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Chapter 3

Remus stiffened in shock as he felt Harry kissing him. It had been bad enough when he found himself with an armful when he had stood up. Now that lean body was leaning even further into his as Harry moved his mouth slightly.

It was his first kiss, he realized as it continued. And it felt good.

He had never known that it could feel this good.

And that was before Harry's tongue brushed across his lips.

Opening his mouth to speak, he found himself starting to participate in the kiss. A slick, wet tongue brushed once more over his lips before sliding in to dance with his.

Remus felt like he was drowning as he kissed Harry back. It was the best feeling in the world, especially when Harry moved his hands to his back. They moved in a sensuous pattern before one slid up to entwine itself in Remus' hair. That was when Remus realized he could move his hands, too.

Firm muscles played under his hands as he brushed them across Harry's arms. He raised them to his neck, feeling the soft hair that rested above the robe's collar. Remus slowly threaded one hand into the hair there as he and Harry continued the kiss.

"Remus...."

Harry's groan snapped his thoughts back to what they were doing.

Merlin! Harry was his student.... He couldn't be doing this.

Pulling away abruptly, Remus backed towards the door, watching almost absently as Harry lurched when his support disappeared.

"Harry, we can't do this!"

Harry blinked and headed to where Remus was standing. "Yes, we can. We just did!"

Remus shook his head. "No. No we can't!" Scrambling for the door, he wrenched it open and hurried to his room. Finding that Sirius wasn't back yet, he rested his head against the door, trying to figure out what had gone on.

******

Sirius kicked back and watched the rest of the teachers as they talked to one another. It had been hilarious to see Harry inebriated, but Remus hadn't seen the humor in the situation. He had become rather ticked at his friend for letting his godson get drunk off his arse instead. Since he had felt that way, Sirius had insisted Remus take Harry back to his room. That would accomplish two things: Harry wouldn't get into any more trouble that night, and maybe the two wouldn't act as strange as they had since they'd all come in after the snowball fight.

He looked up as Dumbledore came and sat beside him, glass in hand. Sirius waited for the older wizard to talk, but all the headmaster did was take a couple of sips of his punch.

"Yes, Professor?" Sirius asked as he looked at Dumbledore in curiosity.

The headmaster shook his head. "You can call me Albus, Sirius. I think by now you've earned that."

Sirius gave a half-smirk, but didn't say anything. He knew that Dumbledore had more to say.

"Do you think that Remus will continue teaching?"

The younger man eyed the headmaster. "Why? Do you know of anything that would keep him from teaching next year?"

Dumbledore shook his head. "That wasn't what I was asking," he admonished.

Sirius blushed, an action he hadn't believed he could still do. He knew what Dumbledore was talking about, but that didn't mean he wanted to. "Yes. He loves it here, especially since the kids really seem to love him."

The headmaster nodded. "Yes. It's good to see the students react to a teacher like that."

"Why did you ask me that in the first place?" Sirius asked.

Dumbledore just gave him a steady look in reply, his eyes twinkling in the dim light of the room as the candles burned themselves down.

Sirius eyed him briefly before nodding. "One of your mysterious, 'only I know what's going on' sort of thing?"

The old wizard laughed at the expression. "If you put it like that, yes. I have plans for when I leave at the end of the year, and I expect that most people will find it shocking."

A frown appeared between Sirius' brows. "What does that have to do with Remus?"

"Nothing, at least at the moment." He raised a hand at the question in Sirius' eyes. "I decided that this year would be my last. With the threat of Voldemort gone, I now have plenty of time to scope out who I would like to see as Headmaster of Hogwarts."

"Snape?" Sirius didn't like that idea, but he knew that his old classmate probably would love to have the job.

Dumbledore shook his head. "No. Severus is also retiring at the end of the year."

The statement shocked Sirius for a moment before he remembered the look of tight pain in the other man's eyes earlier this afternoon. It made sense now. Snape had mentally recovered, but the stress of teaching was causing him physical pain. Sirius was still thinking about Snape when he realized Dumbledore was speaking again.

"What do you think Harry is planning to do after he graduates?"

The black-haired man grinned. "I think he really doesn't know what he wants to do. He was talking last summer on how he just wanted to take a couple of months to figure out what he wanted to do with his life. Up until now he really hasn't had the chance to sit down and think about it."

Dumbledore nodded. "Yes. Voldemort tended to be first in everybody's mind for the last couple of years."

Sirius snorted, and tried to cover it up with a cough. From the knowing look in the headmaster's eyes, he wasn't successful. "Harry's thoughts probably centered around how long he was going to live, and trying to evade Voldemort, so, yeah, I can see why he wanted to take time off."

"What about the Ministry?" the headmaster asked.

"No," Sirius answered. "I know that Harry doesn't want to do anything within the Ministry. He knows that he would get frustrated with all the disorganization within that joint. Besides, the best job he's qualified for is an Auror, and he had enough of chasing down Death Eaters during the war to not want it.

