a/n: possible Kleenex alert
the most recent one shot posted Chocolate and Raspberries corresponds to this chapter. Read this first and then I recommend checking out the one shot because it's pretty cute.
Emma's pace was near feverish as she made her way back to the castle. It seemed that luck was on her side as Honeydukes had what she was looking for. She wasn't sure that the store would have exactly what she needed, but the expansive Muggle selection of candies was perfect. All she could do was hope that Remus remembered what she did, but the idea that he might not worried her. It was stupid when she had the proof herself, but she needed him to see it himself, to remember a moment that they actually shared. Their story together was broken and disjointed, and she wanted to be able to piece it all together – they had to piece it all together.
For good measure, to soothe her entirely shot nerves, Emma picked up several bars of chocolate and some sugar quills. There was no point in wasting the trip when it would be much harder to get to the village once Remus knew what transpired. She could practically feel the quill in her pocket growing heavier and heavier. Emma wished she had any idea of what to do with it.
Needing something to distract herself, Emma tucked her bag from Honeydukes under her arm and pulled out the ripped pages of her mother's diary. She carefully made sure that the photo Fenrir gave her was tucked safely in her pocket and continued on. There had to be answers in the pages – why else would they have been ripped out? Her mother didn't want them seen and kept them in a folder meant to be with her, but somehow Fenrir had it. The idea of it was terrifying, but there wasn't much she could do. She had to take what she was given and hope it was exactly what she needed.
Emma had to read through what she could and fast. The moment Remus caught any scent of Fenrir, she was doomed. She just wasn't sure what reaction he would have since she didn't use the Portkey, but she was glad that she didn't. For once, she didn't feel threatened around him, but his words stuck out to her – "Whatever your father tells you about me is what he wants you to think. I'm not entirely the monster everyone makes me out to be."
That couldn't be true, could it? She knew what Fenrir was like. He had tried to bite her behind a shop in Hogsmeade, he had tried to track her down when she went out on the full moon, and he had slipped into her room uninvited. He was a complete monster and absolutely insane, but he was different in the bookshop. No – Fenrir could only be a monster. He did terrible things to people who didn't deserve it. Whatever Remus told her had to be the most accurate depiction of who Fenrir Greyback was, but if she knew Fenrir…
She couldn't allow herself to think about it. Fenrir had completely ruined her father's life by turning him into a werewolf. Her father was a talented man who was incredibly skilled but was forced to take jobs well beneath his skill level. Fenrir Greyback was the monster everyone said he was, and nothing could change her mind about that.
Emma flipped through the pages almost violently, searching for the page with that single stupid sentence that she read. For some reason, Fenrir had tucked it between pages instead of placing it back on top where it belonged. She gave a jubilant shout the moment she found it and read with the same fevered pace as she walked.
'Sirius asked me to the absolute strangest thing of me today. He asked me to be a surrogate and have a baby for him and Remus – on my bloody birthday. Imagine getting ready to go into your seventh year, and your brother's boyfriend asks you something like that. Git. At least he made up for it with the promise to get me anything I want before term starts. I fully plan on taking him up on that offer.
'At first, I thought he was joking, but you know how Sirius gets. He gets, well, he gets serious when he means something. Serious Sirius. God, I can see him laughing if he were to see this, practically rolling on the floor, laughing his arse off. Sirius has this ridiculous obsession with making jokes with his name. Sometimes I wonder what Remus sees in him, but I get it. He's handsome, and they've been thick as thieves since day one. I just wish Remus hadn't been so stupid for years and realized that the arsehole was in love with him since I started at Hogwarts. I'll never get over how many times Remus would come home for the summer pining over Sirius and telling mum all about him.
''Mags, Maggie, Daisy Mae,' he says to me in that pathetically ponce voice, 'you need to do this.' Damn it, he begs me. Can you believe it? Sirius Black begging? Seems absolutely unreal. Anyway, I digress – it was hysterical to have Sirius try to explain what surrogacy actually was. Of course, it would be some incredibly insane idea Remus would come up with. He reads far too much, feeling the need to fill his brain with useless trivia. Sirius had to be truly desperate to come to me, but I get why he did. If not me, then who else?
''Maggie, Daisy, we want kids,' Sirius pleaded with me. 'We want to get married, have a house with dogs, and we want children. A boy and a girl. We have to have both. A little girl for Remus and a boy for me. But we don't care what they are, not really. But we need someone of your type to have one for us!'
