*****
As far as James Potter could tell, being an adult was more a
state of mind than anything else. And the way he figured it, even at the measly
age of eleven, he was an adult. There was a long list of reasons as to why this
was that he kept in his head.
He dressed himself. He took care of his own personal hygiene. When he was at
home, he cooked his own meals and set his own bedtime. He knew how to make sure
the house stayed clean and he made sure that the cupboards stayed stocked. He
made sure his father kept the bills paid and that he came out of the study
every once in a while to sleep, eat, and shower. The only thing he really
couldn't do was earn the money his father made.
In spite of that, he felt very much like an adult inside, even though on the
outside he looked like a half grown kid.
After all, if it had been Peter caught out here after hours wandering the
castle halls by himself, things would have been very different. James seriously
doubted at times that the bloke could even walk himself to class, Peter seemed
that unsure of himself. Or, at least, that was why James figured Peter had
decided to latch on to someone as obviously out of touch with reality as Lupin
was.
Yeah, James decided, he was much better off than Peter would have been. Probably
even Sirius too, because James knew how to take care of himself without much
fuss.
Because, if anything, James was good at survival.
Which was why he assured himself that the dark halls did not scare him. Nor did
the eerie howls in the far distance raise the hairs on the back of his neck.
And, of course, the full moon was nothing but a big bright light in the sky
that allowed him to walk through the hallways without the aid of his wand.
Too bad that a small part of him was still quaking in his pajamas.
Frowning hard, he walked down the last corridor he'd chosen only to discover
that he'd reached one of the thousands of service doors that led outside. He
hadn't even realized he'd made it onto the first floor.
On the upside, he now knew exactly where he was in the castle. On the downside,
he still was separated from Sirius and Peter. He couldn't, in good faith, go
back to the dorms without them. He'd never hear the end of it, from Sirius at
least, if he fled up to the safety of his curtained bed like a baby. No doubt
Peter would share his cowardly retreat with Lupin, as well, and god only knew
that was going to lead to unwanted bloodshed.
Looking at the stupid door, he tried to screw up his courage. Part of being an
adult was understanding that no matter what happened or who he was with,
inevitably, he was always alone. Here today, gone tomorrow, as the saying went.
Depending on someone else was stupid. Maybe all the other snot nosed kids
waited around for some adult to take pity on them and make them feel better,
but not James. Unlike Lupin, he'd figured out that adults, as a whole, didn't
give a damn unless there was something in it for them. He could jump around and
demand their attention like Lupin, but in the end, it only got a bloke hurt when
they demonstrated that they were only out for their own interests.
James wouldn't have been hurt by Longbottom's callous desertion. He never would
have mistaken Longbottom's easy going chatter for genuine affection, because
James had known from the start that it was already affection that was bought
and paid for in the teacher salary package. Maybe on some level, Longbottom
actually felt something for Lupin, but even then, it was just as insubstantial
as the man's position in the school.
Here today, gone when it suits them.
In fact, the way he saw it, most of the world was like that. Sighing, James
decided he wouldn't be at all surprised if Sirius and Peter had made their way
straight back to the dorms after their untimely separation. Peter had probably
bawled hysterically after Sirius's rather daredevil jump across the stairwell.
But then again, Sirius was a strange kind of bloke. James was half convinced
that Sirius didn't know the meaning of the word fear. Hell, if he were here
now, he'd die laughing at James's hesitation over a bloody howl on the wind and
a couple of dark hallways.
Sirius wouldn't have been scared of going outside. Sirius wasn't scared of a
blasted thing.
Hesitantly, he pushed open the door and peered beyond the hedges that lined the
castle wall before he slipped farther out. So what if the castle bordered the Forbidden
Forest, right? It wasn't like dangerous dark creatures had complete run of the
castle grounds. He was safe here. It was a blasted school, for hell's sake. If
he couldn't be safe at school, then where could he be safe?
But then again, he thought that home could be a safe place, too.
And, not for the first time, James felt his face heat up with anger. So he was
all alone. Big deal. He didn't need someone holding his hand. So what if there
were funny animals growling out in the Forbidden Forest? God only knew he'd
faced worse. He wasn't scared of some stupid moon in the sky. And he wasn't
afraid to walk outside unprotected under its light. He was an adult. And fuck
anyone or anything that suggested otherwise.
