FIC: Once in a Blue Moon - Ch 26 (WIP)
Start of the story, including summary, full ratings, warnings, pairings etc. Here
Disclaimer: I own nothing that you recognise. J K Rowling retains all copyright.
Where Do I Belong? (PG13 for language)
Remus made his enquiries about Rita’s article as quickly and as calmly as he could. He was slightly disheartened to find that most of the students who had left had done so because of Dumbledore’s decision to allow him to attend the school. On a more positive note, he had found that several of the students he had spoken with had been far more accepting of him that he would have initially thought. In fact there was only one student who was openly hostile towards him, and the Ravenclaw in question had lost a parent to a werewolf attack and was understandably bitter about it. On the whole though, it seemed that most of the students were far more concerned with their own lives and dramas to be too bothered about Remus and his furry little problem.
“I told you that you were worrying too much,” Sirius told him as they walked up the stairs towards the dormitory.
“I guess,” Remus agreed. “Hopefully everyone will forget about Rita’s story soon and I can just enjoy being at Hogwarts again.”
“You mean you’re not enjoying it at the moment?” Sirius asked.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Remus replied, faltering slightly as he tried to put his feelings into words. “I just want to enjoy being here, instead of worrying about the other students and what they think about me. I don’t want to be the freaky werewolf, I just want to be a normal student.”
Sirius didn’t know what to say to that. Remus would always be a werewolf, unless someone found a cure. He would never be just another student.
They arrived in the dormitory and Remus threw himself onto Sirius’s bed with a contented sigh. “It’s been a long day,” he declared. “I’m so tired I may even sleep in tomorrow.”
Sirius hovered at the edge of his bed, casting a wary glance at Romulus who had appeared in one of the windows. He’d put off talking to Remus about the sleeping arrangements in the dormitory for the last couple of days, but with Remus’s ghostly brother lingering nearby, he knew he couldn’t put it off any longer.
Remus, seemingly anticipating that Sirius was going to say something, sat up with a questioning expression on his face. “What is it?” he asked.
“I was thinking about this,” Sirius said vaguely as he waved his hand towards the bed.
“About what?”
“About us sharing a bed like this,” Sirius said. “I think maybe it would be best if we didn’t do it any more.” The words tumbled forth in a rush, but he could tell that Remus had understood them all.
“I thought you didn’t mind?” Remus asked quietly.
“I don’t,” Sirius assured him.
“Then why?”
Sirius chewed on his lip slightly and suddenly the exact words to make Remus agree with him appeared in his mind. “Because it’s not normal,” he said quietly.
Immediately the words were spoken, Remus lost the will to argue about the situation. “I didn’t think about it like that,” he whispered as he climbed off of the bed and moved towards his own.
Sirius reached out to Remus as he passed him, but the other boy ducked out of his range.
That night they climbed into their separate beds and Sirius tried his best to ignore the empty space beside him.
James arrived in the dormitory after yet another detention and looked like he was about to make a comment of his own. A warning look from Remus saw the words dying on his lips and he climbed into his own bed without making a sarcastic remark.
Sirius tossed and turned until the early hours of the morning, frustrated with his inability to fall to sleep, a problem only compounded by the fitful movements of Remus on the other side of the room.
-o-xXx-o-
Hogsmeade was the image of a winter wonderland on the December morning that had been chosen for the second Hogsmeade weekend of the year.
Sirius, Remus, James and Peter made their way slowly to the village, stopping to throw snowballs at each other every dozen or so yards.
“No using magic, you cheater!” Remus yelled at Sirius who was using his wand to conjure more than one snowy missile at time.
“We’re wizards,” Sirius called back. “We’re meant to use-”
Unfortunately he never finished his sentence because a particularly well aimed snowball from Peter caught him squarely in the mouth.
It was mid-morning when they finally reached the village itself. The street was crowded with students from the school, many doing their last minute Christmas shopping.
The school choir was singing carols under the watchful eye of Professor Flitwick in the main village square and there was a joyous holiday atmosphere in the air.
The four boys had organised their own shopping schedule the night before. Sirius and James would shop together for Peter and Remus, and vice versa, before switching partners after eating lunch in the Three Broomsticks in order to buy the last of their presents.
Sirius and James were already laden down with goodies and heading towards the Three Broomsticks, when they found their path blocked by an elderly woman, barely visible beneath the threadbare cloak that covered her from head to toe.
“Foretell your future, boys?” she croaked, her hand outstretched in the hope of payment for her offer.
“Do you see a pretty redhead in my future?” James asked with a laugh. “Or failing that, the little blonde in Hufflepuff would do for a date or two?”
“Old Ursula will tell you only what she sees,” Ursula said with a laugh that was almost a cackle. “Whether it be good or bad, you’ll know the truth.”
“I think I’d rather live in hope,” James laughed. “Come on Sirius, the others will be waiting for us.”
Sirius nodded and stepped to the side to let the old woman pass him by, but she didn’t seem to be moving on.
“What about you, young man?” she asked, reaching out for his hand.
Sirius was about to protest that he didn’t want to know his future, but the old woman suddenly looked up and stared him directly in the eye. “What is it?” he asked, shocked by the stunned expression on the woman’s face. “What do you see?”
“Come on, Sirius!” James was getting impatient and was already several paces ahead of him when he called back.
Sirius ignored him, his eyes unable and unwilling to break contact with those of the crone. “What do you see?” he asked again.
“Nothing,” the woman whispered. “I see nothing but darkness, darkness like you can’t imagine.”
“I’m one of the Black family,” Sirius replied with a forced laugh. “Darkness is practically our name.”
“Not like this,” the woman warned. “You’ve never known darkness like that which is to come to you.”
Sirius shrugged. He knew that warnings of doom and disaster were the bread and butter of those in the trade of foretelling the future. It was just his bad luck that she seemed to have chosen him for her predictions.
“Sirius!” James called again. “We’ve not got all day for you to try and pick up women!”
Sirius laughed at the affronted expression on the face of the woman and made his escape.
“You do seem to attract the weirdos,” James teased as they continued down the road. “Werewolves, ghosts and now seers.”
“The Lupins aren’t weirdos,” Sirius replied as they side-stepped the carol singers who were starting to sound a little strained after a morning of singing.
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Then you shouldn’t have said it.”
“Don’t know why you’re so touchy about it,” James muttered. “It’s not like I said that all the Blacks are inbred lunatics.”
