Two Fathoms Deep

Remus' Journal Entry

September 25^th, 1972

There is something daunting about a blank journal. This one is new and nice smelling and filled with lots of cream-colored pages. I think it smells like cedar, which is probably why I suddenly remember winter nights back home with my parents, right after the full moons when I would be consumed with the smell of the forest. I don't know why the thought of keeping a journal came to me-- I suppose that after last night I need something to tell my thoughts to, since it can't be someone. I know Sirius, James, and Peter would never think to keep a journal. I guess it's not something normal teen boys do, is it? Still, I'm not just a teen boy, not really, so I'm not suffering under any delusions that I'm normal. Even if I was just Remus I still wouldn't be normal, seeing as how Sirius is always teasing me for reading too much and worrying too much and I suppose acting too much like a girl in general, what with my quiet wonderings. I think if he knew I was keeping a journal his teasi! ng me for being a girl would suddenly be filled with much more conviction. Note to self: Hide diary journal and look up some advanced locking charms!!

I suppose I should fill up these 400 blank pages (I just now counted) though I'm not sure that I have anything interesting to say. Rather I just have a secret that's tearing me apart, haha, literally! Oh Merlin, now I'm going mad.

I never knew anyone my age before coming to Hogwarts, so I don't have much practice in confiding, which is probably why I feel like a prat writing my thoughts down. It's not as if confiding in anyone was ever an option for me. I remember my parents' nervousness about me going to school and they made me nervous about leaving. Their anxiety was understandable, all things considered.

I could tell they were surprised when I wrote to them that I'd made friends with Sirius, James, and Peter. I think they felt guilty afterwards for assuming that I wouldn't make friends, and if I thought they wouldn't deny it then I'd tell them not to feel guilty for thinking that, since our friendship still surprises me, too. How I can sit down next to Sirius, James, and Peter any time I want and they don't tell me to sod off, and how I am allowed to tell them to sod off when they ask to copy my homework (as long as I give in and let them anyway). I don't think I'll ever take friendship casually, like how James and Sirius naturally play off one another and never seem to think the connection between them is something incredible. I can laugh with the marauders about our nighttime wanderings and pranks, but I'll never go to bed after thinking it ordinary and expected. It will always be surprising to find that there are three people who like me, three people who! want to take me away from my books so that I can live with them in the present. Instead I'll always go to bed after our adventures increasingly convinced that they can never find out the truth about me, or else I'd lose this wonderful, surprising thing forever.

I don't have a fear of being alone. I enjoy the solitude, as long as I have a good book and a comfortable chair. It's the feeling of being alone in a crowd that makes me want to crawl inside myself and disappear. Stupid, really. I should at least be able to feign the easy-going confidence that Sirius has. He walks into a crowded room and he's the center of everything, smiling effortlessly and looking utterly nonchalant. I, on the other hand, shut my mouth and go sort of rigid, like someone tried to cast Petrificus Totalus on me and it only worked half-way. But when it's just the marauders and me in a room together I can return Sirius's grin and move all my limbs with ease. Lying to them every full moon is the one exception to this-- I feel again as if I'm lost in a sea of people, rigid appendages floundering in the panic that wells up inside me.

I don't know what I was expecting last night when I went and sat down for dinner in the Great Hall. I was nervous, but in a calm, detached sort of way. Like I was heading into a battle and was sure I wouldn't live to see the next sunrise, but knew that I must forge ahead anyway, expecting the worst and trying not to think about how it would feel to be without Sirius and the marauders. That's the one thing I had assumed--that I would be kicked out of the group, perhaps to be replaced by one of the other second year Gryffindor boys.

My insides sloshed around like pumpkin juice and I wondered if I should just tell them the truth, but then I came to my senses and realized that despite Sirius' vehement proclamations of despising his pureblood family's prejudices, he too would reject me. There are some things that defy any Natural Order, and always will be intolerable to wizards. I'd rather he hate me for lying than hate me for what I am.

So I knew the battle was coming, but I didn't know how the attack would begin. I sat down in my usual seat next to Sirius and waited for the first blow to fall.

It never came.