'Ordinarily, I would be rather offended, but I knew what he was trying to say. I couldn't resist teasing Sirius, though. It was absolutely worth it. 'My type?' I asked him, hoping that my face was dead-straight, and he couldn't see that I was stringing him along. 'You know, a woman! With your…woman bits,' Sirius said all panicked, doing that awkward flailing gesture he sometimes does when he's at a loss.
'And I laughed. I couldn't help it. I really tried to hold back but messing with Sirius is so enjoyable. Being able to mess with Sirius Black is just one of the perks of being Remus Lupin's little sister, I suppose. I laughed so hard I cried, nearly had a wee I laughed so hard because Sirius Black and women genuinely don't mix. It's a wonder that all the other girls could never see it. Sirius Black has always mooned over Moony, and my brother's absolutely ridiculous nickname has never been more fitting.
'Of course, I agreed. I'm of age now, and Merlin knows Remus needs a bit of happiness in his life.'
Emma couldn't read any more of the entry. Her eyes were too blurry with tears.
'Remus needs a bit of happiness in his life.'
'A little girl for Remus.'
Emma was sure she would be repeating those words for the rest of her life. If all of that was true, she was truly her father's daughter. It had to be true – her mother wrote it. The very person Remus was so sure hated him had done something incredible for him. She was so happy that she felt that she could finally cast her Patronus. Emma was ripped from one emotion to the next – happy, sad, excited, confused.
She had one bit of truth to the mystery that made up who she was. It wasn't the entire story, but it was a start, and honestly, if that's all she ever knew about herself, that was fine. She could care less about Fenrir and the fact he was hell-bent on during her into a werewolf. She could care less about whatever Jude's involvement in her life was – he didn't matter anymore. The one part of her identity, and possibly the most important, finally had one bit of proof she could latch onto.
But then she noticed Padfoot watching her, tucked in the foliage outside the gates of Hogwarts, and she was angry. She was angry that Sirius wasn't her biological father, and she was angry that he never said a word to her. Jude should never have been a part of her story, but he was. Sirius was partially why she existed in the first place, and he wasn't a part of her life like he should have been. It made her feel a white-hot rage that she had never felt before.
"You," Emma snarled, stuffing the diary pages back into her coat and seizing her wand, brandishing it at the nervous dog. She was grateful that most of the students were still in the village and would stay there for a while – she didn't want anyone watching her rip Sirius to shreds. She wanted to hurt him so badly and make him feel every bit of pain she experienced. If it weren't for Sirius, things would have been so much different, and that elation she felt was gone. "You ruined everything."
A part of her wanted to cast some sort of hex at Padfoot, but he cowered, and she couldn't do it. He was defenseless, and he didn't understand why she was angry. Instead, she kicked the snow at him with a shout of rage. If anyone were to walk down the drive, Emma was sure they would think she finally lost it. Why would someone be yelling at a dog the way that she was?
She shoved her wand back in her coat, dropped her bag from Honeydukes on the ground, and picked up a pile of snow. She held the cold powder between her fingers, not caring that it was so cold it made her fingers numb. With another angry shout, she threw the snow at Padfoot. Emma felt absolutely no remorse when the pile in her hands landed right in his face. If Padfoot was really a dog, Emma never would have thrown the snow at him like she did, but he deserved it.
Padfoot stared at her, shaking the snow out of his fur. He looked confused, but then the look on his face shifted. He had seen the papers in Emma's hands – he had to know that she knew everything. Remus told her that her mother never went anywhere without the journal, and they all knew about it. It had been the one thing she never let anyone touch – Sirius had to know all about it considering how often he was actually mentioned in the pages.
"Y-you ruined absolutely everything! And you fucking know it, don't you?"
The pathetic whine that left Padfoot told her that he knew that he did. He wasn't going to try and hide it anymore. She ripped off her hat to run her shaking hands through her hair as she paced back and forth, not caring when her fingers tore through knots. Her heart was racing so hard it made her chest hurt. "Forest. Now," Emma snarled, gathering the fallen contents of her Honeydukes trip.
Emma knew she was acting ridiculous as she stomped towards the Forbidden Forest, she knew it deep down, but she was angry. There was no point in trying to reason with herself when she was furious. Sirius's role in her life was inconsequential, but it wasn't all at the same time. He could have changed so much, and suddenly those sad little daydreams she had actually held meaning because they should have been a reality.