“Why not? They are,” Sirius replied easily.
“You really hate your family that much?”
“Not all of them, but my parents are determined to drive me up the wall with their plans for me…and all the girls they keep trying to set me up with are distant relatives somewhere on the family tree.”
“Not all of them?” James asked in surprise. “Besides, they might not really be related.”
“They are,” Sirius explained. “We’ve got this ugly family tree tapestry at home. Every time Mother invited one of the wretched girls over in the summer she made me memorise the relevant branches of the tree so that I could ask her about her family.”
“Sounds right boring.”
“It’s even more boring than having to memorise the dates of all the Goblin Rebellions.”
“You mean those same dates that Remus was reciting in his sleep last week?”
“That would be the ones.”
They reached the Three Broomsticks and found that Remus and Peter were already waiting for them and had got the first round of butterbeers already.
“It’s about time,” Peter complained as he glanced up from the menu. “We were about to order without you.”
“Sorry,” James replied as he took a sip of his drink, relieved that it was still warm. “We got held up when Sirius pulled.”
Sirius glared across the table at James as Peter and Remus both asked, “Who?”
“I just got collared by some old seer,” Sirius explained.
“That’ll be old Ursula Trelawney,” Remus commented. “I think she lives in Dove Town, but she used to come to Hogsmeade quite a lot.”
“You’ve met her?”
“A couple of times.”
“Is she really a seer?”
“If she is, she’s not a very good one,” Remus muttered. “She cornered Rom when he was working at the Hog’s Head one weekend and told him he’d marry a muggle.”
“Oh.”
“Just forget about whatever she said.”
“She said she saw darkness.”
“She probably just recognised you as one of the Black family and took a lucky guess.”
Sirius nodded in agreement. It was too nice a day to worry about vague predictions of darkness. “Probably. We are pretty recognisable. Everyone knows who we are.”
They ordered their lunch and were determined to put all dreary thoughts from their minds for the rest of the day.
“So, did James drop any hints about what he might like for Christmas?” Remus asked as he and Sirius made their way towards the Post Office later that afternoon.
“Not really, he just went on about Quidditch most of the morning.”
“I thought you liked Quidditch?”
“In small doses,” Sirius replied with a smile. Remus laughed and elbowed him teasingly.
Their laughter lasted only until they entered the Post Office. Rita Skeeter, who had been successfully evaded by both boys for some time now, was blocking their way and the look on her face made it clear that her presence in their path was not a coincidence.
“Remus, how are you?” She smiled coyly and batted her eyelashes in what she clearly thought was a winning manner.
“Fine,” Remus muttered as he tried to step past her.
“You’re just the person I’ve been looking for,” Rita continued. She stepped into his path once more. “I’ve been watching you all term, seeing how you’re settling into school life…”
“Yeah, I noticed,” Remus snapped. “Maybe no one told you that the boys’ bathrooms are out of bounds for the girls.”
“I think you’ll find that in cases of emergency, any student can use either the girls’ or boys’ bathrooms,” Rita informed them with a smirk.
“And I think you’ll find that harassing students about your newsletter isn’t an emergency.”
“But you’d be perfect for it,” Rita gushed.
“I don’t have time,” Remus replied. “I’m trying to catch up on all my subjects as it is.”
“Don’t have time for what?” Sirius asked curiously. He was well aware of Rita pestering Remus, but he’d assumed she just wanted to write a follow-up article on him. Now, he wasn’t so sure that was the case.
“Nothing,” Remus said as he tugged him towards the counter.
Rita wasn’t giving up though, and she trailed after them, clearly sensing that Sirius might listen to what she had to say, if only for the sake of curiosity. “I want Remus to write for the newsletter,” she explained with enthusiasm.
“Write what?” asked Sirius as he paid for the fastest owl they had to take Regulus his Christmas present. He hoped the bird made it in time. He’d waited until the last possible minute for Damon to return and he had a sneaking suspicion that his own bird was deliberately taking the slowest route back to him in order to avoid the anticipated Christmas journey.
“Don’t encourage her,” Remus interrupted. “I’ve already told her no a dozen times.”
“But it would help so much,” Rita argued. “All the news about the dark creatures of the wizarding world, right from the source.”
“I don’t know any other dark creatures.”
“You’ve been writing to Fenrir Greyback all term,” Rita pointed out slyly.
“How do you know about that?” Remus asked.
“I have my sources,” Rita replied with a smirk. “You could give us reports from practically right inside a Dangerous Creatures Camp. Not even the Daily Prophet has ever reported from inside one of them.”
“You think Greyback tells me what’s going on inside there?” Remus asked. “He’s written to me three times since the summer and most of that has been asking questions about me.”
“You think he’s looking to act as a real father to you?” Rita asked, her quill already poised to take down his reply.
“I have a real father, I don’t need another one,” Remus replied with a scowl. “Greyback’s just…” Remus’s voice trailed off as he tried to explain just what the older werewolf was to him. The problem was he didn’t know what he was. Fenrir Greyback had written politely and curiously about his young ward, but never once had he revealed just why he had done what he had to save Remus from the executioner’s axe.
“Come on,” Sirius urged, steering Remus back outside.
Rita was not so easily discouraged though. She continued to pester them as they walked down the street.
Sirius could tell that Remus was getting more and more irritated by the never-ending questions. Rita seemed to be completely impervious to the Black glare and was like a dog with a bone. “What do you think your real father thinks about you being practically adopted by Greyback?” she asked.
The question was the final straw for Remus and he spun round to level a glare of his own on the irritating blonde. Whilst the Black glare had done nothing to phase her, the Lupin version forced her to at least back up a few paces. “What does my father think?” he asked in a deadly quiet tone. “I’ve no bloody clue what he thinks. I’ve not seen him since I was six years old and only have one memory of him. Do you want to know what it is?”
Remus waited whilst Rita made her decision. Sirius knew that if he had been standing in the girl’s place, he would have declined to hear about it. Rita on the other hand nodded slowly.
“I remember him standing over me with his wand pointing at me. It was the morning after the first full moon after I’d been bitten. I didn’t really understand what had happened to me; I only knew that I hurt all over and I was crying and screaming for the pain to stop. Then my dad was there and I knew he would make it all better again. Because he was my dad, and that’s what he did. But you know what he did?” Rita shook her head. “He pointed his wand at me and put a silencing spell on me. Then he left me.”
