Warnings: In this fic, there are some themes that may serve as a trigger for some - mentions of child abuse, eating disorders, self-injury, and talk of death and suicide. As well, some minor violence and minor coarse language do present themselves.

Author's note: For the "Fanfiction Idol" fanfic contest, audition round. As per the contest, it is a one-shot, but I may revisit this later (no guarantees!) because I really like the concept. Enjoy. It's not as good as I had hoped, but I don't think it's entirely a wreck. I've never written anything about Moony and Padfoot, so this was a bit difficult.

To Watch a Rose Die

Watch it wilt yet turn away

Forever forsaken dreams; all turns grey

A posing rose against starlit sky

Panes of glass that shatter; scatter

Piercing flesh; split into ribbons

Marred flesh and broken glass

To watch a rose die

And simply stand idly by

Avert curtained eyes away

Forever without remembrance's pain

"Moony," the tall, black-haired teenager gasped to a woman who stood silhouetted in the doorway, her face the perfect caricature of shock. "I need Moony - I mean Remus. Is he here?" His gestures were frantic.

"Yes, he's here," the woman said slowly. "Did anything happen, Sirius dear?" Concern was clearly etched into every corner of her features.

"Nothing happened! I . . . just really need to talk to Moony."

The woman nodded, obviously not believing in his denial. "Alright." Mrs. Lupin turned behind her and called to the house at large, "Remus! There's someone at the door for you." She turned back to Sirius, smoothing a few stray hairs back into her messy bun atop her head. "He's coming," she smiled warmly, leaving him standing in the doorway.

Rustling could be heard through the open doorway, and moments later, a considerably ruffled-looking brown-haired teenager came to stand there. "Padfoot? What are you doing here?" He gave him an odd look. "You do realise it's dark out, right?"

Sirius gave him a look fit to make a king quail in his boots. "No, Moony, I just walked all the way down the walkway thinking I was soaking up the sun. No, er . . . My mum . . . Something happened. Kind of a mixture of me running away and me getting kicked out of the house by my mum."

Moony appeared uncharacteristically dumbfounded. "Bloody hell, Sirius. Why would she do that?"

"Something about me "fraternizing with mudbloods and bloodtraitors" and "not upholding the family honour." Nothing new. Usually I just shut myself in my room, but this time . . . "

He nodded. "That sounds like your mum. Do you need to a place to stay?"

Sirius shook his head hurriedly. "No, I've got some money with me, I'll figure something out. I just wanted to let you know I wouldn't be able to owl you for awhile because I can't use the family owl anymore."

"No way, Mum'll let you stay here! She'll understand. I can do all of the explaining for you. You've got your stuff, right?"

He tugged at his the neck of his cloak uncomfortably. "Barely." He smirked. "Look, Moony, I don't want to impose. I mean, you're mother's nice and all, but when it's the full moon, things are going to get really awkward. It's not like can just go transforming in front of her!"

"Oh, yeah, good point. But surely James's or Peter's mum will let you stay at one of their places for the full moon. Hopefully James." Sirius's cloak collar chose that ill-opportuned moment to break and snap away from his neck, revealing the myriad of injuries covering his arms and lithe frame. "Bloody hell, Sirius! What the hell happened to you?"

Padfoot had horror written in his face as he quickly grabbed his traveling cloak before it fell to the ground, clasping it back to his neck. "Nothing happened. Okay? Nothing happened." Padfoot was usually a much better liar, but now he was visibly shaken. Remus saw right past the lies, pulling the cloak off of his friend.

"Don't tell me nothing happened! Who did this to you?" Remus grabbed Sirius's arm a bit more vigorously than he intended, and Sirius winced, attempting to pull away. "Oh, sorry." He took a deep breath and continued. "What happened? Did your dad do this to you?"

"Yes. Yes, that is exactly what happened."

Remus glared at his friend. "I don't believe you."

"Is something the matter, boys?" Mrs. Lupin was back, standing next to the kitchen doorway in a stained apron with gloves sticking-out of the pocket. Her son turned to face her.

"Actually, Mum, there is." Sirius tried to cut him off, but to no avail. "Sirius's mum kicked him out, and his dad," he rolled his eyes, though the action went unnoticed by Mrs. Lupin, "Beat him up. Look." He pointed while Sirius glowered.

"What?" She ran over to the black-haired boy. "It's alright, dear. You can stay with us. Come now, let me have a look at the G-dawful bruises." Remus smirked as his mother led his friend into the kitchen. They'd talk about that later.

As the two were readying for bed in Remus's room, a cot having been put up for Sirius, Remus became very serious. "Okay, now, what happened? I'm your best mate, you can tell me. Better yet, you have to tell me."

Sirius quailed under his gaze. "I already told you - my dad did it."

"Sod off. Sirius, I've never seen you like this. It's only a month into the summer holiday, and you're the skinniest I've ever seen you! You're dad didn't do that. It's all too . . . organized. Premeditated. If he did that, he would have put a glamour charm on you, and you know it. What the hell happened?"

He sat on the cot. "Look, Moony, I really don't want to talk about this." At his friend's look, he decided better. "Okay, look, my dad did do this. I got away before he could apply the glamour charm, though! Better?"

"No. Maybe you're dad did beat you, but you can't make me believe he went this far, and you can't explain away all of those injuries. He might not treat you right, but Merlin."

Sirius hid his face in his hands. "I did it," he whispered in a small voice.