*-----*-----*

Remus set aside his quill and stared down at the words he'd just written. This journal idea seemed a poor substitute for someone real to talk to. It couldn't answer all the burning questions that were on his mind, like what am I going to say next full moon? and how long will it take for them to figure out the truth?

He didn't know why Sirius, James, and Peter had dropped the subject of his disappearances so quickly, although Remus had a sinking feeling that they had merely devised a plan to find out the truth. And, if the marauders had a plan to do something, Remus knew from experience that one way or another, and usually in the worst way possible, they'd accomplish it. Keeping a journal lying around would be begging for one of them to snoop through it. Really, what locking charms could keep a determined Sirius and James out?

Confused and disheartened, Remus closed his journal and shoved it to the end of the table he was sitting at in the library. Usually he found the dusty bookshelves comforting, thousands of years of knowledge tucked away in untold volumes, but he was too anxious to take solace in his escape.

It's a miracle I have any friends at all, Remus thought miserably, bringing one hand up to rub his throbbing temple. Not that I will have them for much longer--

"Remus?" a soft voice questioned cautiously, its owner sitting down in the seat across from him.

Remus made a noncommittal noise from behind his hand, not removing the feeble shield. At first he couldn't discern who the voice belonged to, but after a moment of contemplation he realized it was Lily's. It had been hard to recognize, seeing as how he usually heard her voice when she was yelling in righteous indignation at James or Sirius.

"Remus, why are you crying?" she asked, her voice now gentle and feminine and full of concern.

Remus' hand flew off his face. "I'm not crying!" he said quickly, hoping the fact that he felt like it would escape Lily's notice.

Lily smiled at him. "I knew that," she said, "but I didn't know how else to get you to stop hiding and talk to me. Really Remus, what's wrong?"

And in the puzzling way that females have, Lily's voice seemed to flow around him, beckoning him to open his heart and soul to her. The pounding of his head and heart subsided as he imagined how wonderful it would feel, if only for a few brief moments, to be free of the insidious secret eating him from the inside out.

Remus quickly shook off the urge.

"Why are you calling me Remus?" was what came out of his mouth instead, and after he said it he felt immediate regret. He hadn't meant to sound so rude; she was being nice, after all.

Lily, however, didn't seem perturbed at his question, and merely shrugged, saying, "Well, you're not a prat like Black and Potter. I don't know, to be honest. I guess I just see more of myself in you, if that makes any sense."

"Great," Remus muttered, self-disgust surging inside him, "as if Sirius doesn't tell me often enough that I'm a complete girl."

Lily laughed at this, saying kindly, "That's not what I meant at all! You're actually very handsome, you know. You'd make an awful girl."

Remus thought disjointedly, this isn't happening. Lily--no, Evans--is not sitting here with me in the library, calling me Remus and handsome in that soft girl voice, and oh Merlin, am I blushing?

Lily tucked a lock of her red hair behind her ear, and looked at Remus as if sizing him up, and Remus did all he could to fight the instincts that were screaming for him to run, run away, and don't look back...

"So is that why you're upset, then? Black, Potter, and Pettigrew are being gits?"

Remus considered this. His friends were concerned about him because he had been lying to them about his absences, and they had decided to get to the bottom of it. "No," he said truthfully, feeling a terrible twist of guilt in his chest as he answered Lily. "The opposite, actually. They're the best friends I could ever ask for, and I..." Remus trailed off. I what? I lie to them about being a werewolf so they won't abandon me? I lie to them and cause them to worry? I lie to Sirius and he looks at me with that hurt, lost look on his face, as if he can't understand why I'm doing this to him...

Lily looked politely incredulous, but reached out and patted him softly on the shoulder anyway. "Well, I'm sorry about whatever it is that's bothering you," she said, as if understanding Remus' reticence, and Remus had the slightly hysterical thought that she'd make a wonderful mother someday.

Giving him one last sympathetic pat, Lily got up quietly and walked down the row of bookshelves, making her way towards the exit.

Remus sat still for a few moments, digesting his strange conversation with Lily. It reminded him of his odd confrontation with Snape in the entrance hall. He would never have expected either of them to take any kind of interest in him, and couldn't understand why they seemed to care. Surprised that anyone besides his fellow marauders noticed him, Remus turned to write down some of his conflicting thoughts in his journal, rationalizing to himself that it might make more sense if he could see it down on paper, and that it wasn't a diary, or any kind of evidence to merit Sirius' suspicions concerning his masculinity.

