Notes: Hoo, boy. This took too damn long and I don't even know if it makes sense. But here it is. My Remus (aka the one living in my schizophrenic head) attached himself instantly to this song. He likes it. He even likes the video, minus the dancing. Me? I have absolutely no opinion.

Quick warning: This contains sex between two males (brief and toward the end), mention of non-consensual sex, violence, disturbing content, and… um… that's about all. Blood. Lots of blood. And Reading is a city in England. The Hobgoblin is a real bar. I looked it up. I've never been there myself.

This fic assumes two things, by the way. 1) That Remus is back as DADA professor (oh, how I wish) and 2) That he and Harry are (to put it colloquially) sleeping together on a regular basis (I wish for this too). That should be about all.

Thriller

Another month and another moon's come to pass. I am huddled, shaking and sweating, in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom. The muscles of my stomach clench and I bend forward, clutching my abdomen in pain and shock. Cold sweat trickles over my temples, tracing rivers down my cheeks and collecting in pools around the hollows of my collarbone.

That familiar shiver and involuntary contraction of my muscles is the warning that transformation is near. The twilight is slipping away and the moon is rising; my body reacts most appropriately. I am panting, writhing with the blinding pain traveling through every nerve in my body. My head is throbbing; I can hear my blood and my heartbeat amplified a thousand times. Every little noise is like the roar of the ocean, the screaming of the crowds.

Yes, and I can hear every single person in those crowds. It's like Altamont, like Woodstock. It's like war, except that my consciousness is so sensitive that it is more than war. It is fear, starvation, plague, and the concentration camps. It's my body moving without me telling it to; it's unwanted physicality. It's the rape, burning, and pillaging of my perception.

All that and it happens once a month too.

It's close to midnight and something evil's lurking in the dark
Under the moonlight you see a sight that almost stops your heart
You try to scream but terror takes the sound before you make it
You start to freeze as horror looks you right between the eyes,
You're paralyzed

My stomach lurches, and I lunge for the nearby wastebasket. My entire body kicks as I vomit bile and water into the waiting depths of the plastic garbage bag. Again and again and again. My insides squeeze and twist as my stomach heaves. Some of the stinging liquid trickles out of my nose and I want to scream "Fire! Fire!"

"Fire!" Ha… I'm the kind of person who always itched and longed to yell 'fire!' in a crowded theatre. I am The Boy Who Cried Wolf, although I can't deny that in my life I have been both The Boy and The Wolf.

Thinking of this paradox makes me laugh, and laughing hurts. But I do it anyway. Pain is so damn incidental, even when it hurts. Ha, ha… funny stuff, Remus. But, although I've been many things in my life, I've never been the comedian.

I used to tell Sirius: "It's like being in some fucked up novel where we're the stars." He'd always laugh and swing a friendly arm around my shoulder.

"Sure! We're the stars. We're the brightest stars in the sky!" He'd laugh, even though it was never funny.

We're the fucking stars, Sirius. But not in some novel-turned-cinema atrocity. No, we're the stars in this goddamned acid flashback they call life. Life. And this is the kind of life where stupid-ass kids shove a pair of knitting needles into their eyeballs to stop the rats from eating their brains. It's the kind of life where autos overturn and some poor sap needlessly ends his life with his brains painting the motorway. It's the kind of life where a psychopath can run a country and take a whole race of people hostage. It's the kind of life where some fucker, high on ecstasy, walks into an airplane propeller moving at full speed, showering his internal organs upon the windows of the business class passengers.

Actually… that'd feel kind of good right about now.


'Cause this is thriller, thriller night
And no one's gonna save you from the beast about strike
You know it's thriller, thriller night
You're fighting for your life inside a killer, thriller tonight

I sit back on my heels and lift my face to the ceiling as if in prayer. I can feel wetness pouring down my cheeks, but I can't tell whether it is my tears or my blood. Absently, I lift one hand and run the pads of my fingers above my upper lip and down the crevices in my cheeks. I then hold my hand away from me to get a clear look.

Blood. Yes, most definitely blood. My fit of regurgitation gave me a nosebleed, and a bad one at that. I pinch my nostrils closed and tilt my face forward. The best way to choke on your own blood is to lean back and let it trickle down your throat, you know. Plus, it's awfully disgusting.

