Disclaimer: I would only ever look like the owner of Harry Potter material with extensive plastic surgery (and a sex change operation).
A/N: I got nothin, so get to it!
My life was over. Utterly. Completely. Terribly. Horrifically. Tragically. One hundred percent over. That was it. It was the end. If only, if only.
Am I sounding morose? Anyway. As I stepped (reading between the lines: fell) onto my living room floor, I couldn't help but think about how entirely WRONG this day, night, hour, whatever had gone. I simply could not comprehend how much trouble I was in (mentally, of course).
Did I just call myself mentally unbalanced?
Yes.
Who said that?!
I did, right.
Oh well, so maybe I was a little unstable mentally (and physically, that floo crap always gets to me). I mean, I had good reason to be. An entire friendship ruined. Completely. Utterly. Etc. Etc.
Blah, blah, blah.
Blah, blah, blah.
And for good measure, just to skip over more rambling: blah, blah, blah.
Wow, much better and only after three lines. Anyway, I must stop feeling sorry for myself. I must become a man. And men are tough. Maybe then, Lily will take me back. What I chose to do was right, right? But … I don't know. I'm so confuzzled.
It always seems like life moves so darn fast. One moment it's raining, the next it's pouring. I would say that my life is raining cats and dogs, but kitties and puppies are adorable. Who wouldn't want it to rain cats and dogs? Don't answer that. So, it's more like my life is raining spiders and snakes. Yuck. Just thinking about it makes my back shiver. To quote one of my muggle heroes, Indiana Jones, "Snakes! Why did it have to be snakes?!"
Isn't it amazing how you can be deep in thought and not realize where your legs are taking you? It's like they have little minds of their own. One second you're standing right beside your living room couch and the next you're walking face first into your closed bedroom door and falling on your arse when you ricochet off. Then you sit there with that pain in your arse and grumble about the complete lack of communication between your legs and hand and you're simultaneously wondering how your legs can lead you right to where you want to go without conscious thought.
Moving on. Yeah, I wish I could move on. That way I wouldn't feel this horrible pain in my heart that threatens to tear me apart. What did I do? I should have taken a different action. I should have thought. I should have known. Why did I ruin my relationship with the love of my life? Now I'll probably never get to be a part of that huge family that I've wanted to join for months now. I just shot myself in the foot. This is all my fault.
And what's probably worse is the fact that I'll end up like that last guy that got close to sleeping with Mr. Potter's only baby daughter. In other words bamboo shoved up my fingernails and burned at the stake. Or maybe even worse because I was so close to her. There are no limits when it comes to Mr. Potter and revenge (or so I hear).
Maybe I should run away. That way he'll never get near me. I kinda don't like pain. I mean I know I have to be brave and all (being a man and a Gryffindor) but it would just be so very much easier if I could run far, far away from my problems. Yeah. That's what I'll do. I will run away. Of course that means writing a tearful (I mean tearless) farewell letter to my parents, but I can tough it out (oh, and add a mental note to burn those copies of Witch Weekly under my mattress that follow the Bulstrode scandal and have tips for a better sex life (whoa, did I just say that I have Witch Weekly magazines? I need lessons in being a man. (Ha, I had a thought within a thought and now a thought within a thought within a thought. Ahem. Anyway.)))
"Remus?" Damn, that would be my mother. And here I am with the duffle bag already in hand. "Where are you going?"
"I … I, " I stuttered to give myself time to think of a reasonable answer to why I would be packing my bag. Then I blurted out the first excuse that came to mind, "I'm going on a camping trip with the Potters!"
Wow, what an excuse. Everyone knows the Potters don't go camping. Mr. Potter has long held the belief that he never wants to set foot in a tent again. He seems to have a natural aversion to the things. And on top of that it's almost midnight and I'm supposed to be at a sleep over. Nobody leaves for a camping trip in the middle of the night. Brilliant Remus. Real inventive.
"Harry is going camping?" asked my dad from the hall outside my room with disbelief in his voice. "I thought he had refused to do so since The War."
My mother gave me a stern look. Uh-oh. She is going to see right through me as only a mother can. I avoided looking at her eyes and consequently gave myself a nervous expression as my eyes darted around the room. One whole minute later my mother spoke with accusatory tones, "Which girl are you running off with? Is it Lily? It must be Lily as she is the only girl you've had eyes for since last Christmas break."
I gulped in response. She just knew too much!
Again my mother stared me down. "No, that's not it at all. You're running away from her. Not with her. What happened between you two Remus?"
Legillimency. That is the only possible answer. All mothers must be great Legillimens. How else could she have seen right through me like that? Sure I may not have been running away from Lily, but I was running away. And something did happen between the two of us. How could she have seen that?!
"Well," my mother said, tapping her foot. "I'm waiting."
"I- I'm …" I stammered, not sure what to say. Then I just said it, "I don't want to die."
