his friend stumbled across the grounds and disappeared behind the whomping willow. He waited to see if anyone would follow him, perhaps, he wondered, he was meeting someone there. A date of some sort. Or perhaps, he would see him emerge a little while later. But neither such occurrence transpired. Instead, the entire hour Sirius was sat in McGonagall's office serving his detention, there wasn't even a sound to come from behind the tree. He probably shouldn't have paid it any notice, and honestly he couldn't recall the last time something held his attention for so long, but recently, Remus had been holding his attention. He'd held his attention so much he felt he could die from not speaking to him for as long as he had. Sirius had spent a lot of time chasing after boys who treated him like shit. He supposed, perhaps, the childhood of horror, with coldness from his father and torment from his mother, left him a little confused and underdeveloped when it came to love. But, he learnt, through experience, that actions speak louder than words, and that constantly making excuses for someone only leads to more heartbreak at your end. So instead, he decided to practice what he had so often and eloquently preached, and he stopped talking to Remus, when it seemed, so clearly, that Remus was more interested in someone else. But there was still a niggling part of his brain telling him that in fact, Remus was different, Remus was kind, and Remus wasn't a liar. But he told himself over and over, that these thoughts were just his old romantic heart aching for the great love stories he read in books, or saw in muggle movies, and that they were never going to exist in the real world. Especially not in his world. But still, despite it all, he found himself, on a Friday evening, stuck in detention beside Peter, caring about nothing else other than getting out so he could follow Remus behind the Whomping Willow and apologise and make everything right. Or at the very least, find out what the fuck he's doing.

McGonagall held Sirius back, "See you in the common room." Peter said, scuttling away.

She sighed. "You know, this is not exactly how I wanted to spend my Friday night either. I expected better from you."

Sirius scoffed. "Why?"

McGonagall rolled her eyes. "Because, beneath it all I know you Sirius, I know you are a kind and thoughtful boy. I know you are the only person in this school that gives poor Peter the time of day, and I figured, perhaps, you were more responsible than to get him involved in such stupid behaviour."

Sirius put his head down. "It was just a laugh."

"You were drunk."

"Everyone was drunk!"

"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that. You have been involved in more and more incidences like these since you started spending time with Remus, I know Fernsby caught you smoking and I know you have been sneaking around after dark. I understand you are teenagers but there's only so far I can turn a blind eye, and when your grades are affected, and you're dragging in innocent people like Peter into your little games, I begin to doubt my opinion of you, which, if you'd like to know, is rather high. You could be brilliant Mr Black, please stop letting yourself be distracted."

"Well… I don't really talk to Remus anymore anyway so you don't have to worry about that."

"Good. Now, please stay out of trouble." She dismissed him, but before he reached the door he turned and asked "Professor...When exactly was the Whomping Willow planted?"

"Uh, well I suppose the year you started here. Why do you ask?"

"No reason." He responded, and left in a hurry.

The next morning Remus woke up, naked, tired, and not where he usually was. He was curled up, and shivering, halfway through the tunnel. He wondered if he hadn't made it to the shack before transforming, he wondered if he'd been heading back to hogwarts, or worse, heading back from hogwarts. He could rarely remember the things he did whilst transformed, though they sometimes crept up on him, when he was particularly tired, or even in dreams. But in those cases it was easy to brush off, because, how could he be sure they were even real?

In searching for his clothes he thought it best to check the shack, where he usually changed before transforming, before heading out naked into hogsmeade, or worse, hogwarts grounds. Though he couldn't be sure whether he even managed to get his clothes off before transforming, and was worried he would find just a pile of torn up fabric and would have to wander back to his room wrapped in the bedsheets, which, again, wouldn't be ideal. But when he got to the door he couldn't open it.

He pushed and pushed, shaking the handle as much as he could, refusing to humour the thought that was niggling at his mind. The only way to lock the door was from the inside, which would mean someone was in there, which definitely can't happen. But after a small shuffle, he heard a voice on the other side of the door "Hold on, one minute." It was quiet, and wary, and he realised, immediately who the voice belonged to.

Sirius opened the door, furniture all moved out of place having just been propped up against the door, clearly used for extra protection...against Remus. Remus' heart sunk, Sirius knew now, Remus' greatest secret. Worse, he probably saw him, and he was probably afraid of him. Remus remembered, suddenly amongst all the worry, that he was completely naked.

"Oh my god." he said, covering himself up. "Are my.. " he voice was croaky. He cleared his throat. "Are my clothes in there?"

"Uhh, some of them…. Sirius moved aside and Remus saw his underwear and a torn up t-shirt on the floor. He quickly rushed in and got dressed.

"So you're a werewolf huh?" Sirius laughed, breaking the awkward silence between them.

Remus nodded. "Did you see me… you know, transformed" Sirius nodded.

"Its my fault, I'm sorry." Sirius sat down on the bed, and Remus sat tentatively on the edge. "I saw you going behind the whomping willow and, well I was probably still drunk… but I just figured I would come and see… where you were going...or if you were meeting someone…" Sirius admitted.

"No just…. becoming a terrifying monster."

Sirius chuckled. "It wasn't that bad. I got into this room and well you weren't anywhere...but then I heard something in that closet… crying… and you were in there… and you looked at me, and I was scared, obviously. But you didn't attack me. You sort of sniffed me, and you snarled a bit, and then just ran off. So I locked the door. I didn't really compute what was happening, but for some reason I knew it was you. And I think you knew it was me." Remus smiled, a rush of relief overcoming him at how well Sirius was taking it all, he shouldn't have doubted him. He felt as if a giant weight had been lifted from his shoulders.

"I wish I could tell you if that was true but… I can't remember what happened. I never do."

"Oh..well.. it was nice of you to not kill me either way."

"Well I guess I must have just spent the rest of the night in the tunnel, that's where I woke up."

"Probably. I heard you moving around a bit but nothing else."

"Good. Now where's my trousers?"

"I think they were in the other room. You seemed to have undressed in a hurry, shame I wasn't there to see it." Sirius winked at Remus, who blushed and headed to the other room. After a couple of seconds of silence, Sirius heard a scream from the other room. He rushed up from the bed, and through the door where Remus was standing, his trousers only on one leg, pale as a ghost, pointing into the corner of the room. Sirius took a step toward where Remus was pointing, and as his eyes adjusted to the darkness of the shadows, he saw, lying in the corner and covered in blood, a dead body.