The moment they reached a spot where they couldn't be seen, Sirius was already transformed.
"Emma, I can explain," he said quickly, holding his hands up in surrender as Emma barreled up to him, throwing her bag back down.
"What is there to explain, Sirius? My entire life is all your fucking fault!" Emma shouted at him. She lifted her hands, wanting to hit him, but her hands fisted her hair again. She turned and yelled into the forest with such an intensity that she swore it was a roar. Emma paced, trying to run through her thoughts, rubbing her face hard. "You never said a thing to me! You could have told me! There were many times you could have told me before, but you said nothing! Hell, you could have written me a bloody letter, Sirius!"
"Emma, I…I didn't…" Sirius could only stammer, choking on his words as he tried to figure out what to say.
His hesitation was all Emma needed to convince herself to stop herself and turn back to him. "You could have said something, Sirius! If you had told me from the fucking start, I wouldn't have completely lost it! I would never have put Dad what I put him through! Do you know how I feel every day knowing I almost ruined everything? On Halloween, of all days! You knew that I knew absolutely nothing, and you used that against me to make me help you!"
"I know, but –"
"You're a fucking coward! And you were a fucking Gryffindor? I don't even understand how you could be a bloody fucking Gryffindor!"
"I know…" Sirius's face was pained, but he let Emma's verbal assault continue.
"You left me, Sirius. You left us." And then Emma remembered a crucial piece of information Remus told her, and her anger intensified. "You left more than Dad and me. You left Harry – you left every single one of us. All four of us should have been a family!" Emma went back into her coat and ripped out the page she had been reading, her chest heaving as she found the spot she wanted to read.
"Do you know what my mother wrote? You should because it was something you said. Do you know what it was you said?"
Sirius's eyes flicked between the page in Emma's hands and her eyes. He opened his mouth to speak but promptly closed his mouth.
"Convenient. Cat's got your tongue. Rather ironic for a dog," Emma said with a derisive breath. "She wrote, and I quote this verbatim from something that you said, 'We want to get married, have a house with dogs, and we want children. A boy and a girl. We have to have both. A little girl for Remus and a boy for me.' Do you recall saying that?"
"Yes," Sirius choked out.
Emma shoved the page back in her coat, going back to pacing, crossing her arms to keep herself from lashing out. "You had everything. We had everything. Fuck, Sirius! Do you even understand how much this changes everything?"
Sirius looked stunned, his mouth falling open, tears filling his eyes. "I know," he said, his voice cracking. "I know what I did. I know that I ruined your life and Harry's. I know that I hurt Remus, but I…"
"How could you?" Emma shouted, shoving Sirius hard because she didn't know what else to do. When he didn't stop her, she did it again.
"You had to go –" she shoved him "– and play the fucking hero –" she pushed him once more "– and look at what you did!" Emma went to shove him again, but she grabbed onto the front of his robes, pulling him close as her anger gave way to grief. She held tight to the flimsy fabric beneath her fingers and pressed her forehead to his chest, needing something to ground her as she cried.
"But it's not your fault," she choked out with gasping breaths. "Fucking…the fucking rat. This is Peter's fault. This is Jude's fault…"
Sirius tentatively wrapped his arms around Emma, resting his chin on top of her head. "It's still my fault. I was angry," he said. "I was angry, and I was scared. James and Lily were family, and we all loved Peter because he was our brother. He completely blindsided us." Sirius took a shuddering breath, his voice breaking. "And Remus…Remus was with Fenrir's pack, and I was so sure that it was him for a while. He never said that's where he was going, but when he came back one time, I knew. It's…it's hard to miss Fenrir's scent. We were all so young, and so many people we loved were dying around us. We were all terrified of what it could mean if Remus was living with Fenrir. He would leave to go back to the pack and come back completely changed and refuse to talk about it." Sirius tightened his hug as Emma's arms snaked around his body.
"All Maggie and I were trying to do was keep you safe. Emma, I need you to understand something - Never for one moment believe that I have ever loved you any less because you aren't biologically mine. Maggie was scared because things went wrong, and she was so sure I would be upset over it. She wasn't even worried about having a child so early, but she wasn't sure if we would still want you. But I always wanted you – it didn't matter to me, and I knew it wouldn't matter to Remus. You were ours, even if you came way earlier than any of us expected.
