CHAPTER 7
"Remus? We have to talk to you." Sirius looked at his friend, nervous. It was the next day; James Potter and Sirius Black were going to tell their friend that they knew his secret. They and Remus Lupin were in the fourth floor corridor where they were the only people around. The fourth floor corridor was always vacant; with the exception of students trying to get to their classes. It wasn't a spot where people were much which allowed the three some privacy.
"Sure, what's going on?" Remus asked, completely clueless to what bombshell was about to be dropped on him.
"We know." James forced out. He felt extremely uneasy about telling his friend this. Would it change their relationship? Would Remus be expelled if other people knew? Oh, James could only guess what could happen.
"Know what?" Remus was trying not to sound obvious.
The thought of doubt began to grow in Sirius' mind. He could always be wrong.
"That you're a… a…" James couldn't bear to say the words.
"Werewolf." Sirius finished for him.
Remus' eyes widened. His worst fears had been realized: someone found out. Now he was sure that he would be a social outcast. This terrified him: no one would want to be his friend. But then again, no one was really his friend before this; that scared him even more. His friends knowing his secret would definitely lead to them leaving him. Now he had experienced the sensation of closeness with other people like he had experienced with James, Sirius, and Peter. He finally was able to utter the words, "I guess I'll be packing, then."
James looked at him, "What are you talking about?" although he figured he would get this reaction, James was still surprised to hear the words that followed his.
"Well, now that you know, it's not like anyone would want to be friends with me. I'm the dangerous werewolf, remember? I'm sure half the school knows by now and in a few days parents will be sending letters to Dumbledore and he'll have no choice but to expel me." Remus looked down at the ground.
"No, we're the only ones that know. And I can't believe you'd think we'd tell people about this. Who do you think we are, shallow, vein teenagers who can't see that us knowing about this would made you dangerous?" Sirius' eyes widened in such a way that the words 'Duh' instantly came to Remus' mind and made him feel at ease.
"Actually, the part about being shallow and vein applies to James, remember?" Remus smiled but then retracted. Why would he say that? He was digging a hole deeper than the one he was already in by saying that.
But to Remus' surprise, Sirius and James laughed at this. "True, true." Said Sirius.
"But still, we wouldn't say anything. You know us better than that, Remus!" James smiled.
This instantly made Remus feel better, but he was cautious about letting this feeling last. He walked over to a nearby bench and sat down.
"From what we read," James sat down next to Remus, he herd Sirius cough loudly. "From what Sirius read that the transformations aren't so pleasant. Just out of curiosity, what's that like? All night I've been thinking about that."
Remus looked down, "Excruciating. You feel your bones grow right under your skin, your spine curves, your skull is pushed out into an unnatural shape-" Remus paused, he was shaking.
"Its ok, you don't have to say anymore." James put his hand on his friend's back. "But there has to be some way we can help you make this easier." James looked at his friend longingly. There has to be something he could do.
"No, I don't think so. But, anyways, where's Peter?" Remus looked at Sirius, then James. "What? What happened?"
"He really said that?" Remus wasn't too surprised but he was still hurt.
Sirius was now crossing his arms and leaning against a nearby wall. "Does it really surprise you?" he raised his eyebrows and laughed by a quick exhale though his nose; which he did often.
"I guess. But, I think we should give him a break." Remus suggested.
"Why? Why would we give that ignorant bastard another chance?" Sirius moved his eyebrows in such a way that he really didn't have to say anything.
"Because," James looked back at Sirius, "he is peter. Peter's like that, we all know it. Come now, Sirius, did you really expect Peter to act any different?"
Sirius looked down, he finally said slowly, "Yeah, you're right." But he added in a self justifiable voice, "But he still had no right to say that!"
"I know, I know, but we really can't expect too much out of peter." James threw up his hands in defense which turned to a shrug.
"He's really going to get himself into trouble someday being like that." Sirius relaxed, leaning against the wall.
"Yes, but it's not fair for us to just blow him off." Remus said.
Sirius was surprised by Remus, but after a few second's thought, he finally said with a sigh, "Yeah, I know."
"Really? Oh Remus! Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you! You're such a forgiving person and…" Peter went on thanking Remus and complimenting him repeatedly while James and Sirius watched in disgust from afar.
"Can you believe what you're seeing?" Sirius scoffed.
"Well," James raised his eyebrows and turned to his friend, "if it were any normal person, no; but it is Peter we're talking about here. So, yes, it's believable."