"What did you say?" Remus said, disbelieving.

"I did it, Moony."

Bloody hell.

Later that night, Remus woke to the sounds of shuffling about his room. "Padfoot?" He murmured into the darkness, his voice slightly muffled with sleep, towards a dark figure crouching over a bag in the corner. The figure ceased movement, and Remus moved to turn on the light.

"Wha' are you doing, Padfoot?" He squinted towards the analog clock on the far wall. "It's three o'clock in the morning." Remus failed to suppress a yawn. "What are you doing up?"

"Couldn't sleep," Sirius said innocently. "Go back to bed."

"Well, that's just great, because now I can't sleep either." He got up and walked over to his still-crouched friend. "Just what are you doing, anyways?" He looked over his shoulder curiously.

"I- I was just going to get . . . a head start on the summer work, y'know?"

Remus didn't buy it. "Then why are you holding your potions knife? They don't assign actual potions work for the summer, Padfoot."

"Just looking for my transfiguration book."

Sirius looked up as his best mate took the knife from his hand. "Sirius. I don't believe you. I'm keeping the knife."

"Why?" He asked incredulously.

"So you don't do anything else stupid! Great Merlin, Sirius, are you really that dense?" I already know about everything, you told me yourself, was the unspoken meaning to the sentence.

At Hogwarts, nothing seemed to be getting better when it came to matters of Sirius and his . . . little issue. Remus kept noticing more cuts, more bruises on his friend's arms, though Sirius seemed adamant on trying to hide the marks that marred his pale flesh. There was no point, though, because Remus had already seen the damage, and frequent wandwork and potions work often resulted in the hems of his work robes falling to expose old scars and new injuries. No one else noticed in the brief seconds that the hems were moved back, but Remus watched his best mate closely with the senses hawk. Or rather, in his case, that of a wolf.

No number of nasty confrontations could get Sirius to break his "nasty" habit. Remus simply couldn't understand why his friend ever would resort to such a crude form of self-expression. He had never known someone who had the same problem, and couldn't understand any of the psychology behind it for the life of him. It was no secret that Sirius had a horrible home life, but . . . Hell, his life at Hogwarts had to easily make up for that deficit, and in fact surpass it! He spent nearly ten months out of the year at Hogwarts School, and barely two at his family home, and now he would likely never spend any more time there ever again.

Even worse, Sirius seemed to not be able to be bothered to eat a reasonable amount. Remus wasn't sure if this was intentional, or if his friend of five years simply had no appetite any longer due to some kind of severe emotional turmoil. He even attempted to get on his case for this, but to no avail. Sirius would brush off his concern, saying "I'm not hungry," or some other lame excuse such as, "I had a big lunch," while Remus knew all to well that he had not had a large lunch in weeks.

Sirius was broken. There was no doubt about it. Remus didn't know what to do, but he couldn't just stand back and watch his friend fade away . . . could he?

One day, Sirius snuck away in the dead of the night, unaware that Remus was watching him leave. Entirely aware of the fragile state of his friend's mind, he followed after, snatching James's Invisibility Cloak from his bedside table without a backward glance. He followed as Sirius padded quietly out of the dormitory, and out of the common room. He matched his pace, tiptoeing a few feet behind his friend so that he would have warning if he stopped suddenly, not wishing to barrel into the animagus and alert him to his presence. Sirius seemed to wander aimlessly throughout the castle, until he came to the astronomy tower's entrance and began ascending the stairs. He stood still for a long time looking at the sky before moving towards the edge of the tower, and Remus suddenly took all leave of his senses, throwing off the cloak and reaching towards his friend, who started and turned towards him with confusion etched in his features.

"Moony?" He whispered. "When did you get here?" He looked at him suspiciously. "You've been following me," he nodded in understanding. "Just like you've been following me all year to make sure I don't do something stupid." He rolled his eyes and shook his head, releasing a bark-like, mirthless laugh. "No matter." Sirius turned back to edge.

"You're not mad at me?" Remus's tone was incredulous.

"I don't care."

"What do you mean? Surely you're mad at me."

Sirius smirked in a somewhat frightening, humourless manner. "You heard me," he whispered softly. "I don't care anymore. About anything."

"Padfo-"

"Sod off, Moony. I don't have anything to care about anymore. I don't have a home, I've practically been disowned, I've got no money, and my grades have gone to Hell." He stared forward, not looking at the person he was conversing with. "I do wonder, though. Is there anything out there? I'm not so sure." Unexpectedly, he turned towards Remus. "If you want to be of any service, either leave now and leave me with my demons, or answer me this: would any one care?"

Remus was incapable of comprehending momentarily, and then the answer to the meaning of such a question was all too evident. "Padfoot, yes. Yes, people would care." Seeing his friend didn't believe him, he gripped his shoulder to force him to continue looking at him. "I would care. Prongs and Wormtail would care. Sirius, think about it. Death is final. There's no coming back, once you're dead, your dead. You can't revive a lost rose, you can't nurse a rotting skeleton back to health and life. I don't know what's beyond. No one knows. There could be nothing, there could be Hell, maybe, by some miracle of a chance, there really is a Heaven. But we don't know, which is why you just have to make the best with what you have in the here and now." Great. Now he was being all philosophical.

"Come on, let's go back to the dorms, Padfoot. A wilting rose can be brought back to health, and I'm . . . tired of watching one die."

Sirius just looked at him in disbelief at his idiotic metaphors, but followed his friend's instruction.