Archive of Our Own

DAY ONE - MONDAY

Monday is, unlike most students, Remus’ favourite day of the week.

Not only does he have his best class schedule, but every afternoon he also has a free period to study or, if it’s a particularly tiring day, take a nap. During this time James has quidditch practice and Peter has tutoring, usually leaving Remus alone with Sirius. He can never decide whether this is a good thing or not.

“Mooooooony.”

They are in the Gryffindor common room, where, at the moment, only a handful of students hang about. Normally students are either playing quidditch or watching it, and it almost always guarantees Remus and Sirius get the big couch. Sirius, taking full advantage of this, is completely sprawled across one side (read as most) of the sofa. His arms and legs are tangled in a mess of all the pillows he’d gathered, and his feet gently nudge Remus’ thigh.

He lets out a low, cushion-muffled groan and tries again. “Moony.”

Remus decidedly does not look up from his book, because some people are not miraculously brilliant in every subject and actually need to revise.

Sirius’ head pops up from under his mass of pillows to look at him. He pouts, not that Remus can see because he is avidly reading about the Goblin Revolution of 1612, but he can guess as much by his tone of voice when he says, “Moony, pay attention to me. I’m bored.”

“What do you want, Sirius?” he asks patiently, in a way that almost reminds him of a mother speaking to her over-active child. He tries not to overthink that, and continues studying his book, turning the page carefully.

Pushing himself up, Sirius props up onto his elbows. “Really, it’s not like I ask for much.”

A quiet “ha,” is Remus’ only answer.

Then Sirius persistently prods Remus with his toes, thankfully socked, as he complains, “Why are you ignoring me? I thought you loved me.”

“Ah yes, just how I love it when you attack me with your giant feet.” He pushes them away. “Shove off, will you?”

He really should’ve thought before he said that, though, because Sirius immediately leans forward and waggles his eyebrows suggestively. “Big feet? You know what they say about-”

“Do not finish that sentence.”

Sirius laughs and flops back. “You’re no fun,” he says carelessly. Then he comes up again and, removing his feet from Remus’ leg, he scoots over to sit next to him. Throwing an arm around the back of the sofa, he peers at the book. “So what are you up to then?”

“I think that’s the third time you’ve asked me that in the past hour.”

“Humour me,” he shrugs.

“Well, I was reading for History of Magic, but then someone started to distract me with their incessant questions and toe prodding, and here we are.”

“He sounds handsome,” Sirius comments.

“What?”

“This someone, the toe prodder, they sound very handsome to me.”

“I'm not going to feed into your ego when you're bothering me.”

"That," Sirius smiles, "is not a no."

He wriggles his way down so that he is laying, head now on Remus’ lap. The only problem is that Sirius’ head is dangerously close to crinkling the books pages and Remus wants nothing less that to face the wrath of Madam Pince. He yields and closes his book and lays it down on the coffee table in front of him, trying to reach out far enough to place it without disturbing either his or Sirius’ position.

When seated comfortably again, he relaxes and lets his hand rest on Sirius’ shoulder, and although he knows he wouldn’t mind, he resists the urge to card his fingers through his friend’s hair. Sirius still curls under the touch, bringing his knees up to his chest and pushing back to gain more room. Remus supposes it makes sense, Sirius being a dog, for him to act like this, and he tries not to worry too much about what others in the room think of the display. He wonders if they were alone if Sirius would turn into Padfoot then. Remus often thinks that Sirius would be Padfoot for days if he could, although, perhaps it isn’t healthy to be in Animagus form for that long.

Sirius interrupts his train of thought when he says, “Tell me a story.”

"I could read from the book if you'd like?" Remus offers.

"Nooo, you know Binns sends me to sleep practically every class. Someone talking about history is like a warm glass of milk for me."

"I'd like to think my reading is a bit more lively than an actual ghost. Might do you some good too."

"Oh, hush." Sirius flaps his hand about dismissively. "I want to hear about you, not Goblins. Tell me something about yourself I don't know."

“Sirius, you’re with me virtually every minute of every day and we've been friends for years. There's nothing more to know.”

“You could make something up,” he suggests, picking at a thread on Remus’ sweater sleeve.

"That entirely defeats the purpose of what you've just asked," Remus huffs. 

“Oh, I know,” Sirius squirms a bit to get more comfortable, “tell me about that date you went on with that Ravenclaw girl.”

What.

“What?” He had not gone on any date with any Ravenclaw girl, unless… no I definitely would have remembered that, wouldn’t I?

“You know,” Sirius reminds him. “It was a few weeks ago, I think. She asked you to Hogsmeade or something,” as if it weren’t ridiculous to believe that Remus had gone on this date recently and then had so easily forgotten about it. He pokes at Remus’ leg then and half-laughs, “You didn’t go to Madam Puddifoot’s did you?”

Oh wait, Remus thinks, he does remember that, the date. Well, a date. Or at least, he remembers the anxious boy dressed in his best, pacing back and forth across the small room, asking frantic questions that Remus couldn’t possibly know the answer to.

“Should I get her flowers?”

“Um, why not? That sounds like a ni-”

“No, no, what if she’s allergic?”

“Well, I suppose that’s a possibility but I really don’t thin-”

“I should get her chocolate!”

“Chocolate’s always good.”

“What if she’s lactose intolerant!”

“Now really you’re just-”

“I should get dark chocolate just in case. Oh no, that’s not good, a lot of people hate dark chocolate.” He stops his pacing and turns back to Remus with a look of helplessness and panic that Remus has no idea how to soothe. “I’m a mess, she’ll never like me.”

“Uh…”

“Sirius, last Hogsmeade trip I stayed back to study for my Arithmancy quiz. Peter was the one with a date.”

“Oh, really? Dunno why I thought it was you,” he mumbles into the fabric of Remus’ trousers. “Huh.” He pauses. “Okay well, tell me about another date you went on then. I want all the embarrassing details.”

Remus wracks his brain for an appropriate response.

“Go on then,” Sirius prompts, poking his knee softly with a knuckle when he takes too long to answer.

A blush begins to creep up his neck, spreading across his face, and he silently curses his fair skin, but at least Sirius can't see it. That is, until he turns around to look at him, confusion creasing his brow.

“What is it?” he asks.

Shit, alright. “I’ve never been on a date before,” Remus admits hesitantly.

Then Sirius is pushing himself up into a sitting position, almost hitting Remus in the face because he moves so fast, causing Remus to recoil awkwardly. When he regains his composure enough to understand what is going on, Sirius is just staring at him, or perhaps ‘gawking’ is the right word.

“What?” Remus asks, suddenly feeling much too defensive.

“So, you’ve never-”

“No,” he interrupts, miffed, and maintains, “It’s not a big deal. Plenty of people haven’t,” but he’s not sure how this helps him.

“No, I know, but you?”

Remus isn’t quite sure how to take any of this, but regardless he still can’t help but feel offended on some level. Either way he is definitely not comfortable with the turn of conversation and wants to divert it as soon as he possibly can. But, still, it’s not like he couldn’t get a date if he wanted one. He’d even been asked out by a few nice girls before. Not that that matters.

Luckily for him, right then James and Peter enter through the portrait hole, so the distraction gives enough excuse not to answer Sirius. James is talking loudly, with Peter following him listening keenly, as usual.

“No, see, because the Canons need to place Potts in more to squeeze in those extra points, but they won’t because they know if they risk injuring another beater then they’re done,” James explains. “It’s pretty simple, Wormtail.”

“Wait, who?”

“Come on, Jeremy Potts, he’s the new rising star in the leagues! Their newest beater, best one too, probably.”

Peter nods along emphatically, looking almost as if he is trying to take mental notes. “Right, yes.”

As soon as Sirius notices them, though, he does the exact opposite of what Remus hoped he might. He immediately calls across the room much too loudly, “James, did you know that Remus-” but then remembering the other Gryffindors in the room and feeling Remus tense next to him, he thinks better of it and stops himself, thankfully. Instead, he waits until James and Peter are in a closer range. They approach him with a cautious sort of intrigue, and he stage whispers an urgent, “Did you know that Remus has never been on a date before?”

James looks surprised but more puzzled at the question itself. “Yeah, I suppose so. I never really thought about it.”

Peter adds in a quick, “I know loads of guys who haven’t,” which, despite supporting his earlier point, does nothing to make Remus feel better.

“Okay, that,” Sirius points to Peter, “is not the point.”

“What is this about, again?” asks James. “I feel like I’ve missed something here.”

Sirius begins, “I just found out that Moony’s never-” he cuts himself off then, turning to Remus as if he’d just had a terrible thought, looking more worried than he really ought to. “Wait, you have been kissed before, though, right?”

His eyes widen and his face heats, in resentment or embarrassment or both. “For god’s sake, Sirius, what does it matter if I’ve kissed anyone or not?”

“So… you haven’t?”

The hard look on Remus’ face does nothing to hide his blush, and it’s answer enough for Sirius.

“How did I not know this!”

Remus isn’t really sure what to make of the entire situation, conversation, whatever is happening, but he doesn’t like where it’s going or see any way this could end well for him.

“Why are we so bothered about this?” James asks.

“Yeah, why do we care if he’s been kissed or not?” Peter asks curiously.

“Come on, this is our Moony we’re talking about here,” Sirius reasons. “This needs to be redeemed!” What is that supposed to mean? “This, lads,” he says, “is about Marauders looking out for one another.” Oh, no, he’s got that look on his face.

Remus knows he’s going to regret it but he can’t help but ask, “How does that apply to this at all?”

Sirius puffs up his chest and declares, “I’m going to find you, Mr Moony, a girlfriend.”

James’ immediate reaction is to bark out laughing, and Peter follows his lead but really looks more confused than anything else.

“Yeah, okay, Padfoot, have fun with that,” James says, lips quirked, coming down from his laughter.

Sirius, however, is not laughing.

This stops James. “Wait, you’re not joking.”

“Nope.”

Oh. Shit.

“Okaaay…”

He turns to Remus then. “Moony, I’ll have found you a perfect date by the end of this week.”

“Oh… no, that’s okay. I’m fine.” Shit, shit, shit.

Sirius waves this off. “Don’t worry your pretty little head about anything, I’ll handle everything.”

“Um.”

James cuts in, “Right so, no prostitutes then?”

“No, James, no prostitutes. She’ll be from Hogwarts, obviously.”

“So, does that count teachers or?”

He sighs, “It appears I am the only one taking this seriously.” Turning to James he says, “Prongs, you fought valiantly at my side but I think I’ll have to go solo for this one.”

“Alright.” James shrugs. “I’ll be on my way then. Come along, Wormtail, I’ve got to expose you to the marvel of a beater that is Jeremy Potts. I think I’ve got some old prophet cut-outs in the room,” he says as they head toward the stairs, once again leaving Sirius and Remus to themselves.

There must be some way I can get myself out of this, Remus thinks.

“Um, Pads, I know you’re trying to help, but really it’s alright, I don’t need-”

Sirius waves this off. “Hush, Moony. I’m sure eventually you’d find yourself a fine girl. I’m just trying to speed up the process a bit. Think of it as a gesture of our friendship.”

“Right.”

Remus, unsure where to go from here, just sits still and supposes that he would just wait for something to happen next. He isn’t really one to take action. Finally, Sirius shuffles from his seat back into his position, head on Remus’ lap, and says, “You know, you’re surprisingly comfortable.”

He lets out a breath of laughter at this and relaxes a bit, allowing his hand to (after all) carefully stroke Sirius’ hair. His friend makes a small appreciative noise.

He thinks he would let himself indulge in this, at least, before everything went to hell.

Dinner is somewhat uneventful. Remus watches Sirius, as casually as he can manage, waiting for him to do something. Perhaps he would spend his time looking around trying to spot girls, or begin devising a plan, whispering ideas to James, or even stand up on the table and announce to everyone that ‘Remus Lupin is looking for a girlfriend and anyone potentially interested should contact him immediately.’

He does none of those things. The most interesting thing that happens is James and Sirius flicking some peas at each other, beginning a low scale pea war. It only lasts a minute before McGonagall sees them and gives them a stern look from the professors’ table. So that’s the end of that.

It’s only when they are in their dorm getting ready for bed when Sirius says thoughtfully, “Remus, what would you say you think your type is?”

Remus is in pyjamas, his usual getup: one oversized, tattered grey t-shirt, boxers, and his favourite pair of socks. He is carefully folding up his used clothes and putting them back into his trunk as he does every night, so he isn’t really paying attention when Sirius says this and he absentmindedly asks, “What do you mean?”

