way to start your first day
Sirius knew his brother often kept an eye on him. He wasn’t exactly subtle with it. A bat flying over the courtyard of his school, a lad sitting on a roof, watching him and James from afar, or just straight up lurking in the shadows. It kind of pissed him off, but he had gotten used to it by now. Besides, he couldn’t really do anything to him, except if he maybe wanted the public humiliation of getting beat up by his older brother. Sirius knew he was a lot stronger than him, so he wasn’t really afraid of Regulus. Not for another year, at least. The man never broke his word. He’d have to come up with a solution to keep James safe from his hands -or rather, fangs- before their time ran out.
“Would you look at that!”, James said drawn to a poster in the hallway as if he were magnetised by it. Sirius followed him to see what was up. It wasn’t some cheery poster to announce the next play from the theatre club or a concert from band club or even the results of another lacrosse match their school undoubtedly lost again. It was much worse than that. Now that Sirius had seen that one, he noticed the entire school was plastered with copies of the same police report. They served as a warning.
“Five people were murdered…”, James muttered as he read the text.
“Holy shit”, Sirius said as if he hadn’t seen, and caused, much worse in his past. He read the poster for himself. They hadn’t found the culprit, but all the killings happened in the forest that surrounded the city. The only pictures that were included avoided the actual crime scenes so much in a way that just spoiled it couldn’t have been pretty. Sirius had seen murder cases like this before, and if they wanted to warn the public, they at least added some pictures of an arm or a leg of the victim, faced away from the actual gruesome wounds. If Sirius actually had a heartbeat, it would have skipped one as he realised this killer probably just didn’t leave much of the bodies for the police to photograph.
When class began there were two announcements made: no one was to enter the forest without police supervision; and they had a new student.
“Way to start your first day…”, James whispered to Sirius.
The lad introduced himself as Remus Lupin. He seemed a tad nervous, but it was hard to tell if it was because of the bloody murders, anxiety for his new school, or both. Both seemed the most reasonable.
Remus sat down on an empty seat behind Sirius and James. Sirius took in a good whiff, old vampire habit of him to judge if the human’s blood smelled any good, and found himself not smelling anything. Strange. Maybe his brother was right, and he was losing his mind. He did manage to keep himself in check surrounded by human students every day, after all. Maybe it was just because he had a healthy blood bank diet now, and new human blood didn’t smell as tantalising as it used to.
Sirius turned around to take a better look at the newbie. “I’m Sirius”, he introduced himself while shaking his hand over his desk.
“Remus”, the boy repeated. He had scars on his face which he tried to cover in make-up, but Sirius could still see the change of texture. “Nice to meet you, Sirius…?? How?.”
“Potter.” He shoved James. “This twat is my brother”, he explained. It was true. Somewhere along the years of friendship with James, he managed to convince his mother to adopt him.
“Really?”, Remus asked. He frowned. “You look nothing alike.”
It was true. Sirius had his long black hair, sharp face and sickly pale skin. Grey contacts hid his red eyes. James was tanned like someone who didn’t leave the sunlight once and his round face was crowned by dark brown hair. Behind his big round glasses, his eyes had a very natural shade of brown.
“He was adopted”, Sirius said about James.
“Hey, what the fuck?”, James called out. “It’s the other way around, trust me”, he quickly said to Remus. “Lily, tell him it’s true”, he then begged of the redhead who sat next to him.
Lily barely looked up from what she was doodling in the margin of her notes. “No, he’s lying”, she smiled.
“Lily! You traitor!”, James cried out.
Then Remus leaned in closer to her. “Are those two always… like that?”, he whispered.
“They’re usually even worse. You better get used to it.”
At lunch, Lily had convinced the new guy to sit with them. He agreed but he didn’t eat, claiming to be on some sort of diet.
“You’re as skinny as a twig”, Sirius remarked. “The fuck kind of diet do you need to be on?”
“Sirius!”, Lily called out before Remus even got the chance to answer. “You can’t ask people questions like that. I’m so sorry Remus…”
“Thank you, Lily”, Remus said. “If you must know, I’ve had some problems with my health lately, so my nutrionist prescribed me a strict diet”, he begrudgingly explained before he pulled some book out of his backpack, probably just so he had something on the table in front of him instead of a plate. Honestly, Sirius wished he had thought of that excuse sooner. He had been forcing himself to eat human food for nothing.
James peered at Sirius’ tray. “You know what I’m gonna ask”, he mused as he leaned closer. Sirius sighed and with the back of his hands launched his chunk of garlic bread to land in James’ plate. “Thanks mate.”
“Next time you give that to me”, Lily demanded. “That garlic bread is heavenly. It’s unfair if James gets to get it all.”
“Find your own friend with a garlic allergy”, James said with his mouth full of bread. “So?”, he then asked Remus. “Any ambitions to join a club here?”
“I was actually hoping to make the lacrosse team”, Remus said. “I enjoyed that at my previous school.”
“Trust me. You do not want to join that band of losers. They haven’t won a single match since the school was founded”, James slightly exaggerated.
“And if you do want to join, they would basically let in anyone who isn’t completely crippled by now”, Sirius added.
“I think I’ll pass”, Remus reconsidered.
“Join book club”, Lily suggested peering down at his novel. “These two idiots won’t bother you there.”
“Or join chess”, James said. “Then it’s fun for the whole family.”
“I’ll see what I do later”, Remus decided. Then he looked at his book for a while, read a few lines while the rest was eating, and looked back up with a question on his mind. “Is that really true about the murders?”, he asked rightfully worried.
