So far down.
Sometimes when he closes his eyes Remus can still see Teddy as he was the night of the battle at Hogwarts. If he concentrates enough, he can still feel his son's tight grasp as baby fingers wrapped themselves around a single finger from his hand. He can still see that perfect, innocent smile as he held him.
I'll be back soon, he remembers promising as he kissed his child's forehead.
Sometimes it feels like it has been hours since then. Other times it feels as if it happened yesterday, or the previous week, but now it feels just how it should feel. That night happened nineteen years ago. Those memories belong to that time, no matter how often he wakes, waiting for his infant son to start crying in the middle of the night.
A cool breeze blows in his direction, and Remus buries his hands in the pockets of his traveling cloak as he continues to walk. He's not sure where he is, exactly, just that he's out in the country somewhere. Walking. Alone, surrounded by trees and open spaces and far away from people. Trying to be around people requires pretending, you see. They need to see that he's normal and okay, and that's how he lets them see him. They need to see that he's strong and that he's calm, so that's how he lets them see him.
But he's not calm. He's not normal. He's not okay, and he's most definitely not strong. He hasn't felt strong ever since the previous week, after the full moon. He hasn't felt strong since his son informed him that he was leaving home.
He's not a baby anymore, he tries to remind himself. Ted Remus Lupin is not the baby that was barely months old when the battle broke out in Hogwarts - his son is now nineteen years old. Almost twenty.
A whole lifetime had passed.
One. whole. lifetime.
The reminder brings that familiar bitter taste that he has yet to get rid of since that particular...' incident,' and he can feel the muscle twitching in his jaw. How had things gotten to be so wrong? he thinks to himself as a new breeze brings along a wave of helplessness so strong that it simply clings to him. Teddy was supposed to be at home, with Dora and himself. They were supposed to be a family, finally reunited. Life was supposed to be easy, for once.
But things are never easy, are they? No, instead there's a new war going on that has gotten everyone involved. Living, dead, it didn't matter. Everyone was involved. Everyone was as alive, or as dead, as they allowed themselves to be.
So, what is he, exactly? He has been dead for nineteen years. He came back to life - as much as a dead person can, he could only guess - a month ago. And, now? At the moment he feels empty. He feels hollow despite all the emotions that are boiling within him.
Right now he feels dead. It's so much easier to stop living, it seems, when he no longer has to pretend.
Never had Remus imagined just how much the problems with his family would affect him. Never had he dreamed how much trouble he would have sleeping, or how little appetite he would have. And, even if he knew just how much words could haunt a person, never had he imagined that his child's words could haunt and hurt him as much as they are now. He keeps hearing Teddy as he says how he and Tonks have been ignoring him. He can hear him say how they had made him an outcast in their own family.
Worst of all, he can hear how Teddy says that he and Dora are back to 'playing hero,' and Remus' mind goes into overload for the millionth time. Did Teddy actually believe that they had been 'playing hero' nineteen years ago? Did he believe that everything he and Tonks had done had been done for heroics and recognition?
Now that he's no longer pretending, those words weaken him. They break him. They shatter him into pieces that he no longer knows how to put together, and he leans against a tree when he doesn't feel strong enough to keep on walking. If Teddy truly believed any of that, then the past nineteen years that Remus and his wife spent away from their one and only son has been a waste. Their deaths were for nothing, because them fighting at Hogwarts hadn't been for heroics. It had been for Teddy. It had been for his future, for his happiness.
He's supposed to have faith in his son. He's supposed to believe that Teddy will realize that how wrong everything is, that they will all fix things, and that he would move back in with him and Dora.
Things are supposed to be easy...
He still has every faith in his son, but the belief that Teddy will come home has been diminishing each day that he's not home. He expects him to talk to them, he expects...so many things. For now he has given in to talking to Teddy on his own, but he expects Teddy to smooth things out with his mother and grandmother as well. He expects things to be okay. He expects things to be normal, at least among their family. He expects--
...did it matter, really?
Merlin, he hoped so. They loved Teddy. They needed Teddy.
Figuring that it wouldn't hurt to stay for a bit longer, Remus slides down onto the grass to sit and to gather his strength. Thinking about all this, succumbing to just the surface of everything he's thinking, has drained him too much to simply apparate back home.
