A/N: Another one of those "I saw a challenge comm on lj and decided to do it without actually, you know, doing it" fics...First of 5 posts of two anecdotes each, covering Remus' life from being bitten to his death. So, obviously, spoilers for Deathly Hallows if you, like my dormmates, have not yet read it or heard about it or listened to those of us who did read it bitch about it. There will be slash, and eventually possibly vaguely mentioned sex. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I asked God to give me Harry Potter...and God smacked on the head and reminded me I was a pagan and didn't believe in him, so he wouldn't do jack for me.
1.
Six-year-old Remus is dwarfed by the hospital bed where he huddles, pale and miserable. With his eyes closed he is washed out, colorless; faded honey-blond hair, sickly-white skin, bloodless lips, white sheets white pillows white blankets. It seems deliberately staged to create as great a contrast as possible to the only bit of color about him – the swollen, reddened scars that stand out starkly on his flesh.
It has been three days since Remus wandered away from his parents into the woods at the edge of their house. Three days since they found him unconscious under the trees, robes drenched in blood, face the color of death. Three days since the mediwizards at St Mungo's shook their heads and said "No hope, we're sorry, there's nothing we can do." Three days since Fenrir.
Three days since Remus J Lupin, at six years old, became a werewolf.
And now, for the first time in three days, he is starting to wake up, eyelids fluttering, face tensing in pain, body shifting restlessly.
Remus wakes up feeling weak and wrong and ill, even worse than two months ago when he had the flu. There is a bone-deep ache in his side, sharper, stinging lines of pain across his shoulder and face, and he can't stop the tears that form in his eyes.
"Mother," he whimpers, sick and terrified and wanting nothing more than to be held and comforted and reassured.
Then he feels a soft, cool hand on his forehead, smoothing his hair, and when he turns his head, he sees his mother, sitting in the chair beside his bed.
"It's alright, Remus," she says gently. "I'm right here. You've been ill, but now you're getting better, and soon you'll be fine, I promise."
Remus is too young to hear the waver of exhaustion and fear in her voice. But she leans close, to kiss his forehead like she always does when he gets sick, and he sees when her eyes go wide and her face turns pale. She pulls away suddenly, and tries to pretend she just slipped, smoothing her robes and laughing nervously, but Remus saw it, and he knows something must be really wrong with him for his mother to be scared like that.
Remus is six years old, and he can't understand that he has a monster inside him.
2.
Remus has been at Hogwarts almost a month, and he still doesn't entirely know how he feels about it. The first week was like walking through a dream; still in shock that he'd been allowed to attend at all, half-expecting to come down to breakfast one morning and find the headmaster waiting for him to tell him it had all been a mistake, he was too dangerous, he was being sent home.
He still has a little space at the back of head reserved for fretting about that, but mostly he is too busy, too tired, too lost, too panicked, or too hungry to waste time actively worrying about it, not when they are so many other immediately urgent things to worry about.
He'd been scared he would be completely hopeless, that everyone in his classes would be better than him at every subject, but so far that isn't the case – except in potions, where he's already melted his cauldron twice and several times turned his eyebrows green, but that doesn't count. For the most part, classes are wonderful; the teachers love him, the subjects are fascinating, and Remus has never felt as good about himself as he did the first time he sent a feather floating effortlessly into the air. When he found the library, he was struck speechless by the sheer volume of books laid out in front of him; he missed dinner and very nearly curfew curled in a corner with a towering stack of new reading material the first time, and has gone back every day since. If school were nothing but classes and chances to go to the library, Remus would be in heaven.
Unfortunately, Remus has learned, school also contains other students, and that is a problem. The Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs are fine; he doesn't know any of them, and they rarely have classes together, but when they do, they are polite at least.
The Slytherins are no better and worse than Remus expected from his parents' stories; one look at his shabby robes, scarred face, and shy manner and they knew him for a target. They tease him mercilessly when they catch him alone in the hallways, push him around in the Great Hall, and do as much as they can get away with in their shared classes. Remus ignores them when he can, and fights back when he has to, and he can see it being a workable arrangement for the next seven years.
A loud burst of laughter a few feet down the table reminds Remus of the real problem: his housemates, or rather his year-mates. If he were to have friends, it would be the three of them, but in a month of living together they have barely spoken to him, and though he came to Hogwarts expecting to be alone, he hadn't realized how much it would hurt to be surrounded by friends with none of his own.
It is mostly his own fault, he knows. There are many reasons to avoid approaching them. First and foremost, of course, is the fear, the all-consuming fear that if he befriends them they will find out about the wolf, and then they won't be friends anymore. But there is also his simple shyness, and a self-effacing nature that makes him wonder what he could possibly offer to this group.
There is the fact that James is already immensely popular and there is talk of him trying out for the Quidditch team, and that Sirius is aristocratically handsome and brimming with arrogance and confidence and anger, and all of that is quite intimidating. There is the fact that the two of them seem well on their way to being the perfect team, inspiring each other to fantastic new heights of trouble-making and rule-breaking, and Remus doesn't want to intrude. He'd befriend Peter, the last Gryffindor in their year, but he follows James around like a puppy, and Remus doubts he would notice anyone else.
And so Remus keeps to himself, doesn't say a word to any of them, and tries not to feel lonely and left out.
Especially times like now, when James and Sirius plot one of the pranks they are already famous for.
"No, no," exclaims a voice that Remus recognizes as Sirius. "You have to do it like this" – Remus can imagine the wild hand gestures – "so that we make sure that Snivellus gets covered without McGonagall being able to see."
"It won't work," Remus says without thinking.
Two black heads turn as one to stare incredulously at the pale blond. "What did you say?" asks James, as if unable to believe that Remus said anything at all.
"I s-said that wouldn't w-work," Remus stammers out under their scrutiny. Feeling the need to explain, he adds, "That charm, it will only last for a few hours, and it will be really obvious that you two were behind it. You'd have to use Nidorious Improbus if you want the smell to last a week, and no one will be able to tell you did it."
James and Sirius continue to stare at him, and Remus turns pink and stares blindly down at his plate.
"Did he just –" James asks Sirius questioningly.
"He – he spoke," Sirius answers. The look on his face is inscrutable, and Remus wonders if he is going to hit him.
Remus is so unprepared for Sirius to leap at him, combining a tackle with a rib-crushing hug, that he is knocked out of his seat entirely when Sirius does just that, and they both end up sprawled on the floor of the Great Hall, Sirius laughing hysterically.
"You spoke!" He says again, beaming at Remus beneath him. "James and I were starting to wonder if you were really just shy or actually a hopeless stuck-up prat, but you spoke, and now we can be best friends and it'll be brilliant, you'll see, Hogwarts will never know what hit it, and your advice was brilliant and Snivellus will smell like James' socks for days and I could kiss you!"
For a moment Sirius' face lingers over Remus' in a way that makes him wonder if Sirius actually will kiss him, but Sirius seems to think better of it, and settles for punching his shoulder lightly and hauling them both back into their seats. He spends the rest of the meal in a warm fog of friendship, listening to James and Sirius babble about various schemes to cause havoc, offering the occasional suggestion and once a joke that has both of them howling, trying to keep Sirius from stealing all his bacon, and in general being happier than he could ever remember being before.
A/N: review please?