they sprinkled moon dust in your hair of gold
The next day, nothing had changed, and yet nothing had stayed the same.
They continued on the same as they always had, but Remus had an unmistakable feeling of being weightless.
For the first time since he could remember, he felt as if every worry in the world had simply dissipated into the atmosphere, never to burden him again.
Whenever he looked over at Sirius, he could tell that the older boy felt the same way.
It doesn’t last very long, because of course Sirius Black is incapable of staying in one place. Physically, emotionally, and probably even metaphysically.
So really, Remus isn’t entirely surprised when Sirius’s look of enlightenment quickly turns to one of mischief.
After the last 5 years, Remus and Peter can recognize the look on James or Sirius’ faces with a single glance in their direction. He nudges Peter’s foot with his own, and nods his head over towards the table beside them, where Sirius has started whispering conspiringly with James.
Peter sighs heavily and rolls his eyes before muttering, “Whatever it is, I don’t want to be involved.”
“Too right, Wormy. Seems as if you and I are too preoccupied to engage in any extracurriculars at the moment.”
“What should the excuse be? You’re tutoring me, maybe?”
“It’s believable, but probably too obvious-”
“Gentlemen!” Slughorn’s voice comes booming towards them. “Do you care to share with the class, or is this a conversation that can wait for later?” He asks with a scowl.
“Sorry, Professor.” They mumble in unison.
“Very well.” Slughorn nods, “Care to explain the importance of slicing mandrake leaves, rather than chopping them, Mr. Lupin?”
Remus sighs quietly before giving the best answer he’s capable of. Bloody potions.
Later, when they’re back in their dorms for the evening, James and Sirius divulge their “ingenious” idea, which pretty well amounts to “prank the Slytherins”.
“Buck up lads, it’s been forever since we’ve pulled one over on those greasy gits!” James exclaims upon seeing the disinterest on Remus and Peter's faces.
“If it’s already been forever then it can wait a bit longer. Peter and I are on a timeframe to finish this assignment.” Remus says with finality.
But Sirius fucking Black can never let sleeping dogs lay. “Mooooony, c’mon.” He whines with a pleading look.
“I thought you and Reg were on good terms.” He says with a raised eyebrow, “Why would you want to compromise that by pranking him?”
“Merlin, Moons, it’ll just be itching powder between their sheets, maybe some exploding snaps under their pillows. Up keep!” He tries to convince. “I’ll leave Reggie’s bed alone.”
Remus turns his back away from Sirius and continues to proof-read Peter’s essay for Charms. He sighs as Sirius and James continue to plead with them; he should know by now that they won’t relent, regardless of how busy he says he is.
He closes his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose, “You know the moon’s tomorrow, lads. I’m really not up for it.”
He hates playing that card, he knows it makes them feel like absolute prats, but well… sometimes they are.
As they stumble over each other with apologies, he looks over at Peter pleadingly.
Peter gives him a small nod before saying, “Alright you wankers, I’ll help, but only if Moony can stay here to read my essay.”
“Of course!” James is quick to agree.
“Let’s go get our shit and make it happen!” Sirius whoops.
“Have fun!” Remus calls out to Peter. He’s greeted with a scathing look, along with a,“Not bloody likely.”
Remus chuckles lightly to himself, figuring this means they’re even when it comes to favours, and keeps reading the essay.
If you asked Peter to explain how his mind processes information while he’s in his animagus form, he wouldn’t have a fucking clue what to tell you. He doesn’t have the same level of understanding as he does normally, but he still has more control over his thoughts and actions than an actual rat does. Or well, he’s fairly sure, but there’s probably not a solid way to test that.
What he does now know concretely is that even as Wormtail, he can understand when the killing curse is being cast.
He scrambles around the floor of the fifth year Slytherin’s dormitory, trying to get under the bed of the only Slytherin who seems to have left the common room since Peter was last able to see the map
- one Bartimus Crouch Jr.
He has never in his life wanted to kill James Potter or Sirius Black more than he does at this moment.
‘They’re all in the common room!’ They said, ‘Nothing to worry about.’ They said.
As Peter tries to scurry under the bed to avoid whatever “pest elimination” curse Barty seems to have switched to, he thinks enviously of James and Sirius, huddled together, safely, under the invisibility cloak. Decidedly not risking their fucking lives to set stink bombs in people’s chests.
After a few more minutes of what one could call a “cat and mouse” game, Barty manages to grab Wormtail by said tail. Peter panics and does the only thing he can think of.
“What the absolute fuck, Pettigrew!” Barty exclaims as he goes from holding a tiny rat to having a full sized Peter Pettigrew standing all too close to him.
“I - um.” Shit. Fucking shit. Peter wasn’t a great conversationalist on the best of days, but now, when he’d just inadvertently given a very dangerous piece of information to a very untrustworthy individual, he feels particularly tongue tied.
“What are you doing here?” Barty demands, looking a bit shaken. Peter knows the feeling.
He opens up his mouth to try again with a response, but Barty waves him off.
“Actually, I don’t fucking care. I’m sure you’d just ramble on about one dull, unimaginative, prank or another.”
Peter decides that the small noise of protest he hears was something that he imagined, and not James and Sirius making their presence known.
“What the fuck was that? Are there more of you somewhere?” Barty asks, sounding closer and closer to becoming fully enraged.
“I think you’re maybe imagining things there, Bartimus.” Peter applauds himself mentally for managing to keep his cool this time.
“Don’t fucking call me that, Pettigrew.” He bites out.
“Okay, look,” Peter takes a deep, stabilising breath before continuing, “We both know that I’m here for a bloody stupid reason, but no damage has been done, so let’s keep it that way.”
“What are you talking about?” Barty says through gritted teeth.
“You don’t tell anybody, not a single soul, about the whole rat thing, and I won’t tell anybody about the bloody muggle magazines under your bed, understand? We both just forget this entire ordeal ever happened.”
“So what?” The younger boy spits out, “I don’t out you as an illegal animagus and you -”
“Won’t out you as a fag.” Peter nods in assent.
“Don’t fucking call me that.” Barty growls, shoving at Peter.
He hadn’t realised until he was stumbling backwards that neither of them had stepped back to create space between them since he’d transformed back, they’d practically been chest to chest.
“Go back to your little rat pack before the rest of my dormmates come upstairs and hex you to death.” He hisses. “What ever would you do to defend yourself without your almighty protectors around? I don’t see Black or Potter anywhere in here. I guess you’re just the expendable one, hm?”
Peter’s silent for a long moment. Because really, what does one say to that?
“I think you must have a really sad life, Barty, if you live in a world where anyone you choose to spend your time with is expendable to you.”
The taller boy takes a step back, looking as if Peter had slapped him.
“Your loyalty to them is going to get you killed one day, Pettigrew.”
“Merlin and fucking Morgana, Crouch, you’re bloody manic.” Peter says, shaking his head. “Just agree to my terms and let’s get on with it.”
“I won’t fucking tell anybody about your stupid fucking secret, okay? Just get out.” Barty's close to tears by now, looking every bit the 15-year -old kid he likes to pretend that he’s not.
It shocks Peter, considering how casually cruel he’d sounded only minutes earlier, and tugs at his heartstrings.
He wants to apologise. Say he’d never out someone, especially a pure-blood kid with a family as fucking insane as Crouch’s, because he gets it . But he doesn’t. He can’t. He turns back into Wormtail, and scurries out the door, intending to never interact with Bartimus Crouch Jr. ever again.