Both my parents looked confused. Not surprising really. I elaborated before they could ask. "I'm running away from Mr. Potter so that he can't get a chance to kill me for kissing his daughter." I deliberately censored what happened for my parent's delicate ears. No need for my parents to believe I was anywhere near sexually active (that just brings up a whole lot of awkwardness).
My mother scoffed and my father snorted. I can see why. My father was really good friends with Mr. Potter and probably didn't believe that The Chosen One could possibly do anything like that. But he hasn't heard the rumors I have. This one guy dated Lily and when she broke up with him he could be seen crying his eyes out afterward and I swear he was limping. And all of that after he took a hard fall during a quidditch match. Poor bloke.
"Harry Potter isn't about to hurt you, kiss or not," said my mother. "There will be no running away from home for any reason."
"But Mommy," I whined.
"No you will stay in this room until you admit to us the real reason you are running away."
"Fine," I half shouted, crossing my arms and sitting on my bed glaring at my parents. "Keep me here, but you won't be so happy when you come in one day to find I've been tortured into insanity by Mr. Potter for stealing his little girl's innocence."
"Ha, I knew there was more," said my mother triumphantly while my father looked horrified. Oops. Tortured into insanity: his parents. Great now I feel bad. My mother gave me a shrewd look, "You slept with her didn't you?"
I had the decency to look aghast. That woman knew too much!! "I did no such thing," I full shouted this time. "I would never do that to her. I love h-her." Piss. Damn. Why is everyone getting to know my secret today?
It was my father's turn to look aghast. He was truly taken by surprise by my declaration. My mother on the other hand got this whole look on her face like she was touched, but not surprised and her mouth broke into a grin. Great, she already knew. I hoped it was just like mother's intuition or something and that I wasn't that obviously transparent. It would be really embarrassing if everyone knew. Especially Lily or someone who would blab to Lily. Hugo! He would blab in an instant. I better beat him into a pulp to make sure he doesn't open his big, fat mouth. But then again, he isn't terribly observant; maybe he didn't even notice I love Lily.
My mother sounded much more caring and less angry, "Would you like to talk about what happened honey?"
I looked down at my feet, "Not really mom. I would rather just sleep it off."
"Okay, just promise me you won't run off on me, please."
"Sure, sure."
My mom gave me something like an understanding smile and pulled my dad out the door shutting it as they went. I wondered how much she had read from my expressions (and mind, I've decided it has to be Legillimency). I laid back on my bed trying to clear my head from the entire events of the day. Soon enough my eyes were drooping and I was hugging my favorite pillow, drifting off with thoughts as to how I was going to apologize to Lily. I had caused her so much pain. But I was coming up with nothing. So, thankfully, my head was blank when I finally entered the land of the resting.
I jerked awake with the sound of a klaxon blaring in my ears. It was so loud I was practically going deaf. My eyes shot open to find my room lit by a dull red glow. "George frickin' Weasley!" I shouted as I grabbed my wand from under my pillow and jumped off my bed.
My father (well all who fought in the Second Great War) was paranoid with security. He had proceeded to buy an intruder alarm from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes when we first moved into this house. So now we had to deal with the deafening klaxon and submarine war lights whenever someone 'broke into' our house. It was kind of funny the first time Mr. Potter burst into our house one night to report on some evil dude and he practically pissed his pants and got into a duel with my dad before they realized who they were.
I didn't really expect the intruder alarm was set off by someone wanting to hurt us, but raised my wand to attack level and crept to my door to give my dad backup in case it was. I was well versed in both defensive and offensive attacks. My parents (along with the Potter parents, Weasley parents, and others from the original DA) had reinstated the group/club/organization when the children of the original members started to show up in force. Teddy Lupin was the first student leader of the next-gen DA when the group was restarted in his fifth year. My dad was the adult leader of Dumbledore's Army since he worked at Hogwarts. I had been in the DA with Lily, Hugo, and Pixie since our second year (the youngest you can join and honestly we didn't really have a choice. We were the children of the six founding fathers of the DA. How could we not be in it?). When we get out of Hogwarts we will join the Order of the Phoenix like Teddy and James and many others already have.
I made it out my door and was slowly walking towards the stairway when something sped up the stairs in a blur and tackled me before I could aim right and sent my spell ricocheting off the ceiling. "Remmie!" yelled the thing hugging me very tightly on the floor. I couldn't breathe. The floor had knocked the breath out of me in retaliation for falling so hard onto it and now long, silky hair was covering my face and smothering me.
"Get off my son!" yelled my father from the direction of the staircase.
"No!" the thing on me yelled back. My lungs were screaming for oxygen but my air passages didn't seem to want to work. I was starting to feel lightheaded.
