How on earth could you get yourself out of an engagement? Remus wondered to himself, as he made his way down to the dungeons on Sunday evening. He was alone; Lily had asked him to check on the potion they were working on one more time before handing it in the next day. He personally thought it was overkill, but was also guiltily aware that Evans had so far done the lion’s share of the work.
Sirius’s problem had been ticking away in the back of his mind all day. James had charged them all with coming up with a solution by Christmas, but Remus couldn’t see what might be done. He’d never thought about engagement, or marriage, or family honour before. Those were all grown up things. Thirteen-year-old boys certainly weren’t supposed to worry about them. But then, he supposed, turning the final bend in the staircase, nor were twelve-year-old boys supposed to worry about transforming into monsters once a month.
He sighed heavily, pushing the door to the Potions classroom open. To his disgust, Severus Snape was in there already, stirring his own potion. Their eyes met, and Remus froze for a moment, before squaring his shoulders, raising his chin and walking straight over to his own cauldron, choosing to ignore the other boy.
But he couldn’t help but notice that his potion was a slightly different colour from Snape’s, which couldn’t be a good sign. Theirs was a bold, royal blue, much darker than it ought to be. Snape had obviously noticed too.
“You need to add more lavender.” He said, nasally, not looking up from his stirring. “At least another teaspoon.”
“Yeah, right.” Remus frowned, “S’if I’m going to take advice off you.”
“I’m hardly going to ruin Lily’s potion, am I?!” Snape spat back.
Remus considered this. It was true that despite Severus’ generally unpleasant demeanour, the only other thing the marauders knew about him was that he would do almost anything for Lily Evans. It was weird, but Remus wasn’t one to judge anyone for being weird.
He spooned in some more lavender and stirred. At once, the potion took on a paler, sky blue hue, and a lovely dreamy aroma rose from it. Snape made a smug clicking noise with his tongue, and closed the lid on his own cauldron, getting ready to leave.
“Hiya Sev!” a voice came from the doorway, “Oh, Remus…”
It was Lily. She looked a bit embarrassed. Remus frowned,
“Thought we agreed I was checking it tonight?”
“Um, yes, we did… I was just… double checking.” Her usually pale cheeks were bright red.
“Didn’t think I’d show up?”
Snape snorted, derisively, on his way out. Remus fought the urge to throw a spoon at the back of his greasy head. Lily didn’t notice, she had already crossed the room, and was looking down into the cauldron.
“Well, you do get a lot of detentions,” she said, diplomatically. Severus swept out of the room. “Oh wow, it looks much better than it did this morning. Did you do something?”
“Added more lavender.”
“Really? Nice one, it looks exactly right now.”
“Well…” he rubbed the back of his head, glancing that the door. Snape was out of earshot. “Yeah, I just thought it needed some, I s’pose.”
“Nothing left to do, then. Are you on your way back to the common room?”
“Yeah.”
They walked together. Lily was in a good mood,
“We work quite well together, don’t we?” She smiled at him. “It’s a nice change from Sev, anyway, you’re much more easy going.”
Remus had never thought of himself as easy going before. It was a nice thing for her to say, but then compared to Snape anyone might seem relaxed.