"At the end of the day, I knew there were potions to change that, and when it was safe, that was what we planned to do. You would have been the perfect little Lupin-Black child, and Margaret was excited to see what you would look like. I knew, or at least I thought I knew, that Remus wouldn't have chanced it with you with his condition. I was shocked when you told me that he went through the process anyway to make you entirely his. You always were meant to be for him, so it was a relief to hear that Remus accepted it on his own without knowing. I'm glad that he did, because Merlin, you are as perfect as I thought you would be, but I'm sorry that…I'm sorry that you suffer.
"I meant it when I said that I've always loved you. Your father and I both did, even when you were just an idea and didn't exist. You were the reason we fought – he was fighting for you even before he knew what you were to him. I'm so sorry that I never said anything – to either of you. I never would have expected Jude to be so cruel to hurt you so badly. He was a complete arsehole, but I never…I'm sorry. We were so busy making sure that you were kept from Remus until he was done with his missions, and we could be sure it wasn't him. We were waiting for the war to be over before I finally took you home to be a family; when we knew that Remus wasn't the problem. Maggie was…I had no idea…"
"Sirius, he folds his bloody socks," Emma sniffled when her crying slowed enough to finally speak. "How could you ever think he would have hurt anyone?"
"I know, but Peter got in our heads. Every single one of us. I didn't want to think it was Remus, I never wanted to…"
"But you did."
"I did."
Emma pulled away from Sirius, wiping away her tears angrily. "That's really fucking sad because he still loves you. He loves you, Sirius, and you went and threw that away because of what Peter said? Did you even actually love him? Just because he's a bloody werewolf, it doesn't mean he's a bad person. Just because Fenrir made him what he is, it doesn't mean he's the same!"
"I know that! Merlin, I know that," Sirius cried out, clutching at his chest. "Every day, I have to live with the fact that I believed that he was working with Voldemort! I was twenty-one and an absolute idiot!" Sirius took several deep breaths, his eyes growing wide. "Did you just say that he still loves me?"
"Yes, you idiot! He still loves you despite everything! Do you know how hard it is for me to finally understand why he gets sad all the time? Do you know how hard it is for me to watch him sometimes, knowing there's nothing I can do to help him? I thought it was because of me, but it's because of you, too!"
That rendered Sirius completely speechless, and Emma leaned against the closest tree to catch her breath. Her heart hurt, her head hurt – everything hurt. She had just gone through an insane rollercoaster of emotions, and she felt as though she would be sick.
Emma groaned as the clock tower's bell went off. "Fucking why?" Emma shouted, gathering everything she had thrown. She still had one more thing to do before she could settle in for the longest nap ever. "I have to go, or Dad's going to completely lose his shit even more. He's already pissed at me about yesterday, thanks for the warning, by the way – and he didn't want me to go to Hogsmeade as it was…"
"Fenrir," Sirius breathed out, his eyes widening. He rushed over to Emma and quickly stopped himself at the look on her face. "I caught his scent and got worried. I was going to look for you when you were coming up the drive. Did he –"
"He kept his distance. I'm fine," Emma said, waving Sirius off. "He's how I got the diary pages. He had a folder with a bunch of papers he said was found with me."
"Fenrir has the folder?"
Emma glanced over at Sirius, taking in his panicked expression. "I'm guessing the folder's important?"
"The folder means everything," he said. "Everything you needed to know – everything Remus needed to know…it was all in that folder!"
"That's why I took the diary pages," Emma muttered. "Fenrir seemed keen on me having photographs, but I thought the diary pages would be more beneficial than whatever else there was."
Sirius nodded fervently. "Yes, yes, that was good," he said, his eyes still wide. "The paperwork…well, it wouldn't help anyone's case right now. It's important, but the diary is evidence."
Emma stared at Sirius for a moment and shook her head. "We need to talk…but I need time right now, Sirius. I can't…"
"I understand," Sirius said earnestly. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Emma. I truly…Go – Remus has probably paced a hole into the floor by now."
"Probably," Emma admitted, starting to walk away. She paused, turning back to Sirius. He looked as lost as she felt. "Sirius, can you answer a question for me?"
Sirius looked up at Emma slowly. "Yes, anything," he said, blinking at her in surprise.
Emma bit her lip, shuffling the snow underneath her feet. "Would I have been a Black? If things were different?"
