chapter two--finally here.

r&&r.

"Oy. Padfoot. Pass the bacon! Padfoot! Padfoot!"

Sirius snapped back to reality to see a hand passing back and forth in front of his face.

"You okay, mate?" Looking sideways, he saw James had been the one trying to get his attention.

Shaking his head quickly, Sirius sat up straight and tried to act as if nothing was wrong. "Oh yeah. Fine. What was that?"

"Pass the bacon." James repeated. "Wormy's stolen half of mine." If Sirius would have looked up, he'd have seen Peter stuffing what remained of James' bacon into his mouth and he'd would have smiled, but Black didn't look up. He blindly reached for the bacon and knocked over a jug of pumpkin juice in the process.

"Damnit." Sirius grabbed napkins from the table and flung them over the spill with more force than was needed, managing to knock over several platters and full jugs in the process. "Damnit. Son of a bitch." He franticly tried to clean up his mess, all the while drawing attention to himself. Sirius had never knocked anything over in his life. He was always so poised and graceful, but what had happened this morning must have bowled him over.

"Never mind about the bacon." James said. "Are you okay, Pads? What's going on?"

"I'm fine. Perfectly fine." Sirius flung pieces of toast back onto the plates while trying to mop up the spilt milk and pumpkin juice. "I just need some sleep."

"Yeah." Potter nodded. "You must haven't have gotten sleep last night. I heard you rolling around and punching your pillow a few times." At this remark Sirius turned bright red.

"Yeah. I'm sure that's what you heard." He dropped one of the napkins in his hands before picking it up again. Sirius was aware that over half of the table was watching him and so was half of every other table.

"Have an accident Peter?" Sirius froze. He knew that voice. Shit. Looking up from the mess (which he was only making worse by trying to clean) he came face to face with Remus, who was about to sit down opposite of him. Black couldn't tell if Remus even knew what had happened or if he did know and was just acting like he didn't. Either way, he didn't really want to stick round and find out.

Sirius quickly scooped up an armful of soaked bacon and toast along with paper towels drenched in milk and juice. "I'll just….er…go and throw these away." And he raced from the Hall, arms loaded down with ruined food, face red as a beat, and heart beating way too fast.

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Half an hour later, the fifth year Gryffindors and fifth year Hufflepuffs were congregating on the first floor for their History of Magic lesson. James, Remus, and Peter arrived promptly on time, for once and had to wait outside the room with the others.

"Where's Pads?" James asked no one in particular.

Peter shrugged.

But Remus said nothing. His face seemed to go a shade darker than usual and he began to play with the strap of his shoulder bag. Potter, meanwhile, was standing on tiptoes, trying to find the fourth musketeer in the all the jumbled mess of students.

The door to the class room suddenly opened and the large crowd began to slowly drift into the room, non of them too excited about the upcoming lesson. The marauders remained outside the room until Peter spotted Professor Binns drifting through the blackboard in the front of the classroom.

"Class is starting." He state rather stupidly. He waited for the other two to go into the room, certainly not liking the idea of being first in there.

"C'mon." James muttered. "Bloke must be skipping." He turned, heading into the room, Peter behind him.

"Remus." He said. The lycanthrope looked wildly around before spotting James.

"Class is starting." Peter added.

James slapped Remus on the back. "Pity we weren't informed of this ditching. We could have all lain off, huh Moony?"

"What…oh yeah." Remus said rather offhand as James steered him into the classroom.

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Sirius Black, wasn't skipping.

Well he was. But not really by choice. He'd made it to the fourth floor bathroom, clambered in to luckily find it empty, and dumped the soaping napkins and bits of toast and egg into the rubbish bin in the corner. He'd then walked over to the mirror and still stood there now.

He heard the bell ring. He'd be late for class, if he decided to go. It wasn't as if it were anything new. He showed up late all the time and people just simply dealt with it. The teachers had long since stopped trying to give him detentions in order to break him of his habit.

For the past half hour he'd been steadily gazing into the sink that stood below the mirror, not daring to look into the mirror itself. He feared what he'd see, and when he finally did managed to look up, he didn't like what he saw.