He looks over to Sirius. He is in his usual pyjama-wear too: just a pair of black underwear, which isn’t distracting at all. There is a piece of parchment he seems to be studying in front of him as he lays on his stomach.

“You know,” he urges, “your type, like type of girl, skinny, curvy, short, tall, blonde, brunette. That sort of thing.”

“Oh,” breathes Remus, “I don’t really have a preference…” which isn’t at all what he meant to say. What he’d really wanted to say was more along the lines of, I have no preference because I don’t want a girlfriend at all, but he is distracted and sleepy and in no way bold enough to actually say that. A real Gryffindor example, I am.

So that leaves Sirius to smirk and say, “I see how it is,” knowingly, though he really doesn’t know, and Remus wishes he had the ability to go back in time and study in the library instead.

Sirius scribbles something onto his parchment in ballpoint pen, one from the packet that Remus had given him for his birthday. He loves muggle things like that.

“But they don’t even have magic, how do they make this!”

“Machines, Sirius.”

“Oh, Merlin, what the fuck is that. OH MY GOD, LOOK AT HOW IT’S MOVING. Moony, you gotta show this to James, he’s gonna flip out.”

Then it occurs to Remus that he’d never seen Sirius do any sort of assignment in bed. So…

“Sirius, what are you doing?”

“He’s making a list of potential birds for you,” comes a muffled call from James’ side of the room as he struggles to pull his shirt from his head.

“Oh, okay,” exhales Remus, “um, why exactly?”

Sirius looks to him and says in a very staid voice, “This is a very delicate, thought out, process, Moony.”

Remus isn’t quite sure what to say to that, so instead he closes his trunk and gets into bed, pulling the covers up to his chin (because they had been banned from using heating charms after Peter had started a small-scale fire in 5^th year).

He turns to face Sirius, and trying a different approach, says, “This seems like a lot of work, Pads, you really don’t have to do this for me.”

Sirius brushes this off. “Don’t be silly, Moonpie, I aim to please.”

“Moonpie,” Remus mutters to himself.

James cuts in, “Remus, I really don’t see the harm. Padfoot seems happy to do it, and in the end you end up with a girl, most likely. Seems like a win-win to me.”

“Yes, listen to Prongs,” Sirius grins, “Love Guru Pads has got it all under control.”

There isn’t a possible argument Remus can think of that wouldn’t raise any questions, and what are you even meant to say to that?  So he says nothing, closes his eyes, and tries to fall asleep.

DAY TWO - TUESDAY

Remus feels fidgety. He’s not sure why, but he has a nagging feeling that something bad is going to happen. It’s stupid, but he can’t shake it off, and he really wishes that Peter would stop looking at him like that.

“Remus, are you alright?” Peter asks quietly next to him, under Sirius and James yelling across the table, fighting over something that Remus really couldn’t be bothered with right now. All he knows is that they are both claiming they know best and waving around their sausaged forks with so much fervour that Remus fears they would smack each other with it.

He is about to say, “Yes, I’m fine,” but someone hits someone else’s plate or fork or something, and it’s too sudden for him to see who, because he’s suddenly being hit on the forehead with a projectile breakfast sausage.

There is a lapse of silence, the only sound the sausage falling to the table with a soft spthud.

It takes a moment for Remus to realise what just happened.

Then Sirius bursts out laughing high-pitched and too loud, but unable to care because he is gasping, “Moony, your face. Oh my god.”

James just looks at him, gaping in a mixture of horror and pure delight.

Remus blinks, shaking himself out of his still shock and instantly grabs for a wad of napkins, wiping his forehead clean of grease and glaring at his friends.

Ah, yes, a brilliant start to a brilliant day.

In Transfiguration Remus is paired with Peter, which he doesn’t mind too much.

Peter is his friend, perhaps the least close in his group of friends, or maybe the one spends the least time alone with, but he likes him all the same. They get along well, Peter mostly knowing his capabilities and limitations, letting Remus step in when he must. The only thing is, oddly enough for an Animagus, Transfigurations is Peter’s worst subject. It also happens to be the only class where they cannot get away with Remus doing most of the work. McGonagall does not tolerate slackers.

So, basically, they are already off to a bad start.

“Okay, so, all we need to do is transfigure this mouse into a needle,” Remus says slowly, leafing through his book. “Sounds simple enough.” He holds the massive book down with his elbow, skimming the page to find what he needs. “Here we go.” He puts his other hand out to his friend, “Peter, my wand please.” He waits but nothing happens. “What-”

He looks up to see Peter staring straight at the mouse, mouth pressed and eyes wide.

Oh.

“Peter,” he tries, “It’s a mouse not a rat, and either way, we’re going to turn it right back, remember? We’ve done loads of animals before.” Clearly, comforting isn’t Remus’ forte, evident by the unchanged expression on Peter’s face and the panicked glance he sends his way.

“Is everything alright over here?” asks Professor McGonagall, coming up behind them, peering at their (lack of) progress.

Peter lets out a rattled, “Uh,” before Remus cuts in, “Yes, Professor, we were just about to begin.”

“Hm, see to it that you do, Mr Lupin, Mr Pettigrew.”

“Yes, Professor,” he assures. She nods once and then is gone to check on Sirius and Frank Longbottom, who, by the look of it, have already transfigured their mouse and are just in the process of trying to turn it back. Remus sighs and looks back to his book, double checking his spell technique. Peter is still staring at the mouse.

“Oh for god’s sakes.” He snatches his wand from Peter, points it at the mouse, who really seems quite relaxed so he’s not sure why Peter has to be so worried, and raises it, “Inten-”

“Wait!” Peter suddenly pushes his hand away from the direction of the mouse, interrupting the spell and casting bluish-grey sparks. Thankfully they don’t reach anyone, but they do quickly cause Remus to lose his patience.

He snaps, “Peter this is ridiculous, we need-“

“No, just… let me do it.”

“What?”

Peter taps his wand nervously against his other arm, and looking down he mumbles, “It… he trusts me.”

Remus thinks he really needs James to handle this, or Sirius to help him, because he isn’t quite sure he knows what’s happening at this point.

He sighs. “Okay, remember it’s four taps and then Intento Verto.”

“Right, yeah. I, uh, I can do this.”

“Of course you can.” This mouse is going to die a horrible death.

Taking a few deep breaths, Peter raises his wand with a shaking hand, tip inches away from the mouse’s curious sniffing nose, taps four times much too quickly, and says, “Intentoes Vermo.”

Oh hell.

A milky glow emits from the wand and the mouse begins to quiver, twisting awkwardly and changing form.

“Oh, Peter…” Remus exhales.

The mouse, well, what’s left of it, is abnormally lumpy and distorted beyond recognition, a hairless pink mass. The worst bit, though, are the needlepoints. They stick out, about twenty of them, from all over the small, twitching body. It is perhaps one of the most disturbing things Remus has ever seen, which is saying a lot.

“What the hell is that?” Sirius asks, suddenly popping up like he always does in situations like these, managing to sound both mortified and impressed.

Peter’s voice cracks painfully, eyes watering, as he stutters, “I-I didn’t mean t-to.”

Sirius pats his back. “Of course you didn’t, Wormtail,” he reassures, “but you gotta admit, that is one fucked up mouse.”

Peter looks like there very likely would be some vomiting in his near future. Remus just hopes it’s not on him. Then McGonagall appears, coming over to see what was causing all the commotion. “What is going on over- oh, oh my. Mr Pettigrew, what on earth have you done?” she demands, alarmed, but still an edge of weariness to her voice.

“I…”

“Professor, if I may,” Sirius interrupts, “Peter here isn’t looking very well. I think it best that he visit Madam Pomfrey immediately.”

“Yes, you may have a point, Mr Black,” McGonagall agrees. “Please make sure he is cared for and then return directly back to class.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he answers, surprisingly courteous, at least surprising for Remus, not that he hadn’t seen Sirius do this hundreds of times before. He begins to drag Peter out by the elbow towards the door and Remus hears them as they walk out into the hallway. “Now, really, Wormtail, how did you do that?”

This is when McGonagall turns on Remus. “Mr Lupin, care to give an explanation for all of this?”

“Peter is bad at Transfigurations?” he guesses weakly.

She huffs and mutters something under her breath that Remus can’t quite discern as she turns away, leaving him alone with the contorted mouse corpse.

He stares at it.

For now, Sirius’ plan is easily the last thing on his mind.

The Great Hall is fairly empty when Remus gets there for lunch. It’s an oddly sunny day for winter and some major quidditch match is going on right now so most students are outside, huddled over radios, listening eagerly. No doubt that’s where Peter and James are, but it doesn’t explain Sirius' absence. He was never really one for quidditch.

So, Remus sits alone in their usual spot at the Gryffindor table. He doesn’t mind; he’s rather used to being alone.

He is about to serve himself when someone slides next to him.

“Hello, Maeve,” Remus says pleasantly.

Maeve Findley is a very pretty girl with thick, brown hair and dull green eyes. Remus knows her from his Potions and Divination class, and would sometimes see her in the Gryffindor commons laughing with Mary McDonald and other girls.

“Hello, Remus,” she returns, flashing a sweet smile.

Over the past few weeks Remus would say that Maeve had gained somewhat of an interest in him. He would notice her hanging near him a bit more, it could’ve been coincidences, but she had also asked him for some help in Defence Against the Dark Arts. She said that she had heard that he was good at it. He is, the best in the class even, but Remus had the feeling that that wasn’t quite it.

“So,” she says, still smiling, “I was wondering, I don’t have a partner for our Divination project yet, and I thought maybe we could pair up?”

“Oh,” Remus gives a small nervous laugh, “I’m not sure you’d want me as a partner, I’ve been told that I don’t have ‘the eye’ several times.”

She shrugs. “That’s alright, I’m not really the seer type either.”

This makes Remus’ lip quirk, he genuinely does like Maeve and she is very nice and rather funny, but, “Sorry, I’ve already paired up with Sirius.”

Her smile falters, but she doesn’t look particularly troubled by this. She nods and says, “Ah, well, maybe next time, yeah?”

“Yeah, sure, of course,” Remus amends.

“Well, you don’t mind if I stick around for lunch, do you? Seeing as our friends are off for the quidditch match.”

He doesn’t want to give her the wrong idea about his interest, but really what’s the harm in having lunch together? So, he slides his things closer to him to allow her space and she settles next to him, picking up a plate and beginning to fill it too. She is sitting a little closer than Remus would prefer, their knees almost touching, but it doesn’t bother him too much, and it’s not as if Sirius were here to make fun of him.

They have a pleasant lunch together, chatting a bit here and there between eating, and they end up walking back to the Gryffindor common room together, as they still have a bit more time. Maeve is very pleasant company, he learns. He is rather enjoying himself, right up until in the hallway he sees Sirius round the corner in front of him.

It only takes Remus a few precious seconds to assess his situation. He is walking alone with a very pretty girl that he’s just had lunch alone with, who is in several of his classes and he is fairly friendly with. They are walking close together, her hand inching towards him, which consciously or not he tries not to think about, and Sirius, the boy who just yesterday has decided to find Remus a girlfriend, is just about to see them.

So, Remus does the only logical thing he can think of.

“So sorry, Maeve, just remembered I have something very important I have to get to,” he rushes to tell her, giving her an apologetic smile.

“Wha-”

Then, as fast as he can, he runs in Sirius’ direction. He grabs his elbow as he passes him, spinning him around before he could see Maeve, and yells, “Sirius, quickly!”

Sirius is immediately all action, “Wait, what? What is it!” trying to catch himself, running after Remus, who is still dragging him along behind him.

He leads them down a corridor away from the direction of the common room just to be safe. He stops running, Sirius halting next to him, both of them lightly panting.

“Moony, what is it?” he asks frantically, looking around for danger, or something like that, Remus isn’t sure.

“Uh,” he rattles his brain for an explanation. “James’ birthday!”

Sirius stops, bewildered, and stares at him. “What?”

“Um, yeah, I’m not sure what to get him.”

Now Sirius is eyeing him like he’s crazy, and says, “Remus, what are you on about? James’ birthday is months away!”

He looks away and rubs the back of his neck nervously. He had not thought this through. “Yeah, no, I know. I just wanted to, uh, make it really good this year, you know. Turning seventeen and everything…”

“I still don’t unders-”

“You know what,” Remus interjects, waving his hand, “we can do this another time. I was just worrying about it today.”

