Chapter Thirty-Two: Hard to Swallow Truths

With more pushing from Sirius, as unlikely as that still seemed, Remus found himself walking to the library after the festivities were over. He was sure he was more full than he'd ever been in his life and he'd barely touched ¼ of the dishes, though he'd managed to try a bit of all the desserts.

He hoped Lily had decided to just go to bed after the silly 'get to know your neighbor' questions some of the prefects surprised the hall with, in a joint attempt to get the schools to mingle. He wanted to go to bed himself, completely drained from maneuvering the cramped chaos in the hall, even with all the tables magically removed.

"Remus."

He jumped, not expecting to have beaten her there, not expecting her to be behind him.

"Lily...I...we need to talk."

"Yes, I know."

"Not here though," he added quickly, having realized that this might be Sirius' latest ploy.

He could all but see his three nosy friends crammed under the invisibility cloak listening in for some tidbit they could use. He felt bad for thinking that way about his friends but it didn't deny the possibility it might happen. So with Lily's agreement, they went down to the grounds instead. They walked in unpleasant silence for a while. A silence that normally would have been pleasant between them but simply too much was being left unsaid at the moment for there to be anything but tension from it.

Remus finally realized Lily wasn't going to say anything first. She was, in fact, going to let Remus decide if and when he wanted to talk. He was both grateful for this and deeply annoyed since it just made it even harder to talk to her.

"Lily?"

"Yes?"

"I….uh…"

Remus didn't want to say it, he didn't want to have this conversation at all. But even without Sirius' insistence, he would have talked to her about it, eventually, because he was pretty sure it was more stressful not to know her feelings on the topic, at least he hoped so.

"It's alright Remus. If you don't want to talk about it you don't have to. Either way is fine by me."

She said it so matter of fact as if it really was that easy. He turned around to face her, never having been quite so angry with her than he was in the moment.

"I don't want to talk about it but I have to, Lily. I don't know what you're going to do about it otherwise!" he explained sounding stressed when he had meant to sound calm.

"Do?" She looked at him confused, "what do you mean Remus?"

He inhaled deeply forcing himself to remain calm, his emotions may be growing stronger but that just meant his control had to as well.

"Are you going to report me?"

Her momentary alarm turned into tears and Remus took a step back half expecting her to confess she already had based on her reaction.

"Oh, Remus! How could you suggest such a thing?! I mean I know how you could but….but it's me. Don't you know I'd never do anything to hurt you?" He nodded feeling dangerously close to tears now himself. "Then why would you think I would?" she earnestly asked, wanting to understand, to understand him, all of him.

Remus swayed dangerously, struggling to stay calm.

"Might…...most…...not hurting me…...view it that way…," he stammered, his teeth chattering too hard from sheer nerves to be much clearer. Luckily, or unluckily, Lily seemed to understand. More tears ran down her cheeks.

"Remus, of course, I'd view it as hurting you! Dumbledore knows?" he nodded and she looked thoughtful. "I figured as much because of the tree."

"How did you know about the tree?" he asked alarmed, wondering for one horrible second if rumors had spread. Lily looked apologetic, gesturing toward the direction of the Whomping Willow which was luckily out of sight, Remus hated looking at it.

"I did the math once I figured it out."

"How did you figure it out?" he asked a bit harshly, feeling better when he was the one asking questions. Though he imagined she had her fair share for him.

"I was…..not really suspecting for a while but well I knew something was up. We all thought it was your mother... but the fact that you got sick.." She thankfully could tell that explaining it all was just causing him pain and stopped putting quite so much detail behind it. "Because Professor Blavatnik assigned me extra credit on werewolves, he knew what you were and wanted me to figure it out. I was getting close anyway tracking the moon cycles but….well, I didn't want to be right."

Remus hung his head feeling tears, no longer possible to hold back, slowly make their way down his cheeks.

"Because I'm a monster…," he whispered, personally not blaming her. Who'd want to accept their friend was a monster, that was probably the one thing that was leading to his other friends taking so long to figure it out.

