Mischief Managed Y2 Part 2: The Truth of the Tournament

Chapter Fourteen: A Quest for Answers

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The next few weeks passed in a blur of lessons and getting used to school again after what felt like a terribly long break for Remus. Dorcas apparently wanted to have a party with just her girlfriends this year which James and Sirius were put off about. Not that they would have been invited anyway, not with how Lily was on them about attacking Severus as they had supposedly done. The two accused lads had feigned innocence but Remus knew them well enough to find them both a little too proud of themselves to have done nothing. Only the weary boy didn't bother them about it, just hoping it wouldn't lead to retaliation....at least not right away anyways. Plus, Remus hadn't been spending a lot of time with his friends lately, not even with Lily, preferring to spend time alone.

It wasn't that Remus completely avoided his roommates outright. He just had a lot on his mind and could often be found sitting on window ledges, watching the first years, or his friends, play in the snow. The werewolf found that he needed to sit hidden away from prying eyes while he tried to sort through all the many things he was feeling. It didn't help that there was an undercurrent of tension with all the Marauders that filled in the silences. It was like they were one of Remus' many failed potions which would ooze between the cork of the potion bottle, not exploding but not staying in the vial either. They had fun together but then when silence fell, where it would normally feel normal, not even worth noting the comfortable natural pauses, it now felt wrong and just sort of...oozed between them all.

James handled the tension by being louder and even more overconfident about certain topics, specifically Quidditch and eventually getting Lily to like him. Both topics were ones that made Remus want to cover his head with a pillow when the pining bloke went off about them. Due to the wrong feeling of tension that seemed to hang in the air, it seemed to happen a lot. Even worse was that they all knew the full moon was approaching and Remus was unable to hide how anxious he was about it. 

He couldn't help but still be thinking in the back of his mind that they wouldn't be his friends....not after knowing what was causing his disappearance. Surely they wouldn't want to be his friends after witnessing the result of the full moon the next morning which they were pressuring Remus about allowing them to do. Well Peter was, James and Sirius seemed unable to mention the word 'werewolf.' Remus swore every time Sirius entered the DADA classroom, which had been absent of guest speakers lately, his friend would pale a little bit.

"Why won't they just ask me about it, Peter?" Remus mumbled as they watched the other two zoom around the Quidditch pitch during class. The relay races were a great way for their flying professor to gauge their individual skill levels. Naturally, she had pitted Sirius and James together since the young woman seemed to have a pretty good attitude about most things even if she took flying safety seriously, which was honestly a welcome attitude to have in Remus' book. The werewolf had been sure he would regret taking the no longer mandated class but had decided at the beginning of the year that Sirius and James' complaining about him not participating would be worse than the actual lesson itself. Luckily, with Madam Hooch teaching them and all the students being 'heavily encouraged' to take flying again as their first year of instruction had been rather a disaster, Remus found he did not mind the class too much.

"Well, it's because they know they've said really mean things in the past and neither of them feels they have the right to ask specific questions, innit?" Peter attempted to explain. He was the only one out of Remus' roommates who was acting normally...well almost. Remus did not miss the way Peter had yet to touch him and the slight difference in space between them as they sat in the stands which made it clear what the boy actually thought about the werewolf. But Remus could handle that, especially since Peter still seemed able to talk to him. Lupin found it was better than the other two and Pettigrew had actually become somewhat of an interpreter of what some of Potter and Blacks' weirder gestures had meant.