Any Other Way
- All the while James spoke, Remus kept his eyes shut as though he was protecting himself from a physical blow. -
For all the next day, Rachael couldn’t even look at Lily. She felt so guilty about erasing her memory from the night before, but she just panicked and did the first thing that came to mind. Of course Lily was unaware anything had happened because of the charm, but still…
Anyway, Sirius and James’s prank was, as usual, a hit in the Great Hall during lunch. It started normal enough, they were just talking about the homework Professor Sprout gave them and how it would take ages to do. Their Imp Bells were getting feverish due to the increasingly cold weather and it was their homework to research a cure for the common cold for Imp Bells.
“What does she think we are?” Sirius whined. “Rocket Scientists?”
So, as they were discussing the assignment, they heard a loud squishing sound and all heads turned towards the Slytherin table, because that was always the sight of pranks, from every house. There was a large nose, which actually was the size of a dungbomb, just as Remus had said, clamping itself tight on Snape’s real nose. He couldn’t get it off until James lifted the curse.
Of course Rachael had to cover for Remus’s disappearance again. This time he told her to tell them that he was needed to help their mum with something terribly important. He needs better excuses, Rachael thought miserably as she listened to Professor Binns drone on about the Giants in History of Magic.
James, Sirius and Peter were beginning to get suspicious of Remus’s disappearance, but they hadn’t said anything about it, yet. Lily, Alice and Frank were easy enough for Rachael to fool with excuses. But James, Sirius and Peter were Remus’s best friends, they weren’t so easy. They would often try and seek Remus out in the castle just to make sure he wasn’t anywhere. Whenever this happened, Rachael had to beat them to the Hospital Wing and tell Madam Pomfrey about it so she could keep Remus out of sight.
Only this time Rachael was sure they had seen him. She didn’t know why, but they were acting as if they had some secret. Then again, it might have just been some new prank of theirs, since their last one went off with a bang. But if it were a prank they would be more open about it with her. They always told her their plans for pranks and never kept them secret from her. It was really starting to bug her now…
James, Sirius and Peter were sitting in the library with ten books all about magical creatures scattered out on the table all of them open to the same topic - werewolves. They were becoming wary, just as Rachael thought. They were following Remus’s symptoms. It was December now and each month Remus would just vanish and each excuse his sister gave was just as pathetic as the last. Besides, one of them was their grandfather died and she wasn’t allowed to go to the funeral, just because.
“So far we’ve got that every month on a full moon a man bitten by a werewolf will transform into one. Obviously, that wasn’t hard,” Sirius grumbled, leaning his head on his hand. “You find anything, James?”
James had his nose dug into Mystical Creatures of Our World. He wasn’t having much luck. All it said about werewolves was that they were bloodthirsty beasts bent on destruction. He shook his head, closed the book he was looking at and picked up another.
“What about you, Peter?” Sirius said, nodding his head at Peter, who had just picked up an entire book solely about werewolves. The only problem with this book was it wasn’t an informational book. It was just a book about a boy who had been bitten and how he lived his life after that. It did provide good evidence, though.
“Here’s something!” Peter said suddenly. He put the book on the desk and the three leaned forward while Peter read. “‘The doctor told them to make sure the scar was never seen, as it was such a distinct mark, the same on all who have been bitten. The mark was two round bite marks and two square shaped marks in between which never faded, despite how long it had been since the bite was first placed.’”
“But I’ve never seen a bite mark like that on him,” James said, picking up the book and looking at the sketch of the marks in the book.
“Maybe it’s just somewhere we can’t see,” Sirius offered. James gave him a weird look. “Not like that!”
“Come on,” James said, standing up to collect all the books. “Let’s bring these back to the common room, we can look at ‘em there.”
They collected all the books and checked them out from Madam Pince, the school librarian, and headed up the Gryffindor Tower. As they were walking to the portrait of the Fat Lady, they continued the subject.
“You know, I’ve noticed that he always disappears on a full moon,” Sirius said, stooping down to pick up a book he dropped. He stood back up. “And he always looks really pale around then.”
“Yeah I noticed that too when I was doing the Astrology homework. I remember one time when we had to chart down all the full moons and he did it in a second. I just thought it was because he was really good at that stuff, but it can’t be.”
They approached the Fat Lady, gave the password (Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans) and entered a nearly empty common room. There were only two fourth years in the common room, but they were in a far corner of the room talking quietly with each other. There was also another person lying on the couch sleeping. They paid no attention to them and went over to the table. They scattered all the books down and began their research yet again.
