First one-shot! Inspired by listening to the Beatles and looking at Remus stuff online. He's always been my favorite Marauder so I decided to write a story based on his interpretation of his first meeting with Harry since 1981. The capital pronouns are on purpose, they represent The Marauders and Lily as Remus still falters when referring to them by name, even in his thoughts. The apostrophes (') around what appears to be dialogue is Remus' thoughts. He wasn't really asleep in this version, and there's some alluding to suicidal thoughts. Otherwise it's canon and in fact everything marked with an asterisk (*) is from the American Edition of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, pages 82-85 and everything that Remus experiences is based off of that as well. As you can tell by that I do not own anything in this fiction, that credit is due to JK Rowling, who is a better writer than I can even aspire to be.
Monday's Child's Learned to Tie his Bootlace... See How They Run
Remus had arrived at the station almost an entire two hours early. He supposed that his anxiety had gotten the best of him, once again, as he realized that he was experiencing almost the exact feeling as he had when arriving at the station for the first time, his first year in 1971. He couldn't think about that though, that was twenty-two years ago and he couldn't go back there, not with Them, all three were dead to him now. He was sure that it was better this way, focusing too much on the past could impair your future; he had learned that the hard way in the past twelve years. 'Twelve years...' he thought, 'no it couldn't be twelve years, it had to be less, five or six.'
'No,' his mind convinced him, 'it's been twelve years since then. Since you've seen James' mischievous smile, heard Lily's charming voice, helped Peter with anything from schoolwork to Ministry work, and held trust with Sirius and his youthful, playful grey eyes.'
He brushed the memories off, once again, knowing that it was for the best. He shuddered, just thinking of what it would be like to see James and Lily's young son, Harry. He would be so much older. 'Yes twelve years older' he reminded himself once again. He was pulled out of his thoughts as the scarlet train pulled up.
He slowly made his way to the train, nodding at the conductor as he made his way onto the train. He wandered to the back of the train, finding the compartment that he was looking for. It was at the very back of the train, and was more likely not to be intruded by students. He would rather not invade on the students catching up with their friends, as he thought about what They would do if a professor had intruded on Their reunions. He shuddered to think of students still doing things like that after all these years, but he was sure it still went on. He laid his head against the window and drifted away from reality to join the nightmarish world of sleep, a world that awaited him every time he closed his eyes.
Remus awoke, though he knew he did it quietly, something he rarely accomplished. The only reason that he knew the wake was quiet was because as he slit his eyes open, just slightly as he was not sure what he would find, he saw three children conversing about something in whispers. 'They seemed to be close,' he observed, 'maybe as close as We' were.' 'Yes', he supposed, 'they had to be, there was trust in those whispers.'
As he closed his eyes, preparing for more sleep he heard the girl say something, a name that had been thrown around a lot lately, but a name he tried not to think of much anymore. Well, tried not to think of for the past... twelve... 'yes, twelve,' twelve years. They were whispering about the traitor escaping just to get at Harry. 'No', he thought, 'she couldn't be talking to, and about, His Harry. It had to be a different Harry, as it was a fairly common name which They had noticed when They named him, with a sort of pleasure.' He remembered it clearly, for thirteen, 'yes he's thirteen...', years ago. He once again slit his eyes open and glanced at the boy who the girl was addressing, jet-black, messy hair, glasses. Remus had to do a double-take to insure that it wasn't James, 'No his eyes, they're Lily's eyes.' He noticed that, in fact, there were two emerald glossy eyes staring past him, out the window.
An odd whistle noise had started after Harry had insisted that the trouble finds him, which Remus doubted as he was James' son. 'A Sneakoscope,' he thought hopeful that he was wrong as they only whistled like that when there was something untrustworthy going on. He remembered Sirius throwing one away as it wouldn't stop whistling for the whole year, and for good reason of course. 'Were Harry and his friends really that untrustworthy?' He doubted it as one of the boys told the others to put it back so it didn't wake him, Remus that is, up. He figured that the other boy was probably right, it was cheap and it probably didn't work right, just a faulty device.
The children started to talk about Hogsmeade, bringing back good, and bad, memories to Remus. The other boy was caught up on Honeydukes, and the girl was caught up on the history. They reminded Remus of his friends, in Their youth, so innocent. He realized that Harry hadn't spoken since the conversation about Hogsmeade had started. He had an odd suspicion that Harry's evil aunt and uncle, as Lily had always referred to them in that way, hadn't signed the permission form. His suspicion was proven correct as Harry told his friends that they would be finding everything about Hogsmeade out without him, as his permission slip was not signed. Remus cringed at this thought, 'If Lily and James were still here, then he wouldn't have to worry about Sirius coming after him, his permission slip would be signed, and I would've already been kicked out o this compartment because it's not cool for uncles to intrude.'
