Ghosts
Molly Weasley was not a particularly patient woman, nor was she excessively open-minded. She knew this. She took pride in her opinions, if not in her usual methods of expressing them. Sometimes she thought she shouted too much. That was her mother speaking: proper young ladies never shout, Molly. When you are a mother, you will have more opportunity to shout than you could ever want. This lecture was delivered, inevitably, just before Mrs. Prewett began shouting herself. Yes, Molly sometimes found herself disconcertingly similar to her mother, but she wasn't going to change because it seemed to be working. Except for Fred and George. Except for Percy.
Molly quietly brushed away a few tears and resolutely turned her thoughts away from her wayward son, pulling herself back to the rather damp kitchen of Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place. It was a damp that even the large glowing fire could not entirely diminish, and she was certain her recent shouting match with Sirius Black had done nothing to dispel the gloom. Molly was surprised that she had been talked into stepping foot in the place, and even more surprised that she had just agreed to spend the next few months living in this sorry excuse for a house. What was she thinking, to allow her family to move here?
It was for the best, she knew, but for all the protections it offered, Grimmauld Place was not the glamorous Headquarters of Good that the old novels she used to read proclaimed their heroes had. It was dark, both literally and figuratively, and Molly was afraid of the influence it could have on her children. It was a sorry state of things, she thought, that she had to fear for her family within their shelter as well as without. This was not the picture the old novels painted; it was never so grim for the hero. But the Order of the Phoenix did not have an ordinary hero. They were relying on a fifteen-year-old boy.
And his glorious defenders? Those knights in shining armor who paved the way for their prince? Molly glanced around the near-empty table, remembering the faces of those who had sat there a mere fifteen minutes before, and didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Sometimes she thought the Order was tragic, heroic; other times she thought it was a joke, and the real heroes would appear any moment to take their place. But the truth of the matter was this: a rag-tag group of society's underdogs was the real resistance, and the glittering heroes of legend were, well, legends.
Molly knew she was no hero. She was just a poor mother attempting to keep her family together in a world that was falling apart. Molly was also certain that, were this one of the old novels, the two men speaking quietly at the far end of the table would not be the ones holding down the fort, so to speak. She glanced at them, wondering what they were discussing, but too afraid to ask.
Molly Weasley was not an easy person to frighten, nor was she bashful around others. But there was something about those two particular men that made her wary of approaching them. They were seated furthest from the fire, more in shadow than not, and apparently impervious to the damp and chill that permeated that side of the room. Their quiet, hoarse voices seemed to be for each other's ears alone. Perhaps it was the tragedy of their story; perhaps it was the sense of starting again and second chances that lingered between them. Molly wasn't sure. But for some reason she couldn't quite put her finger on, Molly could not bring herself to trust Sirius Black and Remus Lupin. It probably had something to do with old prejudices and shadows, but she wasn't about to admit that she was afraid of ghosts.
Their pale faces wove in and out of the firelight, and the murmur of their voices provided a counterpoint for the sharp crackling of the fire. In that moment, they seemed insubstantial, mere presence. If Molly only looked hard enough, she would see Harry beside them, more of a presence in their conversation than she was. She caught a few of Black's words—he was talking about Harry, remembering. Lupin was listening, his face emotionless. His distant amber eyes glinted suddenly golden as the fire shifted, then were masked in shadow as the firelight flickered on, oblivious. Molly shivered.
Black's reminiscence passed, and Lupin sighed heavily into the silence before asking how many more bedrooms they needed to make fit for human habitation before the Weasleys, Hermione, and, eventually, Harry could move in. The firelight caught the hollows of Black's face as he tipped back on two legs of his chair, considering the question. His pale eyes were stars, almost swallowed by the black holes Azkaban had created around them. Molly shivered again. She had to admit that here, in this house, with war building again beyond its locked doors, she was afraid of the three ghosts who graced its halls.
Her father had taught her to face her fears like a true Gryffindor. Molly, he would say with a stern glance, never give in to your fear. Weakness within creates weakness without. And she learned to not be afraid of the dark, because being afraid of the dark would lead to her being afraid of that Slytherin bully, and what Gryffindor was afraid of a Slytherin?
Old prejudices and shadows, she thought. That's all this is. There were more frightening things to be afraid of than ex-convicts and werewolves, especially when the ex-convict was innocent, the werewolf was civilized, and both were merely shells of men—ghosts of the past and present. They were all that was left of what could have been Harry's family, back when he wasn't the Boy-Who-Lived, the ghost of the future. Molly loved Harry anyway, as these two men loved him.
She would learn to trust them for the same reasons she had agreed to live in Grimmauld Place. She would learn to not be afraid for Harry's sake, for the sake of all the lost children in the world who had never known hope: for Arthur, her sons and daughters, her brothers; for Dumbledore, who bore the weight of all their burdens, and Minerva, his right hand; for Alastor, despite his paranoia, and the girl he was so proud of, who wasn't lost yet, and all those like her who had never known pain; and for the two broken men sitting at the other end of the table, one who never grew past his pain, and one who was old before his time.
She gave little thought to herself. Molly Weasley was, after all, a mother.
