Title: Happy Ground
Rating: R
Word count: 1,295
Summary: Remus is happy now.
Disclaimer: Properties of rightful copyright owners. Not mine.
Author's Notes: Post-DH AU (as in "They're alive! They're alive!").
Warnings: Unbetaed, might be OOC (but then we shall blame it to post-war madness). Critiques are most definitely most welcome.
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Happy days are coming my way, it's been some time, but it's here to stay. Of that I'm sure. These aren't the days that a lot of us expect to witness. Maybe the younger ones, or some the older more optimistic ones, but I wish I can say that I was one of them. I've been too tired, too weary. Too many deaths, too many mistakes, tears and blood.
Not to say that I'm not glad to be alive today. As I say, there's only happy days from here on out.
It's the life of love I've found, you see, the kind of thing that sets me down on happy ground.
Severus will make me suffer if I dare say things like that out loud. Maybe too sickly sweet, too soppy but not less true. This is love, I realise. Slow in coming, lots of wrong turns along the way. The road to here has been hard, but I think I've finally seen it. I'm glad I didn't give up.
"Sleepy head has gone to bed," his voice calls out to me from beyond the door, and for some reason it makes me laugh. Sometimes, he lets his guard down enough to call Teddy all sorts of endearments, pauses, catches himself, then I usually have the pleasure of seeing his face turn red.
He walks into the room now, cheek pinked in embarrassment, "Did you hear me? The pup's asleep, we can tidy up now." He hides his embarrassment behind a cough, bending down to pick a crayon before it disappears under the couch.
I like the look of his arse, the curve of his back, and it's enough incentive for me to tackle him to the ground.
"Lupin!" Of course he'll shout. Embarrassed. Always embarrassed now. Indignantly so. He's embarrassed most of the time now as he slowly discovers a spectrum of feelings, vocabularies, sights and sounds he's never experienced before. Teddy helps. I like to think I help, too.
Giggling down on the ground, I roll on top of him, give him a peck on that cheek, then one between his eyebrows, then look him in the eye. He raises one eyebrow, they way he knows I'm extremely weak against. "Giggling, Lupin?" he asks as he tries to push me aside. "Have you been consuming balloons again?"
I straighten up.
And because he dares look relieved, I pick him up and spin him around. "Lu~pin!" he demands to be returned to solid ground.
He's not light by any means. But love gives a strength you don't know existed.
I'm overwhelmed.
Overjoyed.
Happy now, happy now, happy now I'm on happy ground. I whisper in his ears.
"Stupid wolf," he says. Affection. Irritation. Embarrassment. Love. Though he'll never say it. Only love.
Happy now, happy now, happy now I'm on happy ground.
---
We spend the morning drawing, Teddy and I. We have a small table in the corner of Severus's basement lab. He lets us sit there, provided that we keep quiet and only when he's not brewing anything harmful to little children's lungs, or to werewolves, or both.
"Can... eh... May we go to Hogsmeade?" Teddy asks.
"Sure," I say. "Severus?"
He turns around "I'm busy," he says, wearing a frown. "Go wash it off, you silly old clown," he says after a not-long-but-not-short pause. He points at the end of my nose with the pointy end of his stirrer. A large blue crayonspeck sits there, proud and very blue.
"Come with us," I say, as I put my nose under the tap, rubbing and scrubbing, Teddy pointing at other places that needs washing. Smear of yellow on my forehead, red on my chin. "Look, it's a bright day out."
Severus frowns and looks away. He's still afraid of showing his face to the public. He believes they hate him for not staying dead. It makes me sad, and I think it makes Teddy sad, too, that he can't see how people's view of him has changed. It's a slow thing, but most of the animosity are going away. I know that they won't suddenly see him with the same esteem as they regard Harry, or the Weasleys, but...
"Don't worry about what others say," Teddy says, beating me to it. He jumps off the sink counter and links his hand around Severus's.
"Fine, fine," Severus grumbles. He has learnt that Teddy is a force not to be denied. He looks at me, frowns once more and asks, "Happy now?"
"Happy now?" I ask back, incredulous. "Of course."
The day is beautiful, more beautiful, much more. And the three of us are there enjoying it, walking on happy ground towards Hogsmeade.
Simple days are slipping away, times go fast, and I'm turning grey. Transformations become more painful, recovery becomes more difficult as I grow older. Days and nights like this I hate it. Hate it even more. I fear I shall never be able to come to terms with it. It's not just for my sake, but for Teddy who worries, and Severus who will drown himself in his cauldron to find ways to ease my transformations. His colleagues aren't closer to the solution either.
Some nights are especially problematic, like tonight. Makes me want to gouge my heart out and kill myself. But I've got my love and family too, nothing I'd change.
There's a place in the Hebrides that has certain magical properties in the air that eases our transformations. It has become a sort of asylum favoured by the older werewolves. A friend has recommended it to me.
But all of Teddy's friends are here. And Severus's potions business is here and the parcel owls don't, won't, fly out to the Hebrides, at least not the asylum, for some unfathomable fear only owls understand.
"I don't understand why you won't move," Severus asks. He asks the same question every time following my transformations. "You know we won't abandon you."
And as usual, I won't have any answer to offer. We'll kiss and cry and laugh, and I'll whisper nonsense in his ears, distract him with my voice, my skin, my heart beating as one with him.
To be honest I'm afraid. What if we move and they find they can't stand it. It's not a gamble I'm prepared to take. This thing we have here is perfect even with all its flaws.
"Why?" he asks and I silence him with a kiss.
"Why?" he asks, gasping for air as I touch him here, there, everywhere.
I'm cruel. Teddy will worry but I know it won't be long before one of his friends knock on the door and take him to Quidditch and he'll come back just in time for dinner, forgetting the world, his life-thoughts-words revolving around successful feints and goals and snitches. Severus will worry and lock himself in his basement laboratory but I know one day he'll find whatever it is he wants to find for me.
I've got my love and family too, nothing I'd change.
"Why?" Severus will ask one more time. He's nothing if not persistent.
"Because I'm happy now," I answer with a lick on his collarbone.
Happy now, as I trace a path down his chest.
There's a different kind of magic, a different tune of song that rises up between us, his fingers dancing to a sacred beat across my skin.
Happy now, as we join together, skin to skin, heart to heart, body and soul, bind each other more closely together than any vows can ever hope to achieve. There's nothing happier than this lightness of being.
Happy now I'm on happy ground. I close my eyes and my world is remade anew.
------
Happy Ground (Pete Murray)
Happy days are coming my way, its been some time, but here to stay,
Is the life of love Ive found, sends me up on happy ground.
Sleepy head has gone to bed, makes me laugh, face turn red,
Giggling down on the ground, I'll pick you up and spin you around.
Happy now, happy now, happy now I'm on happy ground.
Drive to town, wearing a frown, go wash it off you silly old clown,
Look at the day, it's going away, don't worry about another say.
Happy now, happy now, happy now I'm on happy ground.
Simple days are slipping away, times go fast, I'm turning gray,
Ive got my love and family too, nothing I'd change, I'm cruel.
Happy now, happy now, happy now I'm on happy ground