Professor Slughorn happily drones on about the ingredients of Veritaserum and where to find substances that can act as alternatives as I take notes robotically, barely paying attention. My eyes are glued to the samples Slughorn is holding up, but my thoughts are circling nonstop on the spot where Sirius' hand is resting on my knee. I catch myself writing the same line over and over again on my parchment.

"What?" I finally respond through gritted teeth.

"I've been thinking," he starts with an unsure tone in his voice.

"That's definitely newsworthy."

His hand leaves my knee and he ribs me hard, hitting a bad bruise.

"Bloody fucki –"

"Lupin, Black, care to share with us?"

"We'd rather not, Sir," Sirius replies, beaming up at him.

I sigh, burying my face behind my propped up Advanced Potions book as I hear James, who is seated at Sirius' other side, snicker indiscreetly. He earns another glare from Slughorn.

"I suppose I can let that quip go if one of you three can actually tell me what my discussion is about," he says calmly.

"Veritaserum, Sir," I recite immediately. "It's the powerful truth serum that forces the consumer to answer anything truthfully. It lacks properties like color and odor, and is almost indistinguishable from water. This potion is controlled by the Ministry of Magic because it is used for interro –"

"Okay, okay," Slughorn cuts me off. He chuckles and says, "That's enough to save your friends. Again. Not him though," he adds, gesturing to an asleep Wormtail next to me. "Tell him to see me after dinner, will you?" He turns around to list down the proper procedure in brewing the serum.

Sirius leans in close, too close for my comfort, and whispers, "My hero."

I roll my eyes and nudge him away from me. "You bloody git, what would you do without me?"

"Well," James starts, his face in mock-uncertainty, "I guess we'd be forced to break out our natural charm, eh, Sirius?"

Sirius nods in a fake air of consideration. "Definitely, James. But I think that wouldn't be very fair to our fellow classmates. Evans wouldn't be able to keep her hands off you," he says cockily as he and James turn around to grin at Lily.

Lily narrows her green almond-shaped eyes at them. "How Remus manages to put up with you three," she starts, flashing a look at Peter, who is drooling on his book, "is the one thing I haven't been able to solve in all my years at Hogwarts."

"You and I both, Lils," I affirm. Much to James' annoyance, I am the only Marauder Lily likes and actually has normal conversations with. Being a prefect, I have constant night patrol shifts with her, and she is the only person other than the Marauders I spend a significant amount of time with.

Lily laughs and winks at me before returning her attention to the lecture.

Sirius turns to me, raising his eyebrows. "What was that about?"

"What was what?"

"You were flirting with Evans." His tone was a formidable mixture of anger and annoyance.

"Woah, there, Pads, I was not –"

"She was winking and giggling and all that," he mutters, irritated.

"Well ask her about that. Why are you so –"

James cuts in before I can finish. "Will you two shut it?"

"Moony here was flirting with Evans," Sirius informs him with a concerned expression.

James takes one look at me and stifles a laugh.

Sirius frowns. "That wasn't the reaction I was expecting."

James, shaking his head, just replies, "Trust me, Padfoot, Lily isn't exactly Remus' type."

I glare at him, casting a warning look. He grins and draws his focus back to the page of the textbook he was doodling on.

"Whatever, mate," he says, his frustration still obvious. "Anyway, Remus, I was gonna talk to you about Friday night," he says, composing himself and turning to me. "The night of your… er, problem? Well yeah, James hasa practice for the game early the next morning and Peter has detention –"

"Yeah, I know. We agreed I could take care myself for one night, remember?"

"Well, I was thinking, that although none of us have ever taken care of you alone, maybe I could still –"

"Not a chance," I say, laughing bitterly.

"No, Remus, hear me out, mate –"

"Not. A. Chance," I repeat, stressing each word.

Sirius opens his mouth to protest before Slughorns voice fills the room once more.

"So, that's it for today, class. Take note of your assignment on the board and read chapter eight of your textbook. Oh, and Miss Evans, may I please have a word with you?"

A chorus of chairs scraping against the floor and heavy murmuring of students arises.

Sirius, lowering his voice as waves of Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs bustle to head to dinner, mutters, "I can do this, Remus. I don't want you to be alone."

"I've transformed alone before, if you've forgotten," I say as I stand up and start to walk out the classroom, craning my neck to spot James and Peter in the crowd of sixth years.

I feel a hand on my shoulder as I walk among the bunch of students in the hallway and I sigh, turning around.

"For the last time, Sirius –" I blurt before I can register James and Peter standing in front of me.

"Oh."

"Yep, not Sirius," Peter pipes in, looking worried.

"Uh-huh." We start walking together.

"So, care to tell me why you walked out on him just for offering to keep you company?" James asks, subconsciously ruffling his hair as Lily passes.

"Because it's a stupid offer."

Peter looks up at me, concerned. "Look, he's just worried –"

"I can take care of myself."

"Barely." James mumbles.

"Bugger off."

"Look," he starts, "I know you've done this alone, but not in the past year. That's why we went through, you know, the transformations. You have grown accustomed to company. And care. And if you –"

"Stop it, James." I wave him off. "Yeah, okay, you guys keep me company and it means the world to me, really. But a lonely wolf is just... Well, lonely. Not more prone to causing damage that it already is."

