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I chuckled to myself as I left the Burrow. A ‘normal’ Christmas indeed. Sometimes Harry reminded me so much of James, and I couldn’t express that thought enough to him. It was not just in looks, either, although that part is rather disconcerting. I recalled my words to him that had seemed to cheer him up momentarily, and the story behind them and chuckled once more.

“Sometimes you remind me a lot of James. He called it my ‘furry little problem’ in company. Many people were under the impression that I owned a badly behaved rabbit.”

It must have been our third year when I first heard James use that term to describe my lycanthropy. I was feeling rather depressed as the moon had waxed and would reach its full hideousness in less than four days. I was sitting in a corner of the Common Room, my head buried in a text, a serious expression on my face. No one dared approach me.

No one that is, except James.

“Remus? How are you this marvelous day?” he said.

“Fine,” I said shortly.

“What are you working on?”

“Potions.”

“Do you want to take a break? We could play some chess.”

“No.”

He was silent for a moment. I felt his eyes on me and turned to meet his gaze. He half-smiled and flung himself into a nearby armchair. The chair rocked, and actually scooted back a couple of inches before falling back into place. I turned back to glower at my book when James tried to start a conversation again.

“Your furry little problem is getting you down, isn’t it, Remus?”

“My what?” I straightened, confusion sweeping through me as I glanced toward him.

He grinned. “You said more than one word,” he started to gloat.

“My what?” I slowly repeated. Surely I had heard him wrong. Surely he wouldn’t choose such an obvious nickname for my condition.

“Your furry little problem,” he announced, quite loudly, to my chagrin.

Biscuits. Exactly what I thought he said.

“Have some chocolate,” James said, holding out a bar of Honeydukes’ chocolate.

How? How does he know? How in Merlin’s name does he know exactly what to say that will both cheer me up and leave me speechless?

“Go on, take it.”

Was he such a natural at friendship, or did he practice these lines? I tried to imagine James sitting around practicing lines to say to me, and a smile found its way to my face. There was absolutely no way that would happen. It must be natural.

“I haven’t poisoned the chocolate, you know. Take it already. My arm’s getting tired,” he started to complain.

I set my Potions book down on a side table, took the chocolate from him, and held it in my lap, looking down at the still wrapped chocolate. When did he figure out my weakness for the sweetest of desserts? I liked chocolate almost as much as I liked a nice juicy rare steak.

“It works for dementor effects, it should work on cheering you up. Even with your furry little problem.”

Was it just me, or were the last three words louder than any other words in that sentence? I winced.

“Stop calling it that,” I requested, fingering the wrapper of the chocolate bar.

“Why?”

The matter-of-fact question took me aback for a moment. “Someone will hear,” I protested.

“No one will guess right. No one ever does,” James reasoned.

“You can’t know that,” I pointed out logically.

“Wanna bet?” asked James in a whisper, leaning closer.

I pursed my lips. If it was about anything other than my secret, I would bet with him, but I wouldn’t want to win that particular bet. I shook my head. James shrugged.