Rita was pale and her quill had stopped moving, which was certainly a first in Remus’s experience of the irritating blonde.
“Now, what do you think my loving father thinks about Greyback?”
Rita shook her head silently. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from the gaze of the young werewolf. She was still clutching her parchment and quill, but was not even attempting to write down the quotes that Remus had given her.
“Come on, Remus,” Sirius whispered. “We’ve still got some presents to buy.”
Remus let Sirius steer him back down the street with only a single glance back at Rita.
“I’m lucky,” Remus said quietly as they entered Zonko’s. “I only had two full moons at home with my parents. Rom came home after the second one and got me out of there.”
“I never thought I’d ever meet anyone with parents worse than mine,” Sirius commented. “But I think you’ve managed to beat me hands down with your lot.”
“Good thing we’ve both got great brothers, isn’t it?”
Sirius smiled tightly as he nodded. Remus seemed to notice his change of mood and halted his examination of an alarm clock that that spat out mini bludgers to wake up the sleeper. “You and Regulus get along all right, don’t you?”
“Yeah, but it’s more difficult since he found out he was a squib. Our parents are always going on about how useless he is and how he’s lucky he’s not been disowned. I worry that one day they’ll carry out their threat and throw him out on the streets.”
“Godric help us if our parents ever met each other,” Remus muttered. He turned back to the alarm clock. “What do you think about this for Peter?” he asked. “You know how he hates to get up in the mornings.”
Sirius laughed as the clock spat out a bludger that caught him on the ear. “You’re sure you don’t just want it for yourself?” he teased, knowing that he had already purchased an identical one for Remus’s own Christmas present. The alarm clock that would wake up the person who set it, but not the rest of the room was, in Sirius’s opinion, perfect for Remus with the added bonus of being something the rest of the boys could appreciate as well.
Remus flushed and put the clock back down.
“I’m just teasing,” Sirius told him with a laugh. “Come on, there’s some new stock over here in the window. I’m sure we’ll find something for him.”
The new items in the store held their attention for the rest of the afternoon and they had no trouble finishing their Christmas shopping before heading back to Hogwart’s, already anticipating the warmth of the Gryffindor common room.
They were halfway back to the school when Sirius realised that Remus had lost his gloves somewhere during the day.
“They’re not lost,” Remus replied in answer to Sirius’s question. “They’re in my pocket. They got so wet in the snowball right it was pointless to keep wearing them.”
“Why didn’t you just dry them with a spell?”
“I tried but…” Remus’s voice trailed off to an embarrassed mumble.
“But what?”
Remus sighed and pulled what was left of his gloves from his pocket. They were certainly no longer wet, unfortunately they were also somewhat charred from a rather enthusiastic warming spell that seemed to have set them alight.
“You should have used your wand to make snowballs,” Sirius teased as he tugged off one of his gloves. “Here.”
“I can’t wear your gloves,” Remus argued.
Sirius rolled his eyes and pulled Remus’s right hand into his own and pushed the glove onto the fingers. “Fine, we’ll share. You take the right one, I’ll keep the left.”
Remus laughed. “So, we’ll have one warm hand and one cold hand each?”
Sirius shook his head and took Remus’s bare hand in his own. “Your fingers are freezing,” he said as he squeezed the cold digits. He drew the hand up towards his face and blew warm air onto the fingers, rubbing them gently to get the blood circulating once more.
“We’d better be getting back,” Remus pointed out.
Sirius kept Remus’s hand snugly enclosed within his own as they made their way back to the castle. They passed a few other students along the way, several of whom smirked at the two boys holding hands. When Remus spotted the first of the amused glances he tried to pull his hand away, but Sirius kept a firm grip on it and glared at anyone who looked like they might be tempted to make a comment.
He told himself it was only because it was cold, that he’d never consider holding hands with Remus in the warmer months, and that it was just a one off.
He knew he was lying to himself. He knew that if he had the opportunity he’d hold Remus’s hand every chance he could, and for no other reason than that it felt so right.
-o-xXx-o-
Two days later Remus walked into the Great Hall for breakfast and felt numerous pairs of eyes on him once again. “Ever get the feeling you’re being watched?” he whispered to Sirius as they made their way to the Gryffindor table.
“I think Rita’s printed something else about you in her newsletter,” Sirius replied. He had already spotted several sheets of parchment scattered across the tables and could see that many students looking in their direction had the newsletters in front of them.
“Better take a look and see what damage she’s done this time,” Remus muttered, picking up a discarded newsletter on the way.
Sirius immediately took the newsletter off of Remus and sat down at the table.
Remus tried to grab the parchment back. “Let me see,” he insisted.
Sirius ignored him, wondering whether it would be possible to prevent Remus from seeing the article if it was something too bad. One swift glance to his left told him that it wouldn’t. The article itself was easy enough to find. Rita had written it as a follow up to her initial interview with Remus and the other students, and just like the previous article, it took up a large portion of the newsletter and was impossible to miss.
Unlike her previous article however, this one told nothing but the simple truth. There had been no reason for her to elaborate on Remus’s words in the snowy Hogsmeade street.
“What lies has she said this time?” Remus asked. He buried his face in his arms and sighed dramatically.
“She’s printed what you said about your father,” Sirius told him as he skimmed the article.
“And?”
“And nothing. She’s not elaborated on it or anything.”
“Why would I?” Rita asked from behind him. “The story speaks for itself.”
“You didn’t want to add that Remus’s father beat him up regularly or something?” Sirius asked with a great deal of sarcasm.
“I don’t make things up for my stories,” Rita replied with a haughty sniff. “I might embellish ever so slightly in the interests of capturing the attention of the reader, but only when it’s absolutely necessary.”
Remus took the parchment from Sirius and read through the article for himself.
“Do you like it?” Rita asked eagerly.
“I’d rather you hadn’t written it,” Remus replied with honesty. “But it is a good piece of writing.”
“But your story should be told,” Rita gushed. She sat down at the table and helped herself to a bowl of porridge. “I could follow your years at Hogwarts and keep everyone regularly updated on how you’re doing.”
“If people want to know how I’m doing, they can ask me themselves.”
“But some people are scared to approach dark creatures like werewolves.”
“Am I that scary?” Remus whispered.
“’Course not,” answered Sirius, who shot a glare at Rita, who looked like she might have replied in the affirmative.