Blood drips into my hands and splatters on the hardwood floor… ugh. It's a bright and vibrant crimson color, shiny and unreal looking; I breathe, shallowly and noisily, into my palms and watch the thick liquid pool and puddle around my naked body.

Just like that time in Reading. Reading. What a thought, what a place, what a night, what a fucking lifetime. And it's a little sad; I'm not really sure what happened in Reading. No, not anymore. It's been too long. Too many years.

About seventeen years, in fact. It was after Harry had been born, but before Lily and James had been killed, I remember. Yes, because James had been the one who drove more than an hour to come and get me after….

After….

After Reading.


You hear the door slam and realize there's nowhere left to run
You feel the cold hand and wonder if you'll ever see the sun
You close your eyes and hope that this is just imagination
But all the while you hear the creature creepin' up behind
You're out of time

I try to focus on the shapes my blood makes when it falls on the floor. It helps the pain to seem more far away and insubstantial. But, no… I've run out of time; the sun has set completely and the moon is now completely visible. Even without windows or a connection to the outside, I can tell.

I can tell because the hair on my body is growing, growing… gone into a thick and furry pelt. The bones in my cheeks and jaw are lengthening, breaking and repairing themselves to form the snout and teeth of a wolf. My ears are tapering to points and moving up the side of my head. Every one of my limbs is changing, the joints swinging and twisting to give me the legs I need to support my changeling form. Extra bones are forming at the base of my spine, expanding to become a full tail. My hands convert to clumsy paws with long, sharp nails that are just itching to rip into the hardwood floor of the classroom.

It takes less than five seconds for the entire transformation to complete itself, but it might as well be five hours for how incredibly painful it is. And I can't even scream, lest the noise awaken and alert someone in the castle. I can't rip into the floor, or my desk, or the walls. Instead, I turn on my heels, ignoring the ache that shivers up my legs and back, and rip into the pile of blankets I'd brought to curl up on. My claws shred them viciously, and I compound the damage further biting into a mouthful of wool and tearing it away as hard as I can. I shake my head back and forth as fast as I can; the only conscious thoughts running through my brain are "Kill it! Kill it!"

But after a few moments, I find my senses returning. Yes, the Wolfsbane potion allows me to retain my human mind and human thoughts, but the temptations of a more… lupine nature often take over in the initial time after transformation. Still, I soon realize that I'm chewing on a piece of my blanket and spit it out unhappily; with a guilty snuffle, I dip my head and paw at the scraps that are left.

Whining with shame, I try to back up. As I shuffle away from my mess, however, one of my hind legs slips and I stumble. With a growl of surprise, I shake a peculiar wetness off of my paw and turn to see what had caused me to lose my balance.

A red smear on the dark wood tells me all I need to know. The coppery smell of fresh blood invades my sensitive canine nose and I am forced to turn away, eyes watering.

Just like in Reading, that's the thing. Every time I catch sight of my own blood, it's 'just like in Reading'.


'Cause this is thriller, thriller night
There ain't no second chance against the thing with forty eyes
You know it's thriller, thriller night
You're fighting for your life inside of killer, thriller tonight

I limp defensively into the far corner and curl into as tight a ball as I can, stretching my tail so that it sweeps around my forelegs and tickles my nose. Because what happened in Reading is the kind of thing that I can only think about when I feel protected. Safe.

Here, in this locked classroom at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, I think I can finally feel safe. Or sufficiently out of harm's way, at least.

I was nineteen years old, hitchhiking through England and seeing the sights. There was something fun and quaint about Muggle travel at the time, something that appealed greatly to me. I've never liked Apparating, the same way some Muggles don't like driving. A bit of a rarity in our world of magic, but I've never enjoyed it. I learned how to operate an auto, as did James… although James learned because Lily made him.

They lived with one foot in the magical world and one foot in the Muggle world, Lily and James. It was one way to insure themselves against the increasingly prominent threat of Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters. The more contacts, the better at that time. Later, it became necessary to pull back from their normal lives and from their friends and neighbors… but then, it was important to have as many people as you could for alliances.

I, however, lived almost exclusively among Muggles. Traveled from town to town, pub to pub. I picked up the occasional odd-job, usually only until the next full moon. Then I would run to the nearest forest and let my animal mind take over. That was frightening; I was never entirely in control, as I am with the Wolfsbane potion. No, I did not have that luxury, and thus lived in perpetual fear of someday hurting someone innocent.

I never did, though. No, thank god.


