"Well that was the most pointless lesson ever," grumbled James, "why on Earth are we learning about bloody gnomes in Defence Against the Dark Arts. How many fatal gnome attacks do you hear about in the Prophet?"
"Hagrid would make a ten times better than that old git," said Sirius, "I'd much rather be learning about those firecrabs than bloody household pests."
"I've heard the Defence Against the Dark Arts job's cursed," said Peter, "apparently no one lasts longer than a year, so next year it could be Hagrid!"
"Who said that?" asked James, "my parents never told me anything about that, and they told me all there is to know about Hogwarts."
"I heard some older boys saying it in the Common Room, apparently a few years back someone put a curse on it and since then no one's been able to keep the job for longer than a year. Apparently one teacher even died."
"I heard about that," said Sirius, "that was some a hundred and something year old who was on death's door when he took the job. That's not a curse Peter, that's just old age, you're just gullable."
"Why would anyone want to curse a job anyway?" asked Remus.
"Merlin knows," said Sirius, "it could all just be a myth, but if it is true then it'll be good riddance at the end of this year."
"Maybe we should start a petition," said James, "Hagrid for Defence Professor."
James and Sirius had taken instantly to Hagrid, and their admiration of him had only increased when over the weekend he had taken them all down to see the firecrabs the Care of Magical Creatures Professor had ordered in for the OWL students to study. Peter was obviously still slighty unsure of what to make of Hagrid, but keen to follow Sirius and James into anything, even, apparently, dangerous, or as Hagrid liked to call them "interesting" creatures.
Remus had not been so keen to go along. Not because he was afraid of the firecrabs or anything, as James and Sirius had teased, but because during that first visit to Hagrid's hut he had gotten the distinct feeling that Hagrid knew. Remus had known that the teachers all knew about his lycanthropy, but he had not thought to ask at any point whether that knowledge extended to the rest of the staff. He didn't mind the groundskeeper knowing, but for some reason he felt wary of associating too closely with someone with such a fascination for "interesting" creatures. He knew he was just being silly, so he had agreed to go and see the firecrabs along with James, Peter and Sirius, but once again throughout the visit Remus had been unable to shake the feeling that Hagrid was paying more attention to him than to any of the other boys.
A few days had passed now, and Remus had decided once more that he was just being paranoid. The groundskeeper had said nothing about werewolves and none of the others had noticed anything unusual in the way he acted towards Remus, he was just imagining things. And even if he was right, he should really just be grateful that someone was going out of their way to get to know him (for Remus was sure Hagrid did not invite every group of students who broke into his pumpkin patch in for a cup of tea and trip to see some firecrabs). And yet Remus couldn't help but mistrust anyone who looked him with such… eagerness? Maybe that wasn't quite the right word, Remus couldn't really describe it even in his head. But somehow that look reminded him of the look in the eyes of those few rare Healers who, instead of making it clear that they were disgusted at having to treat a werewolf, were thrilled to be able to examine a 'real live specimen'. He wasn't quite sure what he feared around Hagrid, but something always kept him on edge around the oversized man.
"Flying now anyway," said James brightly, "I hope they get the balls out this time. I mean, fair enough if they don't get the bludgers or the snitch out just yet, but they could at least let us practise a bit of shooting, don't you think?"
"I'm sure they will soon," said Sirius, "I mean, it's hardly be fair to make muggleborns who want to try out for the team next year go to the try-outs without having any practise at actually playing the game right?"
"Now now Sirius," said James, "what would your dear mother and father say if they heard you suggesting giving muggleborns a fair chance."
"Probably that I was an insolent idiot child who ought to be more grateful that he was born into the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black with blood so pure Vampires could feed it to their newborn babies."
"Charming," said James.
"How do Vampires even have babies?" asked Peter, "Do they even have babies?"
"Well," said James, "when two Vampires love each other very much…"
"Eww James please don't!" said Sirius, wrinkling his nose and covering his ears.
"You started it," shrugged James.
Remus was definitely getting better at flying. He was nowhere near the best in the class, that was probably James, but he wasn't the worst by any means. At least he'd got to the point where he was good enough that he was starting to be able to properly enjoy flying, instead of just spending the whole time trying not to fall off. Peter was more confident on the broom, despite still managing an impressive number of crashes and falls. Remus's approach was still far more cautious. He would hate to end up in the Hospital Wing when it wasn't the full moon, and the last thing he would want would be for his parents to find out he'd been being reckless and writing to Dumbledore asking for Remus to be excluded from flying lessons from now on, or worse, brought home altogether. Remus was sure the latter wouldn't happen, but his mum and dad were always worried about him doing anything as dangerous as even walking on the garden wall at home, so he couldn't be too sure.
When Madam Hooch blew her whistle to call them all back down to the ground Remus skidded into a rosy cheeked and exhilarated looking Lily Evans.
"Sorry," said Lily as they both picked themselves up off the ground, "the mud's so slippery it's hard to land isn't it?"
"Yeah, sorry," said Remus.
