This was written for rtchallenge on livejournal months ago. I completely forgot I'd finally be able to upload my first fanfic after being a member for ages.

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The day that Remus Lupin became a hopeful man, he was immensely grateful that he was already standing in a room in St. Mungo's, because his heart beat so rapidly he feared it would burst into thousands of squishy pieces and perhaps the doctors would like to have a go at attempting to put it back together, messy though it may be.

Remus Lupin was not, by any definition, what you would have called a naturally hopeful man. Throughout his life, he operated with the understanding that his position in life was not enviable and that his condition dictated his circumstances. He had seen much prejudice and endured too many losses. He was forced to live, unemployed and in poverty "to ensure the well being of a society." He saw the injustice in this but fought with his whole being to save a society that abhorred him, not to be accepted by it, but because he knew there was a fight against evil, and it was in his world too, no matter what others said.

The moment the nurse handed Remus his child – his son, his firstborn – and told him they believed Teddy was born a Metamorphmagus, he nearly laughed in her face, which was sure to be a most inappropriate response. Remus was no medical expert, but he was sure that very few babies popped out with bright blue hair that quickly changed to red, purple, mauve then bright green, and eyes that flickered like a kaleidoscope, so he figured their diagnosis to be very likely correct.

After Remus passes his son to his wife to hold, he gazes at the two of them and thinks of his dearest friends, imagining raucous laughter over what has transpired in his life. Merlin, he tried to keep her from caring about him, – and put up a magnificent fight, he thinks amusedly – and tried to run away from her love on two separate occasions, and yet here he stood, with a brand new baby and loved nonetheless. Never had he really imagined this normalcy in his life; not for a single moment did he really believe that he could have his own family.

It is at this point, and not a moment sooner, that Remus looks to the future with hope.

He begins to imagine his family at the park, where the old women will gasp at his son's changing features, his wife's pink hair and especially when they realize that someone has allowed former Hogwarts Professor, werewolf extraordinaire and menace to children everywhere, Remus Lupin, to reproduce.

Remus imagines birthday parties with screaming children and confetti and all sorts of mess, with himself as the Molly Weasley of the family, in a fetching apron that brings out the color of his eyes. He assumes his wife, who has adorably dozed off at this point after handing their son back to him, would more likely only exacerbate the problem.

Remus stares at his son, burning his face into memory, and imagines Christmases and picnics, homework and vacations, then panics at the thought of conversations about girls and all the trouble Teddy will get into because he is the son of a Marauder and Nymphadora Tonks – oh merlin, what have they made? If that's not the recipe for a mischief-maker, he can't imagine what is.

He looks down at his son, gurgling softly and snug in his arms, and feels triumphant. If anything, leading a normal life is the most defiant act that he can take against Umbridge and her kind – and he now has the hope that he's been missing all his life. So he kisses his lovely wife's forehead and walks out to display his newborn baby to his in-laws and friends – and it feels so surreal.