The only problem with this plan, Remus realized, was that his journal was no longer there.

*-----*-----*

For once Sirius didn't feel like asking Remus for help on the homework he'd waited until the last minute to start on. Since he and James didn't really need to study to do well in all their classes, they'd both developed a bad habit of procrastinating on long-term assignments. Sighing softly, he opened his copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and rifled to the page assigned by Professor Kettleburn, and began to read.

"The mooncalf is an intensely shy creature," like Remus, Sirius' thoughts interjected, "that emerges from its burrow only at the full moon. Its body--"Remus' body is nice, Sirius' thoughts again interrupted his reading, he's much stronger than he looks, lots of muscle beneath those jumpers. And all that dirty blonde hair that falls over his eyes, I bet it's as soft as it looks. I wonder what Remus would do if I touched it? And his eyes are a nice sort of brown, like the color of James' tawny owl, but much more sparkly, more golden--

Suddenly Remus was standing in front of Sirius, dirty-blonde hair clinging in wet strands to his sweaty forehead, golden-brown eyes frantic, and panting spasmodically. Sirius worked hard to ignore the voice in the back of his mind (which sounded treacherously like his mother's) that shouted at him for using a word like sparkly to describe anyone's eyes, much less those of his best mate.

"Did--did you--" Remus gasped, trying to articulate something, Sirius couldn't tell what.

"Oi, Remus, what's up?" called James from across the common room, where he was playing exploding snap with Peter. Unlike Sirius, James and Peter had no qualms about asking Remus to copy his Care of Magical Creatures homework later that night.

Remus slumped in the chair next to Sirius, putting his head in his hands, still breathing fast. James and Peter put down their cards and walked over to where he and Sirius sat.

"You guys didn't, did you?" asked Remus miserably, shallow breathing now even enough to speak in full sentences.

"We didn't what?" asked Peter, his question echoing Sirius' confusion.

"Didn't--didn't take my journal."

There was a pause. Then:

"You keep a diary?" Sirius said in gleeful incredulity, half-laughing.

"It's not a diary, it's a journal, and yes, I just started. Unlike some people," and this was accompanied by a glare in Sirius' direction, "I happen to have thoughts worth recording."

"It's missing? Well, why did you think we'd taken it?" James asked, sounding more curious than offended.

Remus sighed, and mumbled something that they couldn't make out. Sirius had a feeling it had to do with suspicions of them snooping to get to the bottom of Remus' disappearances.

"Well, it wasn't us, we've been up in Gryffindor Tower all day," said James, ignoring Remus' unintelligible comment. "Where were you when you realized it was missing?"

"The library."

"Was anyone else with you?" asked James, brows furrowing in contemplation.

Remus colored. "Well, Lily was with me...." he trailed off.

Sirius was taken aback--Remus and Evans? Lily? Together? Alone, in the library? Sirius felt as though all the wind had been knocked out of him.

"You--you and Evans?" James asked, in a strangled sort of voice.

"What?" Remus asked, looking at James, bewildered. Then comprehension dawned, and Remus began to glow an even brighter shade of pink. "No! No, of course not!" he hurriedly explained. "She just came and talked to me for a minute, that's all!"

Sirius started breathing again.

"But Lily wouldn't take someone else's dia--journal," Sirius quickly corrected at seeing Remus' warning look. "I mean, it'd be against what she's always on about. It wouldn't be "sporting" or some such rubbish."

"I didn't think it was her," said Remus, starting to get that panicked look in his face again, the blush having vanished from his cheeks as quickly as it had come.

"Well, didn't you say you'd just started it?" Peter asked, taking a seat across from Sirius and Remus at the table. "It's not like you had any of our really bad pranks written down, is it? So if the Slytherins took it they wouldn't find out that it was us who bewitched Pratchett's knickers, right?"

Remus paled even more. "No, they wouldn't find out about Pratchett's knickers," he said hoarsely, "they'd have much, much better blackmail than that."