He nearly leaped out of his skin as suddenly Lily's arms were wrapped tight around him, hugging him, hugging a monster.

"No!" she sobbed sounding far more distraught over this than Remus could have ever had imagined her being. In his dreams when she found out she always shed a few tears then never spoke to him again, or in his nightmares, she did turn him into the ministry.

"No? No what? And what are you going to do?" he asked, beginning to feel panicky just because nothing was going how he had expected it to. It was like he had always found certain dreadful stability in the fact his friends would leave him if he told them. It was a terrible certainty, a heavy boulder on his shoulders but he'd come to accept it as fact.

Now Lily had casually thrown the boulder off Remus as if it never should have been there in the first place, with simply her tears. This lack of boulder left him dizzy and lightheaded from the sheer change in weight. Worst still was the possibility Remus could be wrong and her tears were for some unrelated reason and she somehow still did hate him, or at the very least feared him enough to stay away.

"No, you aren't a monster. No, I can't believe someone has convinced you so much that you were that you'd believe I'd feel the same. And now what? I'll tell you now what if it was Black and Potter that made you feel this bad I'll …"

"No, no, it wasn't them," he assured her quickly, hating how high pitched his voice sounded. Lily let out a sigh relaxing.

"Oh good. I had hoped not since they really don't seem to know still."

"They don't know," he explained since that was safer than addressing the silent question of who then had convinced him he was a monster. Somehow he didn't think answering 'society' would cut it for her, not with the bits and pieces she already knew about his family.

"I'm sorry Remus, they say such awful things around you…"

"It's alright, I'm used to it."

She shuddered against him, her tiny fists gripping the cloth of his robe tighter.

"Oh please don't say that. Remus, I could never hate you. You're one of the kindest people I know, the exact opposite of a monster…"

"But…," he began only to be cut off firmly by her.

"No! You don't get any 'but', there are no buts to be had. You have a disease Remus, something you never asked for and something you certainly shouldn't have to deal with. But this doesn't define you, you're more than your lycanthropy. You know that right?"

He hesitated, unsure how to answer honestly without causing a fresh wave of tears.

"Right?" she asked again her voice several octaves higher now.

"I'm….I'm beginning to see that…," he replied warily.

"How old were you when you were bitten?"

Remus inhaled sharply, the one question he had expected in every scenario and she had still somehow managed to throw him off by asking it.

"A few years….," he mumbled noncommittally.

Lily finally let him go and he worried that he had angered her. Only she had pulled away not to leave but to look at him with her earnest piercing eyes.

"I know I'm crying right now but that doesn't mean I'm not strong enough to hear the truth. Please trust me, Remus, haven't I earned that much trust?"

She had, of course, she had, but it was more complex than that. Talking about, voicing it, meant there were more emotions and fears and memories tied tight and shoved down his throat everytime he tried to speak about it so that it felt like he was literally gagging on the truth.

"Four….a...almost five though," he added at the look of utter horror that crossed her face.

"Four," she whispered, sounding haunted.

"A….almost five…," he added again regretting telling her this immediately.

"Oh Remus, I'm so sorry. That must have been so scary for you…..and it's so painful every time."

He didn't answer since there wasn't really a question there and he didn't think Lily would benefit from him explaining just how painful the transformations were or on the fact he hadn't just been bitten by Greyback, he had been abducted and tortured.

"It's alright I grew…..," he trailed off realizing how upset it had made her to hear 'I'm used to it' last time. "It….got easier with time…"

No need to mention it was slowly getting harder now, a steady downward spiral which Remus was beginning to fear would just lead to death for him.

"Here I am crying and I'm supposed to be comforting you," she sniffed, sounding very frustrated with herself. Remus cringed to hear her be so hard on herself.

"I've had basically my whole life to get used to the idea while you've had a few minutes," he offered her a watery smile, his tears no longer falling though.

"I've known for months though and I've been going over and over in my head how to bring it up or if I should bring it up?" she admitted still sounding frustrated with herself and her tears which didn't stop falling.

"Yes, but there's knowing, Lily, and then there's knowing."

