It was the day of James' first Quidditch game, and James was poking morosely at his breakfast.

"Big day," said Peter. "Ready to win, James?"

"Yes, of course," snapped James. "Obviously. Shut up."

Angrily, James scraped his fork against his plate—it made a loud screeching noise, and Remus winced. James, having noticed Remus' sudden movement out of the corner of his eye, glared at him. There was a moment of silence, and then James popped some peas into his mouth and chewed furiously.

"Someone's nervous," commented Remus.

"I'm not nervous, Remus. I already know I'm going to be great. Thus I am not nervous, because nervousness implies uncertainty. Now be quiet and eat your sad vegetable breakfast."

Remus glanced on the piece of toast on his plate, a bit uncomfortable. Now that his friends knew why he was a vegetarian, they weren't leaving the subject alone. "Toast is not a vegetable," he said in lieu of real argument.

"It's close enough," said James. "Come on, Sirius, let's go hex some Slytherins. That'll teach them to dare play Gryffindor."

"Ooh, fun," said Sirius, bounding out of his chair, and Peter and Remus were left alone.

There were a few long moments of awkward silence, and Remus stared at his plate. The toast sat there, mocking him. Aren't you going with them? it said. Don't you owe them that? After all, they're staying your friends despite the dangers. And don't you owe it to your classmates to stop your friends from hexing them? You're forcing them to associate with a werewolf unwittingly. And don't you owe it to Dumbledore and the Prefects and the staff to help out? After all, you're...

"I don't owe anyone anything," Remus said fiercely to the piece of toast. "Professor Questus told me so."

The toast didn't respond, but its jam-laden expression became slightly more smug.

"Remus?" said Peter slowly. "Are you okay?"

Remus' head snapped up. "Er, yeah. What do you need?"

There was another moment of awkward silence, and then Peter said, "I was going to ask you to test me on Charms, because I'm pretty sure I'll fail the quiz today. But... you know, maybe I don't want to ask you if you're talking to toast. That doesn't exactly promise much about your intelligence."

Remus laughed, surprised. "That's fair. I'll quiz you anyway, and you can tell me if you think I'm going mad. Mad like James, that is, who's nervous to the point of insanity right now—"

Suddenly, James walked by their table again and bopped Remus on the head. "I'm not nervous!" he shouted before grabbing a scone that he'd left on his plate and running away, presumably after Sirius.

Peter watched James leave; once James was well out of sight, he said, "Er... Remus? Is toast a vegetable? Because I don't know what it's made of, and I heard it has flour, and doesn't flour come from cauliflower?"

"Toast isn't a vegetable," Remus assured Peter, fighting a smile. "And James is definitely nervous."

It was a weird kind of pride, watching James flying through the air with ease. Remus sort of wanted to say "That's my friend!" to everyone, but he also didn't want to stand out. Peter, however, didn't seem to mind standing out at all.

"That's my friend," he told a Hufflepuff first-year, who gawked up at Peter with adoration. "My best friend."

Remus tried not to be offended.

"That's my friend," Peter told a Ravenclaw seventh-year.

"Who, the skinny kid wearing four jumpers, shabby gloves, and the dumbest scarf I've ever seen?"

"I'm only wearing two jumpers," Remus grumbled, but no one heard him.

"No, the cool Quidditch player who's only twelve and scoring all of the goals," said Peter proudly, and Remus tried once again not to be offended.

"Oh, the ball hog," said the seventh-year with a wave of his arm. "Huh. Tell him to give someone else a shot."

"Pretty sure the goal of Quidditch is to keep the other players from getting a shot," Sirius fired back. "How do you expect him to play Quidditch? Just hand over the ball to a Slytherin Chaser and say, 'Here, I just had a go and now it's your turn!'?"

The Ravenclaw seventh-year grumbled to himself and turned around. Remus smiled up at Sirius, but Sirius was too busy glaring at the seventh-year.

James won, obviously. Remus wasn't surprised; James was light-years better than anyone else. James bounded up to the rest of the Marauders after the celebration, mussing his already wind-swept hair and grinning ear-to-ear. "Did you see that?" he said breathlessly. "I won!"

"The Gryffindor team won," corrected Remus.