An utterly inhuman scream echoed loudly across the lake, rousing what seemed to
be about half of the Forbidden Forest in response. Gooseflesh creeped up his
arms as the sound triggered memory after memory. He knew exactly what had made that sound.
Shuddering hard as the monster screeched once more, he clapped his hands over
his ears.
There was no way in a million years that Sirius would have been able to
convince Peter to come outside the castle walls, James decided suddenly. How
dumb had he been to even think it a possibility?
Whirling around he tried to run back into the castle only to collide with
something warm and solid as the beast in the distance screamed. James tried to
scream himself, but his voice caught in his throat as he scrambled to get out
of the grip of the beast that had apparently appeared behind him when he hadn't
been paying attention.
"Thought you'd do a bit of exploring on your own, eh?"
James's head whipped up fast at that, and he almost fell to the ground in
relief as the crotchety caretaker's face came into focus. "Got lost," he
managed to croak out as the man leered down at him, reeking of garlic.
"You'll regret ever having ventured out tonight, I'm sure. Useless brats, the
whole lot of you. Always skulking about sniveling and ruining all my hard work.
Hope your little prank was worth it, because your hide will be mine for the
next fortnight."
"I wasn't planning a prank," he managed to make himself blurt out as his heart
beat slowly started to return to normal.
"That's what they all say," the caretaker gestured wildly, drawing James's
attention to what had most likely brought the man outside in the first place.
"I-I wasn't feeling well."
"So now you're going to tell me you were searching for the infirmary?"
On the whole, James considered himself a rather non-squeamish type of bloke. He
could prank with the best of them. He could feasibly eat pond scum on a dare
and touch dragon feces if his manhood was called into question.
But the two rabbits that the caretaker held in hands? James could handle blood.
He could even handle seeing some of the gorier quidditch accident woundings.
But blood dripping off of two lifeless rabbits as they stared blankly at him?
Looking at two rabbits who hung by their ears and hearing the slight plip-plop
noise of blood splashing on the stone step? Seeing two creatures that looked as
if they'd been mauled by a mad dog?
He nodded dully at the caretaker's question as the blood roared in his own
ears, and then lost all of what had once been dinner on the man's mud stained
shoes.
*****
"Oh, Remus."
It was the sharp intake of breath, Remus decided, that really clued him in to
the fact that he must have made an absolute hash of himself this moon. Sure, on
a certain level, he knew he was hurting like hell. And yeah, his overly
sensitive nose could pick up the metallic, sticky tang of his own blood.
In truth, though, he'd had a hard time mustering up the energy to even care. If
the world weren't already gray, he would have suspected that it had turned gray
merely because he felt so lifeless.
"You put your foot in it this time," Longbottom's words were accompanied with a
heavy sigh, and Remus deigned to open an eye to look at the concerned face of
his professor as the man bent down to his level.
"I don't need your help." The words sounded scratchy and making them made his
eyes water as the sound rubbed at an apparently already raw throat.
"Because you don't mind bleeding to death on the floor? Hm, thanks but I think
you rather do need my help."
Remus let his tired eyelid slam back down, shutting out the image of the man as
he scraped under Remus's limp body and hauled him up. He supposed Longbottom
had him there. He rather did need the bastard's help. Although, he couldn't
help but think sometimes that it wouldn't be that big of a deal if he did bleed
to death on the floor.
After all, no one was going to hold his hand next year. And he doubted that
anyone would be particularly accommodating after he left school. The rest of
the world certainly wasn't going to cut him any slack, and if that was the
case, then in theory, he really ought to get used to bleeding all over
everything by himself with only himself to clean it up and make things better.
It wasn't like his lycanthropy was going to just go away. Everyone else was.
Would it really be that bad to bleed to death? He was so tired. He was tired of
trying to fit in, he was tired of being lied to, and he was tired of being a
werewolf.
"Look," Longbottom sighed heavily at about the same time that Remus felt the
cool, damp air of the morning hit his skin. "I know it's difficult being
different than everyone else."
Different? That made Remus open both
eyes and muster up the energy to sneer at Longbottom's concerned face. "You
know?" This time he had to cough as the words rasped at the back of his throat.
