It started during the night, around three in the morning, when Lily returned from the bathroom, having woken up with a nasty dream. She had gone and washed her face several times and opened up her secret little trunk and hugged the little blanket for a time, reminding herself that there had to be a way that Harry would come to them - there had to be because she'd already seen him, whatever the doctors said, whatever James now guilted himself into believing.

Despite pep-talks, he was fully discouraged now, and Lily hadn't been able to get him to agree to try since the appointment... which was entirely frustrating on quite a few levels, honestly.

She'd finally tucked the little blue blanket away in the trunk again and snuck back across the hall to their bedroom.

James lay curled in a ball, facing away, when she came back, his arms around himself, legs tucked to his chest. The blankets had fallen away when she'd gotten up and he hadn't reached to fix them, even though he was visibly shivering. She sighed as she crawled back up onto the bed and leaned over him, reaching for the blankets herself, intending to tuck him in, but he was so warm that she could feel the heat radiating off him and she frowned put a hand to his forehead.

"Oh my stars, James," she whispered, "You're burning up." She pulled the blanket up over him and got up, going around the other side of the bed to find he was awake and staring straight ahead, too chilled to move, lips chapped and his eyes red and unfocused, as his jaw quaked - literally chattering his teeth. "Oh honey," she whispered.

"L-Lily?" he murmured, voice little and shiver-lined.

Gods, he seemed so small in that instant, she felt her breath catch with worry.

"I'm here, James," she whispered, and she ran her palm over his shoulder, rubbing his skin to make him warmer, "Oh you must've caught whatever Mrs. Davies and Nessa have from the kids," she whispered and she took her wand and sent a blast of warm air through the blankets that were over him so that they were warmer against his skin.

He looked miserable.

"I'm going to get some pepper-up and some supplies. Will you be alright while I run to the kitchen really quickly?"

He made a jerky motion that she thought might be a nod, so she got up and hurried out of the room, rushing down the stairs to the kitchen. It was raining outside, the low rumblings of a thunderstorm building far off, and the pattering of the droplets against the glass in the windows was loud. Lily grabbed the large, dark-grey bottle of pepper-up from the potions cabinet, then set the kettle to heating up on the stovetop. She flicked her wand and opened the fridge with magic, and a bunch of oranges from Costa Rica came flying out, squeezing themselves into a glass. Lily meanwhile was gathering a wash cloth from a lower cabinet and grabbing the blankets from the living room couch.

Lightning flashed as she went back upstairs, all her supplies flying along with her, pausing at the bathroom to get the balm she used on her lips, she back into the bedroom, where James lay in precisely the same spot as she'd left him.

"I'm back, I'm back sweetheart," she whispered, snatching the blankets from the air and tossing them over him, giving him additional layers of warmth. She snatched a glass of water she'd brought from the air and bent the straw in it to his lips, "Here. Drink, honey, you're dehydrated."

He took the tiniest sip ever, barely able to close his mouth around the straw.

Lily sighed and climbed back into the bed, pulling him into her. He protested, his muscles sore and his bones achey from cold, but she laid him against her chest and he sank into her, "B-but you'll c-catch it," he murmured, even as his eyes closed with the comfort of being close to her and his arms closed 'round her.

She took the wash cloth from her levitating supplies, dampened it with warm water, and softly brushed it over his face. He had tear tracks over his cheeks that she wiped away, and she gently used her thumb to rub some of the lip balm across his chapped lips. She cradled him softly against herself as the pepper-up poured itself into the dosaing cup and she held it to his lips. "Here, take this," she whispered.

He made a face at the smell and taste, but she insisted, and he took it, grimacing like a child.

"Oh James, honey," Lily whispered, and she held him all the closer as he started coughing loudly from deep in his chest and she could hear the build up of rubbish in his lungs and she sighed and curled herself around him as he shivered. "It's alright, James, I'm here," she whispered, cradling his head gently. "And you are so, so loved... so, so loved..."