"Why, did you write about a girl you fancy?" snickered James, now recovered from the shock of hearing about Remus and Lily together in the library, and ostensibly relieved Remus didn't fancy that annoying girl.

"You don't understand!" said Remus in a fervent undertone, "It's not some joke, James! How would you feel if you wrote down the most private and personal things about yourself in a journal, and then someone, most likely a Slytherin, stole it? It wouldn't be so funny then, would it?"

"Remus, it's all right, we'll help you get it back," said Sirius, alarmed that Remus was so panic-stricken. Remus had never lost his composure like this before.

"Yeah, don't worry mate, we'll help you get it back," said James boldly, "And I'd bet anything it was Snape. Greasy git."

Remus looked as though he wanted to say something, but then Peter chimed in, "Yep, I bet it was. Well, let's go down to the Great Hall for dinner and see if you can hex him, James."

"Right then!" said Sirius, seizing Remus by the arm and pulling him up from the table, glad for the excuse to quit his Care of Magical Creatures homework. "Off we go, to find Snivellus! Marauders, let the debauchery begin!"

Remus groaned, but followed James, Peter, and Sirius through the portrait hole and down to the Great Hall.

*-----*-----*

Remus couldn't eat a bite of his dinner, despite all Sirius' attempts at persuasion. His stomach was tied in knots, and horrible what ifs were running through his mind. He kept eyeing the Slytherin table, but didn't see anyone recoiling or screaming in horror, so he supposed that whoever had taken his journal either wasn't in Slytherin or wasn't in the Great Hall.

"You know, I don't see Snape," said Peter, staring intently at the Slytherin table. "Too bad, I really wanted to watch James hex him."

James and Sirius cracked into identical wicked grins.

"I think I'm going to be sick," said Remus, and leapt from the Gryffindor table to exit the Great Hall, beyond caring about how stupid he must look. This is not happening...

He rushed out of the Great Hall and collapsed on the floor in the entryway, mind numbly considering the gravity of his situation. Soon everyone will find out, Remus thought dazedly, Dumbledore will be sacked and it will be all my fault, it will be all over the Daily Prophet and oh god, Sirius will hate me even more for finding out like that--I'll never have any friends again, I'll never see the marauders after this, and it won't matter because they won't want to see me...

Remus was so lost in his anguish that he didn't notice the presence of another student until he saw the end of his robe in front of him. Remus uncomprehendingly looked up into the face of Severus Snape, his mind momentarily shocked into a state of calm.

"I believe this belongs to you." Snape spoke matter-of-factly, without any trace of emotion, as he held out Remus' journal to him.

I must have gone mad, Remus thought. Absolutely bonkers. I am hallucinating...

"Well? Are you going to take it, or do you want me to read it?"

At this Remus pounced forward and snatched the journal, landing unsteadily on his feet as he clutched it to his chest and faced Snape uncertainly. "You mean..." Remus stuttered, completely flabbergasted, "you didn't.... you didn't...."

"No, I didn't read it," Snape said dryly, "fascinating as your innermost thoughts must be, I felt that the group of first year Slytherin girls shouldn't waste their time with such possessions of ill-repute."

"First year... Slytherin girls?" Remus tried to wrap his brain around this explanation. "But... why?"

"They believed your journal was Evans's," Snape commented tersely. "They claimed they wanted revenge on her for ending their torment of an unfortunate third year Hufflepuff." The edges of Snape's lips quirked into what may have been the beginnings of a smile, but a second later Remus thought he had imagined it, for Snape had the same insouciant expression on his face.

Remus, still dumbly grasping his journal protectively to his chest, stood before Snape and tried to process this information. "So..." he began timidly, "They didn't read it, either?"

This time Snape did smile, much to Remus' surprise, although the effect wasn't entirely pleasant; it seemed more like a half-hearted sneer.

"Why Lupin, what do you have to be so nervous about?" Snape didn't pause for an answer though, which Remus was thankful for. He didn't think he was capable of forming any response to that. "I overheard the first years talking as they were exiting the library, and I demanded to see the journal. I saw today's date scrawled across the top of the first page and immediately recognized your handwriting. I remember it from partnering you in Defense Against the Dark Arts last week, when we had to write that Dark Creatures essay."

