onewizardwolfpack | everything looks different in the morning

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everything looks different in the morning

Everything seemed familiar as Remus woke. His world was small and concentrated around the pain in his body, the stale metal taste in his mouth. His thoughts were sluggish and his senses felt incredibly dull. He was lying on his side, his shoulder wedged uncomfortably beneath his body, and as he clumsily pushed himself upright his blood started to move more freely, which made him grimace.

He'd made a mess of the floor.

With a rough sound he let his fingers hover over the deepest cut in his arm, and closed his eyes, willing the skin to knit, just enough where the bleeding would stop. Nothing happened. It had been a while since a transformation, even one as violent as this one had apparently been, had stopped him from doing nonverbal magic. If the burning pain in his legs and side were any indication, getting a hold of his wand was going to be a bitch. Gritting his teeth together, he started to his feet, tucking his arm tight against his stomach, and stumbled in the direction he'd left his clothing and wand, folded up and wedged tight between the crap old tool bench and cold masonry wall.

Only none of those things were there.

The room he was in was larger than the one he used for his transformations. There was a cluster of washers and dryers- was he in a laundry? Oh fuckssake, was this a laundry?- were set in the middle of the room. No, no windows, it couldn't have been a proper laundromat. It was some basement, someone's basement. He'd never seen it before. His brain struggled toward alertness, but sheer disbelief was making that difficult.

For the first time in a long time, Remus felt something like real, cold fear. He was injured, significantly, bleeding quite a lot. Wandless magic wasn't working and his wand was nowhere to be seen. He had no idea where he was.

Which meant he'd gotten out. How had he gotten out? How could the charms have failed? What if some of the blood on the floor- on him- wasn't his own?

“Ngh- no,” he said to himself, though it came out a rough, broken whisper. He turned, looking for an exit, and saw stairs leading up to a door. Unfamiliar stairs, and an unfamiliar door.

“Oh, please, no,” he whispered fervently, and lurched toward them, blood running to ice in his veins. He stumbled once, cracking his knee against the corner of a step, but pushed himself onward, and when he clumsily shouldered the door open, he fell onto a cold, plain floor. Not wood. Not his flat. Not even his building.

What had he done?

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There's a fragile, volatile place inside of Sirius reserved for Peter Pettigrew and everything he wrought out of Sirius' naivete. It snaps, clean and sharp and pushing Sirius to his feet in a flurry of adrenaline, and he's suddenly so full up with frustration that he can't contain it. He picks up a chair, throws it halfway across the room with a raucous clatter and then seizes hold of the foot of Remus' slender hospital bed.

"LOOK AT ME!" he demands with a shake of the bed frame, eyes wild but baldly honest and wrapped in tears. "You fucking look me in the eye and tell me you think I would EVER hurt James or Lily. After everything we've been through, you look at me and SAY IT."

He was half out of the bed- though thankfully only half, the sheet staying tangled around his waist and legs because, he realized distantly, he was still naked- hackles raised, heart beating wildly in his chest.

"Do you think I wanted to?" he demanded, the rage undercut by a real desperation that cracked his voice.

"Do you think I could fucking stomach the thought, that I would have believed it for a fucking second if Albus Dumbledore hadn't told me was true?!"

So focused on Remus, Harry hadn't been prepared for the explosion from his godfather and for a few moments he had to stare, mouth agape, seeing the same kind of madness in Sirius' face that he had only seen once before.

This was not the way this should go.

Maybe it had been a bad choice to bring Sirius here so soon.

When Remus started to rise up, Harry sprang into action, positioning himself between the two men, half-leaning over the bed himself. One hand pressed, palm flat and hard, against Sirius' chest and the other rested, much lighter but still firm, on Remus' shoulder. He didn't think they would come to blows, but the intensity of their gazes made Harry as uncomfortable and tense as an outright display of aggression would have.

"Stop it!" he shouted. "Both of you! This isn't helping."

This isn't the place for Harry. As much as this subject matter is inherently about him, this discussion isn't for him. Sirius ought to have given him something else to do, ought to have faced this alone regardless of what that might mean.

In a stern, almost protective gesture, Sirius brings his forearm around to Harry's chest and pushes him back so that he can step in, around the end of the bed and halfway onto it. One knee braced atop the mattress, he takes Remus' face in swift, trembling fingers, gray eyes fixed on the other man as a tear spills over his sunburnt cheek.

"Look at me," he says, unswerving. "I wouldn't. I'd fucking die first."

The contact was jarring. Remus didn't touch people, wasn't touched, any more, not really, but it wasn't the alien nature of the gesture that shook him. It was Sirius's hand, Sirius's long, elegant fingers that he knew, God, so well, that made it shocking.

He met Sirius's eyes and was held there, couldn't have looked away if he wanted to. He should have wanted to.

It was all true, and the realization settled on him like one more lead weight. Everything he was being told was true. It was a bitter, jagged pill to swallow, made no easier by the fact that it had taken him years to get the last one down.

