(A/N): We're back with Remus, Elaine, James, Lily, Sirius, and Peter in the boys' dorm, in the aftermath of Elaine asking whether THEY are what is making Leo 'miserable'. Is it still foreshadowing if it's canon?

Remus

It was heartbreaking to hear Elaine's theory for obvious reasons, but the most painful part of it by far was knowing she included herself in that 'us'- even though if there was anyone that made Leo the opposite of 'miserable', it was her. I knew she wasn't trying to suggest that we, his friends, were making him struggle, but this happened to be the only way she could think of to get around the Lily-necessitated censoring, and once again bring up the idea that Leo's somewhat tenuous control was the sole thing causing him to struggle. The problem was... I wasn't convinced that was true. And even if it was, surely that didn't outweigh how happy we made him- how happy she clearly made him- ...right?

"Elaine..." James said, then seemed to recognise he probably wasn't the best person to try to reassure her on this particular subject, and looked to me to take over.

Although, why he thought I would be able to handle this sort of thing any better than he could, I'll never know. I tried anyway. "I don't know if Leo's... people issues-" AKA, bloodlust. "-are the be-all and end-all that you- and he- seem to think they are." Her eyebrows furrowed, along with Lily's, albeit for what I assumed were very different reasons.

"What- what do you mean?" I glanced pointedly at Lily, who seemed frustrated in a futile sort of way, but not surprised.

"Well, not to put too fine a point on things, but... Leo is a complicated person. Even if we put everything else aside, do you really think any situation that he finds himself in the middle of is going to be so simple- so one-dimensional? There's never just one thing, when it comes to him- or his life. Not to mention that he's had 'issues' of varying origins since long before any of us knew him, so... I just think you're putting too much emphasis on one facet of things, in order to try to simplify them- because if you do, then maybe... you can fix it. But I don't think this is something that can be 'fixed'- at least not by anyone but Leo, himself."

There was silence for a moment as if they were letting that sink in, until Lily broke it. "I have an idea," She started, then hesitated. "I mean, tell me if you think it's a good one or not-"

"There's no such thing as a bad idea when it comes to brainstorming," James rushed to reassure her, and while I wasn't so sure that was true, we all knew Lily would never suggest something that she thought would be bad for Leo- which made this seem like more of a reminder for the rest of us not to dismiss her idea too harshly, if it turned out to possibly be harmful to him, based on things Lily wasn't aware of... like his vampirism. "Besides, you've known Leo the longest-" Probably not the best thing to say, given that I suspected she was still rather hurt that she was the only person Leo hadn't told. "-if there's anyone with insight about who Leo is as a human being-" He put no emphasis on the words, but the rest of us heard what he was trying to say, anyway. "-it's you."

Lily winced, then shook her head slowly. "Except, it isn't." Hm? "That's what I was trying to say. If there's anyone who knows who Leo is- at his core- and understands more of those issues than any of us ever will... it's Mia."

Oh. Well, I don't suppose she was wrong about that. Even if Mia had missed a few years of her brother's life, she'd known him for several before that... years they spent in that house, with those people. And even if Mia couldn't relate to the vampire side of things, she was just as much of a veela as he was, and was raised a Joannis... whatever that may have meant for them. In the end, it seemed like a pretty stellar idea, actually... if we could get anything out of her.

"It's... not a bad idea," Sirius said cautiously- a surprise, coming from him- even as he glanced around at the rest of us a little nervously. His eyes lingered on me, I felt them- but forced myself not to meet them, lest I let them soften me into forgiving him. "If we can get Mia to talk to us in any capacity, I think it'd be a victory, but..."

"But she's already made it clear she isn't willing to rat Leo out- yeah, we know," Peter said, which- funny he should phrase it that way.

Elaine hadn't weighed in on the subject yet, and when I turned my full attention to her, I caught her staring at Leo's bed with a look of concern on her face- one I wasn't entirely sure fit the current situation... at least as I knew it. "Elaine?" She blinked at the sound of her name, and when she lifted her eyes to mine, she seemed to return to the conversation- to the room.

"She doesn't have to rat him out," She said simply, which I felt sort of defeated the purpose, but I knew Elaine well enough to know she wasn't the type to give up, or turn tail and run- especially when it came to Leo. "We just have to frame it the right way. We don't need to ask about Leo, and she doesn't have to tell us about him- after all, Leo can't complain about his friends getting to know his little sister, right?" He could, he absolutely could. "On that note, I need to talk to Dahrya, too- Leo sent me another letter to hand off to her." And, most likely, she wanted to interrogate the younger half-vampire, as well.

"Do you think that'll work?" James asked carefully, and Elaine shrugged.

"It has as good a chance as anything else, I guess. Mia wants to help Leo, we know that- she just also doesn't want to betray his trust. But the fact that she's worried about doing so means she knows something... we just have to figure out what. What 'issue' is causing the... issues." She finished a bit lamely, but I think we all knew what she meant. We didn't need to know what was wrong, we just needed to know where to look- and if there was anyone who could direct us in that search, it was Mia.

Sirius nodded, casually slinging his arm across James's shoulders to lean in closer, presumably to be able to better read the letter from Leo- the one I'd had the least chance to read, so far. Still, the scent of him- and that matching smell of fond, joyful love- wafting off of it put me at ease, somewhat. Hm... "Alright, so, we'll go see them after breakfast, and-"

Surprisingly, Elaine shook her head. "No. No, we can't; it'll seem like we're ganging up on them. Besides, I think we might see tangible benefits to having a more... intimate, gathering. Remus and I'll go alone." I blinked- then immediately nodded, to back her up. To pretend like I knew what she was doing and agreed with it, even if I really didn't. There was no way it was an inconsequential decision, but barring her choosing to explain her reasoning to me, I suppose I'd just have to go along with it, and believe she knew what she was doing.

Luckily, in my experience, she almost always did.

(A/N): So, Elaine picked Remus to go with her for a reason (which will be revealed whenever the next time I come back to this arc is). That reason developed from me coming up with a 'funny headcanon' based on something I remembered happening, specifically with Dahrya... only to find out that the original event actually didn't include Dahrya, but Mia. I considered changing the idea, and then just decided that it was funnier for both things to be true simultaneously. And apparently, as it turns out, Elaine is aware of the 'thing'- which is why she specifically chose Remus to go with her, and another one of her comments will make sense later. Also, is it a 'headcanon' when two of the three characters involved (or three of the four, if you include Elaine) are your own OC's, or is it just 'canon to this story... canon'?

Also, Remus saying it was funny Peter phrased it that way when he said Mia wouldn't rat out Leo was meant to be a fun joke about his animagus form being a rat, but also works double time as a reference to the future event in canon where he betrays them all, and is a dirty rat.