Purveyors of Aids to Magical Mischief-Makers

What if...? #5

What if James never put two and two together and they didn't know Bertram had pictures until it was too late.

The first one came when there was just over a month of school left. To everyone but a group of four best friends, it was just a picture of someone's hand sprawled across another's shoulder; a shoulder littered with fleshy pink scars. Whoever's thumb was in the picture was trailing softly over the imperfect skin. Most people didn't think twice about it when the owls delivered it to them just for it to turn to dust 30 seconds later.

Most people weren't trying to protect their friend's secret identity as a werewolf.

Remus became numb after he saw the picture, and the noise of The Great Hall became nothing but swirling waves around his head, drowning him. He finally surfaced to Sirius shaking his shoulder, the same one in the picture, and he thought he was going to vomit.

"Re," Sirius looked concerned and Remus wanted to laugh at him because what else could he do? "We're not going to let anything else happen."

The words Sirius said made sense, but they came with no attachment to reality. Remus began feverishly scratching his fingernails over his thighs- so harshly that he could feel the sting of them through his trousers.

Sirius collected his hands to encourage him to stop and when he unclenched his first, there was a slip of paper, a note.

you lying freak. tell me the truth and i burn the rest.

Remus rummaged through his book bag while he felt Sirius' eyes on him. Finally he found a quill and he immediately took to correcting the grammar errors in the note- capitalizing letters and adding words to make the sentence make more sense.

Sirius said that he would kill Bertram before he had the chance to send another picture. Remus believed him, but Bertram was nowhere to be found- he wasn't in their shared classes, the great hall, or their trip to Hogsmeade.

A week later a new picture came with the Prophet- a wider shot, more revealing. This one captured all the skin between the small of Remus' back and the dip between his shoulder blades. The same hand as before was there, wrapped below the left side of Remus' rib cage and from the positioning, you could tell that Remus' arms were folded under his head. This picture moved too- when the hand's grip tightened around Remus' ribs, Remus' shoulder blades pinched together.

Remus wondered if any of his peers were smart enough to realize what was happening in the picture. Remus certainly hadn't forgotten the feeling of Bertram's grip tightening as he pressed inside of him.

It had been their first time together and even though it felt entirely wrong, Remus lied and let Bertram kiss him and hold him when it was over. As soon as he left the Prefect's lounge that night, he stumbled into the nearest bathroom and vomited into the toilet until he couldn't anymore and the only thing hitting the water in the bowl were his tears.

By this point, all of the professors were trying to coax information from the students, but no one knew who was sending them or who they were of. After last year and the way they handled the situation with Bertram's howler, Remus made his friends swear that they wouldn't tell anyone the truth; that they would take care of it together when the time came.

The week rolled on and Remus ate less and less and allowed Sirius to touch him in a similar, decreasing amounts. He didn't even find comfort in Sirius' embrace when they laid side by side in a warm bed and Sirius' arms were the only thing holding him together.

Right on schedule, the next image appeared a week later, which was five days before the next full moon. If the numbness Remus felt because of the pictures hadn't been covering his usual pre-transformation rage, there would have been carnage.