Night creatures call
And the dead start to walk in their masquerade
There's no escapin' the jaws of the alien this time
(They're open wide)
This is the end of your life

The night I was attacked, I had been finishing my shift at the Hobgoblin pub, a nice little bar that had kindly given me a job and asked few questions. Reading wasn't a bad place to work and live- I'd rented a very small flat about two blocks away from the Hobgoblin- but I'd known that I wouldn't be able to stay much longer.

I had known this as I walked out of the bar, walked slowly in the darkness, and passed a nearby alley. But I hadn't known about the pair of eyes watching me from within.

A small group of five or six young men about my age had been heading toward me on the sidewalk, walking leisurely, but with purpose. I slowed as well, trying to assess what these men wanted; as I got closer, I'd realized I recognized them. I had gone to Hogwarts with every member of the gang; one was even a former Gryffindor with whom I'd shared a potions table in our sixth year. Cheerfully, I began to raise my hand in greeting, but the man in the lead cut me off.

"Remus Lupin?" He'd asked, his tone of voice daring me to agree. Still, I nodded, trying not to show any fear. He seemed to give this response a great deal of thought before taking a giant step forward. Hesitantly, I took a step back. This man, a former Slytherin and bully, had me feel extremely uneasy just by saying my name. I took another step back as he'd stepped forward and felt my back hit something solid. I turned and saw yet another classmate. This one had come out of the alley I'd walked so blithely by; he too had been a Slytherin. One of his large, meaty hands fell on my shoulder, he grinned at me.

"Werewolf," he'd whispered unpleasantly, the stink of his breath tickling my nose. "Werewolf."

They're out to get you, there's demons closing in on every side
They will possess you unless you change the number on your dial
Now is the time for you and I to cuddle close together
All thru the night I'll save you from the terror on the screen,
I'll make you see
 

They led me forcefully into the alley and began to throw punches at me. The first blow broke my nose; the second caused my head to bang against the brick wall, cutting into my scalp and making my eyes cross. Mostly they aimed for my face, but every now and then one of them would toss an extra knock into my stomach or kick to my shins.

Truthfully, I've blocked the worst of it out. But I think I was still conscious when they began to rape me.

Ha… doesn't that sound melodramatic? Still, I repeat the sentence to myself, relishing the way it echoes in my brain. I think I was still conscious when they began to rape me.

But that's a gross exaggeration. They didn't rape me. Only one, the Slytherin who'd spoken my name, actually penetrated me. At least, from what I can remember. No, the only memories I have retained are those of him crouching over me, huge and threatening, and of being held down by the man who had come slinking out of the alley in the first place. Those… and the uncomfortably frightened face of the boy I'd shared a table with, the boy who'd help me write lab reports and gather ingredients.

You know what I said when I saw him staring at me, shocked at what had become of me and what his friend was planning to do? I said, "I shared my newt eyes with you." And that was it. I don't remember a thing between that and sitting, dirty, nearly naked and alone, on the cobbled street of the trash-filled alley.

How humiliating! Can you imagine how utterly dehumanizing, how mortifying, how shameful it was for me to regain consciousness in that awful, awful state? Even today, I still shake with anger. They left me there. They used me and abused me and left me there.

My first thought after I awoke was that I needed to contact someone as soon as I possibly could. There was no doubt that I'd need medical attention- the blood streaming down my face and between my legs was testimony to that- and I had preferred to be treated by wizard means. Going to a Muggle hospital would have resulted in too many questions and a long period of healing. And I wanted to end the pain as quickly as I could.

As I'd collected my missing clothes that had been strewn about the alley, I went through a mental list of all my close friends and acquaintances. Parents were too far away… besides, I was much too embarrassed to go to them. Peter had also been too far away for me to get a speedy response, and I wasn't even sure he had a telephone- the only means of communication I could think of to get attention quickly. And Sirius… well, I'd had absolutely no idea where Sirius had got off to.

That left James and Lily. I hesitated for a moment while tying my shoes. Surely it wouldn't be in good form to disturb that happy little family with my macabre situation? But I'd run out of people to turn to, and they were living only an hour away on the outskirts of London.

So I had called from a booth down the street, depositing sweaty coins from my evening's tips. No, they hadn't eve robbed me. Just beat me, fucked me and run.

James answered the phone, thank goodness. I hadn't been sure whether I would have been able to find my voice for Lily. "Hello. Potter residence."

