Chapter 48

The Teacher's Problem

Despite Sirius' experience with this potion he and the other Marauders, including Peter who they learned how to revive thanks to the Room of Requirement, left very excited about the Halloween prank. They were going to add it to the food the house-elves were making tomorrow, as that was their only way of administering it during the feast. They entered their dorm talking excitedly about what was going to happen.

"I wonder what everyone is going to see." James said excitedly. "I wonder what Dumbledore will see."

"I wonder if we're ever going to find out."

"Shoot, I just realized that if we add it to the food then we won't be able to eat anything." Sirius told them.

"Crud, he's right." James said. He stood and paced, thinking a way around it.

"Why don't we just add it to the pumpkin juice? Everyone drinks it. And we can pretend to a lot easier." Remus suggested giving James his best fake smile.

"Ya that will work." James said excitedly. "What do you think Sirius?" James turned to Sirius who was now looking out the window with a somber look on his face. "What's wrong?"

Sirius didn't turn to look at James, instead he looked at Remus.

"The sun's about to go down." He told Remus. James gave them a look of pure confusion, but Remus understood.

"I should probably go." He hadn't needed Sirius to tell him, he could feel it. He'd been doing his best to ignore how sick he was feeling, but Sirius must have noticed. Remus stood stiffly.

"Do you want us to come with you?" Sirius asked. James was still confused, just a second ago everyone was excited.

"No, I'd really rather you didn't."

"Where are you going to go?" Sirius asked, moving out from the window. James went to peak out, trying to figure out where Remus was going. He finally realized what was going on when he saw the full moon in the sky.

"It's a long story. I should really go, ask me later, you might be able to convince me to show you." He said happily, even this close to a transformation they were still worried about him. That meant they really did care. Remus was surprised when Sirius and James both gave him a hug, as gently as they could, knowing he was probably sore.

When they pulled away Sirius chuckled at the blush on Remus' cheeks. Remus turned and left the room.

"We should probably get some sleep, I want to be up as early as possible to visit Remus in the hospital wing." James suggested searching his trunk for pair of pj pants and stealing a pj shirt from Sirius.

"How can you sleep knowing he's out there like that?" Sirius asked him, ignoring James' 'thievery'. They steal clothes from each other a lot. One of Sirius' favorite shirts was one he stole from James and never gave back.

"I guess I'm pretty good at blocking stuff like that. Sirius, standing there staring out the window is not going to help anyone any. At least if you sleep, you'll be in a better condition to help him feel better tomorrow." James told him, climbing out of the curtains on his bed and putting his dirty clothes, with the rest of them. He assumed the house-elves washed them.

"I know that. That doesn't mean I can just lay there and pretend it isn't happening though." Sirius almost sounded angry. James just ignored it, he knew Sirius wasn't angry at him, he was just angry at the fact that they couldn't do anything to help.

"I'm turning out the light Sirius, are you sure you're not going to try to sleep?" James sighed and blew out the candles lighting the room when Sirius nodded.

Sirius was still staring out the window when the sun was completely gone. He'd seen Remus run across the yard and, though he couldn't tell how from this high up, made the womping willow stop moving before climbing into what seemed to be a hole in the ground. Sirius continued to stare out the window for several more seconds before he determined that both James and Peter were asleep.

Sirius turned away from the window and grabbed James' invisibility cloak from under his bed. Sirius pulled it over himself before walking out of the dorm. He walked though the portrait of the Fat Lady, ignoring her when she tried to figure out who was there and went all the way down to the entrance hall.

He knew he should have left the cloak on, but he didn't care. He didn't care if one of the teachers found him out after curfew. Actually, part of him wanted to get caught. He wanted to get yelled at. He deserved it, he should have figured out a way to help Remus by now. He shouldn't be sitting at the open front doors glaring at the womping willow with tears running down his cheeks. How was this helping, it would only make Remus feel worse if he knew.

But Sirius couldn't leave. What else could he do? No matter what James said there was no way he would ever try to sleep while Remus was tearing himself to pieces. No possible way. He couldn't even imagine it. The library was closed and locked, so there was no way of going in there to find some way to help.

There was no way to help, there was nothing he could do for his friend. So he sat, Sirius sat as his vision blurred from the tears.

He couldn't help but feel he deserved the pain, that Remus was going though.

OOOOOOOOOOOOO

At first she wasn't really sure she had seen him.

But when she was she was furious. How many times had she told him off for being out after curfew. Black was never going to learn was he!

It was a miracle he didn't hear her. Maybe he just ignored the sound of her storming over to him.

It wasn't until she walked into the moonlight illuminating from the doorway that she started to get curious. She stopped walking towards him and watched him for a moment. He was just sitting there, for no reason whatsoever. Normally she would find him sneaking to the kitchens with James to steal some food, or off to glue the Slytherins to their beds or something of that nature, how they even managed to get into the Slytherin common room was beyond her.

This time James wasn't even with him. Actually now that she thought about it, this might be the first time she'd seen one without the other, not including detentions when she split them up, naturally.

She walked slowly up to Sirius, who still didn't seem to notice her. The first thing she noticed was that he was crying. This fact alone alarmed her. He and James hadn't gotten into a fight had they? It would explain why he was alone. She barely had time to concentrate on this theory before noticing what he was staring at. The womping willow. She didn't have enough time to ponder the willow's part in this before noticing how bright it was for being nearly midnight. That was all the information she needed to figure out exactly what was going on. There was a full moon out. They had just figured out about Remus' condition last month. This was the first full moon that Sirius had known about from beginning to end.

