Deleted Scene: Remus grills Sirius about the full moon
This is the original, unedited hospital wing scene between Remus and Sirius from my fanfiction Jessamine & Lemon Balm. I cut it during a rewrite because it would have taken the story in a slightly different direction but when I went through my drafts I kind of liked it as an independent Wolfstar snippet...
“Was there anything worrisome tonight?” Remus asked, trying to sound nonchalant. Sirius immediately halted in his movements. Well.
“Moony, no.” Sirius lifted his head and met his gaze earnestly. “You’d never hurt us. And we don’t let you hurt anybody else.”
“But you are hurt,” Remus insisted and touched the little scratches again.
“I have worse bruises on my knee from sneaking around last week. I promise those scratches are nothing.”
Although he wasn’t quite convinced, Remus rested his head back onto the pillows and stared at the ceiling. “Okay, tell me.”
Sirius let his fingers wander along Remus’ chest. “Well, there was a very handsome wolf boy, who loved the moon very much and wanted to spend all night in its beautiful light…”
Remus felt his lips stretch into a smile. One of the things that had always freaked him out most about his transformations was the fact that he couldn’t remember anything he had done when the next morning came. But since his friends had started to join him, they had made a habit of recounting their nightly adventures once he was himself again.
At the beginning, they had taken turns, but more and more often, it seemed to be Sirius who stayed with him in the hospital wing while James and Peter took on the job of keeping up appearance for the four of them. But Remus liked Sirius’ stories best anyway. It always appeared to be the dog that the wolf let get closest. The one that he played and chased each other with.
“Being alone underneath the moonlight was cold and boring, though. This is why the wolf boy found himself a dog boy who was also lonely and cold and bored.” Sirius mimed two different characters with his fingers. “They spend the whole night cuddling and warming each other. And suddenly, they felt very happy and safe with the moon watching over them…The End.”
Remus drew his eyebrows together in confusion. Normally, these stories went very differently. A werewolf was still no lap dog after all.
“The End?” He asked sceptically.
“The End.” Sirius confirmed and patted his chest gently.
Remus lifted his head and squinted down at him. Sirius gave him a reassuring smile in return, but Remus could see its nervous edges. He also noticed the sudden twitch in Sirius’ fingers. His suspicion sky-rocketed.
“What are you hiding from me? That’s like…You know that this sounds like a pretty big reach.”
Sirius lowered his gaze and stared at his hand splayed on Remus’ nightshirt. “Don’t be mad…I…we don’t even really know…it’s nothing really…I just know you’ll freak out…but it was actually kind of…sweet?”
Remus gulped, suddenly dreading his answer. “What…what happened?”
Sirius took a deep breath and opened his mouth. Then he stopped, his eyes zeroing in Remus’ hand. “Give me your hand.”
“Wha...What?”
“Give me your hand,” Sirius said more determinately and reached out to grab it himself. Confusedly, Remus let him do as he had wanted to.
Carefully, Sirius pulled their arms into Remus’ sight and splayed his left hand against Remus’ right. “Do you see this hand? It’s a perfectly functioning hand.”
As if he wanted to prove a point, he wriggled his fingers and slipped them between Remus’, stretching and tightening them a few times. If possible, Remus was even more confused.
“Okay…,” he replied slowly, slightly distracted by the fact that Sirius was effectively holding his hand at the moment. “And…?”
Sirius curled his fingers again and tightened his grip on Remus’ skin. “I might have…,” he started haltingly. He bit his lip and avoided Remus’ gaze before he quickly rushed out: “...brokenmypawlastnight.”
“What?” Abruptly, Remus sat up, jostling Sirius into an upright position as well. Surprisingly, he felt no pain shooting through his body apart from an unpleasant twinge in his lower back.
This was what he had always been afraid of. That he would seriously hurt his friends during the full moon and nobody was around to safe them. They couldn’t even change back to heal themselves with their wands!
“Moony, it’s okay!” Sirius exclaimed quickly and tried to push him back onto the mattress. “Look, it’s fine! It’s-”
Sirius gave up on pressing his weight against him and nervously flailed his hands around instead. Remus grabbed both of his wrists and forced them to stay still. Sirius took a sharp breath.
“Which one?” Remus asked with husky voice, his eyes closed in fear. Sirius didn’t respond.
Slowly, Remus opened his eyes again and mustered Sirius sheepish, slightly pained expression. Instinctively, his gaze drifted to Sirius’ right hand, which was wrapped in a tight bandage. Quickly, Remus loosened the grip around his wrist.
“Shit! Sorry! Did I hurt you?!” Remus let go of Sirius’ other hand as well and cradled the injured one between his palms. “Did Madam Pomfrey not heal you?”
“No, it’s fine…and she did,” Sirius whispered quietly. “Well, most of it at least. She said if I was stupid enough to sneak around during a full moon, I could deal with healing the last of it the muggle way.”
Remus fell back onto his pillows and stared at the ceiling, an unsettling feeling suddenly spreading from his stomach to his throat. “You tried to trick me.”
“I’m…I’m sorry.” Sirius didn’t move.
“You deliberately lied to my face,” Remus continued and inhaled shakily. “Do you do that often?”
“No, I…not about the bad stuff anyway.”
Remus lifted his head a little and mustered Sirius who was fiddling with his sleeves, an unreadable but vulnerable expression on his face. It pulled at Remus’ heartstrings. He groaned and reached for Sirius to pull his head back onto his chest.
“No more lies,” he said sternly. Sirius snuggled into his side, relaxing slightly.
“Okay,” he whispered sheepishly.
“None at all. I want to know everything that happened last night.”
Sirius nodded reluctantly.
“Well?”
Hesitantly, Sirius cleared his throat. “It was an accident,” he started slowly. “We were racing each other and I misjudged and…you stopped in time, but I didn’t see the slope – only a chance to beat you – and…well, I just tumbled down in full speed and landed really badly.”
“Were you scared?” Remus asked, mustering him worriedly and more sympathetically.
Sirius sniffed a little. “Yeah. I mean, I was lucky that it was just a leg, but at the time I didn’t think like that, of course. It just hurt so badly and I could tell that Prongs and Wormtail were panicking and I just didn’t know how to get up again and carry on.”
Remus bit his lip and examined the peeling paint on the ceiling. He didn’t want to, but he needed to ask. “What did I-the wolf do? Did it try to attack you?”
Sirius didn’t respond. A few seconds passed. Sirius cleared his throat. Nothing.
“Padfoot…” Remus said warningly and forced his gaze back to his friend’s despite the fact that he was scared shitless.
Sirius squirmed against his side, not meeting Remus’ eyes.
“No. I…,” he finally gave in and if Remus didn’t know any better he’d think that he was turning as red as a beetroot. “The rest of the story…is actually…true?” Remus stared at him in confusion.
“What?” He asked eloquently.