"No. I won."

James was right, as much as Remus hated to admit it (even to himself). Gryffindor had caught the Snitch, but the Slytherin Seeker had been too busy avoiding the blur that was James to have a fighting chance. James had been the driving force behind Gryffindor's win—he'd been the shining star—he'd been the cream of the crop. The Gryffindor team hadn't won. James had won.

"Is there going to be a party in the common room today?" asked Remus.

"Yeah!" said James. "I'm really excited! There're going to be streamers and confetti and sweets, and Puttle even said that he'd keep an eye out for teachers so that we can really go wild! I'm sad Kendric's graduated already. He was always the life of the party. But Felix (that's the Seeker) said that he'd bring Butterbeer. Are you coming, Rem—" James suddenly trailed off. "Oh. That's why you don't like parties. Your... you know, your senses. Hearing."

These were the little revelations that hurt so much—the ones that proved that Remus lycanthropy was now at the forefront of his friends' minds—the small discoveries that bred pity and emitted a mournful mood that seemed to sap all the happiness from the room. "Yeah," said Remus, "it's a little much. Overwhelming, you know. I'll just spend it doing homework in the dormitory. But... please don't talk about it here."

James' eyes were still wide. "What about Quidditch games? Do they hurt your ears?"

"Not really... well, a little, but I still like them."

"And what about Potions class?"

Remus paused. "There's no noise in Potions class."

"No, the smells. Since you have a good sense of smell."

Remus didn't really like it when people pointed that out. Having a good sense of smell somehow felt more degrading and disgusting than having a good sense of hearing. "It does bother me a little, but they're natural smells; nothing like Pensley's scented candles. And I'm used to it, so it doesn't affect the quality of my work. It's about as uncomfortable as the temperature in Professor Flitwick's room—a little uncomfortable, but you get used to it."

Remus' friends nodded. Flitwick always kept his room at very chilly temperatures with some temperature regulation charms, so the metaphor had been a good one (even though Peter and James insisted that it wasn't cold, not really).

"You're actually pretty good at Potions," said Peter.

Remus shrugged modestly. "It's just following directions. I can't improvise like some others, though, so I'm not brilliant."

"Enough about Remus," said James with a wave of his hand. "He doesn't like attention, anyway, and he already asked us to stop talking about this. I like attention, though: so what was your favorite part of the game?!"

"The dive you did!" squealed Peter. "I thought you were going to die, but you didn't!"

"The catch you did," said Sirius. "That was an outstanding catch."

"I liked when the Seeker caught the Snitch and the game was over," said Remus.

James glared at him. "Come on, Remus. You just said that you go to Quidditch games despite being in pain. You have to like something about them."

Remus laughed. "I'm not in pain, James, I'm just uncomfortable. Like in Flitwick's classroom. And I liked the end of the game because... because the poor Slytherins had been humiliated enough!"

"That's the spirit!" said James, ruffling Remus' hair, and Remus found himself unspeakably thankful once again for his wonderful friends.

Remus went to Dumbledore's office on Sunday and knocked on the door lightly. He heard Dumbledore stand up and draw the curtains in front of the portraits closed, and then the door opened. "Ah, Remus. What can I do for you?" said Dumbledore calmly. His voice was always so calm when he answered the door, and it was either soothing or infuriating. Today, it was the former, but Remus suspected that it would turn infuriating soon enough if Dumbledore refused his forthcoming request.

"I wanted to know if I can stop doing meditation with Pensley, sir," Remus said hurriedly. "You said that I needed to continue the meditation so that I had more people to depend on... but now I have friends, sir. I'm perfectly relaxed, and I suspect that this full moon will be far better than the last. I'm having fun, and I feel fine! They're really good friends, Professor... so I don't see why I need to do that thing with Pensley."

"Professor Evangeline, Remus," corrected Dumbledore. "And I don't believe that..."

"If anything, they just stress me out more," said Remus desperately. "The meditation sessions, I mean... not my friends. Well, my friends stress me out, too, but it's a good kind of stress. Anyway. There are too many candles in Pensley's classroom, sir, and the sessions are really long and it's annoying and hard to manage so close to the full moon... I think I would have a better moon this month if I skipped it. Can't we at least try letting me skip?"

