James and Sirius were laughing. This wasn't an unusual occurrence, but their laughter was usually the warning bell for any nearby students to duck for cover. Only in their third year and their pranks were the stuff of legends in the school.

On this particular Sunday morning, James and Sirius burst through the common room, tears of mirth rolling down their faces. A few first years looked alarmed, while Lily Evans simply scowled at them from her window seat.

"Did you see his FACE!!" James wheezed, clutching at Sirius' arm.

"Priceless!" Sirius gasped, almost stumbling into a table and knocking a bottle of ink all over someone's potions textbook. "We have to tell Moony his idea paid off..."

Still giggling weakly, the two almost-brothers ran up the stairs to the boys dormitories. Sirius flung open the door marked with crudely carved initials, and blinked.

Remus was standing opposite a wall, muttering dejectedly to himself and repeatedly throwing a rubber stress ball at  the whitewashed plaster.

"Mate... why are you throwing stress balls at the wall?" James said, his eyebrows almost disappearing beneath the shock of dark hair.

Remus turned around so fast that he gave himself whiplash, and collapsed onto his bed, whimpering with pain and embarrassment.

Sirius almost flew across the room to Remus' side, James at his heels. Both boys sat beside their friend, Sirius rubbing his back comfortingly.

At last Remus sat up, rubbing the back of his head, his cheeks bright red as he shifted almost imperceptibly away from Sirius.

"You okay now Rey?" Sirius asked gently.

"Yeah, I'm fine, just, er... got an urge to throw a stress ball at the wall?" Remus muttered hopefully.

"What's bothering you, Moony?" James asked bluntly.

Remus sighed, and pulled a bar of chocolate from his bedside table, chucking the wrapper onto the floor and beginning to devour the candy inside. "I'm just tired, and worried about McGonagall's essay due tomorrow as I haven't done it yet because of the full moon yesterday and Lily was asking about my appetite at lunch today and I think she's getting to be suspicious and my back really really really hurts and my Dad's got really depressed without mum at home and- "

Sirius let out a low whistle as Remus gasped for breath. "With all that on your mind I'm not surprised you've resorted to the stress balls."

After a moment of thought, Sirius began to smile, a twinkle in his stormy eyes. "Right, Moony you sit there. Good, now stay. Prongsie you sit here- no, here, next to me, look where I'm pointing you git..."

James rolled his eyes as Sirius directed him to sit on the bed, clearly used to the dramatics of his best friend.

"Now that we are all settled, I present to you, the World's very first Werewolf Clinic!"

Sirius raised his arms in triumph as he looked at the others for applause. James cheered at the top of his lungs, stamping his feet while Remus facepalmed in disbelief.

"Moony you're supposed to be clapping and cheering for my genius self!" Sirius hissed out of the side of his mouth.

Remus rolled his eyes as he clapped halfheartedly.

"Good enough," Sirius acknowledged, waving his arms to quiet them like he was a king commanding his subjects. "Now," he proclaimed in a pompous voice that closely resembled Slughorn's, "My name is Dr Padfoot and I will be talking with you today Mr Moony. My young assistant, Mr Prongs, will be observing this meeting."

Remus and James gravely inclined their heads at each other. By now Sirius' performances were expected and the best thing to do was usually to play along with them.

"Right then. Mr Moony, would you please tell us what is stressing you, slowly and one thing at a time."

Remus scratched the back of his neck awkwardly. "Er, I'm tired I guess? I didn't sleep much last night because I was worrying about the essay..."

Sirius nodded. "Well that's solved quite easily. Go to bed early tonight, Wormtail can bring up some dinner to the dorm."

"I can bribe Lily to do the essay for you," James said firmly. "She's your friend, I know that she'd definitely agree to help you out with it."

"But I can't do that, we'd get in trouble, and anyway Lily has already been asking questions..." Remus protested weakly.

"I'll make your excuses. She knows how sick you were looking yesterday, I'll tell her you got a migraine in the evening, and we insisted you go to bed early today as you still were quite ill, which explains your appetite at lunch," James insisted, ruffling his hair unconsciously.

"Very good Mr Prongs. Now Mr Moony, what was next on your worry list?" Sirius asked.

"My back really hurts?"

"Is that a question or a statement?"

"My back really hurts."

"Alright, well I can help with that," Sirius said happily. "Reg used to suffer from back trouble, I'd always give him a massage before bed when we were younger."

"Really?" Remus looked overwhelmed.

"Yeah!" Sirius replied, grinning at the surprise on Remus' face.

"I'll write home to my mum, she's sure to know what helps a bad back," James interjected.

"Blimey, that would be amazing!" Remus grinned at his friends.

"Ok, last one is that you're worried about your dad being depressed?"

Remus nodded sadly. "Mum would make him help around the house usually, but when I went back for the summer last June the whole place was a tip. It's like he hasn't got any motivation to live anymore, he never cooks, only orders food from the pub."

"Hmm," Sirius frowned, scrunching up his forehead and thinking.

"What about a House Elf?" James blurted. Both of the boys looked at him as though he'd gone mad. "I mean - they're dead useful, and it sounds like your dad needs a bit of help around the house."

"I never thought of that," Remus said thoughtfully. "D'you think they'd cost a lot to keep?"

Sirius shrugged. "Well, they don't get paid so I'd guess not. My family have a house elf, nasty little bugger of a creature he is."

James looked interested. "I never knew you had a house elf mate!"

Sirius looked uncomfortable. "Yeah, well, the point is you'll have to make sure they're nice and not all prejudiced like mine is."

"Right," Remus said, looking like an enormous weight had been lifted off his shoulders. "Thanks, guys, this really helped I think!"

Sirius smiled genuinely at the praise, before resuming his role as Dr Padfoot. "It was no trouble at all, m'boy, no trouble at all."

The three boys stood up and shook each other's hands solemnly, thus closing the meeting.

"Ah, Moony, I forgot to say, the prank on Filch worked marvellously!" James said suddenly.

"Really?" Remus said excitedly. "What happened?"

Sirius chuckled. "We crept up behind the old bugger as he was organising the bats for the Halloween feast tomorrow, hid behind a pillar, then used that charm to throw our voices all over the room."

James started to laugh again. "Sirius started making all these ghoulish moans, and Filch nearly jumped out of his skin!"

"Then," Sirius interjected, "James told him that he was his conscience, and he had to repent for his wicked ways of torturing the poor students, and also that the entrance hall was muddy again and he'd have to mop it up!"

"He absolutely howled at that!" James wheezed. "We moaned and groaned for a bit more after that, threatened him with all the usual tosh about haunting him for eternity, torturing his soul to madness, then extinguished the candles and ran for it!"

By this time all three of them were doubled over with laughter. "I wish I could have seen his face," Remus gasped, trying to stop laughing.

"It was marvellous!" Sirius said maliciously, the corners of his eyes wrinkled with laughter. "And the best part was that we poured a load of mud on the entrance hall floor, so he'll be there for hours cleaning it up!"

"Put on Abbey road, Sirius!" James called, flopping down on his bed. "This success calls for a celebration!"

Proudly Sirius put the record on, and Here Comes The Sun soon filled the room. The rest of the afternoon was spent eating mountains of sweets and singing along to the Beatles, and Remus wondered how he'd gained such incredible friends. He didn't know that the other two were thinking the exact sane thing.

Love from Melodie xxx