People who flooded lavs for the hell of it were different. People who could
talk about Quidditch until his ears bled were different. People who asked the
class outcast for help on their Defense homework were different. He was not
merely different. He was his own
bloody species. The service door into the castle came into view, and Longbottom
moved through it with a flick of his wand, as he seemed to be pondering Remus's
question.
"I know it can't be easy," Longbottom started. "And I know it's not going to
get any easier."
As if the man even had a clue.
"Like you care."
"Brat," Longbottom said easily as Remus let his eyes slide shut one more time.
He was just so damned sick and tired of the whole thing. "I do care. You have a
chance here. You deserve a chance here."
Maybe this was the biggest thing he hated about people knowing. He wasn't a
person to Longbottom. Or, at the very least, it didn't seem like he was a
person to the good Professor. He was a just a cause. Or an interesting field
study. It was hard to say which, really.
He'd been able to relax around Longbottom. He'd been able to joke around, and
it had seemed like Longbottom seriously hadn't minded that for one night out of
the month Remus could literally rip him to shreds and devour his flesh with
absolutely no feelings of remorse. Longbottom was supposed to be an ally.
Someone who really did understand
that it was hard and why it was so difficult for a werewolf to masquerade as a
normal well-adjusted student.
Instead, Longbottom had seen him as a quick way to get some auror training in
before he moved away from the snot-nosed kids of Hogwarts to the bigger and better
things involved in hunting down dark creatures and criminals. In a way, Remus
was sure that he'd betrayed some of the greatest secrets his species kept to
the very person who was likely to become their judge, jailer and executioner.
Oh yeah, he was thrilled that Longbottom had taken a chance to get to know him.
To dupe him. And wasn't Remus just so glad he'd taken a chance on this school.
On himself and on believing that he could make it work, despite the fact that
no werewolf before him had been able to.
"I didn't ask for a chance," Remus muttered back sullenly, opening his eyes
enough to take in the steps and the door to the infirmary. He hadn't asked to
become a werewolf. He didn't ask for this affliction, and there wasn't a damn
thing anywhere that said he had to accept his lycanthropy with grace. He didn't
have to like it. Which was good, because he fucking hated it. He didn't have to
make the best of it, because it was his life to screw up, thank you very much.
So someone, somewhere had decided to give the dangerous dark creature a chance.
What? Did they expect him to grovel in appreciation? Did they think that they
were doing him a favor by forcing him to live in a world that he knew he most
certainly did not belong in? Fat
Chance.
He let his head loll back as Longbottom hoisted him up slightly to get a better
grip as they walked through to the center of the infirmary. Out of the corner
of his eye, Remus caught the flutter of fabric, and without drawing attention
to the fact that he was trying to get a better look, he craned his neck
slightly, until his eyes met another pair hidden across the room.
Potter.
Well, hell, wasn't that just perfect. Potter was just everything he wasn't and
was never going to be. The irony was not lost on him, for once.
"Sometimes, Remus, you are the most ungrateful little snot I've ever had the
pleasure of teaching." Longbottom's voice made him break eye contact with his
mortal enemy for a moment. Ungrateful. Because, obviously, he should be kissing
some serious arse since they'd deigned to allow him to do what every other
magical child in the country was entitled to. Fuck that.
Peter aside, he was never going to fit in at this school. The Headmaster knew
it. The kids knew it. The professors knew it. And Remus was certain that even
Longbottom knew it too, since the man wasn't going to stay more than a lousy
year to see how his year group progressed up to the next level. Fine. He didn't
want to be a part of it all, anyway.
Glaring, he found Potter's eyes across the room as the sneaky bastard crouched
down behind one of the unmade hospital beds. He'd never fit in like Potter.
That was the whole point. "Well, yeah, you know us werewolves," he smirked as
Potter's eyes grew wide, "we don't do gratitude all that well."
Longbottom sighed in exasperation, and with a satisfied smile, Remus let his
eyes slide shut once more, tuning out the man's frustrated grumbling. His
secret was bound to be all but published in the Daily Prophet by the time he
made it out of the infirmary this time. He'd spent all this time dreading that
the other kids would find out. That they'd discover exactly why they were so
justified in treating him like a social leper.
And now that he was sure that they would know within the next couple hours, it
felt like someone had taken a couple stone off his shoulders. It was a relief.
And it was so heady, that when he started slipping into the oblivion of
exhausted, pain-induced sleep, he did so with a smile on his face.
*****