“Please let me follow your story,” Rita pleaded. “Everyone wants to know all about you. I get loads of owls asking how you’re doing.”
Remus looked up at this and raised an eyebrow in question.
Rita nodded in answer. “Even some from the parents of students who have sent the newsletters home.”
“And how many have you got from parents saying I shouldn’t be allowed to come here?” Remus asked.
“Not as many as I thought I would,” Rita admitted sheepishly. “I thought there would be loads of complaints after my first report. Worried parents wanting assurances of their children’s safety.”
“You sound like you were hoping for that?”
“Not hoping, expecting. It seems that Professor Dumbledore is so greatly admired in the wizarding community, he can even allow a werewolf into the school and most of the parents just accept it, because he’s such a great wizard. I was even copied in on a letter to the headmaster asking if he would allow the vampire daughter of the family to come here.”
“What did he say?” Remus asked with a frown.
“I think he said no, but not because vampires are dangerous, something to do with not being able to change the school timetable to allow for every class to take place at night.”
“That would be kind of inconvenient for the rest of us,” Sirius agreed. “You say that most of the parents don’t mind Remus being here with us?”
“Some seemed surprised, but hardly anyone said he should be kicked out or anything.”
“Could you try not to sound so disappointed in that?” Remus asked.
“I’m not,” Rita argued. “This is so much better. People writing to me in response to my article, asking about you and wanting to hear all about how you’re doing. You have to let me write more about you. You’re the only interesting thing going on in this school.”
“Don’t do it, Remus,” Sirius warned.
“Why don’t you let him speak for himself?” Rita snapped. “Please? Come on Remus, at least take a look at some of the letters I’ve received before you say no.”
“I’ll have a look at them,” Remus promised. No sooner were the words out of his mouth than Rita was digging into her bag and pulling out dozens of scraps of parchment. Remus groaned as she pushed his barely touched breakfast out of the way to make room for more letters.
“I have loads more,” Rita told him with a bright smile. “These are the best ones and the ones that want a personal reply from you.”
“Replies?” Remus squeaked.
“Some of them have a lot of questions for you,” Rita explained brightly. “You can borrow some of the school owls if your own can’t handle all the trips.”
“Athena could do with the exercise,” Remus mumbled, knowing that the owl had been getting decidedly overweight since she had joined him at Hogwarts at the start of the school year. A handful of trips to Cheshire were nowhere near enough to keep the bird occupied for long.
“Then it’s settled.” Rita clapped her hands excitedly.
“Why did you agree to answer this lot?” Sirius asked as he plucked a letter from the top of the pile. “It’s not like you have time for it.”
“I can answer them over the holidays. It shouldn’t take too long to get through them all if I do a few a day.”
“You’re crackers,” Sirius told him with a frown. “All these nosy people wanting to know every detail about your life, why don’t you just tell them to mind their own business?”
“Because I can’t.”
“Sure you can.”
“No, I really can’t,” Remus said. “Think about it. What if I wrote back to these people and told them to mind their own business? What would they think?”
“Who cares?”
“The Board of Governors would care if they wrote to them and told them how the school’s werewolf was rude and secretive. I can’t be all secretive about everything without them thinking I’m hiding something, and you know what they would think I’m hiding, don’t you?”
“They would think you’re up to no good,” Sirius guessed.
“Exactly. I can get into mischief and get detentions like the rest of you, but to those outside the school I have to appear to be a model student or Dumbledore will have to kick me out. If the way to stay here involves writing to every nosy parent who’s read Rita’s article, then that’s what I’ll do. I don’t want to leave.”
“Sounds like you’ve thought a lot about that,” Sirius commented in surprise.
“Professor Dumbledore warned me some of the parents might write in when they found out I was being accepted as a student. He and the other teachers, mainly McGonagall and Sprout, have made sure to - how did McGonagall put it? - drum it into my head to at least appear to behave like the rest of you.”
“I’m surprised she didn’t tell you to behave better than the rest of us,” Sirius commented with a grin.
Remus grinned back. “She did. Anyway, they made it clear that if too many parents complain I may lose my place here. If writing to them gets them on my side then I’ll write to every last one of them.”
Sirius nodded. “I’ll help you answer them if you like.”
“Thanks,” Remus replied with a smile. “You can start with this one from your mother.”
“What?” Sirius grabbed the parchment in astonishment. “How did she get a hold of the newsletter?”
“You’re asking me?”
“I guess one of my cousins got hold of a copy and sent it to her. You’d think they would have more important things to worry about than a school newsletter. What does she have to say for herself?”
“Don’t know, I just recognised the name.”
Sirius unrolled the parchment and skimmed the letter, his annoyance mounting with every word. “Looks like this is Bellatrix’s handiwork. Her husband’s younger brother sent her a copy with a note about how I’m friends with you. My mother is ordering you not to associate with me and, if possible, to request a room to yourself instead of staying in the dormitory.”
“Wonder what she would say if she knew just where I was sleeping in the dormitory for nearly a year,” Remus whispered wickedly.
“Don’t even joke about it,” Sirius warned. “I’m surprised she hasn’t written to me about staying away from you, too.”
“She did,” Remus replied automatically.
“I think I’d remember that.”
“It was a howler and arrived about a week after the last newsletter got published.”
“She must have sent it at the same time she sent this,” Sirius commented as he spotted the old date on the parchment. “How come I didn’t see or hear the howler?”
“It arrived at the crack of dawn whilst I was down in the common room and the rest of you lazy gits were still in bed. I saw the name and the return address and it was obvious it was a howler so I opened it for you. I figured if there was anything important in it I could tell you about it. If it was just shouting and ranting and all the usual rubbish she writes to you - and it was - then you wouldn’t have to know about it.”
“You opened a howler for me?” Sirius smiled at Remus, inordinately pleased.
“You’d do the same for me,” Remus replied with a smile of his own. “Tell you what, you reply to your mother’s letter for me and we’ll call it even.”
“Deal,” Sirius replied with a grin. “What sort of reply should I send? Polite and respectful or what she deserves?”
“Depends on how you plan on signing it. If you’re putting my name on it - and remember to disguise your handwriting if you are - then go for polite. If you plan on being rude then sign your own.”
Sirius laughed and tucked the parchment into the pocket of his robes. Remus gathered the rest of them into his bag and they made their way outside. One thing was for sure, they would have plenty to occupy them during the Christmas holidays.
