Chapter 8
After only a month of being at Hogwarts, Remus was already feeling at home. His friends were the best there was and he figured out that maybe a girl or two actually paid attention to him, not counting Lily though. She had suddenly lost interest in him after what seemed only a few days. Well not really interest. She always seemed to be watching him closely, as if studying him. Every time Remus caught her, she's turn away blushing, and then go right back to studying him when he turned.
Now the situation with Lily was confusing, but he pushed it into the back of his mind and thought no more of it.
"Boo!"
Remus jumped about a foot in the air as the shout came in close to his ear.
"James!" Remus said as he looked at the ink blot on his parchment. James sat down next to him, resting his elbows on the table. "What did you do that for?"
"It's almost Halloween!" James said excitedly.
"In a week and a half!" Remus said, and only a couple days till the full moon,he then thought.Remus rubbed the blot, tryingto get rid of it. His rubbing only spread it farther, making it worse.
"So? Halloween is my favorite holiday," James said. "I mean there's the scary stuff, there's the Halloween Feast, and a whole bunch of stuff," he finished lamely.
"James, I thought your favorite holiday was Christmas because of the presents and days off school," Remus said.
"Well fine, since I can't have more than one favorite holiday," James said, rolling his eyes, "Halloween is my second favorite holiday. Happy?"
"Very much, thank you," Remus said grinning as he began to work on his Charm's essay.
"Is that due tomorrow?" James asked.
"Yes," Remus replied.
"Does it have to be a foot and half long?"
"Yes."
"Does it have to be about the Levitating Spell?"
"Yes."
"Can we borrow yours when you're done with it?"
"Yes." Remus said in monotone. He suddenly realized what James had asked. "Wait! No, wait." But it was already too late. James was bounding up the stairs to tell Sirius. Remus had fallen for it again.
"Why do they keep doing that to me? Why don't they just do their own homework like everyone else?" Remus mumbled as he began to work on his essay again. Just a few more inches were all he needed.
"Remus! You better get up here fast!" Sirius' voice rang through the common room. The quiet room grew quiet and stared at Remus. Remus rolled his eyes, but blushed at all the people's stares.
"What did they do this time?" Remus sighed, setting down his quill and standing up. Remus smiled as he thought of all the things that James and Sirius could've done. Charming the furniture so it levitates, making the furniture disappear, or just create utter chaos were some of the things that popped into Remus' head.
His smiled disappeared though, when he walked into the dorm room. Ronny was on the ground holding his stomach while belching slugs. The floor was already a mess. Sirius and James were both seated on a bed with bemused looks on their faces
"Sirius! James! What did you do?" Remus asked, trying to suppress a smile and rushing toward Ronny but then backing up when he threw up another handful of slugs.
"Well..."James started off, not really wanting to finish. "Sirius you tell him."
Sirius shot James an evil look before looking at Remus who was waiting for an explanation. "We wanted to try out this spell that I heard of over the summer and I decided to try it. Ronny just happened to be our test subject," Sirius said easily, almost laughing.
"What spell?" Remus asked.
"Um...not sure," Sirius said, pretending to think.
"Sirius!" Remus said, exasperated. "I guess we'll have to take him to Madame Pomfrey."
"No!" both Sirius and James yelled at the same time. James continued, "You see she said she'd give us detention if we did magic on another student again." James looked at his feet guiltily.
"What was the spell then?" Remus asked again.
"I really don't remember. It had some weird words and, well, I cast the spell a little bit ago," Sirius said.
"He's been like this for awhile?" Remus asked, shocked.
"Yeah and he's still puking like there's no tomorrow," James shouted. Remus couldn't help but laugh.
Remus knew he should take Ronny to the Hospital Wingbut they were his friends andhe stood with them no matter what. "Ok I guess we'll just keep him here and see what happens, but get a bucket or something because I don't want to watch him be sick all over the room."
Sirius and James look at each other and then both start to push each other.