For now, he would wait. He needs to get ready to go back to pretending again, after all. Maybe, while he did so, he could figure out a way to fix things, somehow, so the pain and everything could simply end.
For his family's sake, he could only pray that this would be the case.
I'll be back soon, he remembers promising as he kissed his child's forehead.
Sometimes it feels like it has been hours since then. Other times it feels as if it happened yesterday, or the previous week, but now it feels just how it should feel. That night happened nineteen years ago. Those memories belong to that time, no matter how often he wakes, waiting for his infant son to start crying in the middle of the night.
A cool breeze blows in his direction, and Remus buries his hands in the pockets of his traveling cloak as he continues to walk. He's not sure where he is, exactly, just that he's out in the country somewhere. Walking. Alone, surrounded by trees and open spaces and far away from people. Trying to be around people requires pretending, you see. They need to see that he's normal and okay, and that's how he lets them see him. They need to see that he's strong and that he's calm, so that's how he lets them see him.
But he's not calm. He's not normal. He's not okay, and he's most definitely not strong. He hasn't felt strong ever since the previous week, after the full moon. He hasn't felt strong since his son informed him that he was leaving home.
He's not a baby anymore, he tries to remind himself. Ted Remus Lupin is not the baby that was barely months old when the battle broke out in Hogwarts - his son is now nineteen years old. Almost twenty.
A whole lifetime had passed.
One. whole. lifetime.
The reminder brings that familiar bitter taste that he has yet to get rid of since that particular...' incident,' and he can feel the muscle twitching in his jaw. How had things gotten to be so wrong? he thinks to himself as a new breeze brings along a wave of helplessness so strong that it simply clings to him. Teddy was supposed to be at home, with Dora and himself. They were supposed to be a family, finally reunited. Life was supposed to be easy, for once.
But things are never easy, are they? No, instead there's a new war going on that has gotten everyone involved. Living, dead, it didn't matter. Everyone was involved. Everyone was as alive, or as dead, as they allowed themselves to be.
So, what is he, exactly? He has been dead for nineteen years. He came back to life - as much as a dead person can, he could only guess - a month ago. And, now? At the moment he feels empty. He feels hollow despite all the emotions that are boiling within him.
Right now he feels dead. It's so much easier to stop living, it seems, when he no longer has to pretend.
Never had Remus imagined just how much the problems with his family would affect him. Never had he dreamed how much trouble he would have sleeping, or how little appetite he would have. And, even if he knew just how much words could haunt a person, never had he imagined that his child's words could haunt and hurt him as much as they are now. He keeps hearing Teddy as he says how he and Tonks have been ignoring him. He can hear him say how they had made him an outcast in their own family.
Worst of all, he can hear how Teddy says that he and Dora are back to 'playing hero,' and Remus' mind goes into overload for the millionth time. Did Teddy actually believe that they had been 'playing hero' nineteen years ago? Did he believe that everything he and Tonks had done had been done for heroics and recognition?
Now that he's no longer pretending, those words weaken him. They break him. They shatter him into pieces that he no longer knows how to put together, and he leans against a tree when he doesn't feel strong enough to keep on walking. If Teddy truly believed any of that, then the past nineteen years that Remus and his wife spent away from their one and only son has been a waste. Their deaths were for nothing, because them fighting at Hogwarts hadn't been for heroics. It had been for Teddy. It had been for his future, for his happiness.
He's supposed to have faith in his son. He's supposed to believe that Teddy will realize that how wrong everything is, that they will all fix things, and that he would move back in with him and Dora.
Things are supposed to be easy...
He still has every faith in his son, but the belief that Teddy will come home has been diminishing each day that he's not home. He expects him to talk to them, he expects...so many things. For now he has given in to talking to Teddy on his own, but he expects Teddy to smooth things out with his mother and grandmother as well. He expects things to be okay. He expects things to be normal, at least among their family. He expects--
...did it matter, really?
Merlin, he hoped so. They loved Teddy. They needed Teddy.
Figuring that it wouldn't hurt to stay for a bit longer, Remus slides down onto the grass to sit and to gather his strength. Thinking about all this, succumbing to just the surface of everything he's thinking, has drained him too much to simply apparate back home.
For now, he would wait. He needs to get ready to go back to pretending again, after all. Maybe, while he did so, he could figure out a way to fix things, somehow, so the pain and everything could simply end.
For his family's sake, he could only pray that this would be the case.