-
Chapter 27
Disclaimer: I own nothing that you recognise. J K Rowling retains all copyright.
Where Do I Belong? (PG13 for language)
Remus made his enquiries about Rita’s article as quickly and as calmly as he could. He was slightly disheartened to find that most of the students who had left had done so because of Dumbledore’s decision to allow him to attend the school. On a more positive note, he had found that several of the students he had spoken with had been far more accepting of him that he would have initially thought. In fact there was only one student who was openly hostile towards him, and the Ravenclaw in question had lost a parent to a werewolf attack and was understandably bitter about it. On the whole though, it seemed that most of the students were far more concerned with their own lives and dramas to be too bothered about Remus and his furry little problem.
“I told you that you were worrying too much,” Sirius told him as they walked up the stairs towards the dormitory.
“I guess,” Remus agreed. “Hopefully everyone will forget about Rita’s story soon and I can just enjoy being at Hogwarts again.”
“You mean you’re not enjoying it at the moment?” Sirius asked.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Remus replied, faltering slightly as he tried to put his feelings into words. “I just want to enjoy being here, instead of worrying about the other students and what they think about me. I don’t want to be the freaky werewolf, I just want to be a normal student.”
Sirius didn’t know what to say to that. Remus would always be a werewolf, unless someone found a cure. He would never be just another student.
They arrived in the dormitory and Remus threw himself onto Sirius’s bed with a contented sigh. “It’s been a long day,” he declared. “I’m so tired I may even sleep in tomorrow.”
Sirius hovered at the edge of his bed, casting a wary glance at Romulus who had appeared in one of the windows. He’d put off talking to Remus about the sleeping arrangements in the dormitory for the last couple of days, but with Remus’s ghostly brother lingering nearby, he knew he couldn’t put it off any longer.
Remus, seemingly anticipating that Sirius was going to say something, sat up with a questioning expression on his face. “What is it?” he asked.
“I was thinking about this,” Sirius said vaguely as he waved his hand towards the bed.
“About what?”
“About us sharing a bed like this,” Sirius said. “I think maybe it would be best if we didn’t do it any more.” The words tumbled forth in a rush, but he could tell that Remus had understood them all.
“I thought you didn’t mind?” Remus asked quietly.
“I don’t,” Sirius assured him.
“Then why?”
Sirius chewed on his lip slightly and suddenly the exact words to make Remus agree with him appeared in his mind. “Because it’s not normal,” he said quietly.
Immediately the words were spoken, Remus lost the will to argue about the situation. “I didn’t think about it like that,” he whispered as he climbed off of the bed and moved towards his own.
Sirius reached out to Remus as he passed him, but the other boy ducked out of his range.
That night they climbed into their separate beds and Sirius tried his best to ignore the empty space beside him.
James arrived in the dormitory after yet another detention and looked like he was about to make a comment of his own. A warning look from Remus saw the words dying on his lips and he climbed into his own bed without making a sarcastic remark.
Sirius tossed and turned until the early hours of the morning, frustrated with his inability to fall to sleep, a problem only compounded by the fitful movements of Remus on the other side of the room.
-o-xXx-o-
Hogsmeade was the image of a winter wonderland on the December morning that had been chosen for the second Hogsmeade weekend of the year.
Sirius, Remus, James and Peter made their way slowly to the village, stopping to throw snowballs at each other every dozen or so yards.
“No using magic, you cheater!” Remus yelled at Sirius who was using his wand to conjure more than one snowy missile at time.
“We’re wizards,” Sirius called back. “We’re meant to use-”
Unfortunately he never finished his sentence because a particularly well aimed snowball from Peter caught him squarely in the mouth.
It was mid-morning when they finally reached the village itself. The street was crowded with students from the school, many doing their last minute Christmas shopping.
The school choir was singing carols under the watchful eye of Professor Flitwick in the main village square and there was a joyous holiday atmosphere in the air.
The four boys had organised their own shopping schedule the night before. Sirius and James would shop together for Peter and Remus, and vice versa, before switching partners after eating lunch in the Three Broomsticks in order to buy the last of their presents.
Sirius and James were already laden down with goodies and heading towards the Three Broomsticks, when they found their path blocked by an elderly woman, barely visible beneath the threadbare cloak that covered her from head to toe.
“Foretell your future, boys?” she croaked, her hand outstretched in the hope of payment for her offer.
“Do you see a pretty redhead in my future?” James asked with a laugh. “Or failing that, the little blonde in Hufflepuff would do for a date or two?”
“Old Ursula will tell you only what she sees,” Ursula said with a laugh that was almost a cackle. “Whether it be good or bad, you’ll know the truth.”
“I think I’d rather live in hope,” James laughed. “Come on Sirius, the others will be waiting for us.”
Sirius nodded and stepped to the side to let the old woman pass him by, but she didn’t seem to be moving on.
“What about you, young man?” she asked, reaching out for his hand.
Sirius was about to protest that he didn’t want to know his future, but the old woman suddenly looked up and stared him directly in the eye. “What is it?” he asked, shocked by the stunned expression on the woman’s face. “What do you see?”
“Come on, Sirius!” James was getting impatient and was already several paces ahead of him when he called back.
Sirius ignored him, his eyes unable and unwilling to break contact with those of the crone. “What do you see?” he asked again.
“Nothing,” the woman whispered. “I see nothing but darkness, darkness like you can’t imagine.”
“I’m one of the Black family,” Sirius replied with a forced laugh. “Darkness is practically our name.”
“Not like this,” the woman warned. “You’ve never known darkness like that which is to come to you.”
Sirius shrugged. He knew that warnings of doom and disaster were the bread and butter of those in the trade of foretelling the future. It was just his bad luck that she seemed to have chosen him for her predictions.
“Sirius!” James called again. “We’ve not got all day for you to try and pick up women!”
Sirius laughed at the affronted expression on the face of the woman and made his escape.
“You do seem to attract the weirdos,” James teased as they continued down the road. “Werewolves, ghosts and now seers.”
“The Lupins aren’t weirdos,” Sirius replied as they side-stepped the carol singers who were starting to sound a little strained after a morning of singing.
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Then you shouldn’t have said it.”
“Don’t know why you’re so touchy about it,” James muttered. “It’s not like I said that all the Blacks are inbred lunatics.”
“Why not? They are,” Sirius replied easily.