He could hear her heart beat.

She could feel his muscles relaxing as he fell asleep as she hummed a song quietly.

Sirius showed up in the morning and ran up the stairs, changing into dog form halfway up, passing Dora. "Oh!" she said, surprised to see the shaggy beast running past her. "Good morning."

The dog woofed a hello, but didn't slow, running up the hallway and nosing his way into the bedroom and jumping onto the bed where both Potters were asleep. Lily roused lightly as Snuffles snuffled his way between them, pushing his nose under James's torso.

"What'reyoudoing?" Lily asked, voice slurring the words together.

Snuffles snuggled into the pillow and looked up at her.

"Oh you could feel him, couldn't you?" she said, realizing. She sighed and reached over the bulk of the dog, brushing James's hair off his forehead. His skin was clammy and pale. She frowned. "Poor thing," she whispered.

Snuffled whimpered.

"I know," Lily answered, "I hate it when he's sick, too, Padfoot." She rubbed the dog behind the ears, then said, "Hey - stay here with him. I'm going to go make him some of my mum's chicken soup. It always made me feel better."

The dog looked up at her hopefully.

"Yes, I'll make enough for you, too," she laughed quietly, then kissed the top of the dog's head before brushing James's hair back again and kissing his forehead a second time. "Gods he's burning up..."

"Lily?" James asked quietly as the mattress shifted under her weight as she got up.

"Shhh, love," she said quietly. "I'll be right back. Padfoot is here, though."

Snuffles stuck his damp muzzle against James's cheek.

"Hullo Padfoo..." James's voice drifted off so that the T in Padfoot dropped away. He wrapped his arm tight around the dog's bulk and Snuffles tucked his face under the small space between James's neck and the pillow as he fell back asleep.

"I'll be back," Lily whispered, slipping out the door.

"Soooo how did you and Sirius meet?"

"We were dorm mates at school," Remus replied. The smell of turpentine was making him sick, so his voice shook a little bit as he answered.

Lula was itching to talk, though. She'd already gone uncharacteristically long without talking because Stewie had been quiet for the entire class, having spent the first half of it mixing an extensive color palette before disappearing behind his canvas, deep in concentration. Now, forty minutes in, and she couldn't take it anymore - so Remus, who kept taking a step back from the paintings to gasp a breath nearer to the window before stepping back and attempting to hold his breath while he painted, was now her conversational target.

"Dormitory room mates!" Lula said, grinning. "So you've known one another a long time then, eh?"

"Years," Remus nodded.

"How'd you get together?" she asked, eyes glowing. She was thoroughly distracted from her painting. They were doing imitations of famous art pieces in their own styles and she was working on a version of Monet's Waterlilys.

Remus, who was doing Van Gogh's self portrait but with his own likeness in Van Gogh's style, was wincing into a mirror and trying to mix a paint the color of his scars to mark up the already painted face. He frowned as he mixed a bit more pink into the blob of color. "Oh um. It's sort of a long story, I guess. It was a bit of a slow burn, you might say."

"Romantic," Lula said. She criss-crossed her legs and sat sideways on the bench seat at their table, staring up at him with dreamy eyes. "Who fell first?"

"Me," Remus answered. He looked up at the mirror again, his eyes meeting his own eyes in the reflection. He searched them for a long moment, then looked back down, avoiding his own gaze. He felt like he could still feel himself staring, despite knowing better, and he shifted uncomfortably. "I kissed him one night. On a whim. He said some pretty things about my scars and I thought -- It was my birthday and I made a fool of myself. He pushed me off and it was the most horrific thing I've ever been through. The next year was terribly awkward because he knew - he knew how I felt, but he - he didn't know if he was - you know... interested back at all. He had a girlfriend, even."

"A beard," Lula said. She smirked.

"Yeah, I s'pose," Remus said. "Then one night, just before Christmas, he came up to the dormitory after the Yule Ball --"

"Oooh Yule Ball. That sounds lovely."

