chapter title: "friends" by the velvet underground

"MOONY! PADFOOT!"

Remus looked up to see James Potter pushing through the crowds of students at Hogsmeade station with Peter in tow.

It was finally the start of term again and Christmas break was over. And it was 'finally', because Remus was thankful that his alone time with Sirius had come to an end. After their incident on Christmas Eve, Sirius had clearly been avoiding Remus. He had scarcely seen him outside of meals and when they sat in their dorm it was mostly in silence. But Remus hadn't failed to notice the glances Sirius had thrown at him from across the room when he had thought Remus had just been reading.

The rest of the Christmas break had been more than a little awkward for both of them, and Remus was not inclined to initiate a conversation with Sirius regarding the kiss they had shared the night after their trip. So Remus was eternally grateful when term was due to start up again and James and Peter would be back, refilling their dormitory with the usual noise and chaos. Sirius had become so uncharacteristically quiet that Remus had begun to wonder if Sirius was ill and he had somehow infected him with some weird disease when he had kissed him. 

James came hurtling through the crowd, immediately throwing his arms around Sirius and Remus as he reached them, crushing them together in a somewhat painful hug, Peter soon piling on from behind as he tagged along behind James.

"How was Christmas without me?" James threw a wink at Remus who shrugged with a small smile.

"Good." He lied. Christmas day had been...well, strained was an understatement. Remus had spent the entire day walking on ice around Sirius, pondering over whether he should say something- if anything at all. Truth be told, their Christmas break had been excellent up until the kiss. He and Sirius had lounged around the common room playing games, drinking butterbeer and listening to their records on full volume when the common room was empty. They had stayed in their dorm to smoke since James and Peter weren't there, and Remus had read all of the books he had planned on reading over the break, desperately trying to ignore Sirius who would dance around their dorm, listening to music, his black hair bouncing over his shoulders, often begging Remus to get up and dance with him. And then there had been the trip to London, and Remus could barely think of many times in his life where he had been happier. And then there was the kiss, and for a second Remus didn't think he could possibly have wanted anything else in the world...and then it had all come crashing down and it had been strained between them ever since.

"Good?" James questioned. "What you guys get up to?" The four boys made their way over to the horseless carriages before climbing into one.

"Remus and I went to London." Sirius said suddenly, and Remus looked up in surprise. He hadn't actually thought about whether or not Sirius might want to tell James about their trip, but he supposed that of course he would. What else would he tell him that they had done over the last two weeks?  'Oh yeah, it was great and then we made out on my bed and now we've been avoiding each other ever since'?

"London?"

"Muggle London." Sirius supplied.

"Wicked!"

And then Sirius' face cracked into a grin that Remus hadn't seen in almost a week. "Yeah it was. We went to a load of thrift stores, you should see the outfits I got for our future gigs."

"Oh Merlin." Peter groaned, and Remus couldn't help but smile just a little at that.

The rest of the journey back to the castle was spent with James and Peter filling them in on their Christmases, and soon they were trekking back up the hill in the slowly melting snow and through the entrance hall.

When they finally flopped onto their usual sofas surrounding the fire in the Gryffindor common room, Remus found that he had missed the usual, content sound of chatter of the crowded common room.

"I've been thinking," James started suddenly, gazing into the dancing flames of the fire with an intent stare.

"Merlin help us." Muttered Sirius.

James swatted him on the arm as he turned to face the group.  "When was the last time we pulled a wonderfully epic Marauder's prank?" He asked, his eyes glinting with mischief and excitement.

Remus groaned, and sunk deeper into the sofa, but Sirius was immediately alight with interest.

"What were you thinking, Mr Prongs?" He asked, voice laced with delight as he positioned himself to stare intently at James.

"Oh I don't know, Mr Padfoot. Something to kick start the of the new year though don't you think?"

Remus rolled his eyes. "Don't you think we should be concentrating our efforts on other things? Mainly our studies, and possibly the band that you insisted we start? Rather than marauding?"

James feigned a gasp of betrayal, clutching a hand to his chest. "Moony! Where is your sense of mischief and roguery?!"

Remus fished his book from the large pocket of his large, ill-fitting cardigan and shook his head with a small smile, before opening the book to the page he had last left off.

He had barely read a line however, when the book was pinched from his hands and James stood above him, reading the front.

"Magical Water Creatures?" James asked, his eyebrows raised as he waved the book at Remus.

Remus stood and snatched it back, an easy task considering how much taller he was than James, and taking it back before seating himself back down.

James immediately came and sat right beside him, his face eager as he leaned in to watch Remus.

"Come on, Moon. I know you're itching to set fireworks off in the Slytherin common rooms at midnight again." James whined.

Remus hummed, turning the page of his book.

"Filling the staff room with dungbombs?" James suggested, hopefully.

Remus sighed, setting his book down to look James in the eye.

"How about something a little more original?"

James crossed his legs on the sofa next to Remus and looked up at him imploringly, clearly readying himself for another one of Remus' great ideas.

Sensing that he had captured the attention of all three of the Marauders, he ran his fingers through the loose curls on his forehead, frowning when he realised how long his hair had gotten.

"How about we do something to do with the band?" Peter piped up, suddenly.

Remus nodded. "We could..." He said thoughtfully. "How about some sort of advertising technique?"

Sirius wrinkled his nose. "Like...put posters up asking people to come to our shows?"

"Not quite." Remus said with a smile, an idea suddenly forming in his head. "I was thinking maybe we could do some enchantments.... maybe enchant all the portraits to sing the songs we've been singing or something. that would certainly get people's attention."

James and Sirius shared a look of mutual enthusiasm before James' face broke into a grin.

"Moony, you're a mastermind."

***

That night, James, Peter, Sirius and Remus all crept out of their dorm after hours, slipping through the portrait hole, concealed by the invisibility cloak. They had devised a plan to go around the castle casting a simple enough enchantment that Remus had discovered that would make the portraits around the castle sing the songs they had so far played in the common room for their performances. The only problem was that the charm had to be cast on each portrait individually, and there were a lot of portraits filling the walls of the castle. But the Marauders never did a job halfheartedly, so they had simply decided to split up to try and cover as much of the castle as they could before the sun started to creep up over them and they would have to scurry back to bed.

As Remus crept down the charms corridor, alone, concealed by a simple invisibility charm (effective enough for the time being but not as reliable as James' invisibility cloak) he found his mind wandering elsewhere, and for the first time since the incident had occurred, away from the kiss he had shared with Sirius.