“Um. Okay.”

“So,” Remus asks, “where were you at lunch?”

Sirius grimaces and explains, “I was on my way when ol’ Slughorn stopped me in the hallway asking me to join his stupid pureblood club,” Remus doesn’t bother correcting him, “which held me up for a while. Obviously I said no. Again.”

“Have you eaten, then?”

He shakes his head, “No, that’s what I was about to go do, but,“ he looks at his muggle wristwatch, another gift from Remus, “I don’t really have much time.”

By studying the paintings around him, Remus can usually discern where he is and find his way around the castle when he doesn’t have the map. He recognises the portrait of the man with the straw hat to Sirius’ left and says, “Let’s go to the kitchens and get something for you then.”

He makes his way down the corridor, Sirius falling into step, and finds one of his favourite secret passageways. It is a narrow hallway that cloaks itself to look like a part of the wall unless you are specifically looking for it. Sirius, immediately recognising this, becomes excited and without thinking grabs Remus’ hand. He pulls him along to the spiral staircase the passage leads to. Remus tries not thinking too much about it.

They head down the stairs and come out to the Dungeons, only a little bit away from the kitchen doors. Sirius has not let go of his hand yet. They walk quickly side by side now. When they reach the kitchen they are greeted by the house elves.

“Master Sirius, Master Remus!” they say excitedly.

One house elf that Remus is particularly fond of, Roory, who dawns oversized blue rags, urges them in, waving his hands.

“Oh, Master Remus, Roory has not seen in very long time! We have prepared special spiced cakes and chocolate strawberries!”

Sirius rubs his hands together. “Yes, please, Roory,” he says eagerly.

“That sounds lovely, thank you,” Remus smiles politely.

A large platter of cakes and treats are presented to them and Sirius begins to grab several stuffing them into his pockets and stuffing his arms full. The elves looked pleased at his keenness for their cooking, and are used to seeing James and Sirius pack their cloaks and trouser pockets full, but Roory looks at Remus with wide eyes and asks, “Will Masters Sirius and Remus not be staying?”

“No, sorry, we’re in a bit of a rush,” says Sirius ruefully.

Remus amends, “We promise to be back later this week, though, have a proper meal.”

Roory lights up and nods his head enthusiastically, “Oh, yes, we would like this very much, sir.”

“It’s set then,” Sirius says, “this weekend we will all come and stay for a proper meal.”

“Masters James and Peter too?” asks another elf.

Sirius answers, “Yeah, sure, them too.”

There are animated murmurs among the elves and they all nod keenly. “We are very excited for this indeed!”

They thank the elves and make their way out, sent off with many scattered, “Goodbye Master Sirius! Goodbye Master Remus!”

In the hallway again, they find their way back to the passage. Sirius says, “I’ll never understand why they like to serve us so much.”

Remus frowns. “I think it’s all they know, at this point. They must be happy just to have kind masters… not to say that we are their masters, but they don’t know anything but service, so I suppose we couldn’t be seen as anything else.”

“Yeah, sorta fucked up." Sirius pauses "Nice of them to give us so much stuff, anyway," he says, taking a bite of what looks like a turkey sandwich.

He offers Remus some but he is happy just with the small piece of banana bread he had taken for himself.

DAY THREE - WEDNESDAY

Remus is in a bad mood.

Sirius is in an annoyingly good mood, which only helps to fuel Remus’ bad one. He is seriously considering punching his friend in the throat, which coming from a willowy boy like Remus doesn’t seem like a huge threat, but being a werewolf comes with its perks, namely supernatural strength.

“What a beautiful day! Isn’t today a lovely day, Moony?” Sirius says much too cheerfully, taking a deep breath of the (freezing) morning air as they journey through the dew damp lawn to the Herbology greenhouses.

Remus winces, rubbing his temple, which really does nothing to soothe his aching head. “I only got four hours of sleep last night, so if you could refrain from yelling, that would be fantastic.”

Remus’ hair is a great mess from turning over and over in bed the night before, but he couldn’t be bothered enough to fix it, so he’d just sort of left it as is. He isn’t sure why he’d had such a hard time sleeping, but maybe it had something to do with the fact that he is suddenly stressing over all contact he has made with any girls ever.

After the almost incident with Maeve and Sirius in the hallway, even though he had had a very good time sneaking food and eating in secret together later in Divination, he had realised that for at least for this week he had to be careful. He would have to avoid all girls except the ones already in relationships and Lily Evans. Which he supposed wouldn’t be that hard, considering Lily is his best girl friend. Girl that is a friend. Friend that is a girl. He really hates Sirius at the moment.

So, he supposes, that is why he didn’t sleep well, after all.

Really, his hair doesn’t look horrible, but he isn’t really one able to pull off the ‘I just rolled out of bed’ look.

Sirius laughs at him, a quiet soft sound, and to Remus’ surprise, reaches over and pushes some loose strands away from his eyes. But he doesn’t stop at that, his hand moving up, briefly brushing through his soft hair. He’s looking at Remus with a very lovely smile and… wait no, what? Then he grins and stuffs his hand back into his pocket, saying, “You really look a mess, Moony,” but Remus is frozen, staring. He really shouldn’t be allowed to do that, that’s not fair.

But then Remus pulls himself together and mumbles, “It’s your fault, anyway.” Shit, wait, no. He hadn’t meant to say that.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Sirius hums tunelessly in response and they carry on walking.

They are late to Herbology but the Professor doesn’t seem to notice or care, and continues his lecture on safety and, uh, other things. Remus doesn’t really know because he’s not actively paying attention, if he’s being honest. It’s not his favourite class but he doesn’t mind Herbology and finds it interesting enough. He is usually a good student and listener, but bugger if he’s not entirely too distracted with Sirius.

Sirius isn’t actually doing anything particularly distracting per se. He’s watching the teacher speak with that sort of ‘focusing too hard on paying attention to actually pay attention to what I’m meant to be focusing on’ look on his face, which is oddly adorable, but Remus can’t think of anything but warm hands in his hair and-

“Mr Lupin.”

Remus abruptly tears his eyes away from Sirius, only then processing that, yes, he had in fact been staring, and turns to his teacher with a helpless, blank look.

“Uh…”

He sighs. “Mr Lupin, I asked what is a possible use of a Puffapod when defending yourself?”

“To ward off trolls, sir,” Remus answers easily, gaining his composure.

“Correct,” he says, mildly impressed. His eyes slide away from Remus and he goes on to explain the importance of Dittany. Remus makes an extra effort to pay attention.

Not without first taking a quick glance to see Sirius’ reaction, or if he had noticed Remus’ gaze, but he seems to be very engrossed with a fallen leaf, rubbing it between his fingers carefully.

Quickly, Remus’ plan to try and ignore Sirius as much as possible for the next hour is slashed, as soon as he is paired with him to feed the Snapping Tulips.

Remus is concentrating very hard as to not get bitten and does not notice Sirius scanning the room until he asks, “What do you think of her?”

“What?” he looks up and is straightaway nipped at painfully. “Oh fu-!”

“Moony!”

“What?” he demands heatedly, because now he is holding his bleeding finger and everything bad that has happened today is really Sirius’ fault.

“Her,” he gestures offhandedly to a girl, “What do you think about her?”

“Anne?” Remus asks, confused why this was worth getting injured over, “I don’t know, she’s good at Potions?”

Sirius tut-tuts and says, “No, Moony, darling, I was referring to her figure.”

What the hell is he going on about? “Her figure?”

“Yeah, like do you think she’s hot stuff?”

A Hufflepuff girl from the group in front of them turns around to look at them disapprovingly, before turning back and whispering something to her friend, who frowns in turn, glancing back to them.

Remus wants to stop her and tell her he’s really not a part of this, but instead all he can do is feel his face flush heated and embarrassed and glare at Sirius.

“So no, or?”

Sighing, he turns back to the tulips and tries very hard again to resist the urge to punch him once again.

By lunchtime, Remus is starting to feel better. Sirius could do whatever he wanted, but now Remus is prepared for questions Sirius might throw his way, having rehearsed various situations and his answers in his head over the past hour and a half: witty answers, evasive tactics, nonchalant brush-offs. So far his passive attempts to stop Sirius and compulsive reactions hadn’t helped any, so he is going for a different strategy. He would simply… not be a part of it. Yes, Remus is fairly confident in his new plan and feeling better about the entire situation. His headache has even subsided.

That is to say, until he enters the Great Hall.

Instinctively, he looks to his usual spot at the Gryffindor table. He sees Peter, plate piled high as always, and James, masticating a chicken leg like it would be his last, but no Sirius. That's strange because lunch is Sirius’ favourite part of the day, besides ‘waking up to see your Moonbeaming face every morning,’ he tells Remus, but more importantly because there was no way he’d miss lunch two days in a row.

He goes to sit anyway, sliding next to Peter.

“Have you seen Sirius?” he asks.

James grunts, still engrossed in his chicken, and nods his head to the left. Remus’ eyes follow his movement, only to find Sirius, surrounded by girls. His heart drops.

Sirius seems to have said something very funny, and most probably very flirtatious, because then there is a chorus of giggling girls that follows. It’s a group of 6^th year Gryffindors, girls he recognises from his classes.

To his relief, one girl does not seem as charmed as the rest. She looks very concentrated on her food and very concentrated on decidedly not jinxing somebody. Even though they probably deserve it. Lily Evans, Remus thinks in that moment, is a good judge of character. She glances up from her mash and greens, and catches his eye. They share a moment of mutual understanding, of what he isn’t sure, but it makes him feel better.

“What,” Remus asks, “is he doing?”

“Chatting up some birds, I expect,” supplies Peter.

“Yes, I can see that.”

Sirius turns then and looks back to them. He spots Remus and grins, suddenly excusing himself and sauntering over.

“I am an excellent friend,” he announces as he approaches them, plopping down next to James, who laughs, earning him a swat on the arm. “This is when you’re all meant to say, ‘tell us something we don’t know, Sirius.’” Peter opens his mouth as if he’s actually going to, but then thinks better of it.

“What have you done?” Remus half-humours him, not looking up as he stabs at a piece of roast beef, bringing it to his plate.

“See, Moony loves me.” Right.

Pouring himself a glass of pumpkin juice, Sirius says, “I have been scouting.”

“Scouting?” James asks around a mouthful, so really it comes out, “Sckammptn?”

“Yes, Prongs. Scouting for girls. I have been-“

“I’m sorry, what?” Remus interjects.

“Oh, Moony, don’t look so scandalised. I’m just looking around.” Pause. “For you. Remember?”

“Oh.”

“Yes, I am wounded that after just having done very selfless acts-”

“Ha, selfless.”

“Shut it, Prongs. Yes, after very selfless acts for my dear friend, instead of thanking me, he criticises me.”

Remus isn’t sure how to respond to that. This was not in his set list of scenarios he had thought out. He would have to improvise. On one hand he could play into Sirius’ delusion as to not upset him, but it might, no definitely would, encourage him further. On the other hand- Oh hell, I don’t have time for this.

He stands abruptly, startling the group. “I just remembered,” he says, “I have to go. Forgot to do the Potions homework.”

“Hold on,” Sirius begins, just as James says, “Did we have-”

“Yes. No. Just me, extra credit, you know. Got to go.”

He steps over the bench and tries very, very hard not to do that weird sort of rushed half jog, as he walks out of the Great Hall, feeling their eyes on his back the whole way out. Save James perhaps. As soon as he is out of sight, though, he picks up his pace, scurrying awkwardly, until he is running and running, surprising a few stray students as he races past them.

He is running but he has no clue where he is going and feels rather stupid.

He finds himself at the castle side doors and he thinks yes, fresh air, that is what I need, and he is outside.

He stops. He looks out to the swath of grass and the trees and lake and he thinks God, I’m a coward.

“That was strange,” says Peter as he watches Remus push past a few arriving Ravenclaws to disappear around the corner.

Sirius only stares at the entrance, a curious expression on his face, but James answers, “Full moon’s next week, he always gets weird around then.”

Remus walks down to the lake, each step making a wet squelch under his foot, the ground still damp from rain the night before. His dress shirt does nothing to keep him warm. He regrets not having his cloak or sweater, but the combination of the wet and cold, seeping his trousers as he sits, prickles and numbs his skin until he finds it doesn’t bother him anymore.

