CW: Talk of child abuse

Peter being angry at Sirius was incredibly annoying. Both of them were distraught, but at least Sirius was trying to be a good friend, whereas Peter was just angrily ignoring him, and although I felt sorry for Peter, I was getting annoyed at him for his behaviour.

News quickly spread about Peter's dad, and of course, some of the Slytherins were giving him a rough time. James, Sirius, and I caught a fourth-year named Bertram Aubrey tormenting Peter about his loss early in February at the library, and James and Sirius were both enraged and hexed the older boy.

His head immediately began to swell, bigger, and bigger, until it was double the size of his normal head and he was soon rushed to the hospital wing as Professor McGonagall came marching into the scene, her lip curling. Peter squeaked and rushed away.

"That was an illegal hex!" she shrieked. "I don't care for your excuses, Mr Potter! That's double detention for both of you and fifty points from Gryffindor! I don't care, Mr Black! Nothing gives you the right to hex another student! Especially an illegal hex!"

She marched away, leaving James and Sirius in pits of fury.

"Why do I even try?" Sirius said angrily. "And Peter treats me like shit for what my father did… why do I even try to help him?"

"Maybe you shouldn't have—" I started.

"Defended a friend?" Sirius hissed. "Maybe your parents are dead, hey? If people tease you for that, do you want me to just stand around and do nothing? Even if it's my parents who kill them?"

He spun around angrily, cursing his family.

"Have… have they ever killed someone before?" James asked.

"I don't know…" said Sirius. "I dunno if I would've found out if Peter hadn't been moping around about it."

"His dad has been killed!" I hissed. "Do you expect him to not be upset?"

"Of course not, I just expected he wouldn't take it out on me, I didn't even… I know it was my father, but I didn't… he wasn't even angry at you when you literally —"

"That wasn't his dad! I… he was angry, I know…" I felt dizzy and shook my head angrily. "Look, he's being a prick, but he's obviously going to be sad. He'll come around."

Sirius just rolled his eyes and stormed away, followed closely by James. I just sighed and grabbed a book. At least Peter knew the state of his parents now, whereas James and I were still left in the dark.

The February moon fell on a Thursday, and when I came in late to Potions on Friday, Snape was glaring at me. I glanced over at him, and his look said one thing, 'I'm onto you.'

I was strongly reminded of when my first year at Hogwarts was just finishing up, and Sirius had been overly suspicious about my condition. At least he hadn't given me angry looks.

Snape was talking with Lily, and both of them were looking over their cauldron at me every minute or so, and I knew they were talking about me.

I'd heard Snape telling Lily his suspicions about me being a werewolf before, but she'd just brushed it off. Did she… believe him now? And then there was the boggart…

My thoughts were interrupted by a bang towards the back of the classroom. I turned around to see it had been from Sirius's cauldron, and his face was now covered in the sickly green potion.

"Mr Black!" Slughorn cried. Sirius stood up and walked to the classroom sink to wash his face and ignored everyone for the rest of the lesson.

The bell rang, and we walked towards the Great Hall for lunch after being dismissed by Professor Slughorn.

"What happened with your potion?" James asked.

"I dunno," Sirius muttered. "Just lost it, I guess. After this morning…"

His expression was pained.

"What happened this morning?" I asked, but I instantly regretted asking, seeing Sirius's face. He looked like he could have cried.

"I… um… got a letter from home," said Sirius. "I didn't want James to see it, but of course he did… uh, yeah."

He seemed uncomfortable, so I left it at that. If Sirius didn't want to talk about it, he didn't have to. Later, that night in the dormitory, James came to my bed to explain to me what had happened.

"Sirius said he'd prefer if I told you… he's not doing too well," James said, pulling the curtain of the four-poster back and sitting down. I just nodded and listened to what he had to say. "So… um, apparently Sirius's dad killed Peter's dad, who's muggle-born because he's… well, muggle-born. In the letter, he said that Sirius was to kill a muggle-born as soon as he turned sixteen, or he'd… he'd…" James trailed off. He didn't need to finish his sentence, and a sick feeling settled into the pit of my stomach. "Yeah, so… good night."

