ludic • remus lupin

12 • Dawn

The sun was blinding. The hum of birds and the whistle of the wind flowing between the trees was what Coco woke up to. All was calm, all was peaceful. Until, of course, she realized she was naked.

She shot up from the patch of grass the had fallen asleep in after the exhausting night, and looked around helplessly for her clothes.

She heard a voice call calmly.

"Coco?!"

"Cocobear?!"

"James?" She managed to say.

A high pitched scream came from behind her, and clothing was thrown at her back.

"Merlin Coco, a warning next time maybe?" James said with his hand covering his eyes. She quickly put the skirt and sweater on, then turned back to James. He was fully clothed, thankfully.

"You can look now." She called, and he released his hand from his eyes.

"Yikes love, nasty wound." James said and rushed up to her. He grabbed her face in his hands and his thumb rubbed the new thick line across her cheek, and she flinched.

"Moony won't like that." He sighed.

"How is he?" Coco quickly asked.

"He's in the hospital wing with Wormtail and Padfoot, as well as Lily. She won't leave me alone about what happened last night, since we made quite a scene. She's very suspicious. Well anyways, they sent for me to get you." James responded. They began walking back to the school, weaving around trees and stepping over roots.

"Dumbledore asked why you were in the woods; we had gotten up before he woke up; so we told him when Moony was transforming back into himself, you went out to check on him." James explained, and Coco nodded.

"Is Kathy in the hospital wing? This might be one of our last chances to talk to Moony before Holiday break tomorrow." Coco asked.

"Kathy is in her bed knocked out cold with no memory of last night, thanks to Sirius. He's not as dumb as I thought, I guess." James laughed. Coco lightly hit him on the shoulder and laughed too. They looked up and saw the school in front of them, then quickly rushed forward and ran to the hospital wing.

Remus looked like a mess. He always did after full moons, but this time was different. He looked worse. Coco let out a breath she had been holding in and rushed to his bedside, next to Sirius and Lily, who was standing there as if she was trying to put pieces of a puzzle together.

"Remus!" Coco called, and grabbed his warm hand. He looked at her face and looked like he was gonna throw up.

"I'm so sorry." He said. His eyes looked like they wanted to fill up with tears but there was no more left.

"It's okay, Moony, It's okay! It barely hurts, I promise." Coco blurted.

"Plus you guys are matching now, isn't that cool?" Sirius laughed, referring to the scar on Coco's cheek and the many spread across Remus's whole body. His laughs stopped when James elbowed him in the side.

"Not just that Coco, I mean i'm sorry for the things i've said. I feel like i'm in a battle with myself that I can't win, I can't control myself," His chocolate eyes became to fill up with newfound tears.

Coco frowned to suppress her smile, and hugged Remus's upper body against her chest.

"It's okay, I promise." She breathed. It broke her into pieces to see her best friend like this, so she had to forgive him. Put part of herself wasn't completely honest in that hollow forgiveness.

"I'm still fighting it... guys? Padfoot?" Moony said, his eyes going wild. Sirius rushed by his other side, and put his hand on his friends shoulder.