Chapter 2
The first two weeks of school passed without incident. Remus was taking more classes than James, Sirius, and Peter and, as a result, had been spending a lot of time in the library. James and Sirius had taken to gallivanting around the halls and doing who knows what in their freetime. Peter hung around the common room or sat in the library, reading, with Remus. No one had gotten detention yet.
Remus was busy looking up the various uses of mugwort for a potions essay when James slammed his bag down on top of Remus’ book, spilling his inkwell in the process.
“Can you believe the absolute nerve of Snivillus, Moony?” he said, oblivious to the slow destruction of Remus’ almost finished essay. “I was in the hallway with Peter, minding my own business, not even looking at him and Evans as they walked by, and he decided to hex my bag and make it grow legs!” James’ bag gave a little wiggle, as if to help emphasize the drama. James smacked it.
“Mm,” Remus said, too focused on drying his essay and getting the ink back in the inkwell to give a proper response. James was too busy ranting to notice.
“It wasn’t even a proper hex, my bag only grew three legs. And Evans was upset he might get detention for it, they ran off before I could get him back. Why she hangs out with him still I’ve no clue,” James paused, this time expecting a real response from Remus.
“Right,” Remus said, flipping back to the page on Mugwort and preparing to begin writing again.
“Were you listening?” James asked.
“Snape cursed you in front of Lily and ran before you could get him back. Have you considered that it might look better in Lily’s eyes if you didn’t get him back?” Remus said, jotting down a couple bullet points.
“What do you mean?” James asked, sitting on the table so he could see Remus.
“I mean, it will make you look like the innocent victim of Snape’s attack if you just leave him be.” Remus put his quill down and looked back at James.
“But then—”
“—Lily will be angry at Snape for attacking you. She’s expecting you to retaliate like you always do. It’s what makes her think you’re immature. If you don’t, it makes you look more mature than Snape,” Remus explained.
“I am more mature than Snape,” James said.
“You’re more mature than Snape,” Remus agreed. James frowned.
“How do you know all this?” he asked after a couple seconds.
“Unlike you, I get along quite well with Lily. We studied together for exams last year,” Remus said, returning to his essay.
“I thought you were in a study group.”
“I was.”
“But you just said—”
“She was in the group with me, Prongs. Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to finish my essay before tomorrow.”
:
James told Sirius and Peter what Remus had suggested and they both agreed not to do anything to Snape as well. Peter had met up with Bertha Jorkins a few more times but he always seemed disappointed when he got back to the dormitory. He wouldn’t talk about it, not even to Remus.
Sirius was also acting oddly when it came to girls. Usually he flirted shamelessly and encouraged rumors of all sorts, but he had become quite reserved whenever the subject was brought up. Remus assumed he must have a crush on someone and was too embarrassed to actually admit it to any of them.
Remus’ own adventures with relationships were, of course, non-existent. Apart from the constant fear that any girl he dated would eventually find out what he was and hate him for it, Remus simply didn’t think any girls had noticed him. James and Sirius always insisted he was wrong whenever he mentioned this but he never believed them. He wasn’t particularly handsome and he had the social skills of a dead salamander. He’d been told more than once that he looked too intimidating to approach. He figured the only things he had going for him were his height and his smarts. Sirius insisted that girls were into tall, smart guys. Remus wasn’t too concerned about it, though he figured he should at least have kissed someone before leaving school. He mentioned this when they were having another conversation about the likelihood of James and Lily getting together this year.
“It just seems like a kind of landmark in your life, you know?” he said. They were in the hospital wing. It had been two nights since the full moon but Madam Promfrey had insisted on keeping him in the hospital wing another night. James, Sirius, and Peter were sitting beside his bed eating the candy they had brought Remus.
“Yeah, it is, I guess,” Peter said. As far as Remus knew, he was the only one of them to have been in a relationship. If that’s what you could call what he did with Bertha. Apparently all they did was snog.
“You’re the only one who’s done it, Wormy. Unless all those rumors about Sirius are true,” James said, laughing and nudging Sirius with his shoulder. Sirius gave him a tight smile but didn’t say anything. James didn’t appear to notice. “I want my first kiss to be with Lily. Outside by the lake. On a really clear night so you can see all the stars and—” James paused, stopping himself before he said ‘the moon’ “—um, everything,” he finished slightly lamely. Peter nodded.
“That sounds really romantic,” Peter said, his voice tinged with jealousy.
“What about you, Remus? Where’d you like to have your first kiss?” James asked. Remus saw Sirius twitch out the corner of his eye.
“I hadn’t thought about where I’d like to have mine. I think it would depend on who I was kissing,” he said. James nodded sagely. Sirius twitched again and Remus glanced at him. All of a sudden the image of Sirius from the first night came back. Remus was shocked at how well he remembered the details after nearly a month. The muscles pulled tight as he raised his arms. The curve of his exposed hip. The pale skin and faint scars his mother had given him. The way his hair had parted around his neck, covering the sides but letting the small smattering of freckles on the back of his neck show. Remus dragged his eyes away from Sirius before he could catch him staring. He picked at the patchwork of the quilt Madam Promfrey always gave him and let James and Peter lead the conversation into a different area.
This was not the first time the image of a shirtless Sirius had entered Remus’ mind. It would happen at the most unexpected and unwelcome times. Sirius would pull his hair back while they were studying or give Remus one of his extraordinary smiles during transfiguration and Remus would turn into a blushing mess. Worst of all, it would happen when Sirius wasn’t even in the room. He would be studying on his own or eating an early breakfast with Lily and there it was, that perfect image. Remus had done his best to avoid being in the dormitory when Sirius was changing. Or, if he couldn’t help it, to look literally anywhere except at Sirius.
Of course, Remus knew what being gay was. He knew there were a few gay couples at Hogwarts. Lily’s friends Marlene Mckinnon and Dorcas Meadows, for example. But, the thing was, he wasn’t gay. He’d never thought about a guy the way he had thought about a girl. Though, now that he actually thought about it, he’d never thought about a girl specifically. Just the concept of one being there when he had his first kiss. Maybe that was a telling thing. Maybe it was like that for everybody. But whatever it was, it couldn’t happen with Sirius.
Sirius was one of his best friends. Remus couldn’t ruin that with whatever this new thing was. If he wanted to figure this out—which he wasn’t even sure if he did—it couldn’t be with Sirius. Maybe he could talk to Marlene and Dorcas and see if they could help him. Then again, maybe this was some weird phase that would pass in a couple weeks. Remus really hoped it was the latter.