"Yeah," I said, nodding. "Night."

He left, and I put my head on my pillow. Were Sirius's parents going to kill him? Would it go that far? They'd tortured him so much, and now they were going to put his life on the line to force him into killing someone? Sirius would choose death for himself, most people would. But… I couldn't imagine a world without him. No, I couldn't let that happen. I shook my head and drew back my curtain to speak to the others.

"You know what might get our minds off this?" I said, looking out at them all. "A good old prank."

James sat up now. "You want us to do a prank? I thought you were meant to be the responsible one!"

"A harmless prank," I said, giving them all pointed looks, "One where no one gets hurt and…" my eyes fell on Peter "… we all work together."

Peter opened his mouth to protest but seemed to decide against it and remained silent.

"No one gets hurt and no one hides away in their room for a month," I added to Sirius and James. "And no one gets hit by some… weird curse."

"About that weird curse," said Sirius, "I did some research of my own… months ago, in November… but I found nothing."

"So did I," I said.

"Can we not talk about this?" Peter interrupted. He was paler than usual. "Let's just get on with the prank."

"Alright," said Sirius, nodding and smiling at Peter. But then he gasped, "Peter! What if we… get revenge on my father!"

"Sirius…" James started. But Peter was speaking before he could continue.

"Yes," he said firmly. "That is a brilliant idea."

And all of a sudden, the two boys who hadn't spoken to each other for weeks were grinning at each other with shared hatred, ready to take action.

Within 24 hours, Sirius and Peter were like the new Sirius and James. They were both shooting revenge ideas at each other every few minutes, and on their way to dinner just a day after their making up, Sirius stopped and gasped.

"I've got it!" he cried. "If my parents can send me a howler, why can't we send them one?"

"That's a good idea," said Peter, "but how do we send a howler?"

"Oh, don't worry Peter," Sirius said, grinning.

"Sirius!" James hissed, later that evening in the common room as Sirius fiddled with a red envelope. Sirius just ignored him.

"Sirius," I tried, but no response. James and I knew Sirius would get himself killed if he did this, but he wouldn't listen to our pleas for him to stop. Peter was going off at us for trying to stop their plan, which simply infuriated James even further.

"Why so angry, Potter?" came a voice. Lily was looking at him from across the room, her copy of A History of Magic propped up on her lap.

"I'm not angry!" James shouted.

"Sure," said Lily, raising her eyebrows.

"It's none of your business, Evans," James sighed. "Just go running back to Davey Gudgeon or whatever."

Lily crossed her arms. "For your information, I broke up with Davey. He's too clingy. But anyway, sorry for being concerned, Potter!"

She returned to her book. James was smiling goofily. He checked his breath and messed with his hair until he finally seemed to return to the present and spoke to Sirius.

"Sirius!" he yelled. Sirius jumped, then looked at James. "Don't do your… big plan. It's just going to get you killed, and—" he looked around the common room and seemed to finally notice that everyone was watching him, so we ran up to the dormitory. Soon, Sirius, James, Peter, and I were sitting around the table in our dormitory, debating angrily.

"Your parents are constantly doing the cruciatous curse on you for doing one small thing, what do you think they'd do if you —"

"James, since when are you so responsible?" Sirius said angrily, finally looking up from the red envelope. "All this time… I thought it was you and me… the troublemakers… are you too cool for that now?"

"No, that's not… Sirius… you're my best friend! I don't want you to die!" James's face looked desperate, and I realised for the first time how tired he looked.

Sirius looked back down at the envelope, his dark hair falling over his face.

"Fine then." James crossed his arms. "I'm going to bed."

And he did. And the next morning, James didn't speak to Sirius, who was still tapping that envelope with his wand at breakfast. James didn't speak to anyone until his owl dropped a letter in front of him.

From his parents.