"Oh, God no," Sirius said with a barking laugh, the start of a genuine smile on his face. "I never would have done that to you."
"Good," Emma said with a resolute nod. "Emma Hope Black sounds weird. Emma Hope Lupin makes much more sense."
Emma turned to leave, but Sirius called her back. "Emma, wait!" he shouted, drawing Emma back just enough to shoot him an annoyed look. She had to go before Remus really tried to find her – she wouldn't be able to explain being in the forest with Sirius. "If…If Fenrir has the folder, then that means…" Sirius trailed off, trying to run through his thoughts. "That folder had built-in plans on where you were meant to go in the situation something happened, and none of us could get you. The wrong person had to have heard me, someone connected to Fenrir. If they kept you from Remus for so long, something isn't right. I just have no idea who or why. Be careful, Emma."
That made Emma a little dizzy to hear, but she nodded. Emma had no idea how she would try and propose that as an idea to Remus without bringing up Sirius, but she would have to try. Maybe it was time she admitted to seeing Sirius, even though she was sure Remus would never let her go anywhere without him ever again.
Before Sirius could say another word, she was fled from the forest. Hopefully, this time Remus didn't try to put together a search party to find her. She wasn't entirely sure she could explain why she was in the Forbidden Forest if anyone found her there.
Emma ran back to the castle, slipping on the snow as she went but not completely falling. Her lungs were burning from the cold, and the sheer exertion required to run through pathways not yet cleared. Her frantic run to the castle at least settled her emotions, but Sirius left her with a gaping hole in her heart. When she felt herself start to break again, she ran faster. She nearly fell as she ran into the courtyard to head back inside and hit a patch of ice.
"We have bloody magic and still can't get rid of all the ice," she muttered to herself as she scrambled into the entrance hall and to the stairs. She refused to stop, even as she barreled past Remus, who was moving at the same speed she was. He must have been on his way to find her because she took so long as he was carrying his cloak over his arm.
"Don't say a word!" she shouted over her shoulder to a completely flabbergasted Remus. "I'll explain, but you need to hear what I have to say first!"
It took Remus quite a bit longer to react than she expected. She knew the exact moment he was pulled out of his stupor and picked up Fenrir's scent. His footsteps were heavy on the stairs as he chased after her, and Emma was incredibly grateful the castle was mostly empty.
"Emma!" Remus shouted. "Stop right where you are!"
"Absolutely not," Emma said, forcing herself to move faster up the stairs. "You have to listen to me first!"
"Emma Hope!"
"Nope! Not stopping!"
"Emma Hope Lupin, you will stop where you are at once!"
Emma was almost to the third landing, while Remus was still on the second. To humor him, she stopped to turn and look at him. "I stopped," Emma said. Remus looked at her as if she had gone mental. He took another step, and it sent Emma running up the rest of the stairs. She stopped like he had asked; he just didn't tell her to stay.
"Merlin, EMMA! Stop right now, or I will make you stop myself!"
"I'd love to see you try!" Emma shouted, darting down the hall to the classroom. She wasn't sure if Remus had given up on running since she went straight to the class, but she wasn't going to turn to find out. Emma rushed up the stairs to the office and yelped as Remus stepped into the room, looking frustrated. She wasn't expecting him to actually have his wand out, and Emma hoped that it was meant to be more threatening than anything. She hoped he wouldn't try to use a spell to stop her, but she wasn't sure. It was best not to find out.
Emma scrambled through the office, into the living room, and rushed down the hall to her room. She threw her bedroom door closed for good measure, made her way to the bookshelf, and snatched her copy of War and Peace from the line of books.
"Please be right," Emma whispered to herself, staring up at the ceiling before opening the cover. A small gasp escaped her lips, and she began to laugh as she read the words 'Property of R.J. Lupin' written on the inside of the cover. How could she have ever forgotten such a significant moment for so long? She had even more evidence of being in Remus's presence. She had no idea because it had been years since she actually opened the book.
She flipped through the pages taking in the underlined passages and notes written in the margins. The damned book had been sitting on her bookshelf forever, and Remus didn't even recognize it as his. Did that mean he didn't remember?
Her door slammed open, and she jumped, looking over at Remus.
"God damn it, what is wrong with you? Emma, if I tell you to stop, then you stop. I don't understand what has gotten into you in the past twenty-four hours. What did he do to you?"