Remus flushed. "I stayed in the common room, I've never been one much for dancing."

"Oh that's a shame, dances are such fun."

"Sirius can dance." Remus's mouth split into a smile. "Sirius is... brilliant at dancing... more than brilliant, really. He's classically trained. The way he can waltz..."

And for a moment, Remus let his mind wander, his eyes moving back to the glass in the mirror, remembering a time years ago when he'd stood in the prefect's toilet, staring into his own eyes in the mirror, brushing his teeth, when Sirius had approached him about taking Lily Evans to the Yule Ball. Was it sixth year? Remus tried to remember and he reckoned it must have been. Sirius had come up behind him and he'd teased him about dancing and Sirius had told him about his training in waltzing.

Remus had challenged his knowledge and the next thing he had known, Sirius had swept him back into his arms, dipped him low, and begun leading him in a music-less waltz right there in the prefect's loo. Remus had clumsily followed Sirius's lead, feeling like he was all left feet as Sirius's graceful form moved. Remus could hardly breathe at what the movement did to Sirius's muscles, and the way his arms felt when he dipped Remus back, his biceps tightening and rippling in a way Remus could feel under his palms as he held on...  Even the memory of the moment gave Remus Lupin butterflies in his stomach and he could still hear it in his head - the way Sirius had started humming the music for them. His voice was rich with the song, rising and falling with each of their steps, a slight undertone of a laugh chasing each note, making it ever more joyful.

"The Waltz of Wolfstar," Sirius laughed as he turned Remus at the end of it, spinning the taller, skinnier boy away... before reeling him back into him so that their chests collided and Sirius lay his head against Remus's chest, looking up at him, pushing Remus into the position of the lead as the waltz became a basic slow dance, rocking gently back and forth, fingers laced together on one side, Sirius's hand on Remus's hip and Remus's hand on Sirius's back by instinct. "I love you, Remus," he'd said, and Remus had said he loved Sirius right back and that had been one of the best moments of Remus's entire life.

"I ought to have known," Remus said now, to Lula, "That he knew how to waltz. Of course he did. He was raised in an extremely..." Remus wasn't sure what adjective to use, and finally went with, "Rich house."

"Not a home, just a house," Lula said, knowingly.

"Exactly."

"Stewie and I were too. My mum never smiled a day in her life and Stewie's grandfather raised him from - how old were you, Stewie?"

"Eight."

"And his grandfather was --"

"A curmudgeon."

"To put it lightly," Lula said.

"Sirius's parents were extremely dark," Remus said bluntly.

"Dark?" Lula asked.

"They abused him terribly," Remus admitted. He paused in his painting - he'd been laying the strokes of the scar on his chin onto the canvas and now he lowered the brush, looking at Lula. "He ran away from home eventually."

Lula gasped. "Oh the poor thing. At least he had you."

"Our friend James was mostly the one who helped Sirius through all that time," Remus admitted. "It was his house Sirius ran to, his parents that took him in... James's parents took all of us in, basically, in the end."

Lula asked, "What happened to your parents?"

"My mum was murdered," Remus said, "And a few years later, so was my dad."

Lula's eyes widened. "Murdered?" she gasped.

"Yeah. By the same man who caused me to have my scars," he added quietly.

Lula looked positively appalled.

Remus forgot how much less common murder was in the muggle world, how they didn't hear things like that very frequently, how they had no idea there was a war on, that things like murder against those in opposition to evil were being murdered by dark wizards left and right... He wondered what it was like to hear the word murdered and feel so appalled as Lula looked by it? He had never known a world so safe as that.

He had only ever known this fragile, dangerous world that was constantly so close to just burning up all around him.

One day, maybe, he thought, they might get to know a world like Lula knew, too; a world that was safe...

Remus turned back to his painting, lifting the brush again, touching it against the strokes of his own face, drawing in one of his many scars.

He'd always wear the memory of this world, though, he thought, no matter what he might one day get to know.