“You really hate your family that much?”
“Not all of them, but my parents are determined to drive me up the wall with their plans for me…and all the girls they keep trying to set me up with are distant relatives somewhere on the family tree.”
“Not all of them?” James asked in surprise. “Besides, they might not really be related.”
“They are,” Sirius explained. “We’ve got this ugly family tree tapestry at home. Every time Mother invited one of the wretched girls over in the summer she made me memorise the relevant branches of the tree so that I could ask her about her family.”
“Sounds right boring.”
“It’s even more boring than having to memorise the dates of all the Goblin Rebellions.”
“You mean those same dates that Remus was reciting in his sleep last week?”
“That would be the ones.”
They reached the Three Broomsticks and found that Remus and Peter were already waiting for them and had got the first round of butterbeers already.
“It’s about time,” Peter complained as he glanced up from the menu. “We were about to order without you.”
“Sorry,” James replied as he took a sip of his drink, relieved that it was still warm. “We got held up when Sirius pulled.”
Sirius glared across the table at James as Peter and Remus both asked, “Who?”
“I just got collared by some old seer,” Sirius explained.
“That’ll be old Ursula Trelawney,” Remus commented. “I think she lives in Dove Town, but she used to come to Hogsmeade quite a lot.”
“You’ve met her?”
“A couple of times.”
“Is she really a seer?”
“If she is, she’s not a very good one,” Remus muttered. “She cornered Rom when he was working at the Hog’s Head one weekend and told him he’d marry a muggle.”
“Oh.”
“Just forget about whatever she said.”
“She said she saw darkness.”
“She probably just recognised you as one of the Black family and took a lucky guess.”
Sirius nodded in agreement. It was too nice a day to worry about vague predictions of darkness. “Probably. We are pretty recognisable. Everyone knows who we are.”
They ordered their lunch and were determined to put all dreary thoughts from their minds for the rest of the day.
“So, did James drop any hints about what he might like for Christmas?” Remus asked as he and Sirius made their way towards the Post Office later that afternoon.
“Not really, he just went on about Quidditch most of the morning.”
“I thought you liked Quidditch?”
“In small doses,” Sirius replied with a smile. Remus laughed and elbowed him teasingly.
Their laughter lasted only until they entered the Post Office. Rita Skeeter, who had been successfully evaded by both boys for some time now, was blocking their way and the look on her face made it clear that her presence in their path was not a coincidence.
“Remus, how are you?” She smiled coyly and batted her eyelashes in what she clearly thought was a winning manner.
“Fine,” Remus muttered as he tried to step past her.
“You’re just the person I’ve been looking for,” Rita continued. She stepped into his path once more. “I’ve been watching you all term, seeing how you’re settling into school life…”
“Yeah, I noticed,” Remus snapped. “Maybe no one told you that the boys’ bathrooms are out of bounds for the girls.”
“I think you’ll find that in cases of emergency, any student can use either the girls’ or boys’ bathrooms,” Rita informed them with a smirk.
“And I think you’ll find that harassing students about your newsletter isn’t an emergency.”
“But you’d be perfect for it,” Rita gushed.
“I don’t have time,” Remus replied. “I’m trying to catch up on all my subjects as it is.”
“Don’t have time for what?” Sirius asked curiously. He was well aware of Rita pestering Remus, but he’d assumed she just wanted to write a follow-up article on him. Now, he wasn’t so sure that was the case.
“Nothing,” Remus said as he tugged him towards the counter.
Rita wasn’t giving up though, and she trailed after them, clearly sensing that Sirius might listen to what she had to say, if only for the sake of curiosity. “I want Remus to write for the newsletter,” she explained with enthusiasm.
“Write what?” asked Sirius as he paid for the fastest owl they had to take Regulus his Christmas present. He hoped the bird made it in time. He’d waited until the last possible minute for Damon to return and he had a sneaking suspicion that his own bird was deliberately taking the slowest route back to him in order to avoid the anticipated Christmas journey.
“Don’t encourage her,” Remus interrupted. “I’ve already told her no a dozen times.”
“But it would help so much,” Rita argued. “All the news about the dark creatures of the wizarding world, right from the source.”
“I don’t know any other dark creatures.”
“You’ve been writing to Fenrir Greyback all term,” Rita pointed out slyly.
“How do you know about that?” Remus asked.
“I have my sources,” Rita replied with a smirk. “You could give us reports from practically right inside a Dangerous Creatures Camp. Not even the Daily Prophet has ever reported from inside one of them.”
“You think Greyback tells me what’s going on inside there?” Remus asked. “He’s written to me three times since the summer and most of that has been asking questions about me.”
“You think he’s looking to act as a real father to you?” Rita asked, her quill already poised to take down his reply.
“I have a real father, I don’t need another one,” Remus replied with a scowl. “Greyback’s just…” Remus’s voice trailed off as he tried to explain just what the older werewolf was to him. The problem was he didn’t know what he was. Fenrir Greyback had written politely and curiously about his young ward, but never once had he revealed just why he had done what he had to save Remus from the executioner’s axe.
“Come on,” Sirius urged, steering Remus back outside.
Rita was not so easily discouraged though. She continued to pester them as they walked down the street.
Sirius could tell that Remus was getting more and more irritated by the never-ending questions. Rita seemed to be completely impervious to the Black glare and was like a dog with a bone. “What do you think your real father thinks about you being practically adopted by Greyback?” she asked.
The question was the final straw for Remus and he spun round to level a glare of his own on the irritating blonde. Whilst the Black glare had done nothing to phase her, the Lupin version forced her to at least back up a few paces. “What does my father think?” he asked in a deadly quiet tone. “I’ve no bloody clue what he thinks. I’ve not seen him since I was six years old and only have one memory of him. Do you want to know what it is?”
Remus waited whilst Rita made her decision. Sirius knew that if he had been standing in the girl’s place, he would have declined to hear about it. Rita on the other hand nodded slowly.
“I remember him standing over me with his wand pointing at me. It was the morning after the first full moon after I’d been bitten. I didn’t really understand what had happened to me; I only knew that I hurt all over and I was crying and screaming for the pain to stop. Then my dad was there and I knew he would make it all better again. Because he was my dad, and that’s what he did. But you know what he did?” Rita shook her head. “He pointed his wand at me and put a silencing spell on me. Then he left me.”
