"Sirius..." James whispered, leaning over to his friend. The charms professor glared at the back of the room, where they were seated, but apparently James didn't see, or simply chose to ignore it. Sirius was trying very hard not to stare at Remus, who had just been called to the front of the room for a demonstration.

This was apparently what the Potter boy was waiting for.

"Sirius!" he whispered louder. The dark haired boy turned his head slightly to show he was listening, but never took his eyes off the smiling blond at the front of the room.

"I think that Remus might be a werewolf."

Sirius panicked for a moment, and if by chance there was any candy in his mouth, he would have choked. He gulped, but felt pretty confident that he had given nothing away. Should he encourage him to find out or try to protect Remus?

"Werewolf?" he repeated in a neutral tone. James nodded, and leaned in closer. Remus' head shot over to the two whispering boys, and a glare almost graced his face. Reluctantly he returned his attention to the teacher, and Sirius briefly wondered if he could hear them. Maybe being a werewolf enhanced his human senses or something. "What makes you think that?" Again, he was as neutral as possibly, not leaning towards belief or denial.

Sirius knew that James would eventually figure it out; he just didn't think he would be so prompt about it. Just last week was when Sirius had admitted to Remus he had discovered his secret, and had also vowed to never leave him. James hadn't spoken about the incident after he found them 'cuddling' later.

"Well, he's gone every full moon, isn't he? And when he comes back, he's always beat up and bruised, you know? So either he's recovering from the transformation, which is supposed to be really painful, or his parents have a weird knack for beating him once a month," James commented, again whispering, and suddenly Sirius felt like beating him. He didn't even know Remus that well. The only time that he ever hung out with James was to help him with homework. What a prick, to think that he was Remus' best friend, when really Sirius did so much more than him, and he actually cared about his friend, not just his grades. This was probably just another plot to break up the two's friendship. James was know to be extremely jealous, and most likely couldn't stand seeing Sirius be friends with someone besides him.

"Plus, remember that Boggart that Pince found last month in his trunk? It turned into a glowing ball when Remus did away with it. I was really confused at first, but a werewolf would be scared to death of the full moon, right?" Sirius was amazed at how fast James had put it together, since he was know to be a complete idiot and ignore anything that he wanted to. "I think that we-"he made a hand gesture to include Sirius in his thinking, "should confront him. Tell him we know."

Sirius thought about that for a moment. At least he was willing to give Sirius some credit for it, although he had no help in planning this. He gave his friend a sidelong look, finally taking his eyes off Remus.

"Then what?" Sirius' lips almost didn't move. He wouldn't care if he got detention for beating James up. He definitely felt like doing so.

"We report him to the head master, right? Or tell him to turn himself in."

"What if the headmaster is helping him?"

"Oh... I never thought about that..."

"Well maybe you should, you great oaf!"

They both fell silent as Remus made his way to the back of the room, again. They had both missed everything that had just happened, but James was confident that Remus would catch them up. The wolf sat down in the empty chair by Sirius, and gave James a distasteful look. James paled.

"What's the matter?" he asked casually, but James just turned back to his parchment, avoiding both gazes, and didn't speak for the rest of the period.

"Told you he would figure it out," Sirius bragged, sliding next to Remus on his bed. James had finally left the dorm at seven for his 'date' which consisted of walking some Ravenclaw fourth year around the lake, and then probably taking her back to her common room, via Astronomy Tower. It was easy for James to woo girls when he had stars there to inspire him.

Both Remus and Sirius had made a bad habit of following each other around after classes, never speaking to anyone else but James, and sometimes their other dorm-mates. They usually ended up with the dormitory to themselves too, as was the case now, and only the Pettigrew boy ever intruded on their little 'group'. It seemed a little weird to be so close to someone, but Sirius now had a plausible reason to latch on to the wolf: he needed to protect him.

"What's the problem?" Remus looked up from his novel. Sirius was positive that he had some sort of super senses now, because he was reading with only the light of one candle flickering across the old parchment pages. The hairy dog couldn't even decipher between words and flaws in the paper.

He acted like he had no idea what Sirius was talking about, but Sirius knew his friend better than that. Not only could he think up excellent lies, but he could flow with them and make them very convincing. Sirius whished he could do that himself.