So he stays, looking over the water, cross-legged in the grass and tries not to think about how dramatic he’s probably being. He doesn’t even know why he did it. Well, no, he does, but that doesn’t help any.

A new series of distant squelches comes up from behind him, but he doesn’t look behind him to see whom it is. He really wants to believe that it’s Sirius coming to apologise, for something he doesn’t even know he’s done, so Remus knows it’s not. Even if it was, he isn’t sure he really wants to see him anyway.

But then it’s a girl’s voice.

“I haven’t seen the giant squid in ages,” she says as she joins him, sitting, “I would say it’s hibernating but I’m not sure that squids do.”

“I couldn’t say I know, really.”

They watch the still surface of the water. Adjusting to each other’s presence, they reach a comfortable silence. It opens when Lily turns her head to watch him instead, and asks, “Remus are you okay?”

He stops himself from saying ‘I’m fine,’ because he’s not really sure how he feels at the moment, so instead says, “What do you mean?”

“Nothing, I suppose. We haven’t talked in ages, you know. I just saw you leave the Great Hall and I was worried.”

So, his exit hadn't been as subtle as he hoped. Perhaps Lily just knew him better than he realised. 

“Sorry.”

“What, for leaving?”

“No, that we haven’t talked. I mean to, but I get caught up..." he trails off lamely.

“No, I know,” she tucks a hair blown stray by a sudden breeze back behind her ear. “It’s okay.”

She looks back to the lake.

Remus looks down to his hands, now bunched up in his lap, his shoulders hunch and he feels like he’s trying to fold back into himself. Maybe that would help, to disappear. He supposes that’s why he must’ve come out here in the first place.

Lord knows how, but Lily, through either random coincidence or acute observation, asks, “What was with Sirius at lunch today?” Then she clarifies, “He’s always been a flirt but he never usually comes up at lunch or anything like that.”

Remus feels the urge to cough rise in his throat at that moment, like choking on air. He swallows it down dryly, and because oh, she’s going to find out anyway, he says, “He’s trying to find me a girlfriend.”

Lily immediately snorts at the prospect, but then, when turning to say something, she sees his face. What he looks like he can’t be sure, but it’s bad enough that she stops herself and says, “No, you're serious? He’s really… Wow, boys are stupid.”

“Lily.”

“Right, no, sorry. Just. Why does he-?”

“It’s a long story.”

“Hm.” She looks as if she still has a lot of questions but she drops it. “So, what are you going to do?”

“About Sirius? Or about him trying to find me a girlfriend?”

“Girlfriend,” Lily answers. “Wait, what about Sirius?”

“He’s trying to find me a girlfriend?”

“No, I mean, you said ‘Sirius or him trying to find me a girlfriend’ like they were two different problems. What else has he done?”

“What, oh, nothing.” Remus considers that he really should think before he speaks more.

“What are you going to do?”

Remus sighs, running his hand through his hair uneasily. “I don’t know, I’ve already tried and told him I don’t want him to, sort of, but you know him. He thinks he’s doing me a favour, to commemorate our friendship or something like that.”

“So, you don’t want a girlfriend then.”

Remus gives her his best look of what do you think.

She shrugs. “Just making sure.”

They watch the water again and the wind blows more forcefully this time, mussing up Lily’s hair no matter how many times she rights it.

“We should go back in.” Remus pushes himself to his feet, and after brushing his hand on his trousers just to make sure it’s dirt-free, he offers it out to Lily. She takes it and he pulls her up easily. Their hands slip apart and they walk back to the castle.

“If we hurry we might just be able to there before Sir Nicolas gives out his deathday party invitations,” Lily jokes. “It’s meant to be really good this year, the big 485.” He laughs and thinks maybe it'll be okay, which of course, he suspects isn’t true.

DAY FOUR - THURSDAY

Sirius wakes up to the sound of James’ voice, which, in his experience, is never a good thing.

“Come on, boys, it’s a new day!” The curtains around his bed, shielding him from the god-awful first light of day, are thrown open. “Time to wake up, Black,” James chides, but it's too fucking early and Sirius is not in the mood.

“Go away,” he groans, pulling the covers over his head.

James huffs and moves on to Remus’ bed, blinding him in turn. Remus grunts, displeased, and grumbles, “Just because you have to get up early for quidditch doesn’t mean we do too.”

Peter, blissfully oblivious, snores in the background while Remus and Sirius must suffer James’ weekly wake up call. Since becoming captain of the team he had made a routine of this. Every week he has one day of early quidditch practice before classes begin; it was actually per his suggestion, to one up on the Slytherin team of course, he explained. God knows why, maybe he considers himself somewhat of a captain of the Marauders too, but he had decided that it would be beneficial to the whole dorm if they woke up early with him.

He has yet to get them to actually use this extra time to go on a morning jog rather than complaining and then going back to sleep, but he is determined to break them. Discovering that they were not at all interested in joining him in his early antics had done nothing to discourage him.

“Seize the morning! Go for a run, breathe in the fresh air, stretch your legs!”

“We could do all of those things at a reasonable hour too,” complains Remus.

“Come on, Moony, where’s your sense of adventure?”

“Right here, with me, in bed,” he mumbles into his pillow.

Now, Sirius is irritated and tired as hell, but he is certainly awake enough to slur, “Oh, Moony, do tell.”

He groans, “Oh my god, shut up, I hate all of you.”

“Suppose, except Peter. He technically hasn’t done anything,” James adds stupidly, because he’s stupid and everyone hates him, fucking James.

Remus shifts, finding a more comfortable position, clutching to his covers as he says, “No, especially Peter because he gets to sleep through this hell every week.”

“It’s not my fault he’s such a deep sleeper. I’ve tried and tried but you cannot wake that boy up before eight o’clock,” James marvels bitterly. “No matter what I do.”

Sirius throws a loosely aimed pillow in his direction, miraculously catching him on the head, and says, “Shut up and go to your stupid quidditch already so we can sleep.”

“Fine, your loss though,” James singsongs, unfazed by the attack. “I’ll be healthy and exercising over here while you lazy around. Birds like a fit fellow, you know.” He takes off then, just to avoid anymore pillows being thrown at him, but he still hears Remus’ mutter of, “God, I hate you so much,” before he’s fully out the door, and they can hear him laugh and laugh all the way down the stairs. Stupid git.

“Who even cares about girls, it’s fucking six o’clock in the morning,” Sirius moans. He forces his head up to look and make sure James is gone. “Oh, for fuck’s sake he didn’t even close the door.” He sighs and turns around in his bed, snuggling into his pillow. He hesitates before saying, “Moony?”

Remus makes a few muffled noises in response.

“Mooooony.”

“No conversation, just sleep,” he demands weakly.

Sirius can’t remember what he even wanted to say in the first place anyway, so he answers a soft, “’mkay,” and closes his eyes, quickly falling back to sleep.

The second time Sirius wakes, it is with a gentle shake from Remus.

“Sirius, we only have ten minutes left of breakfast, and we have Defence Against the Dark Arts first thing, so you probably want to get some food,” he urges him, helping a dazed Sirius into an upright position.

Remus, of course, is already dressed because he is Moony and this is what Moony does. He prepares. However, it takes a few seconds for his words to properly sink into Sirius’ addled brain, and when he finds himself somehow awake, sitting up, Remus’ arms holding him up, he struggles to make sense of all those words at once.

“Breakfast? Ten? Art?” he garbles out. “What?”

“No not- Oh, for the love of- Sirius! Wake up! We don’t have time for this. I already let you have ten minutes extra sleep, and now we need to get a move on.” He adds an impatient, “Please.”

“Get a cold bucket of water maybe,” Peter suggests from across the room as he messes with his tie.

“No cold water!” Sirius manages to say, forcing his eyes open too wide, looking ridiculous with his hair all over the place. Leaning forward awkwardly, still being held up by Remus, he declares, “I’m awake! I’m so awake right now. In fact, it is frankly alarming how,” he breaks for a yawn, dampening his next words, “how awake I am.”

“Good,” Remus lets him go. This takes him off guard and sends him flopping back onto the mattress, but he quickly scrambles up again. After taking a few more seconds, sitting on the edge of his bed, swaying slightly, he pushes himself upright and hastily gets ready. When he looks to the mirror to fix his tie, he sees his hair and curses at its tangles. He pouts and turns to his friend, whining, “Remuuuus.”

“What is it?” he looks up from making his bed. “Oh,” he immediately gets up and goes to Sirius. “I told you it’s too long for this. You need to brush your hair before you go to bed,” he chastises as he fuses with it. He grabs a brush and, holding his hair, brushes out the knots quickly but gently. Then, taking a hair tie from the top of the dresser he pulls his hair up into a neat (but still appropriately messy) bun.

He walks around to Sirius’s front to check his work and for a last touch tucks a loose strand of hair behind his friend’s ear. Remus smiles approvingly at a job well done, and Sirius feels an inexplicable tightness in his chest. Then Remus clears his throat and goes to his chest to gather his things.

“Right, we should go now,” he says.

Sirius pretends not to notice the blush he can see creeping up the back of his neck and follows him when he heads down the stairs, Peter having already gone.

He is about to say thank you for his hair, but it feels strange and he is hesitant to do it, the words stuck right at the back of his throat. Why, he doesn’t know.

With only four days left, including today, to find Remus a girlfriend, Sirius is beginning to panic. Well, not panic, but he is to say the least worried about how much work he still has left to do.

Little does Remus know, though, that Sirius is actually fairly far into his plan. He is more discreet than he would ever get credit for. At first he had considered letting Remus be a part of it, giving him some helpful pointers, what he looks for in a girl, but after seeing how uncomfortable and stiff Remus got talking about such things, avoiding his questions, he decides to keep the process more under the table.

If he were smart like Remus he would probably design some sort of formula or graph that would find Remus’ perfect girl, but he isn’t. He does, however, have his charms, which he figures would help him to get a more hands on experience, feeling out who would be better for Remus by actually hanging around them.

At this point Sirius has completely finished his list of potential dates and is in the process of eliminating girls, narrowing down his options. Even though he isn’t as logical and organised as Remus, he does have some structure to his plan. First he had only written down girls in the appropriate age group, the year below, their year, and the year above.

He had also decided that he would try to not concentrate on the last year as much, just because they were leaving soon. Next he discounted all the girls already in relationships (including Lily Evans even though technically she is not) because Remus is a lot of things, but a home-wrecker is not one of them.

Then he did the next logical thing and crossed off all the Slytherins, obviously.

He had already scouted a bit. He had talked to nearly every Gryffindor girl in 6^th year and had only found one good candidate for his friend, but he does not have high hopes for her.

She is smart, very cute, and can get along with most anyone, which Sirius finds would be a complementary trait to Remus’ sometimes overly self-preserving side that often stops him from being as outwards as Sirius thinks he’d like to be.

Sirius is a strong believer that Remus needs a social, fun person to be with, because no matter how much Moony loves his books and pretends to be boring, Sirius knows he needs excitement or he’ll wither away.

Honestly, he probably gets enough of that from the Marauders, but if he is ever to be happy with someone, long term, that’s what he would need.

So, yes, this Gryffindor girl is good and all, social and nice and fun, but that is all on the surface, she isn’t exactly right. She lacks that spark of spontaneity.

No, really, now that he thought about it, she really isn’t right at all. Too tall too, probably.

At that moment, as he considers all of this, Sirius is in History of Magic class and completely not paying attention to whatever the professor is saying about the founding of the Ministry of Magic. He carefully crosses off the girl from his list he kept, a neat line through Catherine Wetter’s name. Actually, a horrible name, now that he thought about it. He was right to take her off.

“Padfoot,” James hisses from his seat behind him. Sirius glances back to see a gently floating paper flutter towards him. He grabs it quickly before anyone can see and unfolds the note.

Binns is killing me please tell me those aren’t notes you’re taking and you’re actually doing something interesting, it reads.

Sirius waits for the teacher to turn back to the chalkboard before sending back, I’m just narrowing down my list, handing it behind his back, James going to snatch it.

Still sorting birds for Remus?

I’ve just finished sorting through all the 6^th year Gryffindors.

And?

Nothing. Just crossed off Catherine. She was the last one.

Yeah she’s not for him I think. Do you want any help?

Now you want to help?

Mate, anything’s better than this.

Fair enough. You can’t really help any at the moment though, but you could join me at lunch.

Ugh what. That sounds like work.