“You just got here”, Sirius noted. “Are you going to flee the city again if it is?”
“They’re not gonna massacre the same place twice”, Remus brushed off. “But still, isn’t it a at least a bit scary that that murderer is still out and about?” He looked a bit nervous, but Sirius hadn’t really seen him relax yet, and then he looked Sirius straight in the eye. “He could be anywhere”, he said. “It could be one of you, for all I know.”
Sirius caught himself breathing heavier. He didn’t even need to breathe when he wasn’t talking or smelling anything, but he had learned to fake it so James wouldn’t notice he was practically dead. Was this newcomer onto him?, he asked himself. Did he know about his past so soon after meeting him? It wasn’t possible, and if it was, Remus wasn’t who he pretended to be. He would have had to do a lot of research to notice something about Sirius’ backstory wasn’t entirely right. Maybe he was a vampire hunter, Sirius feared for a second, but then he would have just spat his garlic bread out in his face to expose him and called it a day, not pretended to be on some weird diet. It would explain the smell though. Sirius wouldn’t be surprised if the hunters had come up with a way to mask the scent of their own blood. They had been around for as long as he could remember, and science kept moving forward.
“Why do you immediately assume they’re a he?”, Lily asked.
“You’ve got something to tell us, Lily?”, James asked jokingly.
“She’s a feminist, not a murderer”, Sirius defended. “And it’s probably some old, antisocial creep with mental issues anyways. I doubt ‘they’ are a student here.”
“Yes, you’re probably right”, Remus said, seemingly reassured. He finished another page of his book before he asked: “Sirius, would you mind showing me where the bathroom is again. I got a tour of the school but I’m afraid I forgot.”
“Yeah, sure mate. No problem”, Sirius said as he got up, abandoning the rest of his food. “I need to go as well anyways.”
The hallways were as good as empty since everyone was still at the cafeteria. On their way to the bathroom they talked about the school and extracurriculars. When they got to the bathroom, Remus looked around at the different empty stalls, nervously again, and when he had seen enough he slammed Sirius against the wall.
“Hey, what the fuck!”, he yelped as his face hit the cold tiles. “What the hell is your problem?!”, he demanded. His position was most uncomfortable and he was a bit afraid the newcomer might try and take advantage of him. The halls and the bathroom stalls were empty. No one would hear him scream for help.
“Shut up!”, Remus groaned, vowels stretched out.
“Let go of me, creep”, Sirius demanded as he tried to wriggle out of his grip.
“And let you bite me?”, Remus asked close to his face, which was still very securely pressed against the disgusting tile wall. “That’s right. I know what you are”, he claimed. “What the hell is your plan here? Your kind is not supposed to be in schools.”
Sirius was so screwed. If this kid wasn’t a vampire hunter, he probably had parents who were and taught him everything of the trade. He felt himself breathe strangely again. “What are you going to do to me now, hunter?”, he asked with a shaky voice, way more afraid than he should have been. He was a really strong vampire, goddamnit. He should have been able to break free out of this human’s grip with ease, yet he couldn’t even move his head. It was a wise choice of Remus to secure him like this, because his fangs were out by now, albeit not to drink blood, but for self-defence.
“You’re quite good at this whole play-pretend”, Remus hissed in his ear. “Acting all scared like your breath is hitching, but you don’t even have a heartbeat. So tell me honestly, bloodsucker, how many of those murders were yours?”
What?
“That’s not the work of a vampire”, Sirius said offended. “If you knew anything about us, you’d know that! Now let me go.”
“Then who did it?!”, Remus screamed before pressing him even harder against the wall.
“Fuck if I know, mate! I’m just a student here. I don’t really bother with killings anymore…”
Remus heaved, gusts of warm air loudly leaving his nostrils as he angrily let Sirius go, or better said: threw him away from the wall. He then kicked one of the doors from the bathroom stalls so hard that it loudly turned on its hinges to hit the stall with a bang, screamed to let some more of his anger out and grabbed his own head, tugging at his hair. Sirius watched his entire breakdown while he stood frozen in fear in the corner of the room. He didn’t dare to move. “Dude, what is your problem?”, he asked carefully, as if not to startle him.
“The problem is…”, he said while nervously scratching behind his ear, “if you or your vampire friends didn’t do at least some of those killings…”, he crunched his face to shake a thought, “…chances are I did them all.”
What. The. Fuck.
Sirius’ muscles still didn’t allow him to move, as he stood there tense as ever, but he wanted nothing more than to run away from this boy as quickly as possible before the psycho made him into victim number six.
“Hey, I didn’t want to!”, Remus defended himself as he read the fear in Sirius’ eyes. “It was a full moon last night and I don’t know this place.”
“…full moon?”, Sirius repeated confused. Then it all dawned in on him, the smell, the strength, the rage, the him knowing what he was… He wasn’t the only supernatural creature in his class anymore. Remus Lupin was a werewolf.
Remus frowned. “You didn’t know?”, he asked.
“How the hell should I have known? I honestly never even believed werewolves really existed.”
“Is that because you were adopted? Did your family never teach you how to recognise us?”
“That only happened very recently. I’ve had a vampire family for well over 12 hundred years, you know? They still stalk me sometimes. I’m surprised my biological brother didn’t interrupt any of this.”
“Oh, right… I forgot how old you could be. Do any of your friends know?”, Remus asked.
“Of course not.”
“So we’re just gonna… go back and pretend nothing happened here?”
“Depends… Are you going to murder any of us?”, Sirius asked.
“Not without a full moon anyway.”