Rita was pale and her quill had stopped moving, which was certainly a first in Remus’s experience of the irritating blonde.
“Now, what do you think my loving father thinks about Greyback?”
Rita shook her head silently. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from the gaze of the young werewolf. She was still clutching her parchment and quill, but was not even attempting to write down the quotes that Remus had given her.
“Come on, Remus,” Sirius whispered. “We’ve still got some presents to buy.”
Remus let Sirius steer him back down the street with only a single glance back at Rita.
“I’m lucky,” Remus said quietly as they entered Zonko’s. “I only had two full moons at home with my parents. Rom came home after the second one and got me out of there.”
“I never thought I’d ever meet anyone with parents worse than mine,” Sirius commented. “But I think you’ve managed to beat me hands down with your lot.”
“Good thing we’ve both got great brothers, isn’t it?”
Sirius smiled tightly as he nodded. Remus seemed to notice his change of mood and halted his examination of an alarm clock that that spat out mini bludgers to wake up the sleeper. “You and Regulus get along all right, don’t you?”
“Yeah, but it’s more difficult since he found out he was a squib. Our parents are always going on about how useless he is and how he’s lucky he’s not been disowned. I worry that one day they’ll carry out their threat and throw him out on the streets.”
“Godric help us if our parents ever met each other,” Remus muttered. He turned back to the alarm clock. “What do you think about this for Peter?” he asked. “You know how he hates to get up in the mornings.”
Sirius laughed as the clock spat out a bludger that caught him on the ear. “You’re sure you don’t just want it for yourself?” he teased, knowing that he had already purchased an identical one for Remus’s own Christmas present. The alarm clock that would wake up the person who set it, but not the rest of the room was, in Sirius’s opinion, perfect for Remus with the added bonus of being something the rest of the boys could appreciate as well.
Remus flushed and put the clock back down.
“I’m just teasing,” Sirius told him with a laugh. “Come on, there’s some new stock over here in the window. I’m sure we’ll find something for him.”
The new items in the store held their attention for the rest of the afternoon and they had no trouble finishing their Christmas shopping before heading back to Hogwart’s, already anticipating the warmth of the Gryffindor common room.
They were halfway back to the school when Sirius realised that Remus had lost his gloves somewhere during the day.
“They’re not lost,” Remus replied in answer to Sirius’s question. “They’re in my pocket. They got so wet in the snowball right it was pointless to keep wearing them.”
“Why didn’t you just dry them with a spell?”
“I tried but…” Remus’s voice trailed off to an embarrassed mumble.
“But what?”
Remus sighed and pulled what was left of his gloves from his pocket. They were certainly no longer wet, unfortunately they were also somewhat charred from a rather enthusiastic warming spell that seemed to have set them alight.
“You should have used your wand to make snowballs,” Sirius teased as he tugged off one of his gloves. “Here.”
“I can’t wear your gloves,” Remus argued.
Sirius rolled his eyes and pulled Remus’s right hand into his own and pushed the glove onto the fingers. “Fine, we’ll share. You take the right one, I’ll keep the left.”
Remus laughed. “So, we’ll have one warm hand and one cold hand each?”
Sirius shook his head and took Remus’s bare hand in his own. “Your fingers are freezing,” he said as he squeezed the cold digits. He drew the hand up towards his face and blew warm air onto the fingers, rubbing them gently to get the blood circulating once more.
“We’d better be getting back,” Remus pointed out.
Sirius kept Remus’s hand snugly enclosed within his own as they made their way back to the castle. They passed a few other students along the way, several of whom smirked at the two boys holding hands. When Remus spotted the first of the amused glances he tried to pull his hand away, but Sirius kept a firm grip on it and glared at anyone who looked like they might be tempted to make a comment.
He told himself it was only because it was cold, that he’d never consider holding hands with Remus in the warmer months, and that it was just a one off.
He knew he was lying to himself. He knew that if he had the opportunity he’d hold Remus’s hand every chance he could, and for no other reason than that it felt so right.
-o-xXx-o-
Two days later Remus walked into the Great Hall for breakfast and felt numerous pairs of eyes on him once again. “Ever get the feeling you’re being watched?” he whispered to Sirius as they made their way to the Gryffindor table.
“I think Rita’s printed something else about you in her newsletter,” Sirius replied. He had already spotted several sheets of parchment scattered across the tables and could see that many students looking in their direction had the newsletters in front of them.
“Better take a look and see what damage she’s done this time,” Remus muttered, picking up a discarded newsletter on the way.
Sirius immediately took the newsletter off of Remus and sat down at the table.
Remus tried to grab the parchment back. “Let me see,” he insisted.
Sirius ignored him, wondering whether it would be possible to prevent Remus from seeing the article if it was something too bad. One swift glance to his left told him that it wouldn’t. The article itself was easy enough to find. Rita had written it as a follow up to her initial interview with Remus and the other students, and just like the previous article, it took up a large portion of the newsletter and was impossible to miss.
Unlike her previous article however, this one told nothing but the simple truth. There had been no reason for her to elaborate on Remus’s words in the snowy Hogsmeade street.
“What lies has she said this time?” Remus asked. He buried his face in his arms and sighed dramatically.
“She’s printed what you said about your father,” Sirius told him as he skimmed the article.
“And?”
“And nothing. She’s not elaborated on it or anything.”
“Why would I?” Rita asked from behind him. “The story speaks for itself.”
“You didn’t want to add that Remus’s father beat him up regularly or something?” Sirius asked with a great deal of sarcasm.
“I don’t make things up for my stories,” Rita replied with a haughty sniff. “I might embellish ever so slightly in the interests of capturing the attention of the reader, but only when it’s absolutely necessary.”
Remus took the parchment from Sirius and read through the article for himself.
“Do you like it?” Rita asked eagerly.
“I’d rather you hadn’t written it,” Remus replied with honesty. “But it is a good piece of writing.”
“But your story should be told,” Rita gushed. She sat down at the table and helped herself to a bowl of porridge. “I could follow your years at Hogwarts and keep everyone regularly updated on how you’re doing.”
“If people want to know how I’m doing, they can ask me themselves.”
“But some people are scared to approach dark creatures like werewolves.”
“Am I that scary?” Remus whispered.
“’Course not,” answered Sirius, who shot a glare at Rita, who looked like she might have replied in the affirmative.