Lily looked ready to protest then realized she really couldn't and closed her mouth.

"I'm still sorry Remus. I want you to know I'm here if you need anything...if you want to talk about it or….," she trailed off clasping his hand firmly in hers.

Remus was still just adjusting to the idea that she didn't hate him, it was strange.

"I don't like to talk about it…," he began gently, her face crestfallen with disappointment. "But you could….visit in the hospital wing…. afterward…...if…...if you want….," he finished nervously, all of this feeling distinctively very wrong.

"Oh yes! I can do that and I can do more research on werewolves and…"

"No!" Remus shouted in horror. "Please don't do that Lily….nothing you can do…..details….." He risked meeting her tear-filled eyes, "It's too much…..please…..please don't."

"Alright I won't," she sighed with a tone that suggested she had already done it. She realized the panic he felt over this and shook her head with a small sad smile. "I didn't find anything even remotely useful and absolutely nothing on adolescent werewolves. I…..I skipped the parts describing the transformations once it hinted how painful they were….."

"Leads to high pain tolerance," he explained with a forced grin hoping the conversation could become lighter now. But this wasn't his roommates; this was Lily whose concept of comic relief in the middle of a stressful conversation was greatly lacking.

"You should write a book, Remus, explaining the struggle. It could help those who come after you."

He blinked at her having never considered this idea, mostly because it was ludicrosity.

"Lily, no one wants to read the truth about werewolves. They want to read gore and mystery and…."

"I still think you should," she cut him off firmly, "it would be good for you to…uh well...to process I mean…"

"Lily, I've had my entire life to process." She blushed in shame and embarrassment, "but it's not a bad idea…," he relented, mostly to get her to stop looking so awkward.

It was a terrible idea but Lily didn't have to know he'd never ever write a book, even if it would help others. Remus simply wasn't that kind.

"So are you given the proper potions or…."

"Lily…." Remus flinched at the sharpness of this tone and let out a frustrated groan in no way directed at her. "Sorry, it's not you, it's just….." She looked at him expectantly not looking offended so he dared to press on, the reality that Lily was still going to be his friend beginning to make sense in a completely ridiculous way. "...it's exhausting thinking about this….let alone talking about it….."

"Oh," she whispered looking heartbroken.

"Not that we can't ever talk about it…," he added mentally kicking himself for opening the door to more invasive questions and awkward conversations. UGH!

Was there anything he wouldn't do to make someone more comfortable? Apparently he drew the line at not writing a book about his deepest darkest most painful secret. Yeah, that seemed a reasonable place to draw a line that should have been drawn long before that.

"I'm sorry Remus. You must have been very stressed knowing I knew and fearing…." She bit her lip to keep more tears from falling "I'll never stop being your friend Remus. Never. Alright?"

He nodded before considering if he actually believed it or not. She was still holding his hands, though didn't seem to realize this.

"Don't look so uncertain," she huffed, then grimaced "sorry it's not you, really it's not, it's just…"

"The situation? Yeah, it's pretty frustrating."

She made a choked sound and suddenly was hugging Remus again. It felt a bit more comfortable this time but Remus' head was pounding and he just wanted to go to sleep, maybe read a good book, then tomorrow he could delve into the implications of having a friend who knew. Of having Lily know and still care about him so...intensely.

"Yes, it is but we'll get through it. Not that you haven't been doing a fine job on your own...only you aren't alone anymore."

"I never was Lily, if I had been doing this alone I already would have been caught. And…..um….I never thanked you for the other night so….."

"Oh don't worry about it. Although I was surprised that you….I mean….."

"I think I had an allergic reaction to the sleeping draught."

She let go of him to give him a puzzled look.

"Allergic. No, it was more like an overdose. Momentary disorientation on waking, a sleep so deep you could sleep through a day, I imagine a killer headache afterward," she listed, counting on her fingers the symptoms, much more comfortable with this problem which could be properly addressed in a textbook.

"Well yeah…," he admitted, confused about it himself if he really considered it. "But that's not possible. I only took one and….," he trailed off as Lily covered her mouth, eyes widening in understanding. "What?"