Yeah if by work you mean me doing all the sorting and you getting to talk to birds.

Really?

Yeah, I’m tired, give us a break and scout for me will you?

Sounds good to me. What do I do?

Check out the 5^th year Gryffindors. I’ve got to review the 6^th year Ravenclaws and the other half of the Hufflepuffs.

No Slytherins?

Slytherins??????

You have a good point.

Just look about the 5^th years I’ll give you the criteria list later.

You have a criteria list?

I already said, Prongs. It’s a delicate process. Nothing but the best for our dear Moonykins.

Yeah okay.

Sirius nods once then crumples the paper and stuffs it into his cloak sleeve.

Brilliant, now that he had James on board, it would go twice as fast. Remus would have a girlfriend in no time.

James and Sirius have a very hasty lunch, Remus and Peter watching them curiously as they scarf down their food. They excuse themselves, explaining to their friends that they have very important business to attend to and go on their way.

They go to the library because, as Sirius had very cleverly pointed out, this is the last place Remus would think to look for them. They sit at a table situated very snuggly into a nice corner of Astronomy textbooks. They sit across from each other, Sirius sliding the criteria list towards James in a manner that he finds seems satisfyingly both very mysterious and professional for any possible onlookers.

Upon first look, James finds the list to be incredibly demanding.

“They have to be at least an eight?” he asks, reading on, “’They must have at least a mild appreciation for muggle poetry,’ ‘be able to hold a thoughtful conversation when provoked,’ ‘enjoy a good laugh and can still joke around,’ and ‘not be too tall?’”

“What?” Sirius asks defensively.

“Mate,” James says rubbing his face, skewing his glasses, “I’m not sure what that last one even means, but either way we only have around twenty, twenty-five above eights in 5^th and 6^th, and maybe three or four that any of these actually apply to, and that doesn’t even mean Moony’s gonna like them for sure.”

“Well, if you’re such an expert then” Sirius retorts, crossing his arms, “why don’t you write up your own plan.”

James rests the list down on the table, using his other hand to push his glasses back up with his index knuckle. “All I’m saying, is that I’m not sure that there’s really a right way of going about this, and you’re just making it harder on yourself by making everything so bloody specific.”

Biting the inside of his cheek, Sirius contemplates, before saying, “Yeah, okay, you might have a point.”

“But hey,” James jokes, “not really your fault is it? Who knew Moony was such a picky bloke?”

Sirius nearly corrects him, tells him that really Remus hadn’t told him anything and he had been the lone contributor, but he is afraid of the implications that might come with that, whatever those might be, so he says, “Yeah, well, I said only the best, didn’t I?” He uncrosses his arms.

Studying the paper again, James adds, “Oh, but you know you forgot about something.”

“What?”

“You forgot the bit where they have to like him back.”

Something between anger and protectiveness swells in Sirius' chest. “What, like you don’t think we could find someone that’ll like him?”

James looks up, surprised. “What, no. Calm down, Pads.” He leans back in his chair, propping his feet up on the table. “I meant just because some bird fits your stupid ‘criteria’ doesn’t mean she automatically is interested.”

Sirius considers this but he waves it off, saying, “We can worry about that later. I’ll handle it.”

“How?”

“I dunno, Prongs, I’ll figure something out, Remus is a likable fellow, but now I’m going to continue crossing off the obvious ones,” says Sirius. “You should go out and start going through the 5^th years.”

“What, now?” he asks, pulling his feet down again, leaning forwards.

“Yeah, we don’t have that much time, and I don’t really have anything else for you to do here, so,” he motions with his hands, shooing him, “off you go.”

He stands, taking the criteria list and folding it, quickly shoving it inside his robes. “Alright, I’ll report back in Charms then?”

“Yeah, we’ll talk then.”

James is about to go then, but he stops to ask, “Okay, but really what does ‘not too tall’ mean?”

“Oh, um, I don’t know, I just think that Remus would prefer someone shorter than him. Tall doesn’t really seem his type,” Sirius explains.

“Short? Like Jeanine Hempley short?”

“No, no, not that short. Like, uh,” Sirius struggles to think of a comparison so he says, “About my height, doesn’t really matter, like around his chin. Just not too tall.”

“Right, okay. Anything else?”

“Um. Oh, dark hair too.”

“So, around your height and dark hair?” he clarifies.

“Yeah.”

He nods. “Alright, I’m off to woo some girls!” he calls as he goes, disappearing out of Sirius’ line of view behind the bookshelves.

With him gone, Sirius is left free to brainstorm and finish off going through his list of possible girls. He begins to remove the ones who he, from his general knowledge, is sure would not be a good fit.

Laura Barter, obviously in love with Gideon.

Ariadna Darrow, most boring person anyone’s ever had the displeasure to meet.

Pomponia Morris, most annoying person anyone’s ever had the displeasure to meet.

Tayler O’Faolain, made that joke about ‘half-breeds’ that one time.

Mubina Berkowitz, has a strange look about her.

Tordis Harley, stuck up pureblood.

After a while of doing this, Sirius hears shuffling sounds around him. He doesn’t absorb them though, busy in his own work and it being easy to assume it were someone packing up or sorting books. So, he doesn’t realise someone’s joined him until the chair across from him is being pulled out. Carefully not regarding his new company directly, he can see a jumper, seam decorated with a stripe of Gryffindor’s colours, sleeves rolled up, and an old worn brown leather watch.

Of course Remus is here. Sirius was right to think that the library is the last place Remus would think to look for him, but he had forgotten to factor in the fact that Remus is a nerd and would probably come here for himself.

Sirius, as casually but quickly as can manage, sorts his papers and rolls them together in an attempt to hide them from his friend.

Remus watches him dubiously. “Hello, Sirius.”

He looks up. “Oh, Remus, what a pleasant surprise! I did not see you there.”

“Hm, I suppose you came here for some peaceful studying too?” He sits down, placing his books on the table in front of him.

“Just a bit of extra work for McGoogles, she caught me and James passing notes in class again,” he answers easily.

“Where is he then?” Remus asks, looking around.

“Who? Oh, James, yes,” Sirius reminds himself. “He thought we could use some time apart to work so he’s taken the common rooms and I’ve take the library.”

“Yes, I can see that,” Remus muses. “Well, you might want to check up on his work ethic because the last I saw of him, he was chatting up a few 5^th years.”

“Oh?”

“Yes,” Remus says, twirling his wand in his hand, “in fact, I heard him mention me too, asking Bethany if she thought I was ‘boyfriend material?’”

“Oh?”

I’m going to have a chat with that boy, James, about a little thing called subtlety.

“Yes, and then I’m fairly sure I heard him say something about me ‘being such a nice boy,’ and ‘what a pity it was that I didn’t have anyone to go with to the Hogsmeade Christmas trip.’”

“That is,” Sirius says, crossing his ankles under the table, “very curious.”

“I thought so too.” He puts down his wand, looking to Sirius, “But when I asked him what he was doing, he just laughed and ran away.”

“What?”

“He just laughed and then turned and ran the other direction, right out of the portrait hole.”

“That doesn’t sound like James.”

That’s when suddenly someone scrambles towards them, out of breath and yelling, “Padfoot, Remus kno- Oh, hello, Moony.” James slows, walking towards them coolly, as if he hadn’t just done any of that running or shouting, and one hand leaning on the table, asks, “Doing a spot of studying?” his dishevelled hair and crooked glasses the only thing marring his image of nonchalance.

“You could say that,” answers Sirius.

“Great, great, yeah,” James breathes, “Say, Padfoot, could I talk to you for a moment, just,” he nods his head, gesturing to the side, “right over there.”

He stands and Remus watches them as they go behind a line of bookshelves a few rows down.

“Remus told me,” Sirius tells him before he can say anything,” and, when I said scouting, I did not mean directly asking them if they think Remus is ‘boyfriend material,” he hisses.

“Ah, yes, well,” James laughs nervously, “that’s not all.”

Sirius frowns. “What?”

“I might have also told Evans.”

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

“What?”

DAY FIVE - FRIDAY

James is, and always had been, an excellent partner in crime. Well, really in the Marauders it is more like… a small group of crime? Sirius isn’t very good with analogies, but the point is: James is good at scheming and always has his back.

But, really, he should have known that everything would go to shit once James was involved. Because, while James could always pull a great prank and you could count on him to yank you into the closest secret passageway before Filch can catch you after dark, he is easily the least tactful person that Sirius knows. Especially when it comes to Lily Evans. Finding Remus a girlfriend is an operation that requires patience and diligence, two things that James, evidently, does not have. Something Sirius should have thought of before sending him off into the thick of it, checking out the girls by himself. Now, because of his mistake, the most determined girl in school knew about it.

And Evans was making sure everyone else did as well. Or, at least, the girls.

It was sort of fucking up his entire plan too.

They’re at dinner, James silently eating his food, in shame hopes Sirius. Peter is a little on edge from all the day’s drama, and Sirius is grumpily pushing his food around his plate.

Remus seems rather unaffected by the whole thing.

A few Ravenclaw girls pass, glaring at Sirius. He resists the urge to stick his tongue out at them. Fucking Evans.

“This is ridiculous,” Sirius complains, “Evans has blown everything out of proportion.”

“How so?” asks Remus, taking another bite.

“Now all these girls think I’m categorising them based on their worth!”

Remus pauses. “But that is what you’re doing.”

“No,” Sirius corrects, “I am carefully considering them to find a good fit for you.”

“I feel like that doesn’t make much of a difference to them,” Remus says.

Sirius sighs, exasperated, and waves his fork in his direction. “Why are you so…?”

“So what?”

“Okay with all of this. Are you not getting any reactions from the general female population?”

Remus grimaces at this. He puts his fork down and lets out a breath. “Pads, I haven’t actually done anything, you know that right? I’m not a part of this.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure,” Sirius continues, “but you’re still associated.”

“Unwillingly,” he reminds.

Then he has a horrible thought. “Oh no, no, no, Evans isn’t using you as some sort of poster boy, is she?”

“Poster boy?”

“She’s pretending like this is something I’m forcing on you!”

Remus gives him a strange look. “When really…?”

“When really,” Sirius says firmly, “I am doing a favour for my best friend! A grand gesture, one might even say.”

This surprises Remus, his eyes narrow. “Best friend?”

Taking a swig of this pumpkin juice, wiping his mouth on his sleeve, Sirius says, “Well, yeah.” Remus glances to James, questioningly, but he is still eating his food, oblivious to or ignoring their conversation. “Naw, you know James is my brother.” He pauses, “Well, right now he’s on a bit of a probation, but still.”

Sirius isn’t really sure what to make of the look on Remus’ face, but he shakes it off, going back to his food, before Sirius really has time to decide. “Anyway, Lily isn’t doing anything, using me, or whatever else you seem to think.”

He huffs and mutters, “That’s what she wants you to think.”

Remus just shakes his head and continues eating.

After dinner Sirius announces that he’s going on a walk, but really it’s just an excuse to go out for a smoke. He walks outside to his favourite (only) spot where he can smoke alone and undisturbed, a worn out patch of exposed dirt behind the broom shed where he can put out his cigarettes without setting a fucking fire, a lesson learned the hard way.

He spends a good half hour there, his frustration fueling him through smoking almost half a pack. It leaves him feel lightheaded and a bit nauseous as he trudges back to the castle.

As he nears the common room entrance, hands in his pockets, he thinks over the events of the day. That morning he had started getting strange looks, short angry glances, and even some long bitter gazes. He had responded to each one with a confused expression in turn.

Then finally some Slytherin girl had come up to him and said, “We know what you’re doing, Black.”

“What?” he inquired.

She frowned, putting her hands on her hips and said, “Your list.”

Oh, Merlin’s hairy balls. Evans.

He played it off; not really understanding why she was so upset anyway, “What list?”

She laughed, but without humour. “Your fucking list of girls.”

“Sorry, love, don’t have a clue what you’re talking about,” he said, instead of why should you care, I didn’t have any Slytherins on it anyway, because he had a feeling that would only make her angrier.

“Fuck you,” she spat, “Good luck finding a girl now, bastard.”

After that everything had sort of spun out of control. Evans had told every girl in their year and below, even the year above, about his ‘disgusting list.’

Of course, she was entirely missing the point of such a list, and it isn’t even what she thinks. Yes, he admits, it does somewhat objectify girls, but first of all, while it mentions looks it mostly had to do with personality and interests, and secondly, it doesn’t measure their worth, only their compatibility to Remus. It isn’t even for his own gain or entertainment, or whatever she had told them.

