Rage

December 1, 1971

Sirius yawned. It was only Monday, and he was already utterly exhausted. Professor Binns drawled on about the Goblin revolt, saying names like Blodox The Decapitator, and Rankin The Mangler. It was boring him to tears, and he was about to bang his head against the desk just for some noise other than the flat monotone from the ghost that was their Professor. He looked over at the twins, they were usually entertaining, but Romulus was dead to the world, almost drooling on the desk, and Remus had gone into what Sirius was calling ‘Remus World’, where he just stared off into space, thinking but not thinking at the same time.

He looked over at Peter, who was sketching on his note paper. James had a quill in his hand, but he seemed more interested in committing the quill’s exact details than actually writing with it.

He drummed his fingers on the desk, thinking about all the other things he would rather be doing right now, and all the things he would do after class. Maybe he could get a game of truth or dare going on after class. It was the last period, after all. 

After what felt like a millenia, but could have only been 15 minutes, the bell rang, loud and wonderful. Had to be the best sound Sirius had ever heard. He leapt up, shaking Romulus’s shoulder and waving his hand in front of Remus’s face to pull him out of Remus World. He jumped a little and Sirius laughed.

“Wow, you were more dead than your brother. He at least stirred at the bell,” Sirius teased.

“The bell rang?” Remus looked so confused, Sirius couldn’t help but laugh. Remus looked astonished, it wasn’t a common expression on his face. Mostly, his face was either nonchalonce, a smirk, a manic grin, or a scowl. And occasionally, but not rarely, a cold anger, never explosive though, that was his movements. 

“Yes the bell rang, you idiot. Were you even awake?” he asked. It was never a good idea to call either of the twins an idiot, but he risked it.

“Who you callin’ an idiot?” Remus looked at him blankly. In Sirius’s opinion, that was his most terrifying look. His mask was impenetrable, not a single expression on his face. He and James made jokes about the twins masks’ before, calling it ‘the expression of no expression.’ That was the look Remus was giving him. He cringed.

“Lucky that were friends, or I woulda just kicked your ass,” Remus smirked at him. 

“Come on, dinner’s soon, and if it's cheese cake, and I miss out on it, I will strangle you.”

“I’d like to see you try.”

_

After dinner

They sat in the common room. Sirius had arranged the game of truth or dare he had been thinking about, and Romulus got the girls to join in. Sirius would ask truth or dare to someone, they would do whatever was tasked, and choose someone else.

“James, truth or dare?” he asked him, looking at him with that classic smirk when someone asked that simple question.

“Dare, I’m not a chicken.” 

“Dare you to charm your hair a bright, hot pink for the rest of the game,” he smiled as James’s face fell, looking over at the girls who were giggling and whispering. 

“…fine,” and he grabbed his wand, and wow, he actually did it. An almost blinding shade of pink adorned his usually black headed friend. He burst into startled giggles with the rest of the group. The girls, who had already been laughing, started laughing harder, Peter, who could have started a James Potter fan club, was staring at his friend with wide eyes, and the twins, with their usually unbroken masks’ protecting them, were trying to hide their laughter behind their hands. 

“The worst part is,” Remus started, “he can actually pull it off quite well. I’m almost mad at that, actually.” Sirius looked over at James, whose face was as bright a shade as his hair, and actually looked. Remus was right, James could definitely pull it off. He was mildly surprised at this, but with the naturally messy head, his flaming pink hair looked kind of good with it. If the hair was straight, it would look awful, but he could pull it off.

“Mary, truth or dare?” James had to raise his voice to be heard over the hysterical giggling around him. Mary looked up.

“Oh, um, truth, I guess.”

“Who do you have a crush on?” James asked.

Mary shook her head, smiling, “Well… there is this Hufflepuff boy, and he is like, really cute, his name is Ridge. Don’t know his last name.”

Marlene’s eyes grew wide, “Oh, I think I know him. Ridge Carter?”

“Yes! Him,” Mary and Marlene struck up a conversation about this so-called kid. Sirius had no interest whatsoever, so he looked around the room to see if everyone was as bored with this as he was. All of them were, except for Romulus, who looked slightly put out for a second, then put a mask over his features. Sirius wondered if maybe Romulus fancied Mary. He didn’t really think that Mary would be Romulus’s type, he would have put him in the category of tough birds. Maybe Marlene, but not Mary. She was just, he didn’t know, a really girly girl. Like if you were to think of a basic girl, Mary would be a perfect image of that. Sure, she was pretty, and was funny, but Sirius could think of people that had an even deeper personality.

Like, Remus, maybe. He had so many secrets, he had that depressing humour that everyone laughed at, but then immediately felt bad about it. He was a lot smarter than he let on, and he was an evil mastermind for pranks, and somethings that might count as war crimes in some countries. And, he had to face it, he was gorgeous. He knew he was good looking too, but Remus was almost on another level of hot. He had a quiet kid aura about him, but once you knew him, you could tell he was smart. And he was so strong. A few days ago, he did five pushups with Peter sitting on him.

Anyway, back to the conversation at hand.

“Oooh, Mary has a crush,” Lily snickered. Mary swatted at her. She whispered something that sounded like, ‘shut your damn face,’ and the game continued on.

“Sirius, truth or dare,” Mary had turned to look at him, cheeks slightly pink.

“Oh, err, truth,” he replied.

“ Cachu iâr,” Remus said. Sirius heard him say that enough that he knew it meant some form of ‘coward.’ Romulus snickered besides him. Sirius just rolled his eyes. Better not encourage them.