"James?"

"Yes?"

"James?"

"…Yes?"

"James…"

"Yes! Who is this?"

"Remus," My voice had been choked and nasally, broken noise highly cutting on my vocal quality. "I'm sorry… I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

"No! God, no… How are you, Remus?" He paused, waiting for my answer. When I didn't make any move to speak, his voice became worried. "Remus? Is something wrong?"

"Well," Tears had finally begun to nip at the corners of my eyes, and I struggled to hold them in. "I had… a little… accident."

He sucked his breath in. "What happened? Where are you?"

"In Reading," I'd replied, leaning my forehead against the cool glass of the stall and leaving a brilliant streak of crimson behind. "Broad Street. Do you know the Hobgoblin?"

"Yes, yes I do." I could almost hear him nodding through the telephone lines. "What happened, Remus? Are you hurt?" And in the background I could hear Lily's voice asking similar questions: Is that Remus? Why is he calling so late? Is he ok? What's happening?

"Yeah," I'd replied weakly. By now the tears were pouring down my cheeks; I'd given up trying to stop them. "Yeah, I got… attacked. Attacked walking home."

Another little intake of breath. "Oh Jesus… Remus…"

"And…" I began to tell him that they were former Hogwarts students, students from our year. I began to tell him about the werewolf comment and about how the one man, the leader whose name I could not remember, had bent over me with a glint in his eye and a grin on his face. Then I'd remembered sweet-faced Lily and her beloved baby. I didn't want James to turn around and tell her anything like that… no, not yet. "Nothing…"

"Remus," His voice held a great deal of concern for me; I found it strangely touching, "I'm going come right down and get you. Do you have someplace you can go into where you'll be safe?"

"Yes," I'd lied. "I'm so sorry, James. I'm so sorry…" I'd begun to sob. It hurt like hell, but I found it to be an acceptable penance. "I'm sorry I'm so much trouble…"

"No!" His tone of voice had been both admonishing and terrified. "No, it's no trouble. I'm leaving right now, so stay where you are and stay safe… ok?"

I'd waited for over an hour on the street side, eyes downcast, and clothes, hair, and face dramatically gory. Several people passed me, shooting nervous looks in my direction. One or two actually crossed the street to avoid my presence. I must have been a sight for fucking sore eyes. I never wanted to check.

They're out to get you, there's demons closing in on every side
They will possess you unless you change the number on your dial
Now is the time for you and I to cuddle close together
All thru the night I'll save you from the terror on the screen,
I'll make you see

When James finally arrived, he pulled his auto up beside me and jumped out. His face curled into a horrified grimace and then into mask of sadness. He'd thrown his arms around me and held me tight. "Oh no… How are you? Are you ok?" He'd pulled back critically and tilted my chin toward the light. "Good. Your pupils are dilating." He pushed two fingers in front of my nose and moved them from side to side. I followed their path. "Good, good. Any dizziness?" I'd shaken my head. "Nausea? Blurred vision?" No and no again. But James had always been wonderful at doctoring, so I'd put my complete trust in him. "Good enough for me. I don't see any of the usual signs of serious head injuries." He'd given me a weak smile. "Broke your nose, though."

I'd smiled back. Smiled like an idiot. "James?"

"Yes?"

"They did something else to me too." I'm sure that, at that point, I'd been grinning like a madman. And I'd wanted to tell him, really wanted to. Still, the mental block was too great; the words refused to pass the barrier of my lips. "But I… I don't think I can say it."

"Um…" James was quite plainly uncomfortable. "Can you… maybe spell it for me?" I'd closed my eyes and taken a deep breath.

"R-"

He repeated the letters I spoke, as if filing them away for further use. "R-"

"A-"

"A-" I could hear the recognition in his voice, that sinking sound of horror.

"P-"

"P-" His hands closed around mine protectively.

"E." I'd exhaled heavily with relief and opened my eyes. James was staring at me sadly.

"E." He finished with a sigh. "God, I can't believe it. Are you sure?"

I laughed. "Blood never lies!" I said with a touch of sing-song. He looked properly humbled as he nodded and rubbed my palms.

"You're right," Helpless, he met my eyes. "I'm so, so sorry."

"No," I pulled him into a delicate hug, "You have no reason to be sorry." He'd hugged me closer without seeming to care that some of my blood rubbed off on his shirt.

