" 'Morning Sunshine!"
Remus groaned and his eyes fluttered open before he quickly squinted at the bright, piercing lights.
"Shut up," he moaned. "You're so loud."
Sirius grimaced. "I always forget how grumpy you are at your time of the month."
"I always forget how facetious you are," Remus shot back.
"Boys, boys, quit your fighting," James said smoothly, tearing open the nearest curtains and bathing the hospital bed in a glow of painful sunlight.
Sirius stuck out his tongue and blew a raspberry from his perch near Remus's pillow, a small corner of a slimy leaf sliding out from between his lips.
"Careful!" Peter shouted, a hand shooting out and reaching towards him. "We're barely a week in."
Sirius ran his tongue around his lips and sucked the leaf back in, tucking it against his cheek. "Sorry, sorry," he apologized hurriedly. "It's fine. It's still in."
"Close call," James said with a grin, plopping onto the bed beside Remus and failing to notice Remus's consequent wince at the jolt.
"I can't wait to get this leaf out of my mouth," Sirius whined, moving the leaf beneath his tongue to see if that was somehow more comfortable.
Remus blushed and pressed his palms into the mattress, gently easing himself into a sitting position and then lifting himself backwards so that his back rested against the headboard. The sheets fell off of his torso, revealing his bare chest covered in faint scars and white bandages wrapped around his side, shoulder, and forearm, a deep red staining the pristine gauze.
"You know, you could just spit it out," Remus said tentatively. "Really, it's not worth it. I'll-"
"Oh, shut it, Remus," James said with a roll of his eyes. "Don't pretend there's a chance of us stopping now, not after all of that research and planning."
"Yeah, we actually know what we're doing now!" Peter added encouragingly, scooting closer.
"I wouldn't go that far," Sirius muttered.
"Exactly!" Remus said, motioning towards Sirius and clinging on to his admittance like a lifeline. "It's dangerous! You could be grievously injured during the preparation or the transformation and even if by some miracle, that all goes smoothly, I could hurt you! I could kill you! I could- I could-" he fell forward, his face falling into his hands and his shoulders rose in deep and controlled breaths.
James, Sirius, and Peter all shared a single concerned glance before Sirius roughly shoved Peter forward.
"Remus…," he said tentatively, trying to look underneath Remus's hands covering his eyes, "We're doing this for you. We're your friends-"
"That's what I'm saying!" Remus let out, his voice strained, his hands reaching up to his hair and tearing at his scalp. "Chances are one of you will inevitably get hurt by some part of this crazy idea and that blame falls on me. Either inadvertently or directly, I will hurt you."
James rolled his eyes and shoved Peter further along the bed so that he could sit nearest Remus. "Remus, you hurt yourself every month. The least we can do is try and stop you from tearing yourself to bits," he said, motioning to his bandages.
"Oh, it's not that bad," Remus said, rubbing one hand along the bandage on his forearm, forcing himself not to wince at the touch.
"So even if you do scratch us, it won't even hurt!" James said cheerfully.
Remus glared, but James was so used to his disapproval that it hardly phased him and all he did was smile back pleasantly. With a heavy sigh, Remus stared down at his hands and felt a tidal wave of self-loathing crash over him, tearing him apart from the inside out. The scars on the backs of his hands taunted him, every mirror he saw a reminder of the monster that he truly was. The monster who had dragged his closest friends-who was he kidding-his first friends into insurmountable danger with him.
Sure, when they had first proposed the idea of doing something to help him, doing something to ease his own suffering, of course he had said yes. He was honored to have friends who would even consider standing by his side after his secret was out. And then they wanted to help him? When he spent hours dreaming of fantasies of what it would be like to study at Hogwarts, he had never even allowed himself to imagine a moment like that for fear of getting his hopes up. He had never even considered that that might mean sharing the danger instead of just limiting it; splitting the danger between a group instead of limiting it to a single person was in no way decreasing the thing itself. He never considered that it would be his friends voluntarily going through one of the most dangerous processes for any talented adult witch or wizard, let alone a group of ambitious teenagers, drowning in their own brilliance. Yet here they were, smiling down at him as they sucked on mandrake leaves for their ninth day straight, and that was the easiest and safest part of their coming weeks.
"Just think," Sirius added, his eyes glazed over with a vision only he could see. "In two months or so, we'll all be gallivanting through the forest, having the time of our lives. We'll be a lion, or a wolf, or a bear and we'll-"
"You don't know what you'll turn into yet," Remus interrupted dourly. "You could turn into a cute little bunny and a fat lot of help that would be. What if you all turn into tiny animals? Then you'd have no way of helping me and you'll go through the whole dangerous process for nothing."
"I'm not going to be a bunny," Sirius said definitively, practically oozing self-assurance that Remus wished was contagious. "But even if I were, I'd be the most adorable bunny you had ever seen and even the werewolf inside of you would stop and question why it wants to hurt anything that cute."
"Stop treating this like a game! You keep pretending like I can control myself when I'm a werewolf when I can't. I have no idea what I do or where I go, only that I wake up in a heap in the Shrieking Shack with a whole bunch of new scratches come morning," Remus fumed, his gray eyes narrowing at his friends.
"We're not treating this as a game, Remus," James said softly, his head cocked to the side. "We know the dangers, but we've decided that they're worth it. That was our choice and ours alone. You are in no way to blame."
"And we'd make the same choice a hundred times over," Peter added with a nod.
"And whatever we turn into, we'll make it work. The whole point is that we'll be less in danger as animals than humans, so even if we're tiny, useless little creatures, it'll still be better than nothing. I know how hard these mornings are for you, but trust me, they're hard for us too- to see you like this, all cut up and obviously in pain. The sooner we can do something to help, the better all around," James finished.
"Plus, we can't let you have all the fun. I'm curious to know what it's like to turn into an animal," Sirius said with a grin.
"So facetious," Remus muttered with a sigh. Though, no matter the worrying and anxiety-prone individual that he was, he couldn't help the relief that bloomed like a new flame when his brilliantly egotistical and persistent friends refused to give up on him.
"Says the grumpy-pus," Sirius replied with a pout, poking him in the arm. And though the rational part of Remus's brain told him to scowl and continue persuading them off of their gormless antics, the corners of his mouth quirked up and he grudgingly accepted a hand of cards in their game, using his knees as a table.