Disclaimer: Characters, settings, and themes from the Harry Potter universe are property of J.K Rowling. I neither own, nor am making profit from the writing or sharing of this story.
"Did you check again? Under the bed? I promise I heard—" Tucked beneath several worn blankets, Remus huddled in the vestiges of light from the hall. His mother hovered near the doorway, nervously biting a nail, but not one tiny toe stepped into his room. When he reached out a hand toward her, she startled and stepped backward. Lyall moved in front of him then, a towering dementor who snuffed out the light of even the brightest candle.
"Go to sleep, boy."
"But—" The whine in his voice caught on the tears his mother gifted him as she walked away. He moved to lurch out of his cocoon, to follow her, but thick arms stopped him, kept him in the darkness.
"I said go to sleep."
"There's something in here, dad. I-I can't sleep with a monster in here." Remus' eyes were pleading, begging for more than a glance around the room.
Lyall's jaw hardened; his most recent scar jumped along his brow with the thunderous tick of his pulse. He took a deep breath as he turned away, speaking lowly to the monsters Remus sought. "They should be afraid of you; you're the monster now." He tugged the door shut behind him, the rattle of metal clicking into place shielding Remus' whimper.
"I didn't mean to… I promise! I didn't mean to!" Remus' cries faded as he folded in on himself, holding tight to the bandage on his side, squeezing against the pain if only to feel it come alive again.
By morning, he'd mumbled his way into a stupor. Soft hands smoothed back the hair that clung to his forehead with sweat and dread and other, more relentless things. When he looked up at her, all he saw was a hollowness—a vast space where his mother used to be. When she noticed the blood seeping from his bandage and looked down to realize she'd been sitting in sheets stained by something other than the bright dreams of her little boy, she fluttered out of the room like a wind-mad leaf in a storm.
He watched as she retreated. As she left him there, a dark secret of the house. As she left him to whatever had infected him. Made him this thing. This other. This…
He sucked on the words as if they were sour. Squeezed them between his cheeks and puckered when he'd had enough. Eventually, he spat them out: "Monster. I am a monster, now."
He laughed; it was the laugh of a dying man. He was a child who knew he could no longer pretend to be one. He was…