"Nothing!" Emma said quickly, shoving the book behind her back and backing up as Remus stormed over to her. "Absolutely nothing! I'm fine!" Emma dropped the book into the Honeydukes bag so she could set it down. She reached up and grabbed Remus's face, pulling him down to her level. "I. Am. Fine. Please, I really need you to listen to me right now. It's important."
Remus didn't look as though he wanted to listen at all, worry, and anger written all over his face. He very gently pulled Emma's hands away with shaking hands and nodded, his jaw clenched. Remus sat down on the edge of Emma's mattress and gestured for her to do whatever it was she wanted to do.
Emma sighed in relief, picking up the Honeydukes bag. "I remembered something," she said. "When I saw your copy of War and Peace – I remembered…I remembered you." When Remus didn't say a word, Emma took a deep breath, still trying to get air back into her lungs. She was still panting hard, and she took several gulping breaths to try and get her breathing steady.
"At Saint Nicholas's, there was a park near my primary. Sort of. It was a bit out of the way, but that's not the point. It was the big one over by the river – Rowntree Park. I used to stop there sometimes after school because there was a café nearby. I would go and pick up a hot chocolate and a scone when they gave us play money."
Remus froze slightly, and Emma knew that he knew precisely which park she meant. That helped make things a little easier, considering she had a photo with him in that same park. He swallowed hard and waved Emma on.
"Right, so, I remembered one day that I stopped at the café, I was a few Pounds short because I forgot Jocelyn took my money for that week. It was probably the first time that I ever had a panic attack." Emma let out a nervous laugh at the thought. "But then this man stepped up and paid for me instead. I had no idea who he was. I just know he left before I could thank him. The only thing I knew about the man was that he was carrying a copy of War and Peace. I was almost positive that he was wearing a Sainsbury's shirt. Those were the only two things I knew."
Emma let the words hang out there for a moment, watching Remus closely for any recognition. He stared at her for a moment before looking out the window, rubbing his chin as he started to run through his thoughts. She couldn't quite get a complete read on him even when he turned back to look at her.
"Keep going," he said quietly, the anger on his face slowly washing away.
A small smile crossed Emma's face, and she was more than happy to keep going. "A week later, I went to Sainsbury's because we had play money again. I was going to go to the café again, but something told me to go to Sainsbury's instead. It wasn't a very crowded day, and it seemed like every line was open…but then I spotted a man at the register who had a copy of War and Peace. He was reading it while waiting for someone to go through his line. I wasn't sure if it was him, but I took a chance. The book is massive, after all, and how many people would be carrying it around?
"I went and picked myself up a bar of chocolate and went to his line to thank him, hoping it was the same man. Even waited for him to finish up with some old bat that moved slower than a snail. He looked terribly sad, and that didn't sit right with me. I thanked him, of course, but that wasn't enough. It wasn't as though I had a lot, but I asked him what sort of sweets he liked. And he told me that he didn't like sweets too much, but he liked raspberries."
Emma paused, waiting for Remus to say something, but he looked almost pained. She knew he wasn't going to say a word until she finished.
"I wasn't sure what to get the man. I didn't think getting actual raspberries was a good idea, so I went back to the sweets aisle. Almost like magic, I found these…" Emma bent down and reached into the Honeydukes bag and pulled out the Fry's chocolate. Like she had done years ago, she placed three of the four bars in front of Remus. "He refused to take them unless we traded, even though I very specifically remembering buying the chocolates for John. He proposed a trade."
Emma pulled one of the bars away. "He said he would take two, but he wasn't taking the third unless I took his book."
She added the third bar back to the line, staring at them for a moment – this seemed too bizarre. With a watery laugh, Emma bent back down to pull out the book, opening the cover and brushing her finger over Remus's loopy writing. "You gave this book to me six years ago…And do you remember what you told me? You told me that perhaps someday we would meet again, and we could discuss the book. Guess you were right, after all."
Emma's laugh was even more pathetic as tears started falling. She sniffled, rubbed her eyes, and stuck her hand out. "I never did get to introduce myself to you back then since we were interrupted, John," Emma said with a snort. "You really aren't very clever with names, but hi, I'm Emma Lupin, your long-lost daughter. And I never really did get far in this bloody book, but I think I'd like to talk about it now."
Remus looked terribly confused, his eyes moving from Emma's face to the book, to the chocolates and back. "But you didn't look like you," he breathed out. "A part of me wondered if…but I didn't think it was possible. You weren't…you."