“Says here that a werewolf always looks tired,” Sirius said, looking at page fifty-six of So You Want To Track Mystical Creatures But Don’t Know What to Look For? “It says even the slightest sign of weariness, but not sickness, can be a sign of a werewolf. Remus does always look like he’s tired, but he never acts like it. He only acts like he’s tired after he gets back from ‘visiting’ someone.”
“Yeah, but look here.” James leaned over and pointed to the sentence under the one Sirius was looking at. “It says that acting tired doesn’t matter, just the fact that they look tired when they’re really not. That’s Remus.”
“Speaking of Remus,” Peter said suddenly. “He’s right over there.”
Sirius and James turned to see that Peter was pointing to the student who was sleeping on the couch. It was Remus. He had gotten to sleep late the night before because he was helping Professor McGonagall with something for the Transfiguration class. He didn’t get back to the dormitory until three in the morning; he was practically falling asleep in class.
Remus was lying flat on his back, one hand lying on his stomach, the other dangling over the side of the couch. His bangs were slid sideways, where they revealed his scar from being bitten, but his friends didn’t notice at first.
“Well, he does look tired,” Peter said.
“Yeah, but that’s because he was up late last night,” James retorted.
Sirius stood up and walked over to attempt to wake Remus up, but stopped himself, not because he didn’t want to wake him up but because he saw the scar. “What’s that?” he said, leaning over the back of the couch and peering at the scar on Remus’s forehead.
James and Peter looked at each other curiously and walked over to see what Sirius was looking at. Right under Remus’s hairline were four little marks, marks that looked remarkably like the ones they had seen in the book Peter was looking at.
“Peter,” James said nervously, looking at Peter. “Go get the book you had before.”
Doing as he was told, Peter snatched book off the table and flipped open to the page they were looking at in the library. He handed the book to James and James looked from the book to Remus, book to Remus, and then rested his eyes on the book.
“It’s just like the one in the book,” James said, wide eyed, unable to remove his gaze from the scar. “Everything fits… the scar… the symptoms… everything!”
“Remus is a werewolf.”
They didn’t know what to say, they couldn’t say anything. What would Remus say if he knew they found out? He didn’t want anyone to find out. If he did he just would’ve told them right out the first time he met them.
The portrait door opened and in walked Rachael, coming up from the Great Hall. She ran past them, up to her dormitory, and came down a second later with her Herbology book. She went over to the table, about to set her book down, but stopped when she saw all the books scattered across it. She looked at all the books curiously. Her eyes widened a bit, but she remained calm. She turned to the three boys.
“Been researching werewolves?” she said casually, moving some books so she could start her homework. The boys nodded. “Why? My dad didn’t make us do that for homework.”
“We know he didn’t,” Sirius said quietly. The two fourth years got up and went down to the Great Hall; they didn’t have to whisper now.
“Then why do you have-” she stopped to count all the books, “fifteen books about werewolves on the table? Is playing pranks getting so boring you have to resort to reading?”
“No it’s just…” They couldn’t tell her they knew. They didn’t want her to find out and they couldn’t let Remus know either. But they couldn’t keep this from her. “Is there something Remus hasn’t been telling us?”
Rachael’s face remained neutral. She acted as though there wasn’t anything she should be nervous about.
“No,” she said simply. “Why would he have anything to hide from his best friends? I’ve got to start my homework.” She said this all with an air of finality, as in this conversation is closed, don’t bother me.
“Merry Christmas!”
It was Christmas morning and it was only James, Sirius, Peter, Remus and Rachael in all of Gryffindor Tower. Everyone else was gone. They were sitting in the common room with presents scattered all about the floor near the giant Christmas tree.
“Let’s see, what’s this?” Remus wondered aloud as he ripped open a brightly coloured package. He pulled the card out and read it aloud:
Dear Remus,
Have a merry, merry Christmas my favourite child… my only child
Love Mum.
He opened the package and pulled out a blue jumper with a golden R embroidered in. He held it in front of him, admiring it for a split second with a quick glance at his sister, who was looking at it, trying not to say anything. Her mum hadn’t given her a Christmas present in four years. She was used to it by now but it still hurt when she saw Remus’s gift.
