The tub was full of foam. Foam so thick and fragrant that even if he'd been a wolf at the time, Remus would have been lost in the smell of flowers. A pair of hands, large, warm, strong, caressing him, a pair of lips on his neck, and a whispered promise, foolish and heartfelt.
"I'll always love you too, Dear friend." Remus whispsered to no one but his memory.
A youg boy came into his line of sight. It took a few minutes, and extreme effort on the part of the boy for Remus to notice. The man smiled at the boy, a wane, dead smile that left his eyes untouched. Harry sat next to him and mirrored his expression.
"I sometimes wake up and think he's still alive." Harry said, sniffling a bit. Remus patted his shoulder, a breif flash streaking across his awareness.
Warm, so warm. A beating heart. Arms wrapped around his waist, and a face buried in his chest, snoring lighlty, as the now grown man tried to untangle himself from his lover.
"I miss him too. But he died the way he would want. Young and vibrant, fighting. Proving to himself and everyone else exactly what he's made of." Remus noted, before getting up. "Pardon me, Harry. I think I'd liketo be alone."
"Alone? On a night like tonight? Look at the stars, Remus. The moon's so beautiful." That voice. Knowing he would never hear that voice again was enough to amke Remus cry on its own.
"I don't much care for the moon, as you well know." He replied dryly. His lover bent over him and kissed him, gently, but longingly, putting his arguement into his lips instead of his tongue. Fistfulls of silky, long black hair running through his fingers, and the scent. That smell could knock him off his feet and into bed faster than anything else in the world. Which it did, in the end. It always did.
Remus sat heavily on a couch in a differnt room, unaware he'd been crying until he tried to rub the image out of his mind and felt the moisture. Eyes that were already puffy and red had been insensitive to the renewed sting of tears. A well placed box of tissues was his only companion as Remus let his mind wander.
"I'll love you until the end of the world, and beyond." A smile, a kiss, a heartfelt hug. A parting, not unlike this one. Another, more symbolic death. A knot in his throat, knowing, fearing what he knew, and how he knew it.
A knock. Remus looked up, the tissues falling out of his lap. Hermione in the door, her eyes a similar shade of crimson. "They're starting." Remus nodded and smiled his dead smile again, before his last chnce to say his last goodbye to a box full of nothing but the supposition that a corpse should be in there.
"You can't be dead, Padfoot." Remus said under his breath. "You're much too stubborn for that. You've left too much behind."
-
Peace and Love,
Panther Nesmith