Blind Date
by weasleywheezes

Chapter 5 - Full Moon Overture

A/N: Sorry this has been late in coming - suffering from terrible writer's block. Enjoy!

It was routine by now. The day of the full moon, Remus would walk to the Whomping Willow with the school's nurse, shake her hand and duck down underneath the tree, disappearing into it. He walked the long, narrow corridor to the Shrieking Shack, and waited for the moment when the moon's full power would beam through the windows and he would transform into a gruesome, snarling beast. It was automatic. All he could do was wait for the inevitable.

He waited for what seemed like forever. The silence was almost worse than the transformation, but he knew it was for the best. He looked out the window and saw the shadows of the trees surrounding the shack. The moon would soon part company from the clouds and his nightmare would begin. He looked down at his hands and saw that they were covered with fur, his fingernails turned into long, horrible claws. His pupils dilated, his mouth growing wide as his nose grew longer and his jaw dislocated, forming a snout. The pain was intense; the misshapen bones and rapidly growing skin itched. He felt as though his entire body had been broken in two, but the pain was only beginning. His limbs stretched and the remaining skin on his body turned into sleek fur. His teeth grew sharp, incisors dripping with saliva peeked out of his muzzle. He fell onto all fours. Finally, he caught glimpse of the moon, and let loose a disturbing cry of anguish and pain, the echo of the howl vibrating him, causing his aching bones to hurt even more.

Remus' wolf sense took over as he sniffed around the hovel looking for food. Dumbledore was always kind enough to bring a few chicken carcasses to the shack before the full moon for Remus to devour. He found the birds and ate one. He wanted so badly to escape from the house, to look for a person to bite, to devour, to...

The human cried out from within him. You're not a wolf. The wolf howled again. The human took control for a moment and clawed the animal's muzzle. The wolf howled, but it sounded like a scream. He bit himself, scratched himself, and barked madly, and after an hour of this self-imposed torture, the wolf went to sleep.

As the wolf slept, a giant black dog crept into the hovel and lay next to him. The wolf awoke and saw the dog. He growled. The dog growled. They fought claw-to-claw, muzzle to snout, and the wolf collapsed back into sleep as the dog licked its wounds and the wolf's, also.

Hours crept by. The sun started coming up, and Remus began his painful transformation back into human form. The snout shrunk back into his face; the fur crawled back under the skin, which was now red and irritated. The claws turned back into fingernails, and he was back to normal. Back to Remus. Still laying beside him was the great black dog. Remus reached out to pet him. The dog whimpered. It seemed that during the fight with the wolf, it had been injured. There was a bloody slash near its nose. Remus tried to touch the dog, but the dog rolled away. He limped away from Lupin, barking softly.

"Padfoot..." Lupin said horsely. "Sirius." Then he collapsed into unconciousness.

When Remus awoke, the black dog was gone. Lupin sat quietly next to the window, staring out at the trees that surrounded the shack. He wanted so badly to stop being a lycanthrope, to be able to live a normal life and be a normal guy, but there was nothing he could do about it. He had resigned himself to a life of solitude and unhappiness, unless he could find the right woman. Turned out that the right woman was really a man. His best friend, the one person in the world that made him smile and feel happy to be alive. The one person in the world who soothed the crushed feeling inside when he thought about what a raw deal he had been dealt. That person wouldn't be a woman, like he had always imagined, but a man. Sirius. What in the world would he say to his friends? Lily knew, but Lily was unusually kind to sadsacks. She was even nice to Severus Snape, who certainly didn't deserve it. Remus knew that she felt sorry for him. He knew that no one else would take his news so calmly. To Remus, it felt rather like the dread he felt before turning into a werewolf, but he had to face it. He had to let someone know, or it would kill him inside. He knew that they would find out sooner rather than later anyway. Remus swallowed hard. The revelation would be soon, and he thought it would be easiest to tell Sirius during the Christmas holiday. He thought that might be the hardest person to tell. At least there wouldn't be anyone else there to overhear what could possibly be the most important moment of Remus' life.

He returned slowly to his normal routine. The day after the full moon found Remus walking from the Whomping Willow with the school's nurse. He walked the long, narrow corridor to the school infirmary, and waited for the moment when the medicines would be dabbed onto his wounds, a searing pain rushing through his body. He would be given a Dreamless Sleep potion to recuperate. He would be sent back to his room, where Sirius would be sitting on his bed, rummaging through his record collection and hanging around for him. It was automatic. All Remus could do was wait for the inevitable.