All uneducated drivel, he thinks. She really could’ve avoided all this nastiness by just asking him, for god’s sakes. Fair enough, she doesn’t like him. Sirius Black does not happen to be among the people who Lily Evans enjoys or respects, but Remus is.

Remus doesn’t seem affected by this at all, though. Using him as a fucking poster boy, he thinks bitterly.

He is about to reach the portrait hole, but he stops before turning the corner when he hears voices. Something he usually wouldn’t do in normal circumstances, but he recognises that voice.

He listens.

“I’m not saying that it’s right,” the first voice says.

“Then why are you defending him!” the second accuses.

“Lily, I understand why you’re angry but I promise you’ve not got the complete picture.”

“The complete picture? Remus, who cares when he’s making a fu-“

“But he’s not!”

A weighty pause.

Remus sighs, “Look, I talked to James-“

“Ha, James,” she grumbles.

“Yes, listen, and he told me that Sirius’ list isn’t what you think. It’s not just categorising girls ‘hot or not,” he says, as if the words feel wrong in his mouth.

“What is it then?”

“It’s just… based on compatibility for me.”

“What?”

“You know it’s for finding me a girlfriend.”

Lily makes a frustrated noise, “Yes, but, that’s not the point.”

“No, but it is. It has nothing to do with judging girls based off their looks. I mean, it probably has some of that, if we’re realistic, but it’s about finding me someone specifically. So, really, over anything else it’s judging personality.”

She is still adamant, but sounds less cross when she says, “It’s still not okay to make a list, for Christ’s sake.”

“I know, I didn’t say it was,” he agrees, “but he isn’t doing it maliciously, and he’s definitely not doing it to share with anyone else. He’s not even doing for himself.”

She sighs, defeated. “Alright. I’ll… do something, tell them that, so they’ll stop… confronting him.”

“Thank you.”

Sirius hears the portrait door swing open and the short heel of Lily’s shoes clack as she enters it, but before she leaves he hears her say, “You know, if you just told him-“ interrupted by a despondent, “I know.”

Another pause, oh and how Sirius wishes he could see their faces to understand better, but then her shoes’ click-click start again and fade away.

He wants to rush over and thank Remus for defending him, hug him and apologise for ever doubting him, thinking he’d taken Evans’ side. But he doesn’t. Something feels… off. He waits, and realises that he hasn’t heard Remus move.

Troubled and not sure what to do, he backtracks his steps noiselessly and decides to walk around a bit before returning to the portrait hole.

As he ambles on, hands returning to his pockets, he thinks over what he’d overheard. Only one thing stands out to him, though. What had she meant by, ‘if you just told him?’

He wanders, finding himself in a part of the castle he doesn’t know very well. Ah well. There are some other students that hurry about, trying to get back to their dorms before curfew, but Sirius isn’t bothered. He’s gotten in trouble enough times that it shouldn’t really matter. Anyway, he knows enough hiding spots and secret staircases to get away from Filch if it comes to that.

So, the corridor is empty when he decides to study the paintings, maybe even strike up a conversation. As he watches a swaying field of poppies, rabbits hopping along, stopping to look at him, he hears slinking footsteps near him. He decides to ignore them, eyes trained on the animals.

That’s when he hears a snide voice say, “What are you doing here, Black? Don’t you have girls to hassle?”

Sirius really isn’t in the mood, but he still turns, smirking, “Why, Snivellus, who knew you worried so for the wellbeing of girls. You almost sound a gentleman.”

Severus Snape scoffs, “Better than you, I’ve seen your ‘house parties’. All you know is drinking and groping.”

Sirius feigns fawning, “Oh, Snivellus, you do notice me!” but then he becomes staid, and says, “Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll be on my way, your unwashed hair smell is starting to give me a headache,” pushing his way past him.

As he walks away, back to him, Severus calls after him, “I know about your little scheme, trying to find someone for that disgusting mutt of a boyfriend of yours-“

He doesn’t remember deciding to do it, or really doing it at all, but suddenly he’s spun back and Snape is against the wall, Sirius’ forearm pushing painfully on his chest, keeping him there, as he points his wand to his throat.

“You see, Snivellus, I haven’t been having the best day. You seem to have caught me at a rather bad time, where say, I wouldn’t really care how many detentions I’d get for hexing you right into the hospital wing.” He pushes harder against him, jostling him a little, Snape’s face plastered with surprise at Sirius’ reaction, but it slowly transforms into a sneer. “So, it really would be in your best interest if you shut your mouth about Remus, and kindly fuck off.” He releases his hold and Severus drops at the sudden change, falling to his knees.

He just glares at him from the ground, limp hair tousled unattractively. His wand had been pushed out of his hand, skidding across the hall, so he is helpless to do anything else. Sirius thinks about spitting on him, but he doesn’t. He leaves him there and stalks away.

When he returns, the common room is roaring with laughter and tipsiness, people telling stories too loudly and pushing couches together to gather in groups.

Sirius looks around and sees James among them. He goes to him, interrupting his hiccupping giggles at something that Henry Lynch had just said.

“Mate, it’s only half seven, what’s going on?”

James beams at him. “Padfoot!” Others from the group chime in with whoops and a drunken “Heeeeeeey!”

“Join us, come on! Scootch over, Jill, will you?” James urges.

Sirius wants to say no, thanks and move along, maybe even go to bed early, but seeing his friends and housemates so carefree and happy, he rethinks it. If he went to bed now he probably would just lie there and in his head replay over and over what Snape had said, his violent reaction. He’d been trying to avoid that the entire walk back. So, perhaps this is exactly what he needs. Besides, he hasn’t gotten pissed off his arse in a while.

He grins back and jumps over the back of the sofa onto the space Jill had made for him. “Alright, what’s the occasion?”

“‘S Frank’s birthday!” slurs someone else as Frank pumps his fists into the air and says, “Yeeeaaah!”

“Cool, cool,” Sirius answers. “Pass over that Firewhiskey, Mary.” She does and he takes a long swig. It burns on the way down but its effects are rather fast and a light, pleasant buzz replaces it. He searches the people around him but, “Hey, where’s Moony?” he asks James.

“Oh, yeah, Moooony,” James says as if he can’t quite figure out how to get his mouth around the word. He slaps Sirius’ knee flippantly. “He said he had a headache and went to bed.”

“He said he wasn’t feeling well today,” adds Peter coming from behind them.

“Peter’s back with more Butterbeer!” Cheers follow the announcement.

He goes around the couch and sits on the floor in front of them, passing the bottles of Butterbeer he’d brought with him around the group.

Alice gets up from her spot and plops herself down onto Frank’s lap, throwing her arms around her boyfriend’s neck, a bottle still in one hand. They share a long kiss, but then Alice pulls away and exclaims, “We should play a game!”

“Yes, yes, we should,” Mary agrees, she puts her arm around her friend and asks, “Lily what’s that muggle game you told me about again?”

Lily laughs, more relaxed and cheerful than Sirius had ever seen her. “It’s called Suck and Blow.”

The group erupts into laughter and James cries, “Sounds like a good time to me!”

Surprisingly, Lily doesn’t shoot him a hard glare as she usually would, but instead giggles and continues, “Okay, you need a playing card, does anyone have a deck?”

Kingsley Shacklebolt offers, “I have one in my room, I can go get it.” He gets up, stumbling a bit, and goes off to the boys’ staircase. He comes back, deck in hand, and gives it to Lily, sitting back down next to Frank and Alice.

Pulling out the extra instruction card that no one ever needs, she explains, “I’ll use this one because it’ll get ripped.” She places the rest of the deck on a surface behind her, reaching back. “So, basically, someone starts with the card against their mouth like this,” she demonstrates holding the face to her open mouth, “and you suck on it to keep it there. Then, the person next to you needs to get it on their mouth so you sort of press the card between your mouths, and then you blow and they suck to try and give it to them.”

There are more whoops and smirks.

She carries on with her explanation, only acknowledging them with a pause of her own, smile tugging on her lips. “But if you drop it then you have to rip the card in half and both people have to take a shot- Black, you better have not finished that Firewhiskey, we’re gonna need that. Yeah, and then it keeps getting smaller and smaller until it’s too small and you have to stop.”

She reaches out her hand and Sirius gives her the bottle of Firewhiskey. “You start, Evans.”

Holding the card up to her lips, she sucks and turns to Henry next to her. He puts his own mouth up to it too and she blows, passing it to him. Mary giggles, as Henry has to go to James next. He presses the card up to James’ mouth but then they both laugh and the card falls.

Alice sniggers. “We forgot to spread out the girls and boys.”

James waves his hand. “Ah, who cares?” He pours him and Henry shots and they down them quickly. Then he picks the card up from where it fell and he tears it in half.

“C’mere, Pads,” he says putting the piece of card to his mouth, leaning to Sirius. He complies and presses his lips to the card, sucking as James blows back. As he passes the paper over Sirius has a strange moment, his bleary mind pondering over how only a thin layer between their lips, he thinks, I wish Moony were here, he should be having fun with us.

Luckily, Sirius does not drop the card and he passes it over to Jill Riley on his other side. They pass it easily, Jill blushing slightly, and the game continues on. There is a break where the card falls between Kingsley and Lea Astley and they take their shots. The card is torn again and now it’s only a quarter and when Alice and Frank fail to keep it from falling instead of taking shots they just sort of end up snogging.

The others egg them on and someone shots, “Get it, Longbottom!” which makes them laugh between kisses until they’re smiling too wide and they have to pull apart.

Sirius feels lightheaded and happy and he is snorting with laughter but he still can’t help wonder if Remus were here how he would be. He didn’t normally get drunk when they hosted parties or get-togethers like this. If Remus was in a good mood he would have a few drinks but then always retreat back to his dorm before he really could get pissed like the others.

Sirius is never sure if this is because he wouldn’t allow himself to let loose, or because he just really didn’t like it, but because of it he’d only once gotten to see Remus so loose and happy and flushed. It’d been over their last summer. He remembers Remus’ flushed face and uncharacteristically giggly manner as he kicked off his shoes and wriggled his toes, exclaiming, “I’ve never thought about how strange these things are,” he poked at Sirius’ socked foot, “yet, so necce- necessaar- necsa- Pads, help, I can’t remember how to speak.”

He leans onto James, thinking over the memory wistfully, and murmurs, “I miss Moony.”

James pats his head, reaching his arm around him, and says drunkenly, voice going up at the end making it sound almost like a question, “S’okay, Pads, he probably misses you too.”

DAY SIX - SATURDAY

The next morning is a haze of nausea and aching body.

“Ughhh,” Sirius moans as he sits up, one hand clutching his head. “What time is it?” he forces past his sore throat, coming out grumbly and low.

Though he hadn’t really meant to direct it at anyone in particular, James comes from his trunk where is his currently getting dressed and the joins Sirius on his bed. “Half eight.”

“Christ,” a swearword he’d picked up from Remus, “that’s too early to be awake.”

James looks visibly worse for wear, his hair even messier than its usual bird’s nest, eyes red, and a general grouchy I feel like shit expression. Yet, somehow he still manages to look better than everyone else, already half dressed with trousers, a partly buttoned shirt, and a tie loosely resting around his neck.

“Mate, how are you even out of bed right now?” Sirius groans.

James smirks and says, “I keep telling you, Padfoot, gotta drink lots of water before you pass out.”

Sirius snorts and reminds him, “Last time Wormtail tried that he pissed himself in his sleep.”

James laughs, wincing afterwards at the jostling movement it’d made, “A necessary risk.”

They look over to Peter’s bed, but he isn’t there.

“There is no way,” Sirius says, “that he’s already gotten up. Must’ve not made it out of the common room.”

“Yeah,” James agrees. Then he pats Sirius knee and says, “Come on let's get some breakfast, I could use some sausage and eggs.”

Sirius grunts, “Alright,” as he pushes himself up and out of bed, forcing himself to get ready, because really sausage and eggs does sound good.

When they make it down for breakfast Remus is there, eating with a bleary eyed Lily. They had already found Peter in the common room, as Sirius had guessed, fast asleep on a nice patch of carpeted floor along with a handful of other Gryffindors splayed across couches and one even curled up on a table. So, that’s all the Marauders accounted for.

