Friday 6th September 1972
Once the initial ice had been broken, the questions came flooding in. That evening, after dinner, all four boys sat on Remus’ bed,
“When did it happen?”
“Does Dumbledore know?!”
“Have you ever, y’know, attacked anyone?”
“What’s it like?”
“Where do you go, when it happens?!”
Remus gnawed his bottom lip. He’d never talked about his condition before, not to anyone – except for his conversation with Madam Pomfrey last year. None of the muggles he’d grown up with would have believed him, and he’d been led to believe that wizards would shun him.
“Er…” he tried to work out where to start, “I was five years old, when it happened. I don’t really remember much before that. Yeah, Dumbledore knows. I don’t think I’ve ever hurt anyone. I think I’d probably know, if I did.”
“So when you turn, you can remember what it’s like?” Sirius asked, eagerly, “Being a wolf?”
“Um… not really?” Remus thought hard, “Maybe I can remember feeling stuff, but I don’t think I have a human brain while I’m like that. It’s more like a really bad dream.”
“I always thought werewolves were more…” Peter looked at him thoughtfully, “I dunno, scary?”
Remus shrugged.
“So is that what happened to your dad?” Sirius asked, abruptly, “Did he get killed by the werewolf that bit you?”
Remus flinched. Not because of his father, but because he wasn’t used to hearing that ‘w’ word quite so much. He never said it, himself.
“No,” he replied, “My dad, he… uh… well, he killed himself. After I was bitten, so I s’pose it was because of me. My mother – you know, she’s a muggle, I think it was probably a bit much for her, so she packed me off to St Edmund’s.”
There was an uncomfortable sort of silence.
“Have you ever met—“ Sirius began, but James gave him a sharp look,
“That’s enough, Black, leave him alone.”
They eventually split off to start their homework, and James went for a run around the grounds before it got dark. Quidditch trials were coming up and he was becoming more obsessed with fitness and endurance by the day. He tried to get Peter and Sirius to go with him, but they begged off.
“Bloody slave driver,” Peter muttered, as he left. “I’ve told him I’m not even trying out.”
“I think I probably will,” Sirius said, casually, “They need a beater, anyway.”
Homework was eventually cast aside in favour of a particularly aggressive game of exploding snap between the three of them, with a record spinning on its needle – The Beatles, because Peter pleaded for a break from Bowie.
Later, after lights out, Remus sat up reading a book Sirius had lent him. It was a muggle paperback – science fiction. He’d seen a few films like it at the local cinema back at St Edmund’s, but he didn’t know there were books too. It was just getting exciting when he heard the tell-tale creak of the floorboards that meant Sirius was paying James a visit. He heard the curtains rustle, and low whispering, before a sudden unnatural void of sound which meant someone had cast a silencing spell.
Remus ignored it, scrunching down into his duvet and focussing on his book. It was perhaps twenty minutes later that he heard the silencing spell being recalled – it was as though he had been deaf in one ear and could suddenly hear again. He listened to the curtain rustle again, as Sirius climbed back and padded softly back across the room.
