THE LAST THING Claudia had expected that she would do during sunrise on that cold October's day was walking next to James towards the rest of the Marauders, who were all in the Shrieking Shack after that faithful full moon that had caused injuries on all three of them.

Despite just having made the discovery that Nicolas and Regulus were hooking up, Claudia was way too distracted with getting to them as quickly as possible, as well as way too distracted with wondering why the hell they were with Remus during the full moon and why James had come to her instead of Madam Pomfrey.

But that was the case, and Claudia had no energy to question it all too much - especially not when she entered the shack, only to find all three boys completely torn apart.

Sirius was, as always, extremely dramatic over the scratch that crossed his collarbone and Peter was just chilling despite the huge scratch that covered his leg.

And Remus, well, Remus was completely torn about from where he was out of view. He was ashamed, and he didn't wish to be seen.

Especially not by her.

"What took you so bloody long?!" Sirius groaned, his voice then turning into a hushed one so Remus wouldn't hear.

Because Remus hated himself for what he had done to his best friends.

"I could've bled to death!"

"Suck it up," Claudia sighed, walking towards the two boys as James walked to Remus. "This should do it."

Claudia then quickly and quietly cleaning up both of their scratches and used healing charms on the two, which pretty much got them back to normal with small faint scars.

"I just don't want her to see me like this, Prongs!" Claudia suddenly heard Remus' hushed voice say desperately after Sirius had finally shut up. "I don't want to scare her off!"

"Don't you think her coming here proves something?" Said James. "Please, Moony. Just let her help you."

Remus didn't get the chance to finish or even start his next sentance, because suddenly Claudia appeared in front of him with a hallow look, looking at him but not looking into his eyes.

Remus' situation was far worse than the one the other two had. He had small, yet painful scratches all over his stomach and arms, that were revealed since he had no shirt on.

Remus had clearly put himself into more harm than anyone else.

"He won't let me help him," James whispered to Claudia, turning around slightly to face her as her eyes finally left Remus' torso. "He says it hurts too much."

Claudia nodded slowly as she reached out her hand, silently telling James to give her the cloth and allow her to do it.

"Are you sure?" James asked in a whisper. Claudia nodded yet again, so he gave her the cloth and left the two to tend to the others, or, more like, to give them some alone time.

"Hold my hand," Claudia said quietly as she knelt down by the boy who was worried out of his mind over how she would react to what "he" had done to his friends. He gave her a questioning look, but since she didn't look him in the eyes, he did just what she had told him to do.

He took her hand.

"This will sting, alright?" Claudia said softly, receiving a weary nod from Remus in response.

The boy let out an eerie wince as Claudia placed the cloth on his stomach and began to clean up the scratches that he had gotten from himself - which pained Claudia more than she thought that it would.

Even though the girl was gentle and held onto his hand comfortingly as he squeezed it every time the rubbing alcohol stung against his skin, he continued to grimace and make small uncomfortable sounds.

Which inevitably caused Claudia to finally talk - though she was doing it without looking into his eyes.

"Have you, uh, heard the new ABBA song?" She asked him slowly as she cleaned up the final scratch on his stomach. "Dancing Queen."

"Yeah," he replied quietly, feeling incredibly surprised to find her talking to him. "Do you like it?"

"I do," she replied. "Do you?"

"Yeah," he nodded, finding himself forgetting about the pain, at least a little bit. "A lot."

"Apparently there's an album coming soon too," she continued. "Mark my words, it will be one of the best albums of the century."

"You're probably right about that," Remus chuckled. "So, did you make the team?"

She nodded, a proud smile coming over his face as she did so, "Yeah, I did. It's probably just because Lucas is the world's biggest prick-"

"Don't lie, Claudia," Remus said. "You were the best one out there, and you know it."

Claudia didn't say anything to that, instead she gave him a small twitch of her lips as she finally met his eyes, but that was enough for Remus for the time being.

"But are you alright after...you know?" He asked, referring to the fall she had at the quidditch pitch and the strange injuries that had come with it.

"I wish you would stop asking me that," she said with a small chuckle.

"How could I not?" He replied, receiving a glance from the girl that, though unspokenly, asked him why he didn't still hate her.

Which he decided there and then to tell her. If he could, that was.

"I'm fine," she replied eventually. "Betty wants to be a healer, so she helped me. Pandora told me that it's mainly because of everything that's been happening to me, but I don't think Betty would ever admit that."

"You think she wants to be a healer to help you?"

"Partially, yes," Claudia responded earnestly. "I think it's to help everyone, especially with everything that's going on...out there."

"Are you scared?" Remus asked as Claudia cleaned up a scratch on his arm. "About the war?"

"Terrified," she sighed, thinking about where she could end up thanks to her surname. "Are you? Scared, I mean?"

"Yeah," he replied. "But we'll be fine, Claudia. We have to be."

Claudia didn't say anything to that either, because she most certainly didn't believe that they would.

Alright, maybe Remus would, but something told her that she wouldn't.

She would either carry the dark mark on her skin and commit awful things and cold murders, or she would be murdered by her own father or stepmother or by her stepbrothers instead.

Claudia preferred the latter.

"There you go," she said as the final scratch was cleaned up. "Should I heal you?"

"Sure," Remus replied, allowing Claudia to heal all the scratches, doing so as if it was a normal accio charm or something.

"There you go," she said with a faint smile, looking up into his eyes yet again, doing so naturally and both willingly and unwillingly at the same time.

"Thank you," he whispered, and then he did the thing he wasn't supposed to do.

He reached out his hand and cupped her cheek as if he was going to kiss her, leading them into falling into the almost forgotten yet natural trances they always had when their eyes spoke but their lips didn't.

And panic struck Claudia after a few moments as Remus naturally leaned in towards her as his eyes flickered to her lips, causing her to get up and leave the shack without warning as Remus called after her.

Claudia left. She left without receiving an explanation to why they didn't hate her anymore, why they were wounded and why they were in the Shrieking Shack despite the fact that only one of them was supposed to be there.

She just left; because an explanation wasn't a good enough reason to stay behind and kiss Remus and mess everything up like she always did.

She needed to stay away from him no matter what - so why couldn't she bring herself to do it?

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