Naturally they go to sit with them. They’re in the middle of the long table though and Sirius and James are not in a right state to plan ahead so they end up awkwardly sitting on the same side. James sits first because he’s feeling better and is naturally faster so gets there before Sirius can. This leaves him to sit on James’ other side, not wanting to sandwich Remus. He almost wants to tell James to switch with him, but that’s stupid so he doesn’t.

Now Lily sits across from all three of them, but she’s hardly paying attention, just eating and making noises of discomfort at random intervals.

“This is so unfair, why does Moony get to be the only one not in pain?” complains Sirius.

“Because last night I didn’t drink my arse off and went to bed at an appropriate time like a normal person,” Remus offers, but it’s not is his usual slightly condescending yet loving tone, it’s more weary than anything else.

The rest of breakfast is eaten in silence.

Saturdays at Hogwarts are usually spent playing quidditch, studying, sleeping in, and playing wizard chess. It’s raining though, so after breakfast most people are hanging about the common rooms. James and Sirius are invited to the Hufflepuffs’ by a few friends to hang out listen to a some new records that Liam Hunter had gotten early for Christmas from his muggle grandparents. They force Remus to come along, because they know he secretly loves stuff like this, and Peter is still sleeping.

Despite being in the Dungeons the Hufflepuff commons is filled with soft lighting reminiscent of sunlight, and lush plants adorn the lightwood tables and creamy yellow walls. It is really quite comfortable, but of course, not as much as the Gryffindor commons area.

The boys lounge on the sofas, soft black leather, and wait as Liam gets his music. James and Sirius are practically lying on top of each other, Remus in his own single armchair, subtly distancing himself from them, but no one except Sirius notices. He decides not to comment on it.

The first record is a new Eagles album, ‘Hotel California.’ Sirius is the most excited for this.

“Yeah, apparently the first song is like a new classic according to my granddad,” says Liam, putting on the record, “but he’s really into American music so we’ll just have to see.”

The song starts with slow but beautifully layered guitar picking, and it immediately sets a calm atmosphere over the room. They all listen. As the song goes on the drums pick up and the singing begins with a desert highway.

Fuck, this is so American, but he has to admit to himself it’s rather good.

He can feel James’ foot lightly tapping to the beat against the couch, probably unconsciously, but he joins in. Sirius tries to concentrate on the lyrics too, and the song sort of spirals and he’s not quite sure what’s going on but it’s much darker and he’s pretty sure the narrator is trapped in this hotel now.

He’s “running for the door, I had to find the passage back to the place I was before. ‘Relax,’ said the nightman, ‘we are programmed to receive. You can check-out any time you like, but you can never leave!’”

While feeling mellowed out by the music, he is weirdly affected by the message. Is it a prison or rehab maybe, he wonders, but then the music starts fading and he thinks, fuck, wait, I need to listen to it again.

As the song dips out, before the next one can start James says, “Dunno what the fuck that was about, but it was pretty good.”

Sirius agrees, “Yeah, definitely a new classic, I’d say.”

The next song comes in soon after and it is immediately much more country than anyone is comfortable with, but when the singing comes in the whole tone becomes much less so and the tension softens as the song slows.

“Johnny come lately, the new kid in town. Will she love you when you’re not around? There’s so many things you should have told her, but night after night you’re willing to hold her, just hold her, tears on your shoulder.”

“Hunter, honestly what are we listening to?” James prods.

“Shush, this good stuff,” Sirius interjects, bumping him with his knee.

He can see Remus has visibly relaxed in his seat when he looks over to him. Even though he knows this isn’t Remus’ kind of music, he still seems to be enjoying himself.

Liam is leaning against the back of the couch where Sirius and James are sprawled and he sort of faintly sways to the music, and says, “I dunno, I kind of like it too.”

The song that follows has a much stronger rock vibe than the other two that gives you that song of urge to head-bang along with it instantly, electric guitar solos and all.

“Eager for action and hot for the game. The coming attraction, the drop of a name. They knew all the right people, they took all the right pills. They threw outrageous parties, they pad heavenly bills.”

James taps his foot again, this time more sturdily and clearly consciously.

A sappy love song comes on after ‘Life in the Fast Lane’ has finished, and alright, not really my thing, but Remus looks strangely reminiscent in a way that Sirius isn’t sure how to interpret as they listen to lines like, “So you can get on with your search, baby, and I can get on with mine, and maybe someday we will find that it wasn’t really wasted time.”

“Merlin, how long is this song,” complains James. He flops to his other side, forcing Sirius to shift too, and as Liam goes to flip over the record he stops him, saying, “Hold on, give me that cover.” He does, and James reads over the song list. He groans, “A reprise of that lullaby shit, ‘Victim of Love,’ ‘Pretty Maids All in a Row,’ ‘Try and Love Again.’ I think we’ve killed this one, got two good ones at least,” he hands the cover slip back to Liam and suggests, “Put on the next one, mate, not this lovey dovey shit.”

Sirius likes the Eagles about as much as a proud British teenage male could, but he agrees that he doesn’t really want to spend the next half-hour listening to love ballads with a room full of his closest mates. “Yeah, let’s not spend all our time on this stuff,” he asks, “Got anything else?”

“Um, I’ve got another good group, bit different though, well a lot different actually, and then this Swedish one,” says Liam, looking down at his records.

He laughs at that. “Yeah, alright let’s go for the Swedish one then.”

“Okay, but it’s a single so…” He puts on the record.

There is the usual pause and scratch and then the song immediately starts with a hand sweeping over the piano keys and an upbeat tune. Then it just really goes off and they can’t help but start laughing, even Remus.

James manages to get out through wheezing breaths, “Is this that Muggle euro dance pop shit?”

“You are the Dancing Queen, young and sweet, only seventeen!” sings the turntable, “Dancing Queen, feel the beat from the tambourine!”

And fuck if Sirius doesn’t have a life epiphany in that moment, sitting up and whispering to himself, “I am the Dancing Queen.”

He pushes James’ legs out of the way and gets up, turning to his friend and then pulling him up as well. “Fucking dance with me, Prongs,” he croons and James laughs again and does just that.

They dance stupidly and carefree to the rest of the song, trying to sing along as well as they can (not very well), while Liam is helpless to just watch them and his stomach hurts he’s laughing so hard.

“You can dance, you can jive, having the time of your life! See that girl, watch that scene, digging the Dancing Queen.”

When Sirius catches a glance of Remus he is smiling widely and sitting up straight. He wants to go over and grab his hands, dance with him too, and he knows Remus would in that moment, he can see it, but then the song is ending and really it’s much too short. Fuck.

“We need to listen to that five more times,” stresses Sirius.

Liam chuckles, going to turn the record over anyway. “No, I’m not kidding,” Sirius wants to tell him, but the next song is starting and he realises it was a dumb idea anyway.

The extra song really isn’t anything compared to ‘Dancing Queen,’ though, and everybody knows it.

It doesn’t exactly kill the mood, but it creates a weird lull where Sirius worries he will forever lose the opportunity to get Remus to dance. He urges Liam, “Come on, put on the next one.”

Liam pulls out the final album and, fuck yes, it’s the Bee Gees. Perfect.

When the first song starts Sirius already has a good feeling about his plan, but he could’ve never guessed how perfect the song choice actually was until the chorus kicks in.

“What you doin’ on your back? Aaah! What you doin’ on your back? Aaah! You should be dancing, yeah, dancing, yeah.”

James and Sirius easily dance along to the pop song, but as soon as the chorus comes back in after a short verse, Sirius has a good enough grasp of the simple lyrics to separate from James and strut up to Remus’ spot, where he sits, leaning forward and smiling at them again. He mouths along to the lyrics. “You should be dancing, yeah, dancing, yeah,” now dancing right in front of him.

Remus laughs and takes Sirius’ hands, held out in a silent invitation. He allows himself to be pulled to his feet, and at first he’s really not sure what to do, but Sirius take the lead. He spins them around and sways easily to the music, allowing Remus to mirror his movements.

It’s a huge relief for Sirius, being able to have fun and be spontaneous with Remus. The past week has been a strange one, a strained tension between them that he doesn’t understand, but it dissolves as they dance. They’re both grinning and James dances next to them, other random passing Hufflepuffs deciding to join into the fun too, until they’re created their own improvised dance party.

“My baby moves at midnight, goes right on till the dawn. My woman takes me higher, my woman keeps me warm.”

They all look ridiculous and half of them really don’t know how to dance but no one really cares.

There isn’t even a pause waiting for the next song, it begins immediately after, bursting with funk and strong boisterous beat.

“You stepped into my life, stepped into my life, stepped into my life, and I’m, oh, so happy!”

A Hufflepuff does a dance move too complex, something with arms and legs that makes him stumble over, bumping into Remus. He doesn’t seem to mind too much, but the push nudges him forward enough so that he’s suddenly much closer to Sirius than he was a moment ago, chests almost bumping.

Sirius isn’t particularly affected by this, finding the look of surprise on Remus’ face rather amusing.

“You will never know what you have done, my love. You gave me so much more my love is worthy of. Beneath my very soul I kneel before your touch. Your touch is ecstasy, close to me.”

Actually his face is rather close, Sirius realises, and they’ve both slowed their movements, just sort of looking at each other. “Remus-”

Gerry Wood, a Hufflepuff boy, interrupts them suddenly, singing obnoxiously loudly and off tune next to them, “You stepped into my life and I’m oh, so!”

The moment shatters, and Remus looks like it’s sent him reeling back to reality. His expression shifts radically. He looks… disgusted? No, that can’t be right, but he’s stopped moving to the music, having taken a step back, and Sirius isn’t sure what to think.

Remus says quickly, “Sorry, I can’t-” He doesn’t finish his sentence, only turning and pushing his way out of the small crowd they’d managed to gather.

Sirius watches him leave, unsure what to do, how to redeem whatever had just happened. He doesn’t really realise he’s stopped dancing too until James has found him again and asks lightly, “Mate, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he brushes off, “just need to piss, don’t wait up for me,” because that’s the only excuse he can think of as he goes to exit the cluster of people.

James nods, accepting this easily, and moves on to dance with a Ravenclaw girl that had somehow found herself there.

He thinks about following Remus, trying to catch up to him, ask him what the hell that was about, but he doesn’t. He could, though. Even if he couldn’t find Remus at first, he could go back to the dorms and fetch the map from James’ trunk, track the pair of footsteps carefully labelled Remus Lupin until he did.

He still isn’t going to.

Now he wonders why he even left in the first place, if not to do just that. Fuck, I don’t understand anything that happens anymore. Looking down to his watch, he decides 5 o’clock is a good time as any to get dinner, and heads to the Great Hall.

Remus is not there.

DAY SEVEN - SUNDAY

It’s not until 11 o’clock that Sirius remembers.

“Wotcher, Sirius.”

He cranes his head to see a Ravenclaw boy, Tyler Jently, advance towards him.

“Tyler,” he acknowledges casually.

Sirius is sitting in the courtyard, leaning against one of the trees. He isn’t doing anything interesting, just sitting, and watching others pass. It stopped raining the night before so he can lie comfortably on the grass without any trouble. James and Peter got up earlier than him and went off to do something or other, Sirius doesn’t remember what they said (he was still half asleep), and Remus, who knows where he is.

So, he doesn’t really mind the interruption, besides the fact that Tyler is, well, a huge dick.

“Mind if I join you?” he asks.

Yes. “No, go ahead.”

He sits next to him, crossing his legs, tucking his cloak under him. Sirius doesn’t look to him, just continues to watch the people. He wonders if maybe Tyler only wanted company, wasn’t here to ask for anything like he usually is, but that idea splinters as soon as Tyler starts, “I heard about your little service.”

What the fuck does that mean?

“What service?”

“You know,” he says slicking his hair back with one hand, “your little matchmaking thing you’re doing for that Remus bloke.”

Oh. Fuck. Sirius had completely forgotten about that.

Tyler continues, “I don’t really know how your mode of payment works, but I was thinking a three Galleons would be a fair trade.”

Sirius laughs, an empty, hard laugh, and says, “Look, mate, I’m not a fucking matchmaker, this isn’t some weird service.”

The Ravenclaw does not seem to take this well. “I’m being perfectly reasonable here, I’d even give you as much time as you need to find a bird. You’re doing it for that friend of yours-“

“And it was a one time thing.” Sirius stands, brushing off his trousers. “Go take your money somewhere else.”

He leaves Tyler sitting there, mouth gaping as if wanting to say more.

What is he supposed to do now? He isn’t even close to finding Remus a girlfriend, not even a date.

