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In the morning Remus was told that this past full moon represented a milestone to be marked in (secret) history.
One of his friends – not the confident one he'd expected to be the first, not the equally ambitious and foolhardy one, the one he'd yearned to share with, but – the one who'd admittedly been the first before, from the beginning there for him and for himself, for shelter of companionship: that insecure Marauder, the one brave in his cowardice and fear of blood had been the first and succeeded in taking an animal form!
They also confessed that all three of them had spent a couple of full-moon nights in the tunnel right outside the door to the shack. Listening, witnessing his inhumanity, they must have been terrified.
“We know you didn’t want that," James said a bit apologetically, sitting down on the edge of the bed where Remus had collapsed. "But we thought it would help.”
After Madame Pomfrey had allowed him to leave the hospital wing, Remus had struggled to keep up with his friends when climbing all the way up to the Gryffindor Tower. Now he struggled to keep smiling and nodding, expressing his gratefulness, and more: forgiveness, or rather how there was no need for apologies, and curiosity and elation and hope.
Peter had retreated to the windowsill; Sirius was pacing, throwing glances at Remus and Peter in turn.
Why couldn't Sirius at least sit down close to Remus here (just as James did)? Now that they were all excited about the Animagus magic, nobody would pay too much attention to a tender gesture, a gentle touch. A caress you need so much when you've just regained your human body. When the whole body aches for confirmation that it is real. And worthy... of love!
“It works!" Sirius barely looked at Remus and talked only about the magic. "When we feel we just – need to change!”
Need? There had been this feverish urge in Sirius ever since the two of them had revealed some vulnerability to each other.
They now knew how to comfort each other, without ever referring to the shameful fact that when it started, back in September, they both cried – wept! He wanted to help Sirius unlearn the fear of touch. And Sirius wanted to change for him, because he needed an animal's company so as to stop hurting himself as a wolf.
For the Animagus thing to work, they must resort to the Magic of Needs, Sirius had said. But was there love involved in all that?
“I hated... Hearing your whimpers, and screams, and howls, you know?” Peter said. With a tremulous smile.
Or hate? Was there hate involved?
“But I did it! I listened, and waited for something to happen in me – and I was the first to succeed!” Peter seemed to eye Remus cautiously.
Perhaps he saw the blood that had still stained one of Remus's bandages. Yes, he was now looking away, unfolding his sleeves, rubbing his arms.
Remus lifted his hand wearily, wishing he could have reached to tap Peter on the shoulder, and settled with winking at him. “I’m so... proud of you.”
“Tell us again what it felt like!” James said, focusing fully on Peter now that Remus's feelings had been discussed.
“Like... nothing! I stopped wanting to be me – in this body. I hated this body! It was recoiling. I leant against the wall and started chanting the incantation in my head, and...”
“Did you lose the awareness of your dimensions – gradually in the way we have practised – according to my theory?” Sirius said, and a resilient hope in Remus allowed him to hear a trace of jealousy in his voice.
A subtle tone of yearning? Yes, he needed to believe in it.
He wanted to trust that while Peter's crazy idea provoked by the real rat they'd found in the shack three years ago, unharmed by the wolf, had now led to this first success, the other two mates' loyalty would help them soon become... perhaps different animals, strong ones to keep the wolf in check.
And perhaps Sirius's love and need and all the hard work on awareness and incantations would change him into something... similar enough for the two of them to share more and more fully.