"Would you… please, please come back to London with me?" I'd looked up into his handsome face, his eyes wide and scared. "I've got some potions at home that will help with… with everything! And Lily and I would be happy to have you…"

That this is thriller, thriller night
'Cause I can thrill you more than any ghost would dare to try
Girl, this is thriller, thriller night
So let me hold you tight and share a killer, diller, chiller
Thriller here tonight

I went home with James that night. I never went back to Reading, even to get the things from my apartment. I went to his home, sat in his car wrapped in an old blanket. James was one of the nicest boys I ever met and he grew into one of the best friends ever had. I spent two weeks in the company of Lily, James, and baby Harry. They gave me a fleeting glimpse of the suburban life I would have liked to have, had my condition not made it so difficult.

Yes, I can smile at that. Especially when I compare the grown-Harry to the precocious baby-Harry. The baby that I'd held in my arms, played with, and cuddled to sleep. The baby that had looked at me with perfectly serious eyes and declared, "Wuf!"

The teenaged boy that holds me tightly when he sleeps by my side, who tries surreptitiously to tickle me and make me laugh, who reads me every story he's written. Gorgeous Harry, with his soft black hair and bright green eyes.

The lock on the classroom door rattles and I raise my head, ears alert. All of my thoughts and memories suddenly leave my immediate consciousness. Finally, he's here! I leap to my feet and run the short distance to the door. It opens just as I reach it and Harry steps inside, keys dangling from one finger and homework parchments tucked beneath one arm.

"Hello, Remus," he says quietly, smiling down at me as he shoves the keys into his pocket. When I was asked to return to Hogwarts as a teacher, I requested that I be given an extra set of keys to my classroom. I think I had initially planned to give them to Severus so that he could stop in periodically and keep his critical little eyes on me. Instead, on a momentary whim, I gave them to Harry. Then in his sixth year, he'd been eager to come and keep me company when I was in wolf-form. As we'd spent a greater amount of time together, I'd found myself attracted to him in a more licentious way than befits a professor.

And, by some miracle, he reciprocated my feelings. He was the perfect young gentleman about the awkward situation; graciously happy to keep our relationship quite private and share love with me during times convenient to the both of us. These times have been few and far between of course, but he has yet to complain.

Darkness falls across the land
The midnight hour is close at hand
Creatures crawl in search of blood
To terrorize your neighborhood

He sets his parchments down on one of the student desks and kneels besides me. His hands gently brush the fur back from my face, fingertips scratching behind my ears. "Hey there…" He frowns, staring appraisingly at the scabs around my nostrils. "What happened to you? Nosebleed?" I lick one of his palms as an affirmative and trot back to the spot on the floor where my own blood had been spilled. He followed and made a face when he saw the mess I'd made. "Oh, Remus…" With a sigh, he grabbed the roll of paper towels from my desk and wiped the fluid away.

After finishing with his chore, he gives me a charming half-smile; he grabs his bundle of homework and settles beside me in my nest of ripped blankets. Happily, I cuddle up next to him as he kicks off his shoes and pushes the tiny pile of my own clothes off to the side.

"So…" He curls one arm around my torso. "What do you know about Potions?"

I rest my head on his thigh and stare up at him, whining softly. "Ok, ok," he laughs. "I should know it's not your best subject." He sucks on the end of his quill for a moment, an endearing little habit. "Tell you the truth, I'm pretty clueless myself." He stares down at his parchment for another moment before tossing it carelessly out of the way. "It can wait."

Graceful hands with long, perfect fingers give me the perfect massage around my head and shoulders. My tail begins to wag, uncontrolled, as Harry absently pets me. As man and beast, we have an oddly affectionate relationship, one in which Harry doesn't quite treat me as a lover, nor as a pet. What a joy it is to just be Remus.

"Want to hear a story?" He asks and I lick his hand again to show that I am ready to listen. "Ok… once upon a time…"

He begins to weave his tale, made up off of the top of his head as far as I can tell. But his voice is so smooth and he is so confident that someone unfamiliar with his style would scarcely be able to tell.

Harry always tells the best stories.

Still, as good as his story is and as involved in it as he becomes, he soon begins to yawn every so often; his hand slows as he strokes to me. When he finally nods off, I stand and go to the light switch. Earlier I'd attached a piece of string to it so that, whenever this sort of situation arose, I could have the freedom to turn the lights out by myself.