Emma slowly dropped her hand, suddenly feeling like she never should have said anything, but Remus captured it in his quickly, holding it tight between his.
"Please, don't take it the wrong way," Remus said earnestly. "I'm relieved because you kept me from doing something incredibly stupid that day, but I'm confused."
"So am I, but there's more," Emma said quietly. "Courtesy of Fenrir," Emma added with a grimace. Remus immediately paled, but he nodded, letting go of her hand.
With a shaky breath, Emma reached into her coat to pull out the photograph and handed it to Remus.
"What's this?" Remus asked sharply, pulling the photo out of Emma's hand and inspecting it closely.
"S-sometimes they would bring us over to Rowntree when it was nice," Emma said quickly. "They would take pictures of us while at the park."
"And Fenrir had this?"
"And more," Emma reluctantly said. "But he told me to give you this one specifically. He wouldn't give me the rest."
Remus's eyes snapped up to meet hers. "What do you mean, he had more?"
"He had a whole folder of things. He said that it was with me when I was found."
"Then why wasn't I given it? That should've been brought to the children's home…or given to someone at the Ministry," Remus said, almost nervously. "If Fenrir has it…"
"Dad, I don't know any more than you do. This is what he gave me, and I wasn't going to not take it," Emma said with a slight shrug. "He told me he would have given me the whole thing, but I kept ignoring him."
"He wouldn't have given you everything regardless of whether or not you ignored him," Remus sighed, running a hand through his hair as he looked back at the photo. He looked at it a little closer. "You don't look entirely like yourself here, either," he muttered. "At least in this, I can see that it's you, but it isn't entirely. Almost as if…" He frowned, his forehead wrinkling as he tried to run through the possibilities in his head. "This might be more helpful than we think. I have to show this to Dumbledore."
Remus made to stand up, but Emma grabbed onto his arm to keep him where he was. "Wait," Emma said, "there's still more."
"Emma, how long were you with Fenrir?"
"Honestly, no idea," Emma said quickly. "Felt like a blur. But there's more." She reached back into her coat pocket to pull out the diary entries. "You and Elara haven't told me who the other name on my birth certificate was meant to be is because you thought it was meant to be Sirius, isn't it?"
Remus nodded slowly. "We're almost positive that Sirius was meant to be your biological father. We concluded that there was a strong possibility that he would have done what we did, but there was no paperwork to support it. We don't know the circumstances because your mother was with Jude, and well…Sirius was with me. I thought you might have worked that out for yourself, but I wasn't too sure."
Emma nodded, looking down at the papers in her hand. "I didn't get to read past the first few pages, but I have the proof that was the case," Emma said breathlessly, holding them out for Remus to take. He took the pages slowly, nervously. "I know you said you didn't want to read any of mum's diary, but I think you need to read these. It's all the proof in the world that I'm yours, and I was always meant to be."
Casting Emma a suspicious glance, Remus began to read what was in front of him. Emma watched him closely, nervous that his expression was so impassive, but then his wall started to crack. There were several points that he stopped reading, staring off elsewhere as he tried to run through his thoughts. He began to flip through the pages quickly, scanning the words, looking for key phrases, and then he set the pages aside.
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and Emma knew to wait because he was thinking. She knew that he needed to process what he had just read. As hard as it was for her, Emma knew it would be much worse for Remus. She had the opportunity to take out some of her swirling emotions on Sirius, but Remus didn't. This meant something entirely different for him.
She frowned when she noticed Remus sinking too far into his thoughts. Much like he usually did for her, Emma bent down into his line of sight, giving him a shaky smile. When he finally met her gaze, he was looking at her like he had earlier that day. She gently brushed a finger over one of the scars on his cheek.
"I should have known the moment I saw you back in Diagon Alley," she breathed out. "Guess it didn't matter to me that you had these even then." Emma took a deep breath, straightening up. "Hi, Dad," she added, her voice breaking.
Without saying a word, Remus pulled Emma into a bone-crushing hug and just held her as if it was for the very first time. Perhaps, Emma realized, he truly was.
a/n: whoa.
guest - Ahhh, thank you! Please, feel free to ask said questions - I'm curious to see what they are. :D Don't worry about missing reviews AT ALL. I just had the chapters ready to go and I *needed* to post them desperately.