Chapter IV
It had been already two months and Peter would not stop parading his new quill around. He got it for Christmas and it had been actually pretty amazing at the beginning, Sirius had to admit that. It was big and bright red and it could magically correct any spelling mistakes, it was a bloody wonderful quill. But Peter wouldn’t stop trying to write down everything, and that means, everything down.
“You don’t have to write down every single idea I have, you know?” James let himself drop onto his bed, grabbing a pillow to hang on to as he stared at the ceiling.
“But what if you get a good one?” The red feather still dancing around as the tip scratched against the parchment.
“Then you can write that down, I guess”
“What’s the point of this?” Sirius let out a big sigh still sitting at the foot of his bed, annoyed by this whole situation already. “He doesn’t even want a party, he doesn’t even like us all that much, probably.”
“He doesn’t like you all that much.” Said Peter, finally forgetting about the stupid quill.
“Yeah, Remus and I are good friends, actually.” This time it was James, clearly still inside his own head.
“And he does like my quill” Added Peter.
“Well, I’m bloody sorry for not caring then.” Sirius groaned “What if we just say happy birthday and give him a chocolate frog and forget about it? It’s not like being twelve is a big thing, anyways.”
And it wasn’t, Sirius had learned that being twelve is actually not different from being eleven.
“It was when it was your birthday.” Said James, dryly.
“That was ages ago!”
“What was ages ago?”
Remus walked quietly towards his bed and sat down, barely looking at either of them.
“How’s your mum?” James asked him, conveniently changing the topic.
“What?- Oh yeah, she’s alright.”
Interesting, alright.
Sirius studied Remus’ face for a moment. He looked tired, almost like he hadn’t slept for days, he had bags under his eyes and he looked skinnier than usual. His movements were slow, like he was hurting.
“What’cha looking at?” Remus had caught him staring and Sirius felt himself cringe.
“We’re thinking about what to do for your birthday.” He said.
He could hear James and Peter calling him names for spoiling their plans but he didn’t care.
“My birthday?” He turned his gaze, from Sirius, to Peter and then finally, his eyes landed on James. “That’s not for another ten days. I’m not even sure I want to do anything at all.”
“What do you usually do on your birthdays?” asked James’ curious voice.
“Well, I don’t actually celebrate my birthdays.”
“What? You don’t?” Peter seemed dumbstruck, like he had never heard something so utterly shocking as that.
“I mean, sometimes mum bakes me a pie and she sings happy birthday to me but other than that it’s just like any other day I-”
“You don’t even go outside to play with your friends or somethin’?” Peter was raising his eyebrows so high you could barely see them through his blond fringe of hair. “You gotta be kiddin”
“I don’t really have any friends, Peter.” Remus shyly turned around, Sirius could see him putting the wall back up again. He walked straight to his bed and closed the curtains around himself.
“You have us now.” James could only hope Remus heard his words through the thick barrier of cloth.
On the eve of Remus Lupin’s twelfth birthday, both James and Sirius got detention. It wasn’t even their fault. That Slytherin git, Severus Snape had told the Hufflepuff prefect, a blonde girl whose name Sirius can’t remember that he had tripped him on their way to class and James had laughed at him. It technically wasn’t a lie, but in Sirius’ defense, Snivellus had looked at him funny and he definitely whispered something to Avery before laughing smugly, the bloody bastard.
Snape had then called him a savage and whined all the way to professor McGonagall’s office, who said James and Sirius would have detention on Friday evening to reflect on their behaviour. The problem? Remus’ birthday happened to be that Friday, and Peter, James and Sirius had their evening already planned out.
James' idea of a great evening involved sweets and fizzy drinks, maybe a couple of games of gobstones. Sirius, who had read Hogwarts: A History, remembered a thing or two about the kitchens and they had dedicated their whole Wednesday evening to figure out where the entrance to the kitchen was.