“Please let me follow your story,” Rita pleaded. “Everyone wants to know all about you. I get loads of owls asking how you’re doing.”
Remus looked up at this and raised an eyebrow in question.
Rita nodded in answer. “Even some from the parents of students who have sent the newsletters home.”
“And how many have you got from parents saying I shouldn’t be allowed to come here?” Remus asked.
“Not as many as I thought I would,” Rita admitted sheepishly. “I thought there would be loads of complaints after my first report. Worried parents wanting assurances of their children’s safety.”
“You sound like you were hoping for that?”
“Not hoping, expecting. It seems that Professor Dumbledore is so greatly admired in the wizarding community, he can even allow a werewolf into the school and most of the parents just accept it, because he’s such a great wizard. I was even copied in on a letter to the headmaster asking if he would allow the vampire daughter of the family to come here.”
“What did he say?” Remus asked with a frown.
“I think he said no, but not because vampires are dangerous, something to do with not being able to change the school timetable to allow for every class to take place at night.”
“That would be kind of inconvenient for the rest of us,” Sirius agreed. “You say that most of the parents don’t mind Remus being here with us?”
“Some seemed surprised, but hardly anyone said he should be kicked out or anything.”
“Could you try not to sound so disappointed in that?” Remus asked.
“I’m not,” Rita argued. “This is so much better. People writing to me in response to my article, asking about you and wanting to hear all about how you’re doing. You have to let me write more about you. You’re the only interesting thing going on in this school.”
“Don’t do it, Remus,” Sirius warned.
“Why don’t you let him speak for himself?” Rita snapped. “Please? Come on Remus, at least take a look at some of the letters I’ve received before you say no.”
“I’ll have a look at them,” Remus promised. No sooner were the words out of his mouth than Rita was digging into her bag and pulling out dozens of scraps of parchment. Remus groaned as she pushed his barely touched breakfast out of the way to make room for more letters.
“I have loads more,” Rita told him with a bright smile. “These are the best ones and the ones that want a personal reply from you.”
“Replies?” Remus squeaked.
“Some of them have a lot of questions for you,” Rita explained brightly. “You can borrow some of the school owls if your own can’t handle all the trips.”
“Athena could do with the exercise,” Remus mumbled, knowing that the owl had been getting decidedly overweight since she had joined him at Hogwarts at the start of the school year. A handful of trips to Cheshire were nowhere near enough to keep the bird occupied for long.
“Then it’s settled.” Rita clapped her hands excitedly.
“Why did you agree to answer this lot?” Sirius asked as he plucked a letter from the top of the pile. “It’s not like you have time for it.”
“I can answer them over the holidays. It shouldn’t take too long to get through them all if I do a few a day.”
“You’re crackers,” Sirius told him with a frown. “All these nosy people wanting to know every detail about your life, why don’t you just tell them to mind their own business?”
“Because I can’t.”
“Sure you can.”
“No, I really can’t,” Remus said. “Think about it. What if I wrote back to these people and told them to mind their own business? What would they think?”
“Who cares?”
“The Board of Governors would care if they wrote to them and told them how the school’s werewolf was rude and secretive. I can’t be all secretive about everything without them thinking I’m hiding something, and you know what they would think I’m hiding, don’t you?”
“They would think you’re up to no good,” Sirius guessed.
“Exactly. I can get into mischief and get detentions like the rest of you, but to those outside the school I have to appear to be a model student or Dumbledore will have to kick me out. If the way to stay here involves writing to every nosy parent who’s read Rita’s article, then that’s what I’ll do. I don’t want to leave.”
“Sounds like you’ve thought a lot about that,” Sirius commented in surprise.
“Professor Dumbledore warned me some of the parents might write in when they found out I was being accepted as a student. He and the other teachers, mainly McGonagall and Sprout, have made sure to - how did McGonagall put it? - drum it into my head to at least appear to behave like the rest of you.”
“I’m surprised she didn’t tell you to behave better than the rest of us,” Sirius commented with a grin.
Remus grinned back. “She did. Anyway, they made it clear that if too many parents complain I may lose my place here. If writing to them gets them on my side then I’ll write to every last one of them.”
Sirius nodded. “I’ll help you answer them if you like.”
“Thanks,” Remus replied with a smile. “You can start with this one from your mother.”
“What?” Sirius grabbed the parchment in astonishment. “How did she get a hold of the newsletter?”
“You’re asking me?”
“I guess one of my cousins got hold of a copy and sent it to her. You’d think they would have more important things to worry about than a school newsletter. What does she have to say for herself?”
“Don’t know, I just recognised the name.”
Sirius unrolled the parchment and skimmed the letter, his annoyance mounting with every word. “Looks like this is Bellatrix’s handiwork. Her husband’s younger brother sent her a copy with a note about how I’m friends with you. My mother is ordering you not to associate with me and, if possible, to request a room to yourself instead of staying in the dormitory.”
“Wonder what she would say if she knew just where I was sleeping in the dormitory for nearly a year,” Remus whispered wickedly.
“Don’t even joke about it,” Sirius warned. “I’m surprised she hasn’t written to me about staying away from you, too.”
“She did,” Remus replied automatically.
“I think I’d remember that.”
“It was a howler and arrived about a week after the last newsletter got published.”
“She must have sent it at the same time she sent this,” Sirius commented as he spotted the old date on the parchment. “How come I didn’t see or hear the howler?”
“It arrived at the crack of dawn whilst I was down in the common room and the rest of you lazy gits were still in bed. I saw the name and the return address and it was obvious it was a howler so I opened it for you. I figured if there was anything important in it I could tell you about it. If it was just shouting and ranting and all the usual rubbish she writes to you - and it was - then you wouldn’t have to know about it.”
“You opened a howler for me?” Sirius smiled at Remus, inordinately pleased.
“You’d do the same for me,” Remus replied with a smile of his own. “Tell you what, you reply to your mother’s letter for me and we’ll call it even.”
“Deal,” Sirius replied with a grin. “What sort of reply should I send? Polite and respectful or what she deserves?”
“Depends on how you plan on signing it. If you’re putting my name on it - and remember to disguise your handwriting if you are - then go for polite. If you plan on being rude then sign your own.”
Sirius laughed and tucked the parchment into the pocket of his robes. Remus gathered the rest of them into his bag and they made their way outside. One thing was for sure, they would have plenty to occupy them during the Christmas holidays.
-
Chapter 27