“K, do you have a crush?” one James to his right, Remus and Romulus shook their heads disappointedly. 

Sirius, in his mind's eye, saw a flash of bright amber eyes, with a scared nose bridge and freckle-dusted cheeks.

“No, no I do not.” Mary looked at him, not believing him for a second, but seemed to accept his half-truth answer. The thing was, Sirius did have a crush, he just didn’t know it. A crush on a tall, amber-eyed person.

“Remus, truth or dare?”

“Dare! I’m not a cachu iâr!”

“Dare you to… break the window!” Sirius was joking, entirely joking, but Remus got up. Sirius noticed he left his wand where he was sitting. He walked calmly over to the window in the common room, looking out at the darkening sky. They all held their breaths, watching, waiting. Everyone left in the common room was looking now.

Remus squared up, locked his fist, reeled back, and punched the window. It didn’t shatter, but a large spider web crack appeared on the previously perfect window. Before Sirius could react, he reeled back again, hitting harder. The window shattered, broken glass flying into the dusky sky. Remus stepped back, face blank.

Remus turned to look at them, and said, “I will be right back. Carry on.” And Sirius, along with everyone else, released the window wasn't the only broken thing. Remus’s fingers were bent in an odd way, small glass shards stuck from his knuckles, which were bleeding badly, already bruising. Sirius gagged, feeling sick just looking at Remus’s mutilated hand. He opened the common room door with his left hand, and stepped out.

_

December 2, 1971

Sirius was staring at the ceiling. He couldn’t find the twins anywhere, James was watching the Gryffindor Quidditch practice, and Peter had followed. It was nearing sunset, the moon rising at the east end of the tower. He sighed and got up. 

It was a cold night, but he had stolen one of Remus’s jumpers, which was absolutely huge on him, and the warmest, thickest shirt he could find. It turned out to be James’s. He was walking around the Black Lake, cold wind biting at his face. He kept his head bowed, walking slowly. He had just felt like a walk, and Sirius was known to be slightly impulsive. He was starting to regret it now. The sun had set about ten minutes ago, letting the bright, full moon light his path. His boots were soaked through, making his toes like ice blocks. The snow was heavy and wet. 

It was beautiful, though. The pine trees turned white by the heavy snowfall. The moon light reflecting off the frozen surface of the lake. He caught himself wondering what happened to the Giant Squid. His attention was caught by a white fox bounding into the Forbidden Forest. He watched the creature. It was beautiful and graceful. He almost screamed when he saw a white wolf snatch the fox into its large jaws. A snap of the neck, and the fox lay limp in the wolf's clutches. 

Sirius started. He didn’t think that wolves ate foxes, but he may have been wrong. Maybe the wolf was just desperate? 

The wolf seemed to stare right at him as it set the fox down and tore a strip of meat and skin right off the animal. Sirius gagged at the bloody muzzle of the wolf. He turned around, and bolted back to the castle.

_

He ran into the dorm, out of breath and his brain replaying the wolf eating the fox. James jumped in surprise.

“Mate, where have you been!?” he asked, startled. “It’s bad enough the Lupins won’t show, we thought the lot of you got caught by Filthy Filch or something. Have you seen them?” he asked, a look of puzzlement and curiosity etched on his face.

“No, I thought they would be here,” Sirius said, confusion of his own crawling to the surface. He looked around, as if expecting them to just appear right then. He was almost right when the door swung open, but it was only a first year from a different dorm room. There were so many first years this year, Gryffindor house needed a second dorm room for them.

The kid’s name was Elliot Kanger, he remembered from the Sorting Ceremony.  

“Err, can we help you?” Sirius asked. The kid was still silent, looking around the room.

“Hello?” James tried. Elliot finally looked up. He was small, even for a first year. He had seen the twins and Kanger talk occasionally, and he looked positively miniscule next to them. Sirius was secretly hoping that they were just tall for the next few years and then stop growing in 3rd year. 

“Um, have you seen the twins? I was going to ask if I could have the transfiguration notes since I missed McGonagall's last class and she always assigns homework, and I don’t want to get a detention,” Kanger looked like he wanted to leave and just have everyone just forget about this encounter.

“Oh, no, the twins aren't here. They’re probably in detention for hexing Snape or something. Haven't seen them for a bit, come to think about it. Maybe they got sick from the cold weather and didn’t want to tell us? Should I be worried?” James asked, worry creeping into his features.

“James, stop being a mum, they're probably just walking around or something. I mean, Remus keeps disappearing without explanation, and you’ll just see him at breakfast. Ask him where he slept, he’ll give the same answer every time. ‘Ask me no questions, I tell you no lies.’ Really quite infuriating if I’m honest,” Sirius said, shrugging. If anyone could take care of themselves, it would be the twins. James shrugged too.

“I’m sure they wouldn’t mind. I’ll just look for the notes real quick. Just so you know, if we can’t find them, we can’t give you any notes. We all copy off of them so- Aha!” James held up three pages worth of transfiguration notes. “Here.” He handed the boy the notes.

“Don’t lose them because we will be the ones being flayed by them, and personally, I really like my skin, so that would not be great for me,” Sirius said. He was looking at the boy who was laughing slightly at Sirius’s comment. Remus could have probably thought of a better, more morbid comment, but he was tired and cold and really just wanted to go to bed. The kid thanked James and walked out of the room, leaving him, James, and Peter left alone.

“ ‘Night lads, I’m knackered,” Sirius yawned and walked over to his bed. The disappearance of the twins was a little unsettling, but he was too tired to care much, and flopped onto his bed, waving his wand lazily to close the curtains, and promptly fell asleep.