He hadn’t found anyone. Not one girl that he really thinks is a good match. Remus is already acting strangely and Sirius has the nagging feeling it’s because of him, and now he has to tell Remus he had failed. Why did I have to say ‘by the end of the week?’

“Ugh,” he sighs, rubbing his face, as he walks down the hallway. He might as well go find Remus, even if he really, really doesn’t want to have to admit to him that he hasn’t found anyone.

He worries Remus will take it the wrong way, think that no girl liked him, but really it's the opposite. Sirius could not for the life of him find a girl that he thought Remus would like, that would be good enough for him. Fuck that sounds stupid, but it’s the truth.

The Map is still his best bet to find his friend, so he decides to head back to the dorm.

Meanwhile, Remus is about four seconds away from violently damaging school property when his cauldron fizzles and pops in a way that it’s really not supposed to.

“I hate you so much,” he tells the murky brew. It only burbles in response.

He lets out a long breath and turns back to his textbook to figure out where he had gone wrong. Did I add 2 spoonfuls instead of two pinches?

This was his third try at a Shrinking Solution and at this rate he’d never get it. First thing in the morning he had come down to the Potions classroom for his allotted timeframe to practice that he’d signed up for. Complete waste of time.

Hastily vanishing the failed potion away, he gathers new material and ingredients to try again. However, when he goes to the cupboard, it is fresh out of rat spleens.

“Oh bugger,” he curses. “Bugger all of this.”

The cupboard suddenly slams itself closed, not by Remus’ hand, and it leaves him blinking in confusion. He narrows his eyes. It shakes a bit, almost in a mocking sort of way.

“Fine,” he huffs, “Be that way.”

He turns back to his workstation, going back to his potion, but when he does he sees a figure at the door. They stand there awkwardly as if they’d just been caught walking into something that they shouldn’t have.

“Um, hi.”

“Pads,” he makes an effort to sound light, hiding his surprise, “what are you doing here?”

He steps in easily, forgetting his discomfort, and says, “I was just looking for you. Wanted to talk to you about something.”

Remus shakes his head, picking up and placing down a bunch of daisy roots just for something to do. “Can it wait? I’m sort of in the middle of something right now.”

Sirius joins him anyway, standing at the opposite side of the counter. “I’m assuming from your ingredients that you’re making a Shrinking Solution but,” he peers into the cauldron, “I’m pretty sure that it isn’t meant to look like that.”

“What?” Remus looks in too. Hell, I didn’t even vanish it properly. The greenish-brown slop left over coats the sides of the pot unappealingly and lets off a small amount of curling steam. “Yes, well,” he snatches the lid from the table top and quickly covers it, “I’m working on it.”

“Alright,” Sirius shrugs, “Do you need help?”

“Uh,” he almost says yes, “No, I’m fine.”

Sirius frowns, studying his materials. “Well, seeing as you’re out of rat spleens and you can’t really make a new batch, can we talk?”

“No, I…” he begins fumbling with the daisy roots, picking out small clumps of dirt. “I still have other potions that I need to practice.”

“Do we have a quiz?” he worries.

“No, I just need to practice.”

Sirius doesn’t question it but he doesn’t look satisfied with Remus’ answer either.

Remus continues to busy himself, and begins mincing the daisy roots. His movements are a bit erratic and unpractised, sharp knife dicing impulsively. His hands tremble only slightly, but nervous energy thins his concentration and Sirius is just watching him uneasily, which only helps his anxiousness.

He nicks himself. Obviously.

“Shit,” he hisses, taking his sliced thumb into his other hand.

It’s not a serious cut but it’s bleeding fairly well, and Sirius immediately rounds the counter, coming to his aid. He takes Remus’ hands in his and examines the cut; mouth pursing somewhat in concern, and for some reason Remus lets him. Steadily retrieving his wand from within his sleeve, he gently taps it against Remus’ cut, uttering a soft, “Episkey.” It heals instantly.

“Thank you,” he says, taking his hands back slowly, keeping his eyes on them as he pulls back.

He hears Sirius sigh, sounding drained. “No problem, Moony.”

They’re standing quite close, now unnecessarily, so Remus takes a careful step back and asks, “What did you come to tell me?”

“Oh,” Sirius seems to have forgotten about it, distracted by Remus’ work and injury, “I uh…” he rubs his wand-free hand down the front of his trousers. Are his hands sweating?

“What is it?”

He shrugs, but Remus can see the tension in movements, “It’s nothing, I’ll tell you later.”

“What?”

“Yeah,” he says, “You seem pretty busy with your potions actually. I best…” He’s backing away. “Leave you to that.”

Remus doesn’t know what he wants suddenly. “Are you sure? I could-“

“Yeah, no, don’t worry about it,” he assures. “See you later, Moony.”

With a little dip of his head resonant to a tip of a hat, he slides out the door and is gone. Remus stares after him, at the door, for a few moments. Confusion is definitely one of the top feelings he’s experiencing right now but there’s an underlying bubbling of anger, or at least frustration, that begins to spill over the more he thinks about it.

What the hell was that?

Looking back to the daisy roots, he sees that parts of it are now painted with his blood, rendered useless for the potion. In a fit of rage or something he swipes all the roots off the table onto the floor. It is nowhere near violent enough to sate him, but it helps a bit, or at least forces him to realise how stupid he’s being. He sighs, staring at the small cluster mess on the floor. “What does he want from me?” he asks it.

It does nothing to respond.

As Sirius walks from the Potions classroom, he can’t think anything but fuck, that was really stupid. He still has no idea what is going on, but he definitely knows he’s done something stupid, at least. He remembers Remus cutting himself and has to wonder what that was about too. He feels like he’s missing something, something just under the surface that he should be able to see. But he can’t because he’s stupid.

“I need a cigarette,” he says to himself.

Maybe he will have one, he doesn’t have any plans, and it’s not like James would care, off doing whatever he was doing with Peter. It’s decided, and he is about to go off and get his things when someone stops him, calling, “Sirius, wait!”

He’s surprised to see Remus chasing after him, looking... a bit unhinged.

Sirius stops and replies unsurely, “Um, yeah?” but Remus does nothing to slow down, still hurtling towards him. What.

“We need to talk,” he says breathlessly as he nears him.

“Uh.”

Remus stops directly in front of him, face completely flushed, but a determined look in his eyes that only slightly worries Sirius. “And you,” he tells Sirius earnestly, “are going to shut up, for once.”

“Wha-”

“I,” Remus says, “am not a coward.”

Sirius stares at him. “I never said-”

Suddenly, Remus slaps a hand over Sirius' mouth, shutting him up. What the fuck. He looks just as surprised at this as Sirius feels, but then his mouth hardens and his eyes tighten, as if he’s just decided, yes, this is what he meant to do. Or, he was going to go with it either way.

“I am not a coward,” he repeats, “but you have been making it very hard not to be.” Sirius raises an eyebrow. Remus continues. “Or at least, this week you’ve made it very… you know what, this week has been very unpleasant.” Now he is rambling. “I can’t get my potion to work and I don’t even like dancing but you-” he stops himself.

What are you talking about? Sirius tries to express, still unable to speak.

“I…” His hand is a bit sweaty, the one covering Sirius' mouth, and really, now that he thinks about it, it’s quite gross. Remus, also realising this or by coincidence, lowers his hand, looking defeated. He turns away slightly and rubs his face agitatedly.

The hand is not on his mouth anymore, but still Sirius does not speak. This feels important, somehow.

His hands twist violently, clutching onto the hem of his shirt. “Fuck,” he mutters to himself. “You, and your stupid bloody- ugh, I…”

Sirius waits.

“Oh, hell.” He looks up directly into Sirius eyes and blurts, “I’m gay.”

Oh shit, that was not a good idea.

As soon as he says it he wants to take it back, but he won’t.

Remus had stood there, watching those stupid bloody daisy roots for what felt like a few minutes before he got himself back together. What had he been doing? What the hell is he doing? All of this fighting and strangeness was his fault. Sirius, as far as he knows, has no idea what was even going on, and Remus is a coward.

He is-

Lily was right. Not that she had said that directly, but she knew. Fuck, she knew.

So, that is why Remus had, in a fit of something between anger at himself and possibly a mild loss of his mind, chased after Sirius. He’d chased after Sirius and said it. He’d said it and he was no longer a coward but, fuck, what he wouldn’t give to understand the look on Sirius’ face right now. He’s just staring at him and Remus is gay and Sirius is just staring at him.

Then, before he can understand what’s happened, he’s being grabbed by the shoulders and there are lips on his. It is brief and too hard, their faces too suddenly forced together, but it’s a kiss. Sirius pushes off then, looking panicked, but all Remus can think is, Oh my god, Sirius Black just kissed me. Did that just happen? I’ve been poisoned and nothing is real. Oh my god.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I don’t know why I- just because you’re- I shouldn’t have assumed-“

“Sirius, please shut up,” and then it’s Remus’ turn to grab him and kiss him. He honestly has no idea what he is doing considering this is his first- wait, second kiss. This means Sirius Black is my first kiss, he thinks giddily. 

Shock wearing off, Sirius kisses him back and they are kissing each other. Sirius pulls him closer, hand going up to the nape of Remus’ neck to hold him there, simultaneously deepening their kiss, causing Remus to let out a very, very involuntary noise, which under normal circumstances would bother him to no end, but these are not normal circumstances. He is kissing Sirius Black and Sirius Black is kissing him. He moves his stiff hands from his shoulders, down to wrap around his waist and Sirius hums appreciatively.

They pull apart because, though Remus is already light-headed and he’s forgotten he needs to breathe, Sirius is evidently more practiced than him at this. Usually thoughts like that might bother him, but there is a firm hand on his neck, their faces still close together, breath mingling, and Remus feels as if virtually nothing could bother him right now. They stand together, panting faintly, (Remus realises that they are) smiling, and trying to process what just happened.

That is when they realise that they are in the middle of the hallway at a very reasonable time for anyone to just walk by and easily see them like this, and they hastily separate.

“Shit,” Sirius curses as he looks around to make sure no one else is there.

Remus straightens his shirt out and clears his throat, feeling incredibly awkward. “ I think we’re, uh, clear.”

“Um, yeah.” Sirius turns back to him. “We’re good.”

There is an uncomfortable silence as they stand there looking at each together, recognising what they’d just done and what it meant.

Remus clears his throat again and asks, “So, what did you want to tell me earlier?”

Sirius looks at him blankly, but then, remembering, says, “I didn’t find you a girl.”

They stare at each other for a moment before bursting out into laughter and they’re laughing and breathless, clutching to each other again. Remus laughs so hard he worries that he might start crying, his emotions so mixed and confused he doesn’t even know why, but then Sirius gains enough air to say, “We are so fucking ridiculous.”

Remus agrees, “Yes, we are,” and when they’ve come down from their laughter enough, Sirius is looking at him again, differently this time. He’s looking at him like… Remus isn’t sure how to explain, but he feels his lips part unconsciously and Sirius leans forwards again. He kisses him softly, as if making sure it was okay, making sure Remus had not changed his mind, that it wasn’t a one-time thing. Remus kisses him back.

Then they really have to pull apart because this time because there is distant muffled laughter and nearing steps around the corner of the corridor, and once again they realise that there are, in fact, other people in the castle.

Stepping back and looking down to his watch (which he’d forgotten to put on that day), Remus says, “We should probably get going.”

“Yeah, good idea,” Sirius agrees.

And with that they decided to walk back to the common room together, hands just brushing, but not daring to touch.

They have just reached the portrait hole when Sirius stops him suddenly and says, “Fuck, we forgot about something, haven’t we?”

“What?” Remus asks curiously.

“The house elves, we told Roory we’d all have dinner in the kitchens this weekend,” Sirius reminds him, and Remus thinks if they were alone, he would kiss him again.

“Master James, will you be wanting another glass of pumpkin juice?” asks a small house elf, holding up a large pitcher almost her size.

James wipes his mouth hastily and says heartily, “Yes I will, thank you, Binky.” The house elf lifts the jug above her head to reach and pour some into his glass.

All four Marauders sit together, huddled at one of the small kitchen tables the house elves were able to provide. Something, besides their location, is different, though. Instead of their regular seating of James and Sirius on one side and Peter and Remus across from them, this time Sirius and Remus sit closely together on one side, leaving James and Peter on the other.

No one notices, or at least, if they do, they don’t say anything.