Molly Weasley was not a weak woman, nor was she one to give up without a fight. She knew this. But sometimes it was all too much. That was how she found herself, almost two full months later, sobbing her heart out on Remus' shoulder, shaken and in desperate need of someone to cling to. It couldn't be Arthur; he couldn't see her so weak, not now that he had so much to worry about at work. And Remus understood. He also feared being left alone. He also feared the deaths of those he held dear over his own. He worried more than was good for him. He was a giver, just like Molly. She thought it was a shame he'd never had a family; he would have made a wonderful father.
Molly had been surprised when she realized that, despite differences in temper, they had a lot in common. He was something solid, familiar, and comforting. He always knew what to say to make everything all right, without masking the truth. He knew how to listen, as well, which was a rare gift these days. He even put up with Sirius' rants, never complaining. Sometimes, though, late at night, when Sirius had had too much to drink, and Remus had not had quite enough, he would talk to Molly. She'd been surprised; Remus was such a private man, and he liked that he was a mystery. But sometimes, he just needed to vent, too. No one, not Molly Weasley, not even Remus Lupin, could bear such burdens alone.
They became fast friends. She was there for him when he pushed everyone else away, because she refused to be pushed. He was there with answers to her questions when she desperately needed them. Then Dumbledore was gone. They felt as though their world stopped for a moment, and then the war moved on. They both made decisions that fed perfectly into their own dooms within a grander story they knew nothing of—a story with an ending neither of them could be sure of. This wasn't like the old novels. They had nothing to hold on to but the ones they loved, so they did. It was the most they could do.
"You will never touch our children again!" Molly screamed, and she knew it was now or never. She summoned every hurt that the war had inflicted on her to strengthen the spell she was going to throw at Bellatrix Lestrange, the last fighting Death Eater and the greatest symbol of all Lord Voldemort stood for.
Freshest in Molly's mind was the image of Fred, peacefully lying not far from her; then came Percy's tears, George's ear, and the Killing Curse that just missed Ginny. She saw Ron and Hermione planning in what they thought was secrecy to go on a suicide mission with their best friend, who had to save the world. She saw Bill's scars; a mental image of Alastor dropping from a broom with his eye still spinning, paranoid even in death; an image of Sirius falling through the Veil to match it. She saw Tonks' pale face, and Remus' as well. And Harry—Harry—
Molly's curse soared beneath Bellatrix's outstretched arm and hit her squarely in the chest, directly over her heart.
It was over…It was over…It was over…
Molly kept repeating those three words until after the funerals, because it wasn't until she had that closure that she could believe it. It was over. One word for each of the three ghosts now laid to rest. Silent tears coursed down her cheeks as she gazed out over the freshly filled graves. Her family stood there, gathered around the few who had fallen and were honored today. She reverently placed magenta flowers, reminiscent of Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, on Fred's grave, then turned her back, overcome with grief.
She laid electric blue flowers on Alastor's marker, knowing he would think she was being frivolous, and not caring. Pink flowers were laid on Tonks' grave, leaving one bouquet in Molly's hands. They were white flowers—lilies, actually, because she'd thought they were appropriate. The grave she sought was next to Tonks', marked with a red-tinged headstone. It bore two names: Remus Lupin and Sirius Black. Harry had asked that Sirius' name be placed as a brother's with Remus rather than on a separate marker. No one had objected.
Molly lay the lilies on the grave, charming them to last, knowing that few would visit this cemetery to pay respects to her friend, to a man so similar to her that he had won her trust despite old prejudices and shadows. She was sorry she would never know if he would be a good father, sorry, too, that his happiness had been so short-lived.
With the lilies she left a note addressed to the ghosts of the past and the present, letting them know that there was a future, though there was no ghost at the moment. Perhaps they were all together now—Sirius, Remus, and James: the past, the present, and the echo of the future.
Molly Weasley was not a philosophical woman, nor was she a poet. She did not think in elaborate metaphors. Remus Lupin had, however, and he had touched her life. It was fitting, then, that, at the last, he was a part of her metaphor for war. It was the war that had brought two rather kindred spirits together, and the war that had pulled them apart. But that was war. It gave, and it took away. It gave hope for the future by taking away the past and the present. Heaven took many good people; Hell took as many bad people, and the Earth gave those left a place to start again.
Molly Weasley gave a bit of her life, and took away a whole new one. Never again would she fear ghosts. Never again would she fear shadows. And the future lay before her, glowing with the promise of sunshine that the heroes in the old novels always seemed to bring.
A/N: I am well aware that Ginny is Molly's only daughter. When Molly says "her sons and daughters," she is referring to Hermione as a daughter as well. Also, just in case there is some confusion, in Deathly Hallows, Rowling mentioned that Tonks was Moody's protegee, so she is the girl that Moody is "so proud of."
This was a late night story born of the question "Considering Ron's reaction to finding out that Professor Lupin was a werewolf, I would assume that Molly would not be very open to Remus. How did it get to the point where she would be crying on his shoulder in chapter 9 of Order of the Phoenix, and to the amount she worries about him beyond that point in time?" I hope I offered a little insight into Molly's psyche, beyond the fact that she is a mother, since in Deathly Hallows we found out that there is so much more to her than that.