"Do you think he'd like teaching?"

Now the animagus knew what Dumbledore had been getting around to. "Why?"

"Professor Stellar signed on only to teach Transfiguration until a permanent replacement for Professor McGonagall was found. Judging by Harry's scores, he is very qualified for such a position. At this point he is first in points and well ahead of even Miss Granger."

Sirius nodded. "James did very well in it as well."

The two men were quiet for a moment before Dumbledore slowly rose from the couch where they had been sitting. "I think it's time to call it a night."

The younger man agreed. "Now I just have to remember where I put my hangover remedy. I have the feeling Harry will need it come morning."

That set both men to laughing as they parted ways for the night.

******

Remus looked at the clock. Two minutes had passed since the last time he had looked at it.

Not a good sign. Not when he hadn't managed a wink of sleep, and certainly not when every time he closed his eyes he saw Harry watching him, his green eyes filled with things that made him want to shiver with need as they had been the night before. They had been needy and hungry and all manner of things Remus had never had directed at him before.

Figuring that he may as well get up, he went through his morning routine and stumbled out into the main room. He found Sirius sprawled on the couch, blissfully unaware that his best friend had been kissing his godson the night before. When the other man had finally crawled through the door, Remus had only managed a garbled 'good night' before hiding in his bedroom.

Now he had to figure out what he would say to his friend about what happened last night.

A knock on the door pre-empted what he was going to say. Striding towards it, Remus opened the door to find Hermione standing on the other side. Internally breathing a sigh of relief, he looked at her.

"Is something the matter, Hermione?" he asked.

She nodded. "You wouldn't happen to have a hangover cure, would you?"

Remus felt like he had been punched in the stomach. He knew it had to be for Harry, since neither she nor Ron had been at the teacher's party.

"I do," a voice behind him muttered.

Remus turned to find Sirius stretching by the couch before going over to the small case he had brought. Sirius made his way over to where Remus and Hermione was standing, holding a small vial in one hand.

"Let's go help the party child," he said as he pulled on Remus' sleeve.

He wanted to pull back, but knew that Sirius would sense something was wrong. Remus didn't think it was the right time to discuss it, but hoped desperately that Harry wouldn't blurt it out, either. Feeling like he was meeting his doom, Remus slowly crossed the Head Prefects' common room to Harry's bedroom.

Entering, he found Harry sitting, slumped across a couple of pillows with his head in his hands. The shirt he had worn last night was wrinkled, along with his robe as it hung half off his shoulders.

Sirius laughed, making the younger man cringe at the loud sound. Taking pity on his godson, though, the black-haired man crossed the room and handed Harry the vial.

"This'd better work," Harry growled before taking a swig.

Remus watched the smoke pour from Harry's ears, remembering the last time he had needed that. It had been before the Fidelus Charm, before James and....

Fuck! What would James think about Remus kissing his son?

"Thanks, Sirius," Harry was saying as Remus came back to reality. "What happened last night? How'd I get back here?"

Remus' eyes widened. He didn't remember anything?

It was a good thing he had kept his mouth shut. Now, no one would have to know he had kissed Harry but Remus himself. This was probably for the best.

******

Harry looked up at Remus as he paced the floor behind his desk in his chambers, waiting for the younger Gryffindor prefects to arrive for the weekly meeting. He sensed something was wrong with the older man, and wondered what had happened at Christmas. Since then, Remus had been cooler towards him, and Harry was puzzled. Had he said something when he was drunk?

He had gone over what he could have said a thousand times, and figured that Remus was embarrassed by whatever Harry had said. He must have said a come-on or a pick-up line, and, judging by the reaction that the other man was giving, wasn't interested.

A poke in his side from Hermione brought his attention to the meeting, reminding him that he'd better stop thinking about it. At least for the moment. For now he would have to sit through the meeting dealing with Valentine's Day, and the dance Dumbledore had wanted to throw. The topic alone was enough to make him scream, since he couldn't show interest in who he really wanted to take (Remus) and didn't want to offend anyone who wanted to go with him (Lavender, Colin, and about thirty other fans of varying sexes).

He didn't want to particularly sit at a table, watching Ron and Hermione bicker, or Neville and Hannah make those awful cooing sounds that they gave one another. And, being Head Boy, he couldn't not attend. So, he was stuck. Just what he needed. It figured.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Remus gave a sigh of relief as the last of the students left his study. It had been a month since Christmas and it was getting hard to keep everything to himself. Each night he relived that kiss; half of him wishing that Harry remembered it while the other half fervently hoped that he wouldn't.

Still, he could see that the way he was acting was hurting Harry, and that was something he had vowed would never happen. Resigning himself to try and forget that wonderful feeling, he sat down at his desk to figure out the coming week's lesson plans.

******

May found the Gryffindor seventh and fifth years studying their hearts out. The pressure each felt from the NEWTs or OWLs was almost palpable when one stepped into the common room.