"You didn't tell me," he said shakily, blinking rapidly, his own eyes stinging with unshed tears.

"You cut me out, and then- Then you were gone. All of you. I couldn't-" He swallowed thickly against a hitching breath. He didn't want to break, not in front James' son (who'd already seen him at his worst, post-transformation and now this), not in front of Sirius (Sirius Black, murderer and mad man). He didn't realize when he reached up and gripped Sirius's wrist. He didn't pull his hand away.

"I couldn't believe it. I couldn't and then an- there was an owl, and."

As if the Prophet hadn't been enough. Seeing it in Dumbledore's hand had literally brought Remus to his knees with the force of his grief.

"Don't tell me it's not true," Remus said as his voice and breath and expression all broke at once.

"Don't tell me I've spent five- oh, God- five years hating you, learning to hate you, for nothing. Please. Sirius."

Between the two of them, Sirius has never been the strong one. Impetuous, yes. Stubborn without a doubt. But Remus was better at standing firm on his own two feet. Sirius rails, he fights, but it isn't the same. Remus has always been the one made of sterner stuff, even if he never knew it. That he expects Sirius to be the stronger one now is entirely too much to bear. A sob catches in his throat and he wrenches his gaze away at last, face screwed up with the sheer, harsh reality of it all.

"It was my idea," he says, words choked. "I told them to use Peter and they did it, they did it, and now they're dead, Moony, they're dead." His hands fall away and he rocks forward as if he can't physically bear the burden of knowing what he put in motion.

It was fucking too much, far too much, and though his hands came up without so much as a second thought to cover Sirius's shoulders, to hold the curve of his back, Remus's face was strangely blank.

He didn't know what to feel. Hearing his old nickname had been akin to getting kicked in the teeth.

Remus took a moment, sliding one arm further about Sirius's back, to collect his breath and what wits he could find.

"Harry," he said evenly, "would you kindly go find me some clothing."

Harry had watched silently, feeling distinctly distanced from the drama unfolding before him. He had thought he would be needed to referee this meeting. But he wasn't needed at all.

He nearly stepped forward as Sirius settled that old weight of guilt upon his shoulders, but stopped himself. He really was not needed. Remus had him. Much as Harry wanted to be there for Sirius, it was something of a relief.

He nodded several times at Remus' question before backing out of the room, looking a little dazed. He felt so, so far out of his depth and removed from the situation in the little clinic room, but at the same time intrinsically part of it. A prop of some kind, but not a player. He needed the space as much as they did.

The nurse fixed him with an impressively demanding gaze, brows arched high with a question. No doubt he had heard the commotion, but Harry shook his head to tell him not to worry and headed down to the clothes box.

Not until Harry leaves does Sirius fully comprehend why he'd wanted him there. It wasn't as an explanation but rather an anchor, and once he's gone Sirius feels distinctly untethered. He wipes a hand roughly across his eyes, swallows back the bile rising in his throat and looks up to Remus.

"I'm sorry," he says, the picture of heartfelt misery. "I'm so fucking sorry, Remus."

Remus regarded him quietly, letting his hands fall, an entirely new kind of weariness flooding his body. He had thought he'd never see the man before him again. Wrong, and about so many things, apparently.

He dragged a hand across his face, head bowing, and nodded a little.

"So am I." He raised his head to meet Sirius's eyes.

"So am I," he said again.

"You... When?" he asked, frowning a little, trying to piece everything together, to recall what had been said.

"When did you come from. After...?" Sirius looked different, though still young, but not haggard and scarred, the way Remus had always feared Azkaban would make him.

"No," Sirius quickly replies, and feels immediately guilty for that, too, as if he's somehow been less than truthful in his grief. "The day of the wedding. None of it had happened yet, I had to hear about it from others or read about it in books. This place…" He sighs, inescapably weary. "It has magic, but it's stingy with it and sometimes cruel."

He touches Remus' face again, a firm splay of his fingers over stubbled jaw, and it never once enters his mind that it might not be his place to do so. "I've missed you, you know. I wasn't sure I'd see you again."

He didn't flinch, not from Sirius, but it was still difficult to remain still- to neither pull away nor lean into the touch.

"And I knew I'd never see you again," he replied, taking in the angles of his former friend's face, the shape of his mouth, his eyes.

His hair was different. But then, Remus supposed that Sirius wasn't the only one who'd changed. Remus himself had more scars, more lines, more flecks of silver in his hair. He must have looked a fucking wreck to the younger man before him, and he was stunned that he had presence of mind enough to feel self conscious about it.

"I am... glad to be wrong." He let out a rough, shaky sigh, ducking his head and dislodging Sirius's hand. He was furious with the other man, for so many things, if one less, now. He was far too tired to dip into that well, though, and far too happy to see Sirius alive and ostensibly whole to get into the mess of it, of them.

"So that's Harry."

Sirius looks at his hand and then draws it back with a glance over his shoulder toward the door. "It's uncanny, isn't it? How much he looks like James."