"Lily?" yelled my father in a questioning tone over the continuing blaring of the klaxon. What are we a frikin' government building? Then it hit me. Lily! No wonder the thing on me was so soft (and no wonder the hair was smothering me. Not that I'm complaining. That girl has a beautiful head of hair). Suddenly the Klaxon stopped (Thank Merlin).
"What are you doing here at two in the morning Lily?" asked my father. I wanted to ask the same thing (why would she want to see me at all) but all I managed was a loud gasp for air as I started to black out.
"Remmie?" said Lily.
At the same time my father said "Remus?"
All I managed was another gasp.
"Remus!" Lily shouted, releasing me from her grip and jumping up ('Finally' said one part of my brain as the rest concentrated on sucking in air).
After some time my breathing evened out and my mother showed up. A look of mingled surprise and annoyance crossed her features when her eyes locked on my beloved. "Lillian," my mother stated rather stiffly. "What on earth are you doing here at this hour?" Apparently my mother wasn't about to forgive Lily for almost making her 'little boy' run away from home.
"Lils," I breathed as my head finally stopped spinning and ringing (I was going to demand my father get rid of that ridiculous alarm). I managed to push myself up onto my elbows and looked straight at Lily. Why was she here? Wasn't she angry at how I had treated her? I had done so much wrong. I needed her to be furious with me.
"Oh Remmie," Lily said as she jumped back onto me, making me collapse back off my elbows and almost cutting off my air supply again as she hugged me tightly. Then she did the last thing I would ever expect(and oddly enough something that would make me fall even deeper in love with her). She sobbed. And then she sobbed some more before breaking into a full weeping fit. "I am sooo, sooooo sorry."
I wasn't sure what to say or do. It wasn't like I was scared of a weeping girl or anything, but the sensation was new. Lily and Pixie just didn't cry. They weren't 'girlie girls.' Plus, what was Lily sorry for? I just reacted naturally to the situation by rubbing my hand smoothly on her back and whispering things like "shh" and "It's okay." When I looked up from Lily's form on mine it was to find my parents had disappeared (how convenient).
After a few minutes filled with Lily's sobbing, my reassurances, and her continued apologies the weeping slowed to a stop. Lily finally looked up at me with bloodshot eyes. I knew that she probably thought she looked horrible from crying but I could say with all honesty that she looked more beautiful at that moment with tears shining on her cheeks than she had ever looked in her life. I longed to be able to kiss the tears off her cheeks and tell her how nothing she could ever do could put a dent in the love I felt for her, but I resisted that urge.
"I really am sorry Remmie," she said. I continued to wonder what for. "I shouldn't have let my temper control my actions." Oh, she thought last night was her fault. Her eyes left the searching of my face to look straight into my eyes. Those mahogany orbs filled my entire focus and I almost didn't register her next words. "Can you ever forgive me?"
"Nothing you could do would ever turn me away from you Lils. You're my best friend." I said, managing to keep my tongue and emotions separated and therefore escaping telling her that I would never leave her because I was irreversibly in love with her. Then I smirked, "Well, almost nothing." (crossed my fingers on that last part).
A smile started to cross her pink lips and her face lightened with relief. I looked into her eyes again as I attempted my own apology. "I'm sorry also Lils. I should have handled the situation bet-" but my words were cut off as she pressed her pointer finger to my lips. She smiled and the movement brought my eyes darting to her rosy lips for a fraction of a second before returning to her eyes. I could have sworn I saw her eyes dart to my lips, but the movement was so quick I wasn't sure. At that moment nothing could have seemed more perfect to my mind than feeling those lips move with mine. I was exerting all my self-control to resist making that exact thing a reality.
Suddenly a loud banging came from down stairs, indicating that someone was pounding on my front door. I let my eyes leave Lily's to look at the stairway (grateful for the chance to have something pull my mind back from its attempts to force Lily to share my dreams). A chair scraped from the kitchen as someone (I assumed my dad) went to the door and opened it. There were low murmurs from the entryway as my dad apparently let the person in and closed the door again. I quickly looked back at Lily's face and saw it coated with apprehension, to the point of fear.
I wondered at the expression before I heard His voice blaring louder than the klaxon, "LILLIAN LUNA POTTER!"
My Lily gave a squeak of fright and hugged me tight to her again as if I could protect her from underneath. There was a stomping of feet climbing the stairs and with a strength I didn't know I had, I pushed Lily off me (her eyes looked at me with fright and offense). I then sat up and pulled Lily's body behind mine so that she was pressed against my back and hugging me again from behind. She leaned her head against my shoulder and gave a shiver as she heard (and I saw) Mr. Potter stop in front of me in the hallway.
He was breathing deeply and looked very (VERY) angry.
A/N: Right. Cliff hanger, sorry. The next chapter will contain a major plot line and more about the fancy new DA and Order of the Pheonix. I hope you liked the Lily/Remus interaction at the end. Reviews are like good books: nobody can enjoy them until they are writen and posted/published.