Friday, January 4 (Sixth Year)

Moony

Floating in the lake makes me feel weightless, though even gentle motions stirring the water pull at my arms and legs. The night sky above is black velvet punctuated by stars.  It's a full moon.  It seems hazy, tinged a bit green.  The world is blanketed in quiet. It feels eerie.

The Snitch wafts playfully over me, glinting in the moonlight.  James streaks after it on his broomstick, the Quaffle tucked under his arm. He isn't in Quidditch robes.  He seems to be wearing pajamas.

Padfoot chases after James in his customary dog form, but he's sprouted enormous, black-feathered wings that shine in the moonlight.  Neither of them notice me below them, floating in the lake, carefree.  Careless.  Not sure which.

I turn my head, and Peter is beside me.  He speaks, his voice oddly distant.  Muffled.  "Remus—shouldn't you be a werewolf?"  He looks fearfully up at the full moon, and I follow his gaze.

Oh yes.  I've forgotten.  It seems ridiculous, and I'm about to laugh when the transformation sets in.  I feel it growing in my bones—everything stretching, fur erupting from my skin.  I thrash in the water, half man and half wolf. I might drown... but that isn't what frightens me.

The wolf, the wolf, not the wolf!  I start to yell, but my vocal cords are changing, and anyway, the still night seems to have swallowed my voice.  I swim awkwardly toward the shore; Peter beats me there and climbs out, oddly dry, dressed in his Hogwarts robes.  James and Padfoot land there. Sirius changes back into a human, wearing just his boxers, but he still has those enormous black wings, like some sort of dark angel.  What are they doing?  The werewolf is taking over—if they don't change into their Animagus forms—

My vision tunnels, becoming blurred around the edges.  I feel a frantic panic rising inside, but it's becoming dim, muffled... and an intense hunger takes over.  When I look at my friends, I begin to see prey.

No!  I'm not the werewolf, no, I won't—won't hurt them—

When I wake, it's in a cold sweat, my heart thundering in my chest.  I instantly jerk my head around to look out the window—I can only see a small part of the moon, but that's enough.  It's not full yet. Not for a couple days.  Still, I'm slow to relax. My heart pounds no less painfully in my ears.

"Remus?"

Glancing toward the source of the voice, I see James sitting up in bed, his covers pooled around his waist.  He's squinting blearily, not wearing his glasses, and his hair's in worse disarray than usual. If that's possible.  I force myself to calm down; I didn't mean to wake anyone.  "I'm... I'm fine.  Strange dream, that's all."

"Sounded like a—a nightmare," he says through a yawn.  Sirius rolls over in bed and mutters something in his sleep; I glance over at what I can see of him, which happens to be a leg sticking out of his covers and a hand draped over his face.

I manage to collect myself, pulling together a cavalier tone.  "Nah, I'm okay—sorry to wake you."  I can tell that my tone sounds fake, but sleepy James doesn't notice.  He just nods and lies back down with a heavy thump.

I take one last glance out the window.  It's started snowing very lightly, tiny flecks of white spiraling down from the sky and giving the moon a broader halo.  I shudder faintly and turn away, lying down on my side, blankets pulled up to my chin like a feeble shield against the moon, my worst fear and enemy.

* * *

"You're looking awful, Moony," Sirius informs me quietly as we file into History of Magic.  It's our first class of the day. Whoever set up the schedule that way must have been mad, because it's hard enough waking up in the morning without having to sit through the dull droning of Professor Binns.  When you're tired enough, his rhythmic speech begins to seem like a sort of lullaby.  Of course, Sirius, James, and Peter are glad for the extra sleep.  I usually end up taking most of the notes.

"Three more days," James adds, his voice cheery and yet sluggish at the same time.  I'm not sure how he manages it.  He lugs his books to a desk and drops them with a thud, collapsing into his seat and resting his head sideways on his folded arms so that he's still looking at us.  "Why didn't you make it to breakfast?"

"I wasn't hungry," I say, yawning; lie.  Truth: I nearly overslept, despite James and Peter in turn shaking me to wake me before they went down into the common room.  I didn't sleep well, and I had more than one nightmare, some worse than others.

Once the students have settled and begun chattering lazily to one another, Professor Binns drifts in through the blackboard, clearing his throat to silence the class.  The customary stupor that accompanies his teaching begins to descend on us even before he tells us what page to turn to in our books.