"You took one? By yourself! What did Madam Pomfrey say when she found out?"

"She chewed my ear off first before I could even explain but once she found out she got all quiet for a minute and just told me I had to have her express permission first since I sort of got it from Frank and…..what?" he asked again unsure whether to be confused or amused.

Lily's eyes were wide as saucers now and it did look quite comical.

"Well of course she knows about…," Lily whispered to herself, her mouth still covered.

"Lily what?" he asked loudly, confusion turning into concern.

"You already take a sleeping draught."

Remus laughed at her with a hysterical laugh that found the comment much more amusing than it should have been.

"No, I don't. I think I'd know."

"Every morning. Or more specifically whatever meal you're sitting…"

She didn't have to explain further Remus finally understood.

"They've been drugging me!" he gasped deeply upset.

"Well…in a sense, yes but it was to help you…..I heard them talking about it and they were concerned about you not sleeping well and of course them not sleeping well because….," she trailed off coming dangerously close to bringing up nightmares and sweat-soaked sheets and screams ripped from Remus in the dead of night.

She knew she had almost brought up lycanthropy again and shifted, her eyes going past Remus and widening again.

"What?" he asked, an anger building inside him that surprised him. Madam Pomfrey had known. Well of course she did since they had to get the potions themselves. She must have realized it was actually for him. He also had a pretty good idea when it started and though deep down he understood why his friends had drugged him, the fact it had almost caused a disaster made him very angry.

"Three idiots have come to find you," Lily pointed out and Remus turned and finally had the appropriate targets to glare at. They were still too far away to see him, the last traces of the sunset casting their elongated shadows behind them and probably making it hard to see much of anything.

"I'm….I'm going to talk to them. Thank you for explaining Lily..and for...well for everything I….," Remus trailed off his concentration torn between how to deal with his roommates and Lily.

"I'll see you in the library to study this week?"

"And Severus?"

Lily's expression soured slightly when he glanced at her, understanding his implication.

"He doesn't know and he won't ever, I'll make sure of it."

Remus nodded.

"Thank you," he said again unsure how to properly express the confusing gratitude he felt to her staying, to her accepting him.

"No problem," she replied, sounding as awkward as he felt. He hoped this wasn't the typical atmosphere of them talking now, otherwise, it might be a while before Remus could study with her. "Well good luck," she called, walking the opposite direction Remus' roommates were coming from, leaving him feeling numb and exhausted.

"Wotcher Remus?" James called as if they didn't all know Remus had just had a heart to heart with Lily about the information they weren't yet privy to yet were dying to know. Remus considered his options, shouting at them would do no good, and he was dreadful at it anyways.

"Hi James," he called back in as cheerful a manner as he could manage, his three friends relaxing once they realized they weren't walking into a disaster. No, just a trap, he thought, scheming how best to make them pay.

"Things...go well with Lily then?" Sirius asked, a strange mix of hope and bitterness in his tone and an expression that made him look like he might explode.

"More or less. Surprised you lot didn't try to follow me in the cloak," he pointed out his anger at them turning to relief and amusement as the three glanced at each other followed by, varying in volume, shouts of frustration.

"WE'RE MORONS!"

"I WAS TRYING to suggest that to you James but you wouldn't…"

"Sirius how COULD WE let such a golden opportunity pass!"

Sure they were dramatic about it but Remus could tell they were earnest, especially Sirius who looked like he might kick something. James collapsed to the ground in wails of 'misery.'

"OH, WHY OH WHY DIDN'T WE THINK!"

"Shut up James!" Sirius snapped, easily the most irritated out of the three. As James rolled close to him on the grass Remus could see Sirius debating with himself if it was worth it to kick him.

"Do you guys want to visit Hagrid?" he asked suddenly, the suggestion surprising himself even as he asked it. But that would make it easier for Lily to sneak back into the castle without his roommates spotting her, well primarily Sirius, who she didn't need trying to wheedle information out of her, at least not tonight.