the_debt_of_time

"Neville is Frank and Alice's son."
"Wow. What's he like?"
"Brilliant, when given the chance," she replied in a sweet tone she usually reserved for James. Remus
could already tell by how she spoke that Mia thought of Frank and Alice's boy as family. "He's so much
like his father, it's amazing. Neville was a very close friend of mine. He was the first person I met on the
Hogwarts Express. You could say he was my first friend."
"I was actually hoping that Neville would assist me with my lesson." Remus casually
stuck his hands in his pockets, keeping a relaxed stance as he verbally faced off against his
childhood rival. Granted, Snape was more James and Sirius's rival than his own. Mia's, as
well, in all reality. "And I am sure he'll be brilliant. Just needs the chance to prove himself."
Snape clearly did not like that. He sneered and then stormed out of the room.
Remus wondered, once again, if next month's Wolfsbane Potion was going to be poisoned.
A banging noise came from the locked wardrobe, and some of the students jumped
at the sound.
"There's nothing to worry about. It's just a boggart," he said and watched their
reactions that were mixtures of interest, apprehension, and absolute horror. "Boggarts like
dark, enclosed spaces. Wardrobes, the gap beneath beds, the cupboards under sinks...
I've even met one that had lodged itself in a grandfather clock. This one moved in yesterday
afternoon, and I asked the headmaster if the staff would leave it to give my third years
some practice. So, the first question we must ask ourselves is, what is a boggart?"
He smiled when a familiar hand rose quickly in the air.
"It's a shape-shifter," Hermione answered proudly. "It can take the shape of
whatever it thinks will frighten us most."
"Couldn't have put it better myself," Remus replied and grinned when Hermione
glowed under his praise. "So the boggart sitting in the darkness within has not yet assumed
a form. He does not yet know what will frighten the person on the other side of the door.
Nobody knows what a boggart looks like when he is alone, but when I let him out, he will
immediately become whatever each of us most fears. This means that we have a huge
advantage over the boggart before we begin. Have you spotted it, Harry?" he asked,
purposely trying not to chuckle as he saw Hermione's hand back in the air, waving
desperately.
"Er... Because there are so many of us, it won't know what shape it should be?"