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After the night he'd had, Portkey Palooza had effectively lost its excitement for Remus.
The cereal in his glass bowl sat, untouched, soaking up the milk until the small circles grew soggy and fell to pieces. Remus stabbed his spoon through the ripping Cheeri-Owls to speed up the splitting process.
Sydney slid into the seat beside Sirius.
The first portkey victim popped into the sky, falling a few inches to slam atop the Ravenclaw table with a gasp. Remus pressed a cluster of toasted oats into the side of his bowl until they fell to grainy mush.
Barty Crouch Jr. appeared, naked, and clutching a towel, and Remus laughed because he was supposed to. His spoon tinged against the glass.
The misted air stung Remus's eyes as they crossed the grounds to the greenhouses. Remus could feel the fog slip through his nostrils and cloud his chest, making his breathing longer and slightly more painful. Maybe he deserved it. Maybe it was absolutely correct.
There was a small but noticeable gap between himself and his group of friends as they walked. Remus wrapped his coat tighter around his shoulders.
Remus's voice felt foreign as he relayed the portkeyed pots and plants that should be avoided. It slipped through his lips like a ghost, floating through the air with some of the fog in Remus's chest before swirling around and returning through his nose.
Sirius levitated a flower and landed it in Sydney's lap. Remus looked down before he could see her smile.
A young Gryffindor spiraled down and crashed over Snape's plant box and Remus grinned because James's hand had gripped his shoulder heavily and because everyone else was laughing.
James's hand began to feel like a block of molten lead, weighing down Remus's shoulder and sinking through his skin, leaving silver poison in his bloodstream. Remus wanted James to let go, but he did not say so because hands were not supposed to feel like molten lead.
Professor Sprout reached for a table that Remus knew to be charmed, but Remus did not warn her because his words felt like a ghost and because he felt that he deserved the gripping cloud of fog that condensed within his chest.
Professor Sprout blipped away and the class sat in stunned silence for a moment before a few words were exchanged blurrily and everyone rose to their feet.
The air had warmed since they had entered the greenhouses, but Remus still felt like he was encased in mist. He left his coat on.
Sydney and Sirius swung their hands as they walked.
As they trailed through the castle, students slipped out of places of comfort and into places of surprise. Remus laughed at them because he was supposed to find this funny.
A young girl dropped down in front of Alice - half naked as her portkey appeared to be her shirt - and Sirius and Peter laughed.
Remus stopped the girl before she could run away and he transferred his coat around her shoulders. She smiled slightly, yet embarrassedly, and took off.
Remus felt so cold without his jacket.
They spun into their Charms class and Remus moved mechanically to his seat in the back.
Sirius pulled out Remus's chair as his own and Remus was no longer cold.
For a moment, volcanoes erupted inside of him, spewing gasoline across his chest and his muscles and his skin. For a moment a match was thrown onto this gasoline, and Remus was encased in fire, not mist. For a moment his fingernails dug semicircles in his palms and his bottom molars tried to break through his top and he could hear himself exhale.
And then Remus looked at Sydney, who was watching him with a quiet frown, and everything was extinguished and Remus was cold again.
He moved his books over to the seat beside James.
James asked if Remus was alright and Remus shrugged and took out his quill because that's what he was supposed to do.
Remus was glad to be studying nonverbal spells for the class block because it meant that he didn't have to hear his ghost-like voice. It also meant he didn't have to listen to Sirius, who stood a few meters to the side and of whom Remus was unsure he would be able to keep alive.
What he did hear, however, was Sydney's aggravation.
"Stand still, will you?" She said, her wand falling to her side. She shoved her hair behind her ear so that Remus could better see her loosened face and pleading eyes.
"Remus," said James with lips pressed slightly together and eyes that said "don't". Remus inhaled and readjusted his wand.
"What did Flitwich say earlier?" Sydney asked from his diagonal left. "About clearing your mind?"
"You actually listen to that rubbish?" Sirius scoffed.
"Remus," James said again.
"Breathe your words," said Remus, his voice finally feeling like his own. "Clear your head and breathe them."
Sydney's eyes met Remus's and she smiled slightly and nodded and Remus could feel his heart as the wad of muscle in his chest that it was.
Sydney turned back to Sirius and took a deep breath, repositioning her feet and holding out her wand. She closed her eyes as she inhaled slowly, and then her wand flicked with her exhale and Sirius flipped at his ankles.
The backs of Sirius's fingers grazed the wooden floors and his face turned red as his blood rushed down from his feet. His mouth was open in a surprised gasp, like he hadn't expected for Sydney to complete the spell.
And Sydney was smiling, her shoulders dropped back in relief and her wand still pointed at Sirius. But her eyes were on Remus, and that was what mattered.
At dinner, Sydney's eyes were no longer on Remus.
She and the girls did not sit with Remus and the boys. Instead, they sat towards the middle of the Gryffindor table, huddled in a circle with very serious faces.
Sydney was frowning slightly and her eyebrows were pulled downwards, almost sadly, as she twisted her bracelets in her fingers.
The dinner was roasted chicken with corn and rolls of warm bread. Usually this was one of the only meals Sydney would eat in it's entirety, but she was not eating.
"She had a run in with Theo again," said Peter, who was seated beside Remus and who was also looking concernedly down the table.
"Oh," said Remus. The light seemed to fall differently over Sydney now, highlighting the slight tenseness in her jaw and the slowness of her speech. She didn't like to talk about Theo.
"I got her out of it, though," Peter said quietly. "I don't like him much."
Marlene said something and Sydney smiled slightly. Remus liked it much better when she smiled, even if it was a smile that would never be his.
"Me neither," he said to Peter.
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A/N
okay this one was short but the last one was rlly long and this one came out faster so🙄🙄
i wrote a paper in 10mins today and i was rlly proud and then i remembered that i write like 8pg chapters in an hour so... duh...