"Remus."

"And I'm going home after holidays, so this needs to be an easy full moon. I don't want anything that might make it worse, because I'm hoping that Madam Pomfrey will let me ride the train on Friday..."

"Remus."

"And I understand that you want me to continue, but the meditation won't cure me—I know it won't—and I'm just wasting everyone's time, and..."

"Remus!" Professor Dumbledore, holding up a hand. "Why don't you come in? Would you like a butterscotch square?"

"No... thank you." Remus entered Dumbledore's office and took a seat. "Sir..."

"I do not wish for you to stop your sessions with Professor Evangeline."

"Sir!"

"I understand your concerns, but I think it imperative that you continue. Professor Evangeline wants to help, and it seems cruel to stop her from doing so because of a personal preference."

Normally, the prospect of being selfish would make Remus' stomach go all twisty, but he didn't agree with Dumbledore's statement this time. "I don't think it's cruel at all, sir. We tried it, and it didn't work, so we're stopping. There's nothing cruel about that."

"You might be right," said Dumbledore thoughtfully. "Perhaps 'cruel' was not the correct word. I think that I meant 'unnecessary'."

"I think it's crueler to let her keep wasting her time when I know that it won't help. The sessions themselves are unnecessary!"

"Oh, I don't think they are." Dumbledore tried to hand Remus some sort of biscuit with chunks of what smelled like marshmallow and lemon inside, but Remus shook his head. "I mentioned this to you at the very beginning of the year, Remus; I'm not sure if you remember. But I noticed that you tend to get frustrated very easily because of your lycanthropy." Dumbledore gestured to Remus' fingers, which Remus was tapping furiously. Remus immediately stopped tapping his fingers, embarrassed. "Characters like Professor Evangeline tend to put you over the edge, hm?"

"I can deal with it, sir. I think I do very well controlling myself."

"Yes, Remus. You can, and you do. You do so admirably. But I think you can do better, don't you? You'll have to handle people who frustrate you all your life, I'm afraid, and it will only get worse when the Ministry considers you an adult."

"But I can handle it...!"

"Yes, you can. But not comfortably." Dumbledore steepled his fingers. "I'm sure you understand the importance of staying calm in the face of infuriating people. Unfortunately, society considers you to be incapable of controlling yourself. Proving that you can do so is of massive importance. I know it is not ideal, but you need to be very skilled at controlling your emotions."

Remus thought of Professor Questus and grimaced. "I'm trying."

"I know. And this will help, Remus; I would not ask you to do it if I didn't believe it would. I realized a few things at the Ministry last year as I was trying to get the werewolf law repealed, remember?" Remus nodded. That had been quite the dramatic incident. "One of the things I realized," Dumbledore continued, "was that the Ministry will try to condemn you, even if a guilty verdict is illogical. It is not personal; it is simply because they need a political scapegoat for propaganda purposes. Do you understand?"

Remus didn't really, but he thought he knew what Dumbledore was getting at, so he nodded.

"Being the only werewolf to attend Hogwarts in all of written history, you are a target. The Ministry will be watching you very carefully. They'll be looking for any sort of slip on your part, and you will be judged harshly for anything that you do. And I want to commend you for how well you do on a day-to-day basis... but, that said, you have a few nervous tics that make your emotions very easy to identify. I was hoping that spending a few agonizing hours with Professor Evangeline when your emotions are at their worst could help with that."

"Nervous... tics?"

"You tap your fingers. Your breathing changes. You crinkle your eyebrows. You bite your lip. You clench your jaw. You blink faster. Your accent changes. I'm sure you've been told that you go Welsh when you're emotional... you were a bit just now, in fact. And you get sarcastic. I'm afraid it's extremely obvious, Remus. You have been home for so long that you're simply not very good at taking account of how you look to other people—at keeping your facial expressions under control—which could be the thing that gives you away. You realize that appearing as anything other than calm and collected could get you into trouble with the Ministry? Or, even more likely, it could be a driving force in exposing your secret to even more people. I thought that Pensley's meditation would do one of two things: either teach you legitimate techniques for staying calm, or lead you to develop your own techniques after prolonged exposure to a woman you find infuriating. Either would help."