McGonagall sighed. Sirius didn't give any sign that he had heard her, so she assumed he was just ignoring her. She knelt down beside him.

"Black, you know you shouldn't be out here." She said calmly. Sirius just held on to his knees tighter. It was hard watching such a strong young man looking so weak.

She wasn't exactly sure why she did it. It wasn't like he was her child or anything. She had no idea what on earth possessed her to put her arm around her and pull him into her chest like a mother comforting her child. She really hadn't even realized she did it until he pulled his arms away from his legs and sat on his legs instead.

What was wrong with her? She had seen students cry before, she'd had to tell students they'd just become orphans before. Sure, she wanted to comfort them. She would even give them a little hug, but she had never held a student like this before. This wasn't the way teachers treat students, this was the way parents treat their children. So why couldn't she make herself let go? Why did her arm instantly begin to rub his back? How was he ever supposed to take her seriously as a teacher when she couldn't even tell him off for being out after curfew? Why did she find that she didn't really care if he took her seriously as a teacher when he started sobbing into her cloak?

"I'm sorry, Sirius." She told him quietly, using a student's first name for the first time in her teaching career, and for the first time he spoke. She could barely understand him.

"It should be me." He mumbled though heavy sobs. She couldn't respond for a very long time. Why in the world would he want that for himself?

"Why?" Was all she could say, when she could respond. She didn't really expect him to answer her.

"He doesn't deserve it." He replied having to pause to catch his breath in the middle of the sentence.

"What makes you think you do?" She asked, talking seemed to be helping him feel better.

"I should be helping." He said hiding his face even deeper into her cloak. "I shouldn't be sitting here bawling..." He said sobbing even harder. "I should be helping."

She sighed. She'd figured out a lot about his personality, with that one conversation. He had very little patience with himself, especially when it came to his friends safety.

"There is nothing you can do to help, Sirius. You can't go anywhere near him right now." She told him, knowing it wouldn't help, but what else was she supposed to say to someone who wanted to help a werewolf. Sirius didn't even respond. She tried again.

"Don't you know that you are helping? I won't claim to have known him very long, but I have met his parents. Remus has never been happier in his entire life. You're helping him very much." It was a while before Sirius answered.

"He's in pain." He said slowly, the sobbing for the most part had stopped, but despite the fact that she couldn't see his face, she knew he was still crying. "I don't care if he's happier. He's in pain now."

Another piece of Sirius' personality clicked into place. McGonagall figured that by the time this night was over she would probably have the entire puzzle completed.

Sirius didn't think it was worth that much to be friends with him. He thought Remus would rather not have to go though the pain of the transformation, even if that meant he couldn't be friends with Sirius anymore. It didn't matter how much he needed his friends, if giving them up would keep them not just safe, but comfortable and reasonably happy, he would do it. This was not something she was expecting to find out about him. She knew he'd give his life for them, but not to this extent. She had always thought him to be very proud and arrogant, and in public he was, but what he was like in private, was clearly a completely different story.

This puzzle piece scared her. This was the personality of someone who would die needlessly just because he could think of no other way of helping.

She pulled him away from her chest and forced him to look her in the eyes.

"Sirius. Promise me something." She said choosing her words carefully. "Promise me that if you get any ideas on how to help Remus, you will tell him before you put them to use. No matter what you think he'll say." She decided on this promise. She knew Remus would not let him do anything stupid, or even remotely dangerous. "And you'll listen if he tells you it's a bad idea and you shouldn't do it." She added as an afterthought. Sirius didn't respond for a while.

"I promise." He said in a small voice. McGonagall nodded and hugged him back to her chest. He continued to cry, though the sobs were over. He had clearly tired himself out, but he didn't fall asleep.

And when the sun when up McGonagall told Madam Pomfrey that she and Sirius would go down and get Remus so she didn't have to. She agreed, though she was rather confused.

McGonagall stayed with Sirius until James and Peter came running into the hospital wing.

The last thing she heard from the foursome was Remus telling James and Peter that instead of Pomfrey, the first person he saw when he woke up was Sirius.

McGonagall smiled, she wondered if Remus would ever realize just how good of a friend he had.

A/N) Wow that had to be the easiest chapter I have ever written. It was like my mind already had it written before I even finished the last chapter.

I was planning on putting this in the last chapter, but then I got more into detail with them testing the potion then I had planned. I couldn't put this one with it. This story could not share plot-lines with any of the others. It had to be on it's own. That's how important this chapter was to me.

I don't know if you noticed or if I'm imagining it, but the the last chapter seemed like it lacked a solid ending, like it was a beginning and middle, but that was it. This is why it did that.

The only thing I had trouble with was describing part two of her figuring out his personality, I was a little worried that would get confusing.

I worried a little that Sirius was getting a bit out of character until my mind made me write about how she was worried he would die. Then I realized that that is exactly how he did die in the books. Going to the ministry of magic was really really stupid of him, but he had no other way of helping Harry that he could think of, so he did it anyway.

Wow this authors note is way too long. So I'll end it now. Thanks again for reading and for going over the 100 mark of reviews! You guys are awesome!