They failed, but they came up with a foolproof plan. They would ask for food during dinner and then hide it under their robes so they could sneak it into their dorm. Maybe they would even ask for a cake. Yeah, it was all ruined now. Thanks to Snivellus Snape.
“He’s such a baby” Sirius polished yet another trophy. “A bloody rat, that’s what he is.”
James was silent, had been the whole night.
“You reckon Lupin will forgive us?” He muttered, clearly that’s what James had been moping about and Sirius decided it was time to just spill it out before the air started to reek of guilt and mopiness.
“I don’t know.”
“Well, he ought to understand it.” Sirius decided, “It was actually Snevillus’ fault.”
“Why do you think he has no friends?” Asked James, and Sirius was taken aback. It wasn’t like James to encourage Sirius’ suspicions about Remus, perhaps he had no idea he was doing it in the first place. But Sirius’ could see his friend’s big brown eyes full of honest curiosity, so naturally, he began to answer his question.
“He’s not exactly friendly.” He paused, half expecting James to jump in Lupin’s defense. “Honestly it’s like he wants to shut everyone down before they have the chance to know him, like, really know him.” He polished harder this time.
“- Look, I’m not saying I want to know him or anything cause he already made it clear that we’re not ever gonna be the best of friends, but he seems like he’s always hiding something and he’s always avoiding us outside of our dorm. Merlin knows where he’s always hiding. He says he has no friends and I think it’s mainly cause you know, he’s a weirdo. But don’t tell him I told you that-”
“Alright, yeah.” James muttered, not really paying much attention to Sirius’ words. “You really think he’s lying?”
Sirius stopped his words and locked eyes with James for a few seconds, not really knowing what to say.
“Lying?”
“About his mum.”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
In between words, Sirius could read James’ worry, sadness and genuine confusion. It wasn’t like they had known Remus for a long time, but James and Peter seemed both very determined to be friends with him for whatever reason Sirius had yet to understand. Maybe they just found it sad that he had no friends. Maybe that’s the same thing they thought about him and the thought made him feel nauseous.
“Maybe he’s the one that’s sick. I don’t know.”
“Why would you say that?” James’ voice was harsh now, and his eyes looked fiery.
“I didn’t mean it in a bad way.”
“Oh, alright.” His brown eyes softened and without any further comments went back to polishing trophies once again.
They spent the rest of the night in silence, at the trophy room all the way to their dorm. James would occasionally glance at Sirius, his eyes going from angry to sad and everything in between. Sirius couldn’t help but to feel self conscious and he wondered for a moment what would Dolohov think about Remus and if he would also look at him the way James did back at the trophy room.
Maybe he’s just faking it all, maybe he doesn’t even have a mother. Said Dolohov’s voice inside his head. Maybe he’s just a freak.
He tried to push the voice away as he undressed himself ready to fall asleep, James was already hidden under his covers and Peter was softly snoring. Remus was still awake, gazing at the moon sitting on the windowsill.
Sirius walked slowly towards him and sat on the bedside table next to the other boy, who barely paid him any attention.
“Happy Birthday.”
“Thanks.”
“I didn’t have any friends before Hogwarts either.” He caught himself saying. It wasn’t a lie, not really.
Remus scoffed, still looking at the moon.
“I thought James had said you used to be friends with some Slytherin kids.”
“I don’t know.” He muttered, more to himself. “I don’t think I even know what friendship is.”
Remus stayed quiet.
Sirius remembered his conversations with Avery and Dolohov, he only talked to them every now and then, whenever their parents happened to be in the same place. He thought about Peter’s comment about playing with your friends on your birthdays and how not doing so seemed to be a criminal offence, a criminal offence he was guilty of. He didn’t think he knew anything about them, not like he knew how James’ dream was to be the youngest quidditch player to win the Quidditch World Cup or how Peter would eat his weight in chocolate frogs just to get the collectible cards he’s missing. He definitely never had the urge to ask them about their ill mother’s or why they liked staring at the moon.
“Neither do I” said Remus, with his eyes never moving from the sky.