"James. Finding out." After catching Remus up on the conversation, Sirius stretched back to cover the whole bed, and closed his eyes. "I bet he doesn't say anything, he's too cowardly. If he was going to talk to you, though, I'll probably be there too."

"He's not... freaked out?" Remus whispered. This was a pretty touchy subject for him, and he had admitted to Sirius yesterday that he had never spoken to anyone about it before. Sirius leaned over and looked up at wolf-boy. He was getting that depressed glint in his eyes again.

"Remus," Sirius laid a hand on his shoulder. Remus sighed. "No, he is not 'freaked out' okay? Just a little worried, hmm?" He couldn't tear his eyes away from his partners. "Just, expect something, will you?"

Lupin sighed again, and broke the eye contact, returning to his book. Sirius went back to simply lying on the bed, and after a few more minutes he fell asleep, and Remus happily pulled the blanket up over him.

The next night would be the first full moon since Sirius had been certain Remus was a werewolf. He was on edge, barking at ever person who breathed in his vicinity the wrong way, and covered Remus like an angry mother hen. Things got better, though, after dinner when they went back up to the common room to relax, and everyone left the common room because of Sirius' yelling. Plus, quidditch practice was being held on the pitch, and so most of the vacaters simply went to the field to watch, leaving Sirius and Remus with Peter Pettigrew, the new tag-a-long, playing a game of chess in the far corner. The other corner, closer to the fire, was occupied by a few second and third year girls doing homework, and they had kept silent, as they didn't want to get on the rampaging Sirius' bad side.

Peter had teamed up with Sirius, as neither of them was very good, and Remus say across the table from them, winning shamelessly. The floor was hard, and Peter kept wiggling around, almost on top of Sirius, as they had to share a side of the board. He would sit on his knees for a minute, and then move to folded legs, and even stretched legs under the table for a while, but he simply couldn't keep still. Pettigrew wouldn't stop bumping Sirius' hand, when he made a move either.

"Stop it!" Sirius finally burst out at the pudgy boy. "Can't you sit still?" Peter looked hurt and then mumbled an apology. He tried harder to sit still, which he accomplished for five minutes or so. After switching positions again, and moving his pawn, he stood up.

"I'm going to get a pillow, then. Maybe that will help," he turned quickly at the other boys' glares.

Remus swore under his breath. He was on edge too, and Sirius' mood wasn't really making it any easier. The sun would be down in an hour and the nurse should be coming for him any time. He briefly wondered if anything would change, knowing that Sirius knew, but Peter was back before much reflection took place.

Remus shot him a cold glare, for no other reason then he was sitting next to HIS Sirius, and almost growled out loud. Peter, a little offended and definitely taken off guard, dropped one of the four pillows he was carrying haphazardly in his arms and slipped on it.

He crashed forward, and right on top of his destination: Sirius. He tried to move again, but Remus' growl had taken him back too, and it seemed like he was at a lost. He was pretty sure that he had growled, which would have been absolutely sexy, if perhaps Sirius had been a girl, something that he was deeply regretting at this point in time.

Peter squished him to the floor, upsetting their chess game at the same time, and then Remus jumped up in rage, ready to tear apart the clumsy boy.

"Get off of him! Stop touching him!" Remus literally pulled the chubby boy off of his best friend, and sent him flying back a few steps. Sirius, understanding the seriousness of the situation tried to calm Remus down. After standing up, he placed his hands on Remus' shoulders and looked directly into his eyes, trying to defend Peter, and tell Remus it was all a mistake.

Just then their conversation was interrupted by a young lady dressed in white patting Remus on the back.

"Sorry!" she smiled at the two, and both turned promptly to stare at her. "Remus, we have another problem. You're father owled the infirmary and told us that he needed to see you directly. I think it may be about your, ahem, mother." She was also a good liar, and Sirius would have thought she was telling the truth if he didn't know about Remus; but maybe he would have. Her smile was a little too sweet for his liking.

"Coming..." Remus replied in a strangled tone. He touched Sirius lightly on the neck, fear burning in his eyes, as he turned to exit the room. The boy, in turn, grabbed his arm and gave him a sympathetic grin, although he wanted to do so much more.

"Hope you'll be okay..." he whispered to his friend as he climbed through the portrait hole.