Four To The End Book Two (Marauders Era)

Chapter One Hundred-Twenty-One - "Magic Is Part Of You"

Remus sat upright with a cry of confusion, clutching his chest. He looked at his closed curtains, hearing voices outside of them. James and Peter at least, and music. Pushing the curtains aside, he first glanced at the clock—ten-thirteen—then at the room. Clean.

"You all right?" Sirius asked. He and the other two were on James's bed playing cards. Dave and Spinnet were in their beds, reading a book and a magazine respectively.

"Uh—yeah." He rubbed his head as he got out of bed. "What happened?"

Sirius dropped his cards and hopped out of bed, taking Remus's sleeve to pull him out of the dorm. Once they were alone in the bathroom Sirius hissed, "You passed out again!" He gave Remus a gentle shove. "You bloody idiot! What the hell is wrong with you—"

"I was trying to help!" Remus reminded him, face growing hot. "We had to get everything clean before Spinnet came up. Ugh! It's late now, I had assignments to finish—"

"Remy, it's the weekend! You have two full days before our next class!" Sirius shook his head. "You need to rest. You look beyond exhausted." He reached out, as if wanting to touch Remus's face but his hand quickly pulled back and he looked awkward. "That was bad of us to have you help clean."

"You didn't make me," Remus pointed out. Then, "How did you finish cleaning?"

"House-elves," Sirius replied, and Remus frowned. "Don't scowl. We did a lot of cleaning. They simply... finished the job. It's fine. It was either that or Spinnet catching us."

Remus folded his arms, hunching his shoulders. It would be terrific to cover the sixth year Slytherin dorms in mud, and if Spinnet had caught the mud then it would definitely be an unusable prank. He hated having to use house-elves like that, though. Though Sirius did have a point. The Marauders did do a lot of the cleanup themselves.

So, without anything else to say on the mud matter, Remus said, "Thanks for not taking me to Pomfrey."

Sirius groaned. "We should have. You pushed yourself too much." The irritation in his voice softened as he reached out, putting a hand on Remus's shoulder. "You're barely getting any sleep. You look ready to drop."

"I always look ready to drop." Remus shrugged. "In any case, exams are next week plus I need to perfect the spell we're using for the feast."

Sirius blew up at that, and began lecturing Remus about what he needed was rest. How could he expect to pass anything on so little sleep? Remus said he would get sleep the week of the exams, he needed to study. Sirius said no he needed to rest, and Remus countered with the fact he had taken a nearly two hour nap that night already, he had gotten plenty of rest.

"THAT WASN'T A NAP!" Sirius shouted. "YOU PASSED OUT! PASSING OUT IS NOT A NAP!"

"It was still rest," Remus snapped right back. "I'm fine—"

Sirius grabbed him, pushing him towards a mirror. "You're not fine, you look like—it's ten days away but you look like it's tomorrow!"

Remus turned his head away so he didn't have to look at his exhausted reflection. "The holidays start in a week, I will get plenty of rest then."

"You will not. I know you, you'll spend the entire holiday doing homework."

Remus twisted all the way around, facing Sirius. This was a huge mistake since Sirius put his hands on the sink on either side of Remus, pinning him in. Too close. Far too close. Remus's heart rate went up, and he noticed Sirius's did too for some reason. There was something very wrong with the scenario, though he couldn't explain what.