It was worse coming from the Head Prefect's common room.

Hermione had spread books over the entire room, and had even banned Ron from stepping foot into either of the rooms she frequented just so she could study.

Harry tried to avoid her at all costs.

Instead, he had taken a much less intense, but no less serious, approach to the NEWTs. That mainly meant as far away from everyone else as he could get - which meant outside.

It was in a little shade garden close to the edge of Hogwarts' boundaries that he was most often found, whether it was sunny or cloudy. Harry found it peaceful enough to think about what lay ahead of him, after he left Hogwarts. He didn't really want to leave the school, and would gladly teach. Hell, he wouldn't mind teaching potions if it meant he could stay at the school. It was his first home.

That didn't mean he would hate living with Sirius for the summer. His heart jumped just thinking about it, since he had been waiting for that moment since that day at the end of his third year – before Wormtail escaped, before everything that had happened since.

A flap of wings alerted him to Hedwig's arrival. He had sent her off to the Weasleys, sending them flowers for Ginny. She may not even know that it was her birthday, but he wasn't about to forget it. He knew that Molly would need a pick-me-up on such a day, so he had slipped into the forest on the other side of the garden and found some wild roses.

"Hey, girl." He rubbed her chest affectionately as she nibbled on his ear. Gently taking the letter tied to her leg, he opened up the thank you note that Arthur had sent. The doctors hadn't let them take the flowers in to Ginny, so Molly kept them in the kitchen at the seat that Ginny usually occupied. He laughed when he read the postscript that Molly had added, saying that Ron had been a forgetful boy like he always was, and that Harry should go yell at him.

His day brightened a little more than it had been when he woke up, Harry picked up his Transfiguration book to study once more.

******

The garden was where Sirius found him the Saturday afternoon after the Quidditch Cup game had been played. Harry had slipped off from the victory party (Gryffindor had beat Ravenclaw with a score of 230 - 50) and gone to the garden again to study a little more.

A shadow crossed his book, alerting Harry to another's presence. Finding it was his godfather, he gave a big smile and closed the book after marking his spot. "Sirius! I didn't know you were going to stay after the game. I would have come got you," Harry said as he made room for Sirius on the blanket.

The older man shrugged as he sat down beside Harry. "I didn't know I was staying later, either."

Harry looked at him and found worry lines around his eyes. "What's wrong?"

Sirius shook his head. "I don't know." He sighed. "Have you noticed anything wrong with Moony?"

Harry thought about it. Over the last couple of months Remus had become his warm self again, but the last week he had been increasingly tired. "Hm. Well, I think he needs more sleep," he finally said.

Sirius nodded. "Yes, but it's hard for him to find it right now. Full moon's tonight." He turned towards Harry. "I think he needs some company tonight. Want to join?"

Harry's face lit up. He had always wanted to know what had gone on those nights when his father and friends had roamed the Forbidden Forest all those years ago. Besides, he really wanted to be close to Remus, even if he was in his wolf form. There was a feeling he got when he was near the man, and Harry had become addicted to it over the last year, and more especially since they had started to act normal again.

Ever since Remus had warmed up to him again, he had been helping Harry study when he could. Several times they had talked deep into the night about various topics, often drifting from the subjects on the NEWTs to other things. Harry found those nights very enjoyable, appreciating the other man's mind. It was swiftly becoming the second best thing about Remus that he liked.

The first, though, were his eyes. They reflected a lot of what he was thinking. There would be times when they clouded over, though, and Harry itched to find out what they hid, what was going on behind them.

Now would be a chance to see those eyes in another form, from a different point of view.

"Sounds good," he answered Sirius' invitation, giving the older man a grin.

******

Moony paced back and forth in the Shrieking Shack, waiting for Sirius and Harry to arrive. He was starting to think that this wasn't such a good idea after all. Sirius had caught him at a bad moment, and as irritated as he was by his condition, he had snapped out a 'yes' when he had meant 'not a chance in the world.'

Now he was stuck. Still, at least he was in his wolf form, and couldn't talk. They would just have to think that Snape had added just a touch too much Wolfsbane to his potion.

Soon a scratching could be heard, soon followed by the click of nails on the hard floor. Padfoot made his way over to where Moony sat, nudging him in the side to get him moving. Heaving a sigh, the wolf followed the large dog towards the end of the tunnel underneath the Whomping Willow.

On the other side they were met with the big cat that was Harry. Remus was startled, as he usually was, when he saw the black jaguar named Smoke sitting up and watching the two canines. Harry's green eyes glittered brightly in this form, enhanced by the bright moonlight that brought with it Remus' curse. A black tail flickered at the end, where it lay wrapped around his front legs.

Padfoot, of course, missed the feline beauty that sat before him and tugged on Moony's ears. Growling, Moony launched himself at the dog. Soon they were joined by Smoke, and together the three tumbled towards the forest for a wild night.

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