Remus cringed, even more, at the suggestion to sneak out, as offered to Harry by the other boy. He was about speak up, and blow all cover of his false sleep, before the girl pointed out that if Harry did that it would simply be endangering himself, and it was not worth it. Remus had a feeling that he was going to like this girl, as she had already stood up to her friends, in a mere hour or so,more than he had in his whole school career. The children continued to speak for the rest of the train ride, the other boy complaining of hunger more than once, and each time Remus found himself thinking, 'Like Sirius' before he could stop himself. Eventually the trolly did come by, the children discussed waking him up, and the girl even "tried", though her attempt was timidly put forth and Remus didn't feel like food, or facing Harry, so he pretended to sleep on.
The other boy then suggested that Remus had possibly died, he had to try very hard to stifle his laugh as he had thought about death continually for a long time now. He felt the girl come near him, and then heard her comment that he was, in fact, breathing. Later that day he heard someone else enter the compartment and again he slit his eyes open, just a bit. This time he noticed a pale, blond boy and two bigger boys walk into the compartment. They started to tease Harry and the other boy, Weasley, and Remus had to fight the urge to get up and curse those boys like there was no tomorrow, luckily Remus Lupin was very good at fighting temptation. His chance came to intervene, as a luggage article of sorts fell at his feet, he snorted loudly; feeling that it was the best sleep noise that he could imitate that was loud. He heard the other boys leave the compartment and slightly opened his eyes, just in time to see the Weasley boy make an obscene hand gesture at their backs. He, again, found himself close to laughter at the similarity between Them and Harry's friends.
The train lurched to a stop as Remus thought that there was no way that they could be there yet. Glancing down at his watch he confirmed his suspicions, which were again re-confirmed by the girl. He began to get nervous, 'maybe Sirius had somehow stopped the train, he was always a mischievous boy who somehow always made things work his way.' He opened his eyes, fully, as he knew the lights were out by the chatter in the compartment. A boy named Neville, 'not Longbottom, please not Longbottom' was all he could think, stumbled in, quite literally. Another girl, Ginny they said, came in, revealing the first girl's name, Hermione, as well as the Weasley boy's, Ron. 'These children have no idea what is, or could be, going on and here they were making all this racket.' He decided it was time to make his debut.
*"Quiet"* he muttered to the children, surprised at how hoarse his voice sounded. He cast a spell, without his wand, and held the fire looking at the children around him, they looked terrified. He got up to go to the door but before moving he warned the children with a sharp *"Stay where you are." He turned to the door but someone, or something, beat him to it. The door slowly slid open and he looked back at the children, ready to sacrifice himself for them, if need be. He looked back at what was in the doorway and noticed that it was a dementor. It started preparing itself for the kiss. He looked back once more, before his mind became too foggy and noticed that Harry had collapsed on the floor. Remus quickly turned to the dementor and said, *"None of us is hiding Sirius Black under our cloaks. Go. He didn't truly expect anything to happen, and his expectation was fulfilled so he rose his wand and muttered, "Expecto Patronum" As the silvery wisp came from his wand the dementor left.
He turned back around and sat on the seat, allowing Harry's friends to bring him around. He began to reach into his robes for the chocolate that he always carried around, for dementors and for his own sanity. Noticing that the children had succeeded in waking Harry and were now talking with him, he began to break the chocolate into pieces.
*"Here," he said to Harry, handing him a particularly large piece. "Eat it. It'll help."*
The teenager took the chocolate but ignored Remus' advice to eat it. *"What was the thing?" he asked Lupin.
"A dementor,"* Remus answered as he handed chocolate out to the rest of the children. *"One of the dementors of Azkaban."* They all stared at him, he didn't like this type of attention but he supposed he could deal with it. He crumpled the chocolate wrapper and put it in his pocket as he made his way to the door. *"Eat," he repeated. "It'll help. I need to speak to the driver, excuse me..."*
Remus walked out of the compartment, partially to think, partially to leave them to their thoughts, and partially to really speak to the driver. Staring at Harry on the floor had reminded him far too much of James, the facial structure, the hair, and the glasses, but Lily was there too, even if only in the eyes. Saying the traitor's name had taken a lot out of him, as he was one of the memories brought up by the dementor. But still the thoughts led back to Harry, it seemed like just yesterday that he was a tiny toddler, not even able to tie his own shoe, and now a teenager, not to mention an orphan, who had been through more in his short life already than anyone should endure in a lifetime. That's when Remus decided that he wouldn't leave the boy alone anymore and he would make sure that he was there for James and Lily's son, like he should have been for the last twelve years. The boy would no longer be alone, not if Remus had anything to do with it.
Well that's it, I hope you like it. It took me a few hours. I might write more Lupin-based fictions in the future but it all depends. So, again, I hope you liked it and I'm pleased to have pleased you if you did.