Winter break is sixteen days long, and it's not until day eleven that James writes to Peter.
It's not like it's been complete silence from all of Peter's friends this entire time. As soon as Remus got out of the Hospital Wing, he started writing to Peter every night, so that Peter had an owl to wake up to each morning at the breakfast table with Mum and Dad. Even Sirius has sent two letters—one on day four, the other on day nine.
And in case you're wondering, yes, Peter has been keeping score. For as long as he can remember, he's had scorecards in his head to track even the slightest of offenses, just so that he can keep straight how angry he's supposed to be at each person in his life. There's a righteousness in it, a feeling of satisfaction that he deserves better, even if it gets exhausting to tally everyone's offenses and remind himself of all of his harm all the time.
Honestly, by day eleven, he's resigned himself to the idea that James isn't going to write and Peter isn't going to hear a peep from him until Peter shows back up at the castle in January—so it comes as a surprise that James writes at all. Even before he opens the letter that lands in his glass of pumpkin juice at the kitchen table, he knows who it's from: he can recognize James's handwriting.
If Peter were a better person, he'd feel glad, maybe even grateful—but he's not better, and it just pisses him off further. Now James has the audacity to write, like the past ten days meant nothing, like Peter hasn't been sitting here stewing in abandonment this entire time—and yeah, Peter knows they're not in a relationship, knows James doesn't love him, isn't crazy, isn't stupid, but it still sucks. James is supposed to be Peter's best friend, or one of them, anyway. They may not be together, but they are banging. That may not count for anything to James, but it counts for something to Peter.
But their banging days, Peter's well aware, are numbered—probably even already over. That's what this is about, isn't it? James and Sirius must have had all sorts of alone time in the dormitory before Remus got discharged—all those nighttime hours with nobody for company but each other—and the reason James hasn't been writing is that he's been too ashamed to tell it to Peter straight. He's probably put it in the letter. Peter is one paper cut away from losing—
—everything. It feels like he's losing everything. And he knows that's not the case, knows that sex with James isn't the only thing that matters in Peter's life, but lately, it's the only part he gives a damn about, and it's going away.
"My popular boy. Everyone wants to talk to you this morning," remarks Mum with a pleased little smile that Peter wants to rip right off her face. He fishes James's letter out of his pumpkin juice and places it damp in his lap on top of the one from Remus.
It's not that Peter doesn't love his parents. He does. He just—he can't talk to them, and they don't know him. If they knew him, they'd be horrified, and he learned at a very early age that he'd have to hide himself away if he didn't want to alienate his parents. Best to play the role he's become so adept at playing: hapless, clingy, humble, awed.
In some ways, it makes a lot of sense that James took Peter under his wing. Peter thinks James was always pretty determined to make friends with his dormmates no matter what they were like, but it was more than that. Peter was attracted to James because James was strong, and James was attracted to Peter because Peter was weak—or, at least, because Peter presented himself as such. And maybe he is weak—maybe there's nothing strong about seeing through people and harboring secret resentment that he never does anything about—but he's not weak for the reasons James thinks. If James knew—if anyone knew—Peter may feel alone now, but it would be a lot worse if he drove away all the people who think he's something he's not.
So he plays the part, and he seethes, and he tries to prepare himself mentally for James cutting him off in the letter Peter's about to read just as soon as he finishes picking at his eggs and pretending to be interested in what Mum and Dad are saying. This is fine, he tells himself. He never got what he needed from James anyway. He took what he could, and it was something while it lasted, but he always knew it wasn't the same for James as it was for him—always knew this was inevitable.
When he finally shuts himself in his bedroom and fumbles with the letters in his grip, his hands are shaking. It's dumb. Why are they shaking? Peter already knows what this is, and he never was under any illusions that their little arrangement meant a damn thing to James, either. Why does it matter to Peter so much, anyway, when he already knows James has never known the real Peter well enough to love him—and couldn't, anyway, if he did because no one could, because Peter is unlovable?
Is that what this is about? Was the sex a substitute for love? Has Peter been clinging to the only thing he could get because he can't have what he needs? After all these years, shouldn't he be beyond needing anything from anyone?
The letters slip out of his hands. Leaving Remus's on the bedroom floor, he plunks down onto the ground to pick up James's and unfold it.
Wormtail,
I'm sorry I haven't written. I owe you an apology and an explanation.
I did what I did with you because I was selfish. I didn't know how to cope with what felt like Padfoot stripping me of my trust in him, and I didn't want to admit to myself how much it was affecting me, and I was in denial about what he meant to me, and I wanted to convince myself that he was replaceable. I used you. I'm sorry I used you. You deserve so much better than that.
I don't want to hurt you with the details, but stuff is happening between me and Padfoot again, and I'm so sorry I have to tell you like this that it's over for us. I can't decide whether I should have written you as soon as it happened or waited until after break to tell you in person. This too-late letter is the shitty compromise I came up with.
I care about you so much as a friend, and I hope you can forgive me and we don't lose that. Our friendship is really important to me, and so are you.
Prongs
By the time Peter reaches the end, his entire face is dripping—tears, snot, the whole thing. He rips the parchment into jagged halves, quarters, eighths, and flings them onto the ground, pounds on his own thigh with his fist, raises his hands to his face to bury it in.
He doesn't know why he's crying. It's the stupidest thing in the world that he's crying.
xx
He doesn't write back, which means he's filled with dread by the time the start of term rolls back around and he has to catch the Hogwarts Express back to school. Remus kept sending a letter a day even after Peter stopped responding, and Peter read every word and asked himself every morning, does Remus know? Is he playing dumb, acting like everything's normal and Peter hasn't found himself in the middle of a bloody love triangle? Is Remus really that clueless, or does he think he's affording Peter a little dignity?
Spoiler: Peter doesn't feel dignified. Peter doesn't feel anything except furious. He's not sad. He's not heartbroken. He's not.
His heart is hammering in his chest by the time he walks into the castle, up to Gryffindor Tower, and along the stairs to his dormitory. He's not sure whether to expect James and Sirius to be snuggled up together on one bed in there or what, but they're not. Remus flashes Peter a big smile, but he's the only one.
"Hey," murmurs James.
"Hey," Peter mutters back.
And everything's fine.