She had gotten a book about all the different Quidditch teams from James, a red jumper with the Gryffindor Lion sewn in from her dad, a bag of gags from Sirius, a model Quidditch stadium from Remus, a journal from Lily and a deck of wizard cards from Peter. She loved all her presents, but it seemed so miniscule compared to her friends’ and brother’s.
“Hey,” James said, suddenly noticing something. “Your mum didn’t give you a gift.”
Without saying anything Rachael got up and went up to her dormitory.
James looked at Remus. “Did I say something wrong?” he asked, looking a bit guilty.
“No it’s just… just don’t mention anything like that in front of her.”
Christmas was very fun. Rachael felt better than she had in the morning when James pointed out her mother didn’t even bother to wish her a Merry Christmas. There was the Christmas Feast in the Great Hall. All of the Professors were there talking happily and sharing Christmas crackers with the few students who stayed at castle for the holidays.
“Having a good time?” Professor Lupin said, taking the vacant seat next to his daughter. They nodded and Remus and Rachael thanked their dad for the gifts he gave them. “Oh yes, Rachael, come here for a minute.”
He led his daughter out into the Entrance Hall and gave her thirty gold galleons.
“Why are you giving me all this money?” she asked, utterly surprised. Her dad was never so loose with money, no matter who he was dealing with.
“To make up for your mother’s lack of holiday welcome,” he said, a flash of anger in his eyes.
“It doesn’t matter, I don’t care.”
She tried giving him the money back but he wouldn’t have it.
“You’re my daughter and I won’t let my wife treat you horribly. Now just take it and think of it as four years of missing Christmas and birthday presents.”
Later that night Rachael, James, and Peter were all in the common room. The three boys needed to ask Rachael if what they were thinking was, in fact, true. They just had to know and couldn’t wait any longer. They made sure Remus was fast asleep before they began to talk.
“You know he snores really loud?” Sirius said as he came down from the dormitory. “How could you stand it?” he said turning to Rachael.
“Separate rooms,” she answered. “So, what’d you want to talk to me about?”
They found it very hard to word. How were they going to say ‘so is Remus a werewolf?’ That was a little too direct.
“We… we need to… ask you something,” James said, looking at his feet.
“What?”
“It’s kinda hard to ask.”
“Just ask.”
“Okay. Remember when you saw all the books about werewolves we were looking at?” Rachael nodded. “We actually were trying… we were… we were trying to figure out if Remus was a werewolf.”
They expected Rachael to deny, and she half expected herself to deny it as well but, for some odd reason, she couldn’t. It would help Remus if his friends knew, she wasn’t going to lie. “And…?”
“We saw that he always had to ‘visit’ someone on a full moon. He always looks tired and he has the scar.” Rachael nodded her head. “Is he?”
Should she tell them? It seemed wrong, but it would help. She wasn’t sure. But they probably already knew. Still… she never would give Remus’s secret away, just as he never gave away hers. She was going to tell, even though she knew he wouldn’t like it. If they were really his friends they wouldn’t care.
“He is,” she said quietly.
James, Sirius and Peter looked at each other with expressions of triumph, concern and confusion.
Sirius was the first to speak after. “How?” he stuttered. “H-how’d it happen?”
“Well, we were eight; we lived in this little village that had a large bit of woods. No one really knew what was in it; me and Remus didn’t when we went in.”
“Why’d you go in in the first place?” Sirius cut in.
“We were supposed to be getting groceries for our mum, we never did in fact. We were going through the forest to get home. We were in there for a while and kept hearing growling sounds. We tried to get out quickly but a werewolf found us. It chased us through the forest. Remus had fallen behind me and I turned back to see where he was. He was really far behind. I started to go back for him, but he said to keep moving. He was catching up so I knew he’d catch up, but when I turned around I ran straight into a tree.
“I dunno how long it had been after that when I woke up. Me and Remus were in St. Mungo’s. One of the Healers, Griemer, and my mum were talking, saying if it was bad. I didn’t know what they were talking about, so I just listened and then I noticed Remus lying in the bed next to me. He was sleeping and I saw a bandage on his forehead, so something had happened.
“My mum saw that I was awake and first she asked me nicely what happened in the forest, but I didn’t know. She got a bit mad and yelled that I was lying. She woke up Remus and he said he’d tell. First my mum wouldn’t let him, but he did anyway. After I ran into the tree the werewolf closed in on him, after he tripped over a stick. He couldn’t get away in time, the werewolf bit him. When he was done, she was really mad. She yelled a lot, more than I’ve ever heard anyone yell. Remus was a werewolf and she said it was my fault.”