I groan quietly and press my face to the desk. The polished wood is cool against my forehead.  Folding my arms around my head to block out the light, I don't even bother turning to page 462 as Professor Binns launches into a monotonous account of some sort of half-breed persecution.  Even the mention of werewolves hardly rouses my interest.

Something that feels suspiciously like Sirius' finger pokes my ribs. I jump a bit, more tickled than startled, but cover it by acting as if I've just woken up from napping.

As it turns out, I have, and I didn't even realize I'd fallen asleep.  Glancing around, I notice that most of the class is asleep or daydreaming.  James and Sirius are eyeing me curiously. I glance back at Peter and find him staring, too.  "What?" I mouth. I know they can't be up to mischief.  Mischief is particularly difficult to stir up in History of Magic, and isn't usually worth it since Professor Binns is nearly unshakable.  He doesn't have much of a temper at all.  Shame; if ever a class needed mischief, it's this one.

"You were asleep," James says, as if Snape has suddenly become the star player of the Slytherin Quidditch team.

"You normally are," I retort grumpily, shifting in my seat.  My rear has fallen asleep.  A grimace wrinkles my nose.

"But who's going to take our notes?" Sirius asks innocently.  I stare at him incredulously for a moment before I realize that he's teasing—well, at least halfway teasing, but that's normal for him.

I glance up at Professor Binns, but he doesn't seem to notice that we're whispering to one another.  It doesn't surprise me.  He seems like he could teach in the same monotone if the sky turned yellow and Muggles invaded the school.  Glancing back across the aisle to Sirius, I reply a bit too waspishly, "Why don't you take notes for me, for once?"

He takes it in good humor, but I can tell the three of them are perplexed at my behavior.  I sigh and drop my head back to the desk a bit roughly, returning to my nap.

* * *

Padfoot

"He's acting odd," I complain to James over our cup of bones in Divination.  It's the only class we don't take with Remus.  Remus didn't see the point, and besides, he had been worried the teacher would be able to see that he's a werewolf.  Not likely.  Divination is rubbish, if you ask me, but it's easy enough—when in doubt, make things up.  It works enough that we don't fail the class, at least.

"He always acts odd around the full moon." James says and sighs, prodding our cup of bones with his wand as if hoping that'll encourage it to work better.  "S'pose I would, too, in that position."  He straightens and shakes the cup before turning it over and letting the little tiles scatter out on the table surface.  I look up shiftily at the professor, an old, superstitious black man, and wonder how anyone's expected to see anything in the bones.  They just look like randomly placed little pieces of tile to me.  James sighs again and flips absently through the pages of his book, trying half-heartedly to find what the placement of each bone signifies.  Then, with a frown, he glances up at me and says, "He had a nightmare last night, I think.  Woke me up saying stuff in his sleep.  Almost yelled, once."

"Moony, a nightmare?" I snicker.  I can't help it.  I haven't had nightmares since I was small.  I figured everyone but Snivellus was over them by now.

James gives me a rueful sort of disapproving frown, but can't help grinning a little himself.  He scribbles something on our parchment and doesn't say anything for a moment, but then: "I don't guess I blame him, with the full moon coming up.  You see how beaten up he is from when he spent the full moons alone... I imagine it'd be horrible, cooped up alone as a werewolf, clawing at yourself like that."  He's talking very quietly, of course, and sending careful glances the professor's way to be sure he isn't paying attention.  I think James gives Professor Djamba more credit than he deserves. No way the old man, whose head is drooping onto his chest as he begins to nod off, can use his 'Inner Eye' to know what we're talking about.

"But he doesn't have any reason to have nightmares anymore," I point out, looking back at Prongs and dismissing the professor from my mind.  When we're with him, Remus can keep his head as a werewolf.  We can even roam the grounds and Hogsmeade.  James and I are big enough to keep Remus in line if he happens to get a bit more wolfish than human. James knows that.

James just shrugs, though, collecting the bones back into our cup.  Glancing over at our parchment to see what we have so far, I note that we're a throw short.  The bell's due to ring any minute.  The recordings for the four throws we have are ridiculous all by themselves.  One James wrote as, 'On Thursday, a sloth will eat a bull and get indigestion.'  I snort.  "Is that even possible?"

"What?" James asks.

I point to the prediction, smirking.  "Even if it is, who wants to know about that, anyway?"

He laughs.  "Stop it, Sirius, I need to get one more throw done."