Peter turns to me, looking guilty. "Actually, Remus..."

I raise my eyebrows and stop walking, making Peter and James halt as well.

"What is it?"

James sighs and turns to Peter. "I think I should expound everything to him. Go catch up with Padfoot at dinner. We'll meet you two at the dorm."

Peter takes another sad look at me and scurries off to dinner.

I narrow my eyes, "Merlin, James, you're scaring me. What is this all –"

"C'mere," he mutters, as he walks towards an empty classroom, gesturing for me to follow.

I feel my stomach twist sharply. Tears start to brim behind my eyelids. My bony palms press flat onto the surface of the teacher's table behind me to steady myself.

James is standing in front of me, shirt unbuttoned, revealing an uncountable amount of deep gashes, pink stripes of scars, bad scratches, and prominent bruises.

"James...Did I...I –"

My mouth is going dry as every second that I am looking at the sight before me passes. Not being able to speak, I watch him lean down to roll up his trousers to his knees. More wounds.

Standing back up, James looks at me, nervous and concerned.

My jaw hangs, my hands shivering. I push myself up to sit on the table, elbows propped up on my knees as I bury my face in my hands. "What are you trying to tell me?" I mumble into my balled up fists.

"What I'm trying to tell you is..." he utters awkwardly as I unearth my eyes from my palms, watching him tug down the legs of his trousers into place, "Peter and I read this book Sirius stole from the Restricted Section around the time when we started suspecting it about you... There was this chapter that talked about how werewolves in the adolescence are sure to lose more control...

"I reckon we figured that much out already, but then we also read about how that pent up agitation drives the wolf to hurt himself. We got concerned." He pauses and adds, "Concerned is an understatement."

My mind shoots in a million directions, trying to grasp everything. "I didn't know that," I admit meekly, feeling foolish and burdened. I have always been deprived of more information of my lycanthropy. My tendency to read a lot never overshadowed everything getting in my way to learn more from my condition. My dad, the reason I got bitten in the first place, always felt too guilty to talk about it. He stripped all the books on lycanthropy from the bookshop he owns. Even during nights I had to spend in St. Mungo's, he would interrupt before any of the healers could talk to me about it. Mother, who was still getting used to the fact that a world with such thing exists, didn't know anything about werewolves. Much less how to deal and explain anything to her werewolf son, no matter how much she wanted to. But this is the one subject she never won over my dad, who kept me in constant check, making sure I ignore the very concept of lycanthropy everyday of my life that isn't the full moon.

I thought that I'd be more educated about it when I started off at Hogwarts, but all the darker lycanthropy books were in the Restricted Section, and the risk of getting caught sneaking it off by some other student was too much and getting into trouble was too much. The fact that I was even allowed to go to Hogwarts already took an effort, and something to be thankful for, so I let it go, settling for the vague lessons we got in third year.

"But, I don't understand what that has to do with your..."

"Wounds?" he finishes. He buttons up his shirt, stepping forward to sit beside me. "Yeah well, we got worried, so we researched – imagine us three, researching without you – on how to lessen the damage... Because, well most werewolves who were changed before their adolescence...Well, frankly, they don't usually make it."

A cold rush creeps up my skin as all indicators of having blood leaves my face. Pale and unable to move, I feel James's arm sling around my shoulders. I ease a little.

"So we looked it up," he continues carefully, "and do you remember when we decided to transform into Animagi because 'werewolves seemed better off with company'? Well, we sort of sugarcoated our reason. It was easy to keep from you because you would never nick anything from the Restricted Section nor were you comfortable enough to ask for a permission note from a teacher...We found that werewolves cause themselves a lot let pain when they can project their violence onto something else. Something living, something whose energy they can feed off. Animals."

I snap, tear drops now rushing down my hallow cheeks. I open my mouth, trying to speak, but nothing comes out. Reduced to heavy sobs, I let James bury my face onto his shoulder. His embrace tightens as I try to compose myself to mumble an apology.

"Don't be sorry. Every scar was worth it. We all think so."

"T-Thanks..."

He continues holding me as my breathing grows lighter. We stay like that for a while until he breaks the comforting silence.

"You know," he says in careful voice, "if we don't let go now someone might walk in and figure out you're deep in the closet."

I pull away and despite the tears still spilling over, punch him in the shoulder, chuckling softly. "Arse."

He grins at me. "I love you too, mate," he quips, winking at me.

I wipe away my tears, now beaming at him. "Let's go get dinner, you git."

He shakes his head and hops off the table. "Too late for that, Moony. Let's go nick some food from the kitchen and head up to common room so you can apologize to your lover," he teases, pulling me towards the door.

"After you apologize to me for introducing him to that Margaret girl," I reply, only half-kidding.

"She went through a fit because of him standing her up last Saturday. Pretty sure that's taken care of," he says, smirking.

I laugh as he drags me out of the room.

My heart feels a lot heavier than it did a few hours ago, but as James and I tumble into the common room with our arms full of a variety of sandwiches, pies and treacle tarts, grinning wide enough to earn a relieved and approving dimple-clad smile from Sirius on the sofa, none of the extra weight matters that much.