Sirius, James and Peter were hanging on her every word.
“What was it like after that?” James asked anxiously. “How’d Remus handle it?”
“Well, I really don’t know I barely saw him when we got home. He was locked in his room for the first full moon, but I heard everything. As a first punishment, I had to sit outside Remus’s door and listen to his transformation. It was horrible. I can’t even explain how bad it sounded; Remus probably can’t even explain how horrible it felt.”
“Wait,” Peter said suddenly. “What d’you mean by ‘first’ punishment?”
Rachael shifted uneasily. She really didn’t want to tell them where her parents had sent her, but, then again, she had told Remus’s secret. It would only be fair if she told her own, despite how much she wanted to take it with her to the grave.
“My other punishment was… it was… my parents disowned me! They sent me to an orphanage!” The boys were quiet. She went on. “My mum was so mad she wanted to make it that I wasn’t in the family anymore. They sent me to this stupid orphanage!”
“That’s horrible,” Peter muttered.
“Yeah it is. On the Hogwarts Express was the first time I’d seen my brother in years. I don’t know how he handled those full moons; I don’t know how he stood it. I hadn’t seen him in years.”
“Lucky for you, you didn’t have to live with Mum,” Remus’s voice said from upstairs.
Rachael, James, Sirius and Peter all looked up to see Remus leaning over the banister and peering at them.
“How long’ve you been up there?” Rachael asked at once.
“Oh, since you said I was a werewolf,” he answered offhandedly, looking unperturbed.
Rachael’s face turned unnaturally red. James, Sirius and Peter all wore guilty looks.
“Look, Remus, I-”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said quickly, cutting his sister off. He walked down the stairs and stood at the landing. “They’d’ve found out anyway.” He sat on the bottom step. “So…?”
“So?” Sirius repeated.
“I’m waiting. Tell me, how’re you going to stop being my friends? Cold shoulder or just tell me outright?” He looked at them expectantly, waiting for the blow, as it always came when his wizard friends found out, not that he had many to begin with. The ones he had panicked when they found out and never spoke to him again or just said he was mental and stalked off. He was no stranger to this, so he wouldn’t mind so much, would he?
“You’re kidding, right?” James asked incredulously.
Remus shook his head. “You don’t want to be caught hanging around a werewolf. Just say it and let me get on with my life.”
“Okay, I’ll say it then. First: you’re a werewolf, big deal. Second: we’re not going to stop being your friends just because you’re a werewolf.”
All the while James spoke, Remus kept his eyes shut, as though he was protecting himself from a physical blow. When James finished he opened his eyes and heaved a great, sorrowful, sigh.
“See,” he said mournfully. “I knew it, you guys hate “ wait “ what?”
Sirius gave a quick laugh. “Why are we going to stop hanging around you? You’re a werewolf, big deal!”
“Well everyone I knew that knew what I was was afraid of me so I figured if I never told anyone what I was then I’d be safe and have a normal life with friends.”
“Well we’re not scared,” said Peter sincerely.
“Yeah, actually I think its better now that we know,” Sirius agreed.
“You being a werewolf doesn’t matter to us. It’s a tough idea to swallow though, but nothings going to change. You’re still our friend.” James heaved a great sigh and looked up at the giant grandfather clock. “I think I’m going to go get some sleep, you guys coming?”
Sirius and Peter got up and followed after bidding Remus and Rachael goodnight.
Rachael turned to her brother who was still sitting on the bottom step. “You’re not mad at me, are you?” she asked worriedly. She had given Remus her word that she would never tell anyone his secret if he never told her secret. She had gone back on her word.
“No,” he answered simply. “I’m glad you did. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, I guess. But now we’re even; they know both our secrets.”
Remus smiled. “Yeah. You never did tell me, what’d you tell the people there why you were there anyway?”
“Just told them the truth,” Remus’s eyes widened. “No I didn’t tell them what you are. I just said I did something wrong and was paying for it. Come on, if McGonagall or someone comes in here they’ll catch us awake, lets just go to bed.”
The two twins went up to their dorms and got ready for bed. As Rachael crawled into her bed, she thought back to what was said, that Remus being a werewolf didn’t matter to them. That was what a true friend would say. She was happy for Remus to have found such great friends. She wouldn’t have it any other way for him.