On Sunday Harry sent a letter to Remus with Hedwig. He had decided it was time to start helping the werewolf out. He had some fragile information to get to Remus, so the letter he sent was very carefully worded.
Dear Remus,
I managed to finish that project I had been working on. I struggled with it a bit before I was able to cat onto it. Now I don't have any problems with it. I thought maybe I'd be able to help you out with your problem now. My calendar is almost full, but I'm sure I could find the time to help about once a month. We could meet at your old spot.
School's going ok. We had a club meeting on Friday that went pretty well. I start teaching on Tuesday. Quidditch tryouts were yesterday. They went pretty well. I think we have a pretty decent team this year. Not as solid as it has been, but we have a lot of new additions who are bound to improve with some practice. We shouldn't get whomped, at any rate. Let me know if you'll be able to make it this month.
Take care,
Harry
He thought that he did a fairly decent job of disguising the meaning to anyone should they intercept the letter, yet at the same time he didn't imagine Remus would have a terrible time figuring it out.
Harry kept up his morning routine of jogging around the grounds and working out in the room of requirement. Not only was it helping Harry stay in shape, he found it also left him feeling good about himself. He felt refreshed after the routine every morning. Even during the week it left him feeling ready to face the day.
Tuesday morning, Hedwig arrived with the regular owl post during breakfast. Harry excitedly took the parchment and noted who it was from. He stuffed it into his bag deciding he'd read it later. He didn't want anyone else to know what Remus had written.
"Who's the letter from, Harry?" Hermione inquired from across the table.
"Remus," Harry told her simply.
"Oh?" she returned. "Why aren't you reading it? Don't you want to know what it says?"
"I'll read it later," he retorted with a hint of warning in his voice.
If Hermione caught the hint, she didn't acknowledge it. "Why not just read it now? I'm sure we'd all like to know how he's doing. I haven't heard from Professor Lupin in a long time, and I'd like to hear what he has to say."
Harry glared at her sharply. "Then why don't you send him an owl yourself and ask him."
"What's that supposed to mean?" she asked him sardonically.
"It means that some things of mine are private. Just because I get a letter from someone doesn't mean you get to read it. I don't ask you for all the details of the ones you get from your parents. The letters were sent to you, not to me, and I respect that. Apparently asking for the same courtesy is out of the question." He stood from his seat while he was speaking and proceeded to walk out of the hall quickly before their argument went any farther. Hermione could really push his buttons, and he didn't want to end up saying anything he might later regret.
Ginny glared at Hermione from across the table where she had been sitting next to Harry. "You just don't know when to quit, do you?" she asked the prefect. "Can't you see that by constantly pushing him to talk you're only pushing him farther away?"
Hermione looked at Ginny sharply. "He can't keep everything bottled up inside. He needs to let us know what's going on."
Ginny just huffed and said, "You are unbelievable." She followed Harry's example and stalked out of the hall leaving a visibly upset Hermione and a flustered Ron in her wake. She caught up with Harry in the hallway and searched her mind for something to say to him. She found nothing that she thought would help so she went with, "Hermione can be a real cow sometimes."
Harry turned around at the sound of her voice, startled to find her there. "Yeah," he said sullenly. "I know she means well, but she just doesn't know when to quit. She thinks that every one needs to deal with their problems by talking about them. And she seems to think that she's the one I should be talking to. I mean, honestly… did she really think that a booklet detailing the five stages of grief was what I needed for my birthday?"
Ginny couldn't help it. She tried valiantly to hold it back, but nothing could have stopped it. She snorted and collapsed in a fit of laughter. She looked up at Harry's face to see him smiling at her as she continued to giggle from the floor. As her shaking subsided and she began breathing regularly again, he offered her a hand up. She gratefully took it, and he hoisted her off the ground with relative ease. "I'm sorry, Harry. I honestly don't know what to tell you. I've tried talking some sense into her, told her to back off and let you come to her, but she's relentless. Once she gets an idea in her head, nothing will stop her."
"Don't I know it," he replied ruefully. He shook his head clear of his thoughts of Hermione and smiled at Ginny again. "Thanks for coming after me, Gin. I appreciate it."
"You're welcome Harry," she replied. "I told you I'll be there for you whenever you might need me, and I meant it. I won't push you for information. I'll just be there whenever you're ready to talk or if you just need some company."
"I don't know what I did to deserve you, but thanks," Harry told her.
She rolled her eyes at him. "Need we go over this again, Potter? If not for the fact that you're a decent bloke and deserve the comfort of a true friend anyway, then the fact that you've saved my life a couple times ought to be reason enough."
He grinned cheekily at her. "Oh, I know. I just enjoy hearing you praise me so."
She pushed him into the wall and shouted, "You're an arse, Potter." She ran down the hallway and called over her shoulder "I'm off to class. Don't want to be late." Harry laughed as he tried to glare at her retreating form.
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