The Only One at the Funeral

by Time-Space-And-Stories

'The sky was black. Not one of those drizzly greys, where the blanket of feeble clouds had a blue tinge. Not a rumbling, thunder storming charcoal of dark splotches, with streaks of dull purple. The sky was black, not an inch of light across its entire scope; and it was raining.' He had no James or Lily, no Peter, no Sirius; they were gone, and Remus Lupin was the only one left.

The sky was black. Not one of those drizzly greys, where the blanket of feeble clouds had a blue tinge. Not a rumbling, thunder storming charcoal of dark splotches, with streaks of dull purple. The sky was black, not an inch of light across its entire scope; and it was raining.
This was not how he pictured it. Hell, who would think of picturing it – but these are dark times, and such dark thoughts tended to dwell in the uttermost dark corners of the mind when plagued with fear, and doubt, and overwhelming darkness. So he had pictured the possibility of this – but it still felt odd. Like something had gone wrong and he was missing something, that all of this was set up and he might still be in the chance of crawling out of this nightmare before the darkness swallowed him entirely. But the rational – how there's still a sliver of rationality in his mind, he doesn't know – part of his mind tells him that this is real. That it's too late. The darkness has stolen everything that meant something to him, and snuffed it out like a tiny orange ember of a single candle, that he had been so sure was meant to have been an eternal flame. Everything that lit up his world was snatched up by the darkness, and so now all he could do was stand, head bowed, eyes blank as they watched something of a distant past, and chew subconsciously at his lip, the rain pelting down at his shoulders.

He blinked, and saw – just ahead of him – a room, golden and warm and comfy. He saw himself, not so much younger, with his sandy hair and faint scars etched over his skin. He was in uniform, a shirt, trousers, and tie, and he was curled up on an armchair. There was another, a tall boy with thick locks of glossy black hair, and a mischievous grin, who lay across him, his head on one arm of the chair and his legs dangling over the other, and he was holding a book – which was actually his book – and reading from it. Two other boys lounged across the carpeted floor at his feet, beside the large, roaring fireplace; one with a shock of black, untidy hair, and rounded glasses perched upon his nose, and his tie slightly askew about the collar, and the other, slightly shorter and a little more rotund, with watery eyes and a broad grin. He watched as the boy lying atop his younger self read ostentatiously from the book, and he saw his younger self roll his eyes, before trying to snatch his book back. The boy with the glossy hair and mischievous grin yelped and made to grab it back; the other two boys were roaring with laughter as the glossy haired boy got tackled off of the chair and bounced to the floor. Three of them were laughing, unable to contain their amusement at the shock that had wiped away that mischievous grin from the fourth boy, and soon all four of them were in hysterics.

He liked that memory. He liked all his memories with those other three boys, and later on with a feisty, brilliant redhead by their side as well. He loved every single one, but now as he looked back on them, they'd slowly fade; the light and warmth would die out and he would be left alone, having been staring into space for several minutes with a craving to turn back time. He wanted to go back to those memories, where the worst thing that could happen was having a detention, or getting into a rare argument. Those were the golden years, the years he most treasured. Back then, he had even considered the possibility of being able to grow up with these best friends of his, to live their lives together as they had begun to do not so long ago, and be able to grow old together, laugh together, smile together… be together. It was back in those days where his idea of how this current situation would turn out was quite different – when it was for a date in the grand future, in many years to come, and it wouldn't be just him having to face it; there would be some of the others as well, saying their goodbyes, sharing their memories aloud rather than watching them alone in their head, being a shoulder to cry on or just someone who he could turn to and hug.

But he could not. Those times were over. He'd expected this to come eventually: he wasn't the most lucky of individuals and didn't deserve to have had those golden years at all, given the monster that lurked inside him, clawing away at the back of his mind every moment of every day, whimpering until the night, once every month, where it could escape from its hiding place in the darkness and burst from him, injure him, slice him up, and howl at anything that was caught in the gleam of his sharp, amber eyes, to settle back to its monthly hibernation when it was satisfied.

He could no longer while away his days visiting the Potters, being shoved into thick woolly jumpers by Lily and having the chance to joke around with James, planning on pranks for when the other two of the Marauders arrived. He could not watch with glee as James and Lily's son, Harry, whizzed around on a broomstick, hovering above the carpeted floor of the Potter's living room. He could not go and check on Peter, who had – until recently – been struggling in these dark times, and coax him into having some chocolate, and offer him words of comfort. He could not go and visit Sirius, and swap jumpers and shirts and basically wear each other's entire wardrobe; he could not go and brew some hot chocolate, to make Sirius chuckle and remind him that he had a dangerous addiction to the stuff. He could not go and curl up on one of the sofas, to have a sloppy lick to the face as an excitable, shaggy black dog loomed into view and jumped up to sit beside him. He could not reach out for any of these four people and have someone who could comfort him when he was feeling down, or ill because the monster was beginning to stir.

He had no one who would comfort him now. He had no James or Lily; they were to be buried after this was over. He had no Peter; there was nothing left of him, save a finger. He had no Sirius; he was the traitor, the murderer, the spy, the double agent, the trickster – the downright bastard who'd stolen his light and stamped down on it, letting the darkness consume him until he choked and there was nothing he could do to stop himself falling into this spiralling misery, this madness that was sure to stay with him for years to come.

Three of his friends were dead. One was rotting away in prison.

And he, Remus Lupin, was the only one at the funeral.