Remus absorbed his words slowly, pushing away the residual traces of panic from last week when Snape had asked him a question about werewolf origins. After a few moments his clenched stomach relaxed, the realization that his secret was safe washing over him in comforting waves.

"You didn't read my journal.." It wasn't a question; Remus had heard the truth in Snape's words, even if trusting a Slytherin was an entirely foreign concept to him. Snape gazed haughtily back at Remus, as if to say of course I didn't, you prat. He didn't say it, though, and Remus knew this gesture was costing Snape some of his pride, and Remus swelled with gratitude.

"How can I..." Remus began earnestly, a relieved smile on his face.

"Don't mention it." Remus understood his response to be a command, not a "you're welcome," and nodded his compliance. Snape turned on his heel and headed down the dungeon staircase, oily hair shining in the torchlight until it disappeared from view.

Remus stood there for over a full minute, rooted to the spot, staring blankly at the journal that had nearly cost him both his life at Hogwarts and any hopes for his future afterwards. He tucked it inside the pockets of his robes just as he heard footsteps behind him.

"Remus!"

He turned around to see Sirius standing alone, carrying a glass of water and some crackers.

"I thought you were sick in the bathroom!" Sirius explained, gesturing to the water and crackers unnecessarily. "I was just about to come and see how you were doing. You're feeling better, then?"

Remus grinned widely and, not pausing to consider how Sirius would take it, he strode over and embraced him. For a few moments Remus felt so content he thought he would burst, standing there with Sirius in his arms and his secret safe once more. Then he realized that he was hugging his very-male friend and would again be forced to lie about his lycanthropy, and the blissful feeling passed. He let go of Sirius, who had tensed with surprise at Remus' touch, and Remus grinned apologetically at him.

"I got my journal back," Remus explained, hoping that Sirius wouldn't call him a girl for embracing him or something else, something that was far closer to the truth. Sirius shook himself before answering.

"Really? How? Did you find out who nicked it?"

"Some first year Slytherin girls took it by mistake."

Sirius snorted.

"Why would they bother returning it, if there wasn't something in it for them? Remus, did they blackmail you?!"

"No! A.... a friend returned it, after they realized the mistake had been made. No one even read it."

Sirius looked at him quizzically, as if debating whether or not to ask Remus who his mysterious friend was. He seemed to decide against it, though, perhaps guessing that Remus wanted to keep that private. Remus knew that Sirius wouldn't have given James such an easy time of it, and would have demanded to know--but then again, James didn't have any secrets to keep.

"Well, at least you have it back now," Sirius said, changing the topic. "You can look up some secure locking charms to cast on it, and maybe a few good tracing spells, too."

*-----*-----*

September 26, 1972

It turns out that I'll never see these 400 blank pages filled (well, 391, technically, since my handwriting is so big and scrawled that nine pages have already been written on). I wanted to, since writing everything down lessens the essential loneliness of secrecy, but I realize now what a mistake that would be. It has been a few hours since Snape returned my journal, and I haven't been able to bring myself to destroy this, not yet. I thought that I'd write a final entry, one last testament, of all the things that I can never say.

So, here it is: to the marauders, my faithful friends--I'm sorry. I'm sorry for my lies, I'm sorry I can be such a wet blanket, and I'm sorry that I always lose points for Gryffindor in Potions. I'm sorry for spending unnatural amounts of time reading, and studying, and generally trying (and failing) to stop you three from causing too much mayhem. I'm sorry that I don't much like Quidditch, and for that time when I choked on one of Sirius' mints and he had to save me and in so doing we both got curses thrown at us from that awful blonde upper-year Slytherin (and I'm sorry, Peter, but I think that unfortunate burn mark will never fade entirely).

I wish I were more like you three. Instead, I'm sitting in the common room alone at 5 am, writing my goodbyes to an inanimate object, wishing I could banish my feelings for Sirius, knowing that even if he did, somehow, miraculously, feel the same way that I do, I'd never take that final step because it would go against The Higher Power that controls my life.

I'm sorry, Sirius, for my weakness. I've never been more sorry for it since I fell in love with you.

And I'm sorry that my handwriting is rubbish, and that I've proved Lily wrong--

I really am a girl.

*-----*-----*