Remus nodded, defeated. Dumbledore was right. He was always right. Remus still didn't want to do the stupid meditation with Pensley, but... yeah. It might help.

"But I do see the problem in forcing you to do it," said Dumbledore slowly. "I think it should be your choice. Even though I believe it will be beneficial, you might think that it is the best way, and I value your assessment over your own mental facilities over my own assessment. After all, you know yourself better than I know you. If you do not believe it is helping, or if it is causing you unnecessary stress, I must recommend that you discontinue. We will find another way to help you, Remus, I promise."

"I..." Remus thought about Pensley's meditation sessions. He thought about how often he'd had to take inventory of his annoyed huffs of breath and his facial expressions. He thought of the couple of coping mechanisms that he'd already come up with over the past few months of meditation—literally biting his tongue seemed to help, as did the tried and true deep breaths (in through his nose, out through his mouth). And maybe he'd actually try to employ Pensley's techniques? He'd have to swallow his pride, for sure, but swallowing one's pride was just another form of emotional stability that Remus had to work on. "Yes, sir," Remus said slowly. "I think... now that I have an explanation... I'd like to continue. It could help."

"Not at all. I'm glad to explain my reasoning to anyone who wishes to hear it."

"You didn't... just hire her on my account, right? You didn't hire her specifically for this?"

"To tell you the truth, I didn't even realize that she could help you until after I hired her," said Dumbledore. "I mostly hired her because she annoys all of the teachers to no end. You should see Professor McGonagall's face when she has to talk to Professor Evangeline. I thought it would be humorous, and it has been extremely so."

"Oh."

"And there are a few students here who could benefit from her teaching. The Slytherins in particular need a class that forces them to do ridiculous things in front of their peers—they are far too uptight, and that can be a dangerous traits in specific scenarios. Not to mention how lonely Professor Evangeline is. I'm afraid not many people like her very much. Coming to Hogwarts has improved her mood and sense of purpose immensely. And she did present herself to be qualified when I hired her... though I admit that her curriculum is not one that I expected and not one that I particularly enjoy. But I, like you, will keep that opinion to myself, seeing as she is still learning and I have yet to see the effectiveness of her teaching. I will speak to her after final exams this year."

"I see."

"Anyway," said Dumbledore, popping a biscuit into his mouth, "I appreciate your understanding, Remus. It's not often that my incessant rambling gets such a willing audience. And... feel free to bring anything along that you think will improve the quality of your meditation sessions. I am sure that Professor Evangeline will not mind at all, and the whole point is to come up with coping techniques... even tangible ones."

"Yes, sir." Remus wasn't sure what he meant by that. "Thank you again."

"No problem at all. I'm glad to hear that things have been going so well with your friends. Remember what I said: bring anything along that you should desire."

Remus smiled, bemused. "Okay."

With that, Remus departed for his dormitory... and wasn't until nine pm that night that he realized what Dumbledore had meant with his cryptic closing statement.

"Do you want to come with me to meditate with Pensley?" Remus asked his friends over breakfast the next morning. "I really don't want to go, and I think that having some people along might help."

"Sure," said Sirius. "It might be fun."

"I'm in," said James. "Maybe we can plan some sort of joke to play on her."

"Of course!" said Peter. "Cool! I've always wanted to meditate."

So on Sunday evening, Remus explained everything to his friends (against his better judgement). He explained the temper and frustration and how it all spiked the days before the full moon. He described the Ministry's views towards him, and how both Dumbledore and Questus had stressed the need to compose himself and defy society's expectations. He told them that they were very mean people after they affirmed that Remus was indeed terrible at controlling his facial expressions, but he also laughed about it. He told them about Questus' private duelling lessons (the other Marauders thought that it was the coolest thing ever). He explained Pensley's belief that she could cure him (and vehemently brought up the fact that she was wrong). His friends, obviously, had questions.

"Really? You have a temper? You? Of all people?" said James. "You're the calmest out of all of us, mate... I mean, I can tell when you're mildly frustrated, because your face really does give everything away, but you always speak so calmly. Your general demeanor is really calm. You never look angry, just... frustrated at worst. If you really do feel angry a lot, then you're doing well at hiding it."