Sirius smiled and watched James get up from leaning against the wall. They both were leaning against the far wall in a nook in the Gryffindor common room. James had to adjust his head many times for it was resting on a wooden picture frame and was getting uncomfortable. "Well, time to end the groveling. C'mon, Sirius."
Sirius followed in a mockingly heavy, tired fashion; but he smiled.
James turned over on his side to look at the clock beside his bed. 3:00 AM, I'll never get any sleep. He thought. He again turned to his back and thought.
There has to be something we can do about Remus! WAIT, why is this bothering me?
I need to close that ink bottle sometime soon, It'll dry up. I'll do it tomorrow. Yeah, but I know myself, I'll just forget then it'll dry up. Oh well, I need to buy those charmed kind that don't dry up.
Did I do my history homework?
Oh! I remember that time that Sirius… that reminds me of the time Adam and I…
James' mind wandered like this for another half hour or so until it settled on his parents and the time when he was four years of age. He vividly remembered hiding behind that ugly yellow, dragon leather couch that was suppose to be white but over time turned to a yellow-kaki color which he always found disgusting. But he wasn't thinking about the couch at this moment.
"Marie, there has to be something we can do!"
"No, Floyd, he brought this upon himself. It's is fault and there is no reason we should help him! If he didn't go to that ally at that time, none of this would have happened."
"It may be his fault but we NEED to help him, no one else will!"
"FLOYD! Please, stop yelling and sit down, you'll wake the boys."
"I'm sorry, honey. But we should do something."
"Dear, the neighborhood is scared of him, I'm scared of him and you should be too. I don't want you to get involved with him; for our children's sake."
"I won't let our boys get hurt. And yes, I am frightened of him. But that doesn't mean I shouldn't help him. Look."
"What are you doing?"
"Wait, where are you? AH! Here you are! Ok, vampires, page one hundred and twenty four. Alright, Marie. Look at this, 'Vampires come in different states of mind, the two most common is active and reactive. An active state of mind occurs when the newly formed vampire takes the traditional, evil state that is more often than not the state of mind of the vampire that produced the original bite.
'Reacive state of mind occurs when the newly formed vampire keeps the personality it formally had.'
See, he has a reactive state of mind. He is still the same person and doesn't know why he's acting the way he is. There has to be something we can do for him. I'll look into it, alright?"
That conversation is how James' opinion of his mother and father formed. While growing up, he wanted to be just like his father: someone who is reliable, responsible, caring, and overall someone who goes out of his way to help people. And this was exactly what James' was going to do for Remus. there had to be some way he could make his time as the wolf easier. So he got out of bed towards the chest at the foot of his bed, looked around for a while thinking he needed to sort out what was in there, and finally, found what he was looking for: Everything you wanted to know about monsters but couldn't find in any book. His defense against the dark arts teacher wanted to be funny, James reconed.
Werewolves, page five-hundred and forty-six. Ah, perfect!
"I got it." James dropped his Defense against the Dark Arts text book in front of Remus, Peter and Sirius, who were eating breakfast.
"Got what?" Sirius said looking up with a spoon in his mouth.
"I got it!" James' voce dropped to a whisper. "I found out how we can help Remus while he is a wolf!"
Remus was forced to lean in so he could hear James speak. But once he heard this, he had to yell, "You did what?" this made the people around him stop and stare at the four boys.
"Sorry, carry on with your breakkist!" Sirius said.
Once people turned away, James began to explain. "I read in a book that the time as a werewolf is painful and not too pleasant over all. But I found in this book that the werewolf reacts to animals like they would react towards each other. Meaning they can get along. So if we can't be with you as humans, then we'll just be with you as animals!"
"You mean become an animagus?" Remus raised his eyebrows.
"Exactly!" James said.
"You can't! you'd not only be breaking about twenty or so school rules, but be breaking about five ministry laws! You're not allowed to even begin training for that until you're and over aged wizard, and you have to do it with a trained professional, AND you have to register! But you can't register because you can train because you're and under aged wizard!" Remus spoke very fast and had to catch his breath.
"So, once we become animaguses, we can be with you when you transform!" Sirius began to get excited about the idea.
"You mean: once you become animagi." Remus said.
"So you want us to! Great!" James smiled widely.
Remus decided that there was no arguing with him. It would happen regardless of his opinion. "you know, training will take a year if you do it right, and if you don't it could take longer!"
"So what? We have five and a half years before we graduate, we can do it before then!" Sirius said.
"So it settled then? We'll become animagi!"
