Lupus is Latin for wolf
Mary celebrated being thirteen with a party in our dorm room. She invited all of the girls and unfortunately couldn’t invite any boys. Marlene was heartbroken by this. Quite a lot of people showed up, we raided the kitchen for as much food as we could carry. Marlene even invited a few girls from Ravenclaw, including a girl named Dorcus, who she spent the whole night talking to.
Mary was glowing as the center of attention, I didn’t know a person could love making small talks with a bunch of people they barely knew but here she was living it up.
We gave Mary our gift (a bunch of fancy makeup and accessories) earlier in the day so she could simply party. I spent the night talking to Lily.
“So… there’s a full moon on Tuesday.” I smiled.
“Absolutely no, I am not listening to that again!” Lily argued.
“It’s not like we even saw the wolf! We just heard it. Plus we’ll be so high up that the wolf can’t hurt us.” I defended.
“I don’t care about it hurting us it’s just. That man is living through the worst day of his or her life! We shouldn’t use it as entertainment.” She sighed. I took in her words. I knew the screaming sounded painful, it was just so fascinating. I had never seen a werewolf or even heard of them in society. Wizards outcasted them even though they were human 97% of the year.
“Ok, we don’t have to go see the full moon. It does seem wrong.” I acknowledged.
“Good.”
“I think Marlene is swapping us out for Dorcus.” I smiled nodding to Marlene and Dorcus sitting on Marlene’s bed laughing.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen her smile that wide.” Lily said in awe.
“Do you think it’s a fake smile?” I asked.
“No it looks real.” I saw.
“Wow.”
“Indeed.”
* * *
On Tuesday evening (or the full moons evening) Lily and I were in the common room writing our papers for Binns class. The boys came down and without saying anything, Remus left the tower.
“Where’s he going?” I asked.
“Hospital wing.” Sirius said quickly. Almost too quickly.
“Oh no, is he ok?” Lily asked concerned.
“He’s fine he’s just been feeling light headed. He tried some advanced magic upstairs and it completely wiped him.” James lied. James was a pretty good liar, I’ll admit. Anyone who didn’t know him would definitely believed him. But I knew everything about James, I knew he was lying. Luckily for me, I didn’t have to pester him, Lily did it for me.
“What spell?” She asked.
“Accio.” Sirius grinned. “It’s when you try to summon something.”
“Gee thanks, I never would’ve gotten that.” Lily replied sarcastically. “I think I’ll finish this upstairs, coming Hazel?”
“In a second.” I said, “I just have to go check my potion real quick!” I ran out the portrait door before anyone could stop me. This was the second full moon in a row that Remus was mysteriously absent. That couldn’t be a coincidence.
I still couldn’t believe that Remus could actually be a werewolf. It wasn’t likely, this would only confirm that he wasn’t a werewolf.
I ran to the astrology tower with two things on my mind. 1) I got to stop running places and 2) I should’ve brought the cloak. And of course 3) there is no possible way that Remus Lupin could be a werewolf and this would only prove that he did in fact get light headed from magic.
When I got to the astrology tower I realized I wasn’t as out of breath as I normally was. Maybe I was actually getting better at running. Yay!
I looked out of the astrology tower. There were no screams yet which meant the werewolf wasn’t out. I looked around at the grounds. If Remus was a werewolf they wouldn’t let him transform in the castle would they? He could hurt people.
After awhile of waiting I saw three people walking the grounds: Mcgonagal, Madam Pomfry, and Remus! They were walking to the wimping willow! This couldn’t be real, could it? Could Remus Lupin actually be a werewolf? No way, no possible way.
But there he was, in the center of the two women walking to a tree. He was thin, sweaty, and scared. Could he really be a werewolf?
I watched him enter a passageway in the tree. I figured it wouldn’t be long until the screaming started. The tree must lead to the shrieking shack.
“Hazel.” I jumped and turned around me. Nothing was there. Did I imagine the voice? No, James took off the cloak.
“Is it true?” I turned back to the tree.
“Is what true? He asked like an idiot.
“It all started on Lily’s birthday when we heard the screams. Snape said it was ghosts but ghosts don’t sound like that. These screams were alive and so I kept coming back, but the screams only came on the full moon so we decided it was a werewolf. I thought the werewolf lived at Hogsmeade because that’s were the shack is, it’s on the edge of Hogsmeade. However that shack is also on the edge of Hogwarts, it’s right in the middle. And then this year I started coming here on the full moons and every time I went back to the common room Remus happened to be missing. And now he’s just walked right into that tree so it is true that the werewolf that goes to the shrieking shack is actually Remus?!” I told him mostly in one breath. I didn’t feel scared or anything, mainly confused. It’s not everyday you learn that your friend is a wolf 3% of the year.
James listened to my every word. We both knew I was had way too much proof for him to deny anything.
“Yes.” He answered. “Remus is a werewolf.”
“That is both weirdly cool and very very bizarre.” I breathed not knowing what to do with this information. Then I remembered what Lily said: this must be horrible and extremely painful for Remus. It’s like he lives the worst day of his life every single month. “How do we help him?”
“We’re trying to think of things but we’d just danger ourselves if we tried on the full moon. We’ve been trying to come up with remedies to help him for after but nothing so far.” James looked defeated.
“Well.. now you got my help. And mum! she was a great healer we can ask her for help.” I smiled.
“You’re not freaked out and scared?” James asked.
“Maybe a little, but I’d rather help my friend then panic.” I decided.
“Me too.” James agreed. “The only other people that know are Sirius and Peter and Remus kinda freaked when he found out we knew so maybe wait a little bit.”
“Got it.” I nodded and the two of us used the cloak to travel back to the Gryffindor tower.