"This is great though isn't it?" Lily continued, "flying I mean, it's so much better than any sports you can do in the muggle world. I mean, I always liked PE at primary school, but this is just brilliant."
"What's PE?" asked Remus.
"It's a lesson where you do sports and games and stuff," said Lily, "did you not have it at you old school?"
"I er… I didn't go to school before Hogwarts," said Remus.
"Really? How did you learn how to read and write and do maths and everything then?"
"Um… my mum and dad taught me," said Remus.
"Oh," said Lily, "what? Just you by yourself?"
"Yeah," said Remus.
"I'd hate that," said Lily, "how comes you didn't go to school?"
"Umm… I think my parents were worried about me doing magic by accident?" said Remus slowly, Lily had caught him by surprised with her stream of questions.
"Oh, yeah I supposed that would be quite difficult to explain. I got in trouble a fair few times at school for things I'd done by magic without meaning to. Other times I didn't get in trouble though cause it was just so strange that I 'couldn't possibly have done it'. I used to be able to fly sort of actually. I don't know whether I'd still be able to. The first time was when me and my friends were jumping off the swings in the park and I ended up jumping right into this old biddy's garden. That took a lot of explaining and apologising on my mum's part. By that time she knew there was something weird about me and she told not to do it again, but I kept doing it because it was really fun, in the end I got better at controlling it so I didn't fly off into random people's garden's. But it's even better with a broomstick cause you can go anywhere you like and just keep on going. It'd be cool to learn to do loop-the-loops and things like that wouldn't it?"
"Are you coming to the library Lily?" came a voice from Lily's other side.
She spun around and Remus moved to see who it was, of course, it was Severus Snape.
"Sure," said Lily, "didn't you enjoy that Sev?"
"Flying's stupid," said Snape, "the only people who like it are show offs."
"I like it," said Lily, "do you think I'm a show off?"
"No," said Snape.
"Well then," said Lily, "just because Black and Potter messed with your broom that first lesson doesn't mean you should write it off completely, I've never done it before and I'm doing alright now. Have you ever done it before Remus?"
"No," said Remus, "you will get better," he said to Snape, "you just need to take it slowly, that's what I'm doing."
Snape just scowled at Remus.
"Not that you're not… good… now," added Remus uncertainly.
"Come on Lily, let's go," said Snape meaningfully.
Lily gave him an annoyed look, then Remus an apologetic one, then followed Snape towards the edge of the gaggle of students.
"What were you talking to Evans and Snivellus for?" asked James, bounding towards Remus.
"We weren't really talking," said Remus, "me and Lily just nearly skidded into each other then she started talking to me then Snape came along and dragged her away. I think I accidently insulted him."
"Nice one," said Sirius.
"I really didn't mean to!" protested Remus, "I just didn't know what to say, I was trying to just make conversation about flying and he thought I was saying he was rubbish."
"Which he is," put in James.
"I hope Lily doesn't think I was being mean on purpose."
"What do you care what she thinks?" asked James, "she doesn't like anyone except Snivellus and she doesn't like anything except work. She's not even friends with the Gryffindor girls. She never sits with them at meals or anything. If she's not with Snape then she's always alone."
Was she? Remus hadn't noticed that. He'd been too caught up by the fast pace of Hogwarts life, between lessons his dorm mate's escapades. He's talked to Lily a couple of times, like just now, when they had found themselves thrust together, but they weren't exactly friends. He barely considered Peter, James and Sirius his friends, how was he supposed to know all these kinds of things about people he only spoke to occasionally. Over the years he'd gotten quite good at judging what his parent's moods and things meant but in real life (as Remus had come to call it in his head) people were more difficult than he'd expected them to be.
"But she's really nice," said Remus, "and funny and just… chatty you know? How comes she doesn't have friends apart from Snape?"
"Because she wanted to be in Slytherin," said Sirius, "you didn't see them on the train Remus, they're stuck up pricks the both of them. Yeah sure Lily might be nice enough but she still thinks she's better than everyone else in our House. You ought to stay away from people like that. Especially with your bloodline."
"But Lily's parents are both muggles," said Remus.
"Which makes it all the more sinister that she would want to be in Slytherin," said Sirius, "listen to me Remus, I've got enough crazy relatives to know that there are some seriously crazy people in the world."
"But Evans doesn't look crazy," said Peter.
"You can't always tell by looks," said Sirius, "people can seem nice as pumpkin pasties in the surface but you never know what they're really like inside. Sooner or later she'll probably realise how lucky she is to be in Gryffindor and how stupid she was to want to be in Slytherin but until then it's just better to stay away from weirdos like her and Snape."
Remus nodded, but Sirius's words jarred with him, and with his image of Lily, she was a little strange maybe, but no stranger than anyone else he'd met, no stranger than Peter or James or Sirius themselves for that matter, and certainly not as strange as him. But then again, Sirius and the others knew more about the world than he did, perhaps on this, like on Hagrid, he ought to just go with their judgement.