His gaze lingers a moment before he pulls it back to Remus. "He's absolutely brilliant. Got all the best parts of both of them. And he really loves you, too, so go easy on him, yeah?"

Edited 2012-01-26 06:22 (UTC)

"What?" Remus said, looking up, plainly confused.

"Why?"

The withering look Sirius gives Remus makes him almost feel something approaching normal.

"Dumbledore brings you to Hogwarts to teach him," he explains. "You were a bit like a father to him. Me, too, apparently-" His voice halts abruptly, just in time to keep from mentioning how he dies in that alternate future he may never be a part of.

"It's a wonder he turned out so well with the two of us as role models," he quickly adds instead.

"That's completely daft," Remus said. No one would allow a werewolf to teach their children, even if Remus had been suited for the job, which he wasn't.

"On every count. This is mad," he added, and then without thinking reached up twisting a lock of Sirius's hair into a fine rope between his fingers, and all the sadness and hurt he'd managed to push down came flooding back into his face.

"This is real," he said quietly, and though it wasn't a question it certainly wasn't the surest he'd ever sounded.

"Daft but real is a good way to describe it," Sirius softly agrees as he reaches up to catch long fingers against Remus' wrist. "If it was a dream, you'd look less like shit and I'd be the one naked," he adds with the faintest upward quirk of his mouth.

The words stung furiously to hear, because they were so true. Remus looked down and withdrew his hand, expression subtly but fully cordoning itself off. He opened his mouth, unsure as to what he was going to say, exactly, when he noticed Harry standing in the doorway.

He wished he had any idea of how long he'd been there. He straightened a little and cleared his throat.

"Harry. Thank you."

Harry had taken his time at the clothes box. He needed to pick out things that would both fit Remus and did not embarrass him, which was not that simple of a task around here. The navy sweatpants and white t-shirt weren't stylish, but they were better than the dozens of brash t-shirts with witty lines about werewolves that the box had tried to force on him.

Harry had also taken his time in hopes that Remus and Sirius would... be normal again. It was obvious to Harry, watching them from the doorway for all of twenty seconds, that they hadn't quite gotten there yet.

"You're welcome," he said. "I think they should fit."

He moved forward to hand the clothes over to Remus and strongly considered leaving them to it again.

"Oh good," Sirius says, gaze abruptly drawn to his godson. He's got no idea how much Harry heard or even how much Harry had already inferred, but the awkwardness in the room is palpable and he's back to his feet before he knows it, patting his pockets.

"I've done a poor job of filling him in, I'm afraid," he says, and pulls out a cigarette that trembles finely between his fingers, belying his casual tone. "It's got a bit close in here, I'm going out for a smoke."

He perches the cigarette between his lips, thinks better of it and pulls it free again so that he can lean in and drop a kiss to Remus' forehead. "You're gorgeous, stop sulking. I'll bring you some tea on my way back."

He turns then and marches out, pausing only to give Harry's arm a squeeze as he passes.

Remus wished he could have been so casual and easy, even if it was only a facade. He watched Sirius go from the room, eyes tracking him until he was gone from the doorway, before he let out a slow, silent breath and dropped his face into his hands.

He was shaking a little, and needed to stop. Harry was still there. After a moment of digging his fingertips against his scalp, he dropped his hands and straightened up, lifting the shirt and soft cotton trousers from his lap. He looked at Harry, took in the build and the hair. Sirius was right. He was the spitting image of his father. But there were things in his manner, in the way expressions formed and moved on his features, that reminded him powerfully of Lily.

And there was the scar.

He offered the young man a weak approximation of a smile. It was a bit grim, all told.

"I'm afraid I've made a terrible first impression."

Sirius' touch eased the sharp spike of mingled jealousy and annoyance. How come he got to escape the heavy atmosphere of the room? How come he got to leave Harry to the business of explaining to Remus his whole life had changed?

As he left, Harry glanced up to see Lupin shaking, just a little, and he realized that all that didn't matter. They had done so much for him -- died for him -- that a little, or even a lot, of uncomfortableness was a small price to pay.

But Merlin's saggy y-fronts, why did everything have to be so complicated?

He gave Remus a slight, thin smile and shook his head.

"No," he said. "Not to... sound weird or startle you, but this isn't the first time we've met. This isn't my first impression of you. And even if it were, it's not that bad."

"Yes," Remus murmured, "Sirius said I teach you, at one point. At Hogwarts."

He couldn't find it in him to have an actual opinion on the matter, except that it didn't seem very likely.

Edited 2012-01-26 18:33 (UTC)

"Defense Against the Dark Arts," Harry supplied. He wasn't sure Lupin was all that interested, but Harry cared.

"You were the best one we ever had." Which said a lot about the other teachers as well as about Lupin.

Harry paused, his thin smile growing into something warmer.

"First time I met you, you saved me from a Dementor. That makes for an excellent first impression."

Remus's head snapped up, even as he eased himself out of the hospital bed to start pulling the track pants on.

"What? What the f- on earth was a Dementor doing anywhere near you?" he asked.

Edited 2012-01-26 18:58 (UTC)

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