Easily, I am able to make my way back to him in the darkness. Again, I settle myself beside him and rest my chin in his lap, drifting into an uneasy and disturbed sleep.


And whosoever shall be found
Without the soul for getting down
Must stand and face the hounds of hell
And rot inside a corpse's shell

I dream about things that I don't think normal people even understand. The corpses of children, torn to shreds, their tiny fingers clutched in rigor mortis. A bird, a beautiful white dove, with her entire chest cavity ripped open. Her heart, her lungs, her stomach, her entrails are all visible. Some are trailing, bloody, on the ground. But still… still she walks, cooing at all who would care to listen.

A brain, open and exposed but still cognizant. An accident on the train tracks. A power drill and a hacksaw. The overwhelming stench of decay and deterioration. The body of a jumper, splattered on the sidewalk for all to see.

Darling Harry clutching his stomach and coughing up great gouts of awful blood.

I do not dream pleasant dreams; I cannot remember the last time I ever did. They finally wake me in the early hours of the morning, moments before the sun is due to rise and change me back into the form of a man. I can feel the prickling beneath my skin, causing my fur to stand on end.

Sometime during the night, Harry must have awoken and changed positions. One of his arms hangs limply over my hips; his face is nestled in the back of my neck. He stays in that position as I change.

Afterward, as I lay panting and sweating with the physical exertion and pain of reverting to my human form, I feel Harry's fingers tickling over my scalp, combing through my hair. Gently, he nudges me onto my back, where I can easily look into his eyes in the near-darkness of the classroom. He smiles at me and trails his thumb down one of my cheeks.

The foulest stench is in the air
The funk of forty thousand years
And grizzly ghouls from every tomb
Are closing in to seal your doom

Then his lips seal over mine and we are kissing, delicately and lovingly. It is a wonderful feeling, a striking contrast to the sting in my muscles. His hands move from my chest down to my crotch, where his touches cause me to weakly bump my hips against him, urging further contact.

Early during the time when we first began making our relationship into a physical one, Harry and I discovered that orgasm after my transformation would help to lessen any residual pain. The Wolfsbane potion took away most of the strength that would, under normal circumstances, accompany my change. So, after the entire process was completed, I became completely exhausted, unable to function, and in unbearable, screaming pain.

It was completely Harry's idea to research some sort of safe method to help me with the problem. And, in the end, it turned out that it wasn't some Muggle drug or new potion that could facilitate my healing after the full moon, but instead something my body did naturally- orgasm. How simple! Achieving orgasm in nearly all mammals releases endorphins, which are surprisingly close to morphine. All in all, a painkiller and an overall good-feeling hormone.

He strokes me to full erection, even though I can barely move. I tuck my head in the crook of his shoulder and clutch weakly at his shoulders as he plants kisses on the crown of my head. Warm breath tickles my forehead as climax tingles up my spine. I give a little cry and he holds me tighter, holds me while I shake with pleasure.

Once my ejaculation has ceased, he lifts his hand to his mouth to lick away my semen. I watch through hooded eyes, and he smiles suggestively as his little, pink tongue darts in and out. Intrigued, I take a hesitant lick of his pinky finger. The liquid is sharp and tangy on my tongue, and Harry's smile grows wider at the expression I make after tasting it.

"Good, huh?" His voice is low and husky; I know that he'd be overjoyed to go further, but he also knows that I am still too weak to do much else. So he hugs me and kisses me one last time, fingertips lingering on the curve of my chin. "Ok… let's go back to sleep. It's only- what?- 5:30 in the morning?" I smile at him wearily as he pulls the blankets around my naked body. "Love you."

"Love you too," I mumble. But as he closes his eyes, I wonder whether there are some things I should tell him. Love. Isn't love about trust? And I wonder whether there are some stories he should hear. Like Reading.

I want to tell him everything, suddenly. I've never been able to share my past with him, thinking it too much of a burden. But now… now feels like such an appropriate time, for some reason. The night, the moon, the blood, the come.

"Harry?"

"Mmhhmm?" He doesn't open his eyes, but pulls me closer.

"Could I… possibly tell you a story?"

He lifts one eyelid, slowly. "Of course."

Now that I have his permission, I freeze. What to say, exactly? How to begin?

Then a flash of inspiration strikes. "Once upon a time… a long time ago…"


And though you fight to stay alive
Your body starts to shiver
For no mere mortal can resist
The evil of the thriller