"Just make it up," I tell him.  "I can make up something perfect."  In a mysterious voice, I murmur, "'When Jupiter is in Venus' third house, an ant will cater a horsefly's party.'"  Eerie was the intended effect, but by the way James bursts out laughing—even getting a snort in—it didn't work out that way.  I manage to keep up my 'What?  I'm serious!' façade for a good twelve seconds, which is a record for me, before I dissolve into laughter as well.

And then the bell rings.  Prongs forces himself to stop laughing and scribbles down my 'prediction' since we don't have anything better, then passes it to the professor before we head down to the Great Hall for lunch.

We join the crowd of students surging in the doors to the Great Hall, all chattering excitedly.  I can hear several different conversations buzzing around me. One group of students is still talking about the front page of the Daily Prophet this morning.  My stomach tightens a little as I remember it. You-Know-Who making yet another move... He's killed some very powerful wizards, and it has everyone up in a stir, frightened.  But it's only a cursory fear for most.  We're in Hogwarts; that's outside Hogwarts' walls.  We're sheltered, here.

James and I make our way to Gryffindor table, where we meet Remus and Peter, who didn't have to walk as far from their last classes—in fact, Peter had been on break, I think.  I sit down in the chair beside Remus. James, having caught sight of Lily, hardly seems to know what he's doing as he lowers himself into the chair next to mine.  He's making love-eyes at the redhead, but she still won't give him the time of day.  Still, I'm fairly certain she likes him more than she lets on.

I roll my eyes and glance around the Great Hall.  The plates are already filled, and most of the seated students are eating as they chatter excitedly (and in some cases apprehensively) to one another.  Over at the Slytherin table, Snivellus is catching almost as much grief from his own House as from us Marauders. I smirk. Serves the greasy little git right. I watch him pick at his food for a moment before I decide that his filthy hair is making me nauseous, and then I turn my attention back to my own table.

Remus still looks awful.  I watch him push a sausage roll around his plate with his fork, looking very much like he has no appetite, and frown.  "C'mon, Rems, you didn't eat anything this morning—you've got to be starving."

He looks up at me, faintly startled, and manages a small grin, presumably at the old nickname.  With a sigh, he tells me, "I am, but I don't think I can stomach anything."

I feel badly for him.  He definitely looks like he's nauseous, and I can tell he didn't sleep well at all.  His hair's tangled and messy like he didn't have time even to give it a short comb-through; I can just run my fingers through my hair and it looks fine, but Remus and James aren't that way.  His skin is pallid and sallow, especially on his face, lending him that nauseous look.  "Nightmares?" I ask softly, and suddenly it doesn't seem amusing at all.  I remember laughing in Divination and feel a little guilty.

Remus looks up at me sharply and stutters, "Wha—no, I just... I just didn't sleep well.  Full moon's only in three nights, after all..."  He glances past me to James a little suspiciously, but I can tell he didn't intend for me to notice.

I'm about to tell him that it's okay, I understand, but I decide it's better just to leave it alone.  I pick up a piece of bread from my plate and start chewing it thoughtfully.  Beside me, James is running his fingers through his hair as if to be sure it's still nice and messy.  He works hard to get that wind-blown, carefree look; me, I just get dressed and finger-comb my hair once, and I'm ready for the day.  Apparently, it works well enough.  The girls seem to think I'm fairly good-looking.

"Remus," Peter squeaks through a mouthful of roast beef, "what're we doing this time?  Exploring Hogsmeade?  Is the map almost done?  Will we finish it this time?"  When he talks with his mouth full, he bears a strong resemblance to his Animagus form.

Moony shrugs a little and hesitantly takes a bite of his sausage.  I can tell he has trouble swallowing it, and after that, he gives up on lunch.  He pushes his chair back from the table, making his way out of the Great Hall.

Remus' departure finally breaks James out of his Lily-staring session.  Looking around, he notices that our werewolf friend is gone and gives me a curious expression.  "Where did Remus go?"  The food vanishes from Remus' abandoned plate, and James adds as an afterthought, "He hardly ate."

"He's feeling worse than usual," I reply, frowning.  But I dismiss my worries and turn to James with a mischievous grin on my face.  "So, Prongs, how's the Lily-gazing going?"

He gives me a dry but amused expression as he rolls his eyes, shoving me.  We both laugh, and then James begins shoveling food in his mouth, and I follow suit.  He's trying not to embarrass himself again, but I can't miss the little glances he keeps shooting up the table at Lily even as he eats.

Really, he's hopeless.