"You get it!" James said, pushing Sirius toward the bathroom.
"No you get it!" Sirius replied, pushing James.
"You get it!"
"You get it!"
"You're the one who made him sick!"
"You're the one who told me to do that!"
"How about both of you get the bucket?" Remus said, butting in. Sirius and James both looked at him and then both went to the bathroom. He hated it. He hated being the one who always bursts their bubbles. He wished he could be the one having fun, the one who laughed at the dangerous jokes, at the weird people at their school, but he couldn't. He wasn't brought up that way and old habits stick.
Remus sighed as Sirius and James came back with a bucket laughing together. They were about to put it next to Ronny but then he threw up more slugs and they just threw it at him.
Slowly but surely the slugs resided until he just threw up one every couple of minutes. Ronny sat on the bed, glaring at Sirius, James, and Remus who were sitting opposite of him. It was a battle of the glares. Everyone was glaring at everyone; well Sirius and James weren't glaring at each other and Remus. Remus glared at James and Sirius for using the spell on Ronny and at Ronny for the few words he got out during breaks.
Presently Ronny left muttering curse aimed toward James and Sirius.
"He'll be barfing up slugs for at least a day," James said when the door closed.
"I guess Catherine won't want to kiss him now," Sirius laughed.
"Catherine?" Remus asked, searching his brain for recognition.
"Yeah, you know Catherine Wythe, don't you? Dazzling blue eyes," James said.
"Beautiful blonde hair," Sirius butted in.
"Friend to Lily Evans," James said. Oh, that Catherine Wythe, Remus thought. Remus occasionally saw Catherine in the hall with her friends Lily, Brooke, and Zoë. She was a beautiful girl; Ronny was lucky.
"Whom James loves to the very bottom of his heart," Sirius then added.
"I do not! She hates me!" James said, punching Sirius.
"That doesn't mean you don't love her!" Sirius said, moving out of reach.
Here they go again, Remus thought. They would have theses brawls nightly, just for fun. It was their way of proving their friendship to each other in some odd way. Remus could never quite fathom it. Remus would always watch and wait until one of them got semi-hurt and would then use the freezing spell on them.
Not this time.
Remus left the room with a sigh and went downstairs. He scanned the room and saw Ronny and Catherine sitting by each other, though Catherine was about a foot away with this disgusted look on her face. Remus suddenly heard a belching noise as Ronny threw up a slug. Catherine scooted even further away.
Remus left the common room, thoughts buzzing through his head. It was late but he didn't care. It's not like the patrol officers ever caught him. Whoever said Remus wasn't good at sneaking around?
Every night when he was feeling down he headed toward the lake. It was always very quiet and peaceful there. No one ever bothered him, at least not yet.
Remus sat down on a large boulder right next to the lake. It was unusually dark tonight, but that was just because it was first quarter in the moons' phases. Remus sighed again. I seem to be doing that a lot, Remus thought.
Two more weeks and he'd be in that house again, feeling the pain of transformation. Unconsciously his two forefingers rubbed across his two bite wounds. They were almost healed, there were only scabs now. He could pick them off if he wanted to, but then he'd have scars, and those were always hard to explain. How could you explain two puncture wounds that looked like teeth marks? A nail just happened to stab in twice in a row like that? No it'd never worked.
Remus' mind then drifted to his friends. What if they find out that I'm a werewolf? Should I tell them before they find out from someone else? How will they take the news?
"I can't tell them," he said to himself. But you have to be truthful with them, that's what friends are for, a voice inside him piped up.
"But they won't want to talk to me to anymore once they find out that I'm dangerous. That defeats the purpose of having friends" he said again to himself, arguing with his inner self. You don't know that for sure. James and Sirius are weird, they accept anything, his inner self said.
"But this is big news," Remus argued, running out of ideas to argue with. Why do consciences have to be right all the time? Because that's our job.
"I'll tell them when the time is right," Remus decided. "Which is hopefully never," he then muttered.