Just like earlier this morning, a shaken boy of seventeen stared back out at him. He was paler by far and had slight bags under his eyes. In an off handed way, he looked like Remus after a full moon.

Sirius quickly shook his head. No. No more thinking about Remus. He was nothing like him. No more. Looking back at the mirror, he took in his appearance. The front of his shirt and robes were stained with pumpkin juice and various other breakfast items. His hair was extremely messy, but not in an attractive way.

Sirius pulled away from the mirror and headed for the door. "I have to get to class." He mumbled, even though no one was there. Grabbing the handle on the door, though he stopped. "I can't." He said, rather pathetically and let go of the handle.

The door swung shut as he walked back to the mirror. Again, he looked in it to see if his appearance had changed any. No. Still the same shaken teenager. "Boy. I'm a mess. I can't go anywhere looking like this."

He surveyed himself in the mirror for another few minutes before pushing away from it and heading for the door again, intent on changing and then going to class.

For the second time, he reached for the handle.

And for the second time, he let it go and let the door swing shut.

"I can't." He groaned. "I can't go to class. How am I supposed to face the lot of them?" He wouldn't let himself say 'Remus.' "How am I supposed to shrug it off and continue being friends with him and act as if nothing has changed when everything has?"

He frantically began pacing the bathroom, walking at a rapid pace. "I can't face him again. I just can't. He's my mate and I…I…." He couldn't say it. "How is he not torn up about this? He was acting just fine when he showed up in the Hall."

Sirius threw his hands up in the air. "I can't do this. He's not just another girl. He's not even a girl. He's my mate…..and I….I…"

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Sirius returned to the Common Room and spent the rest of the day as far away from his bed as possible. He couldn't bare to go into the dorms.

That was where it had happened.

He'd scarred the dorm that he shared with his mates forever.

Shortly after five o'clock, the other three Marauders clambered through the portrait hole to find Sirius staring into the fireplace.

"Sirius!" Peter squeaked.

And instantly James and Peter piled on top of their friend, squishing him into his armchair. Remus, hung back though and took up to playing with the strap on his bag again.

Sirius busted out laughing, forgetting all his worries and fighting to get Peter's chubby elbow out of his stomach. The trio fell onto the floor and only stopped wrestling when James spoke up.

"Moony! Throw down the prefect badge and join in the fun." He yelled.

Instantly, Sirius dropped Peter's head, which he'd had curled under his arm while messing up his straw-colored hair with the other and he stopped kicking at James.

Remus looked the group over. "No thanks." He said going red and beginning to twist the strap of his bag around his finger even tighter so that his middle finger was turning a nice purple colour. "I have to…to….get to the library." He stuttered out and then turned around and walked quickly from the room.

The portrait hole swung shut behind him and Sirius was on his feet as well. He felt extremely uncomfortable now that the fun had stopped and he'd been forced to remember what had happened earlier. His face paled again.

"Sirius." James said, calling him by his first name in a moment of worrying. "Are you okay? You're okay, aren't you? You didn't skive lessons because you're sick, did you?"

"Oh no." Sirius answered. "I just didn't feel like going." He said quickly. "And…I have to er….shower." He lied quickly before leaving the room and heading up the stairs to the showers. Sirius didn't feel like staying around. Things were only bound to get awkward.

James looked sideways at Peter. "Are you going to come up with a shit excuse to go somewhere?"

"No." Peter said, trying to fix his hair. "But those two are acting odd."

"Yeah." James muttered, ruffling a hand through his on hair.

"Especially this morning…." Peter went on.

"Yeah. Knocking over the juice and all." James commented, surprised that Peter was actually noticing things for the first time.

"No. I don't mean that." Peter said, absently waving a hand.

James' eyebrows knitted together.

"I mean, that Sirius took the napkins with him." The pudgy boy spoke, smiling stupidly. "I mean, the napkins could have been left behind. They get sucked into the table with everything else." He nodded, apparently pleased with himself for dishing out his great knowledge of the Great Hall. Of course he'd know a lot about it. One only had to look at Peter to tell that he loved food.

James couldn't help but smiling at Peter's comment. "Yeah. Exactly, Wormy."