"I practice," said Remus. "But Dumbledore says that it's still rather obvious that I'm trying to control myself, and I need it to look effortless if anyone's going to accept me."

"Cool," said Sirius.

"It's not cool. It's horrible." Remus was rather embarrassed to be talking about this—the awful effect that lycanthropy had on his mind as well as his body—but they had to know. They were, after all, his friends (the thought still made him feel weird, but it was getting better).

"That's why you do the breathing thing," said Peter. "You do it when you're angry."

"Angry isn't the right word," said Remus desperately. "I'm not... a barely-restrained and perpetual ball of anger, Pete. That's not what it is. I just get... frustrated. Like James said."

"Tell us more about the duelling lessons!" said James, and Remus was thankful for the change in topic.

"They were very nice," said Remus. "They were a good escape from everything. You know, a way to focus on something other than... lying to you and doing well in school and the Ministry and full moons and... things. Professor Questus taught me how to do nonverbal magic—I practice every once in a while, especially in the Hospital Wing when I'm bored, but I'm still not great at it. He taught me a lot of strategy, mostly, and we practiced a lot."

"Did you ever beat him?" said Sirius.

"Of course not! He's a former Auror. Once it ended in a draw, though, because he called it off and forgot to disarm me."

"Cool," said Sirius again, and this time, Remus had to agree.

"Henry!" said Pensley, employing disgustingly saccharine tones. "Come on in. Is it really the full moon already? You missed your meditation session last month, and I heard that the full moon was particularly terrible."

Remus set his jaw and tried to smile. "Yes, but I don't think that was because of the lack of meditation."

"Don't be silly," said Pensley, waving her fingers. They glittered in the air because of all the rings she was wearing. Her makeup was glittery. Her robes had sequins. Remus tried not to gag. "Of course it was! You skipped the meditation, and the full moon was worse. I'm sensing a pattern, aren't you, Henry dear?"

"Hey, Pensley," said James, effectively saving Remus from formulating a response to Pensley's downright idiotic assumptions.

"It's Professor Cordelia today, Griffin! And what a lovely surprise to see you here!"

"I brought them along for..." It hurt Remus so much to even insinuate that the meditation sessions helped—he didn't want Pensley to get the impression that they did. He didn't want her to be happy, or to feel as if she had helped, or to see Remus as some sort of special project, because he didn't like her... and yes, he knew he had to swallow his pride at some point, but he really didn't want to. "They were curious," he finished lamely. "Sirius has nightmares. He thought that perhaps they'd help."

Sirius elbowed Remus in the side, and Remus elbowed him back. "I do not have nightmares," said Sirius.

"It's perfectly all right!" said Pensley. The air was so thick with the smell of scented candles that Remus could almost see the fumes. "No judgement here! We all have nightmares sometimes! Why are the others here, Henry?"

"Peter gets anxious over taking tests," said Remus, which was true. "And James thinks that meditation will improve his performance in Quidditch."

"Good, good! Well, I think that it most certainly can! I'm so glad that you've been recommending me to your friends, Henry! You must like my meditation sessions a lot!"

"Mmm," mumbled Remus. He had wanted to say "mm-hm", but the last part had gotten stuck in his throat. "May we have a shorter session today? They have to revise for an upcoming test..."

"We shall proceed in whatever manner our hearts lead us," said Pensley, waving a glittery hand again. "Mental health is far more important than marks are. Have a seat on the floor, if you will."

This was so embarrassing. So frustrating. So horribly terrible. Remus had a seat with his friends and bit his lip, before realizing that he was supposed to be emotionless and calm. He released it and tried to breathe—but normally, not in through his nose and out through his mouth. He could humor Pensley just this once, right? Just once a month?

He closed his eyes as per Pensley's directives and focused on the sounds of his friends' breathing—not the classical music, not Pensley's whiny voice, not the clacking of her rings against one another... he could do this.

He hoped.

AN: Happy May! When I was a kid, my mother would always correct my grammar ("may" instead of "can"). I no longer make the mistake (well, I no longer make it on accident), but I like to call the month of May the month of Can just to get on her nerves. So... happy Can first!