The Marauders: Year One (female)

32. Bedroom Quidditch

Sirius and her friends spent the next few days scrubbing cauldrons in the Potions department, and helping Slughorn and Madam Pomfrey brew and administer potion for shock to the students most affected by Sirius's stupid prank.

Jamie was furious with Sirius. She had immediately forgotten Peeves's involvement, as it was easier to blame Sirius. In her opinion, the original idea to hide Boggarts discreetly across the castle, in such a way that it could have been coincidental was a good idea, but dumping the lot of them in the Great Hall to terrorise the whole school in front of the teachers was not. Everyone still hated them for that, by the way.

As Remus scrubbed out a cauldron on a Sunday evening, feeling woozy from the effects of the full moon and the suffocating smell of Potions on her post-moon nose, she had to agree with Jamie to some extent.

'Bloody prat,' growled Jamie as Sirius rinsed out empty phials of old crusted up Potions.

Sirius flushed, but did not answer. She returned to her work with extra vigour, trying to ignore Jamie, and make it up to them. It was her birthday, but she wasn't about to let Jamie know, especially now that this had happened.

The full moon of November had come, and it was not quite as bad as it had been the first month, seeing as the wolf had become more accustomed to its new surroundings, but it was still worse than the second. Remus dutifully wrote to her parents every week, but she had not mentioned Sirius nearly discovering her. It would be disastrous so early in the term, barely even three moons in yet.

When her dorm-mates had asked where she was going, Remus had replied that her mother was sick. Frankie, Petra, and Jamie had offered their condolences, and had passed on their well wishes, but Sirius had just narrowed her eyes, watching Remus suspiciously. This was the third time Remus was mysteriously disappearing like this.

Sitting on the dusty floor of the Shrieking Shack that cold night, Remus had plenty of time to overthink, until she was convinced that coming to Hogwarts was a complete mistake. Especially with her current year mates.

There was Dolores Umbridge in Slytherin, whose family was obsessed with persecuting half-breeds, and setting new restrictions and laws against them. There was also Sirius Black, who, although she seemed decent enough, came from one of the most dangerous and influential pureblood houses in Europe, and even she couldn't possibly open her heart to a werewolf. The rest, though were either too stupid or not bothered enough to try and find out.

Then the light of the moon hit her, and her mind was gone, given in to the pain of the transformation, and the wildness of the wolf.

After crawling to Madam Pomfrey the next morning, Remus was ready to go back to her dorm on Sunday, just one day later. She had quite a vicious bite on her side, as well as several large scratches, but Madam Pomfrey bandaged them all up tightly, telling Remus to come back to have them changed in a few days.

Upon her return, her friends all greeted her, making inquiries about her mother which Remus asked nervously, not looking them in the eye. 'Your mum alright, then, mate?' asked Sirius pointedly, looking at a large scratch on Remus's arm.

'She's good,' muttered Remus, rolling her sleeve down. She spent the remainder of the evening copying the work she'd missed from Lillian, who inquired about Remus's ill mother anxiously, and ignoring Sirius's long and hard stares.

The next day, Remus's professors all went easy on her, and Flitwick even let her sleep in class, when he saw her bruised looking eyes. This sent Jamie into an uproar (she had lost five points for flipping darts at Sirius) and she was incredibly sulky around Remus for the rest of the day until Petra reminded her that it wasn't Remus's fault that her mother was sick.