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CHAPTER TWO

TELL ME IT ISN'T TRUE – OR LOVE

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N.E.W.T.s were due in a month and between spending time with Bella, recovering from having transformed on a recent full moon night and preparing for the exams, Remus had little time or energy to spend with his best friends. However, they knew that Moony was a study-maniac when it came to exams and did not bother him.

Nobody bothered him except a tall, snobbish-faced blonde from Slytherin – Narcissa Black, and if rumours were true, to be Narcissa Malfoy as soon as she was done with Hogwarts.

She didn't exactly create a nuisance for him as she rarely even talked to him. However, more than once, Remus had caught the haughty blonde regarding him with a nasty look in her eyes – almost threatening. Though Remus couldn't have bothered less, but he was worried for Bella's sake.

One night, when they had sneaked off to a seemingly uninhabited tower they had discovered during one of their night-strolls, Remus mentioned Narcissa to Bellatrix.

Bellatrix seemed unruffled. "Though I am not sure if she knows about us or not, I don't care. I won't be the first rebel of our family."

"But you aren't quite like Sirius, Bella."

"Thank Merlin!" she said laughingly. "Really, Remus, it is useless to worry about useless things! And I am interested in much more important things tonight," she said, pressing her lips to his.

However, after that day, Remus noticed that Narcissa never looked his way at all. He was intrigued, but didn't press the matter. He trusted Bella to sort out her matters with her sister quite well.

And things went on so, and before he knew, N.E.W.T.s were there. That week, Remus saw Bellatrix only once – when she was coming out after her Practical Charms Exam. However, she didn't seem to notice him. She was too preoccupied – her eyes were almost opaque in her anxiety. Remus knew she wasn't particularly good at the Concealing Charm – and it had worried her a lot. He thought the matter to be no more than that.

But he never remembered afterwards that the Charms Practical had not required anyone to perform the Concealing Charm.

o-o-o-o-o-o-

"You are absolutely daft, Bellatrix Black! Mother will be absolutely crazy when she knows what you propose to do!" Narcissa yelled at Bellatrix.

The brunette took a deep breath and fixed her sister with an icy glare. "What part of my explanation have you not understood?"

"You do know that everyone expects you to marry Rudolphus, don't you? What if that beggar wolf asks you to marry him before you get him over to our side?"

Bellatrix was angered beyond reason at hearing her sister refer to Remus that way.

"That is none of your business! It is not my fault that you are deemed too incapable of any job – any important job – by the Dark Lord!" she said frostily, taking up her Potions notes and deciding to go down to the Common-Room.

"You will regret this!" she heard Narcissa yell behind her.

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"What was that about?"

Severus Snape – an ugly, friendless, bad-tempered, sarcastic, evil Slytherin – in short, a person in whom I found a companion without the fear of betrayal or… guilt…

"Narcissa doesn't need a reason to yell – you know that as well as I, Severus."

"Do you really need to revise that?" he asked, glancing arrogantly at the Potions notes in my hands.

Severus is somewhat like Remus when it comes to studies – very, very hard-working. However, he believes that his talent for Potions is something he was born with. It is rather funny – if you can manage to close your eyes to that vain look in his cool eyes.

I never manage that, so I was angry. Not with him though, with Narcissa. But I spilled it out on Severus, because I knew it didn't matter to him whether I shouted at him or was polite. He was too wrapped up in his own world – with his own weird dreams. Moreover, if I was to meet Remus after the exam tomorrow, I might as well do it in an anger-free mood.

"Don't act Sirius, Severus!" I know he loathes being compared to my cousin.

He glared at me in a way that instinctively made me swallow hard, and then he turned away, leaning back in his chair and closing his eyes.

He might as well have taunted me about not having mastered Potions by now for those five hours. Because I managed to study almost next to nothing in those hours; after all, I had a lot of things on my mind.

Remus and Remus and Remus and Remus – nothing other than him… In the past month, I had enjoyed the intimacy with him a bit too much. I had even forgotten for some time when I was with him that I was a BLACK – no, The BLACK. He had a queer way of turning me into a romantic girl – something I had detested… or I had thought that I had detested.

But this was too much. This was only for a little while… once we had graduated… everything would be…

Somehow, I didn't want to think about it at all.

It was nice avoiding thinking about it. I have never found a reason for unnecessary foresight. Why was I to begin that now?

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He noticed that something was amiss. He noticed that I was worried. No matter how hard I try to screen my emotions, Remus always manages to read me quite well.

Oh Merlin! If only he would read my true motives and go away… What I won't give to make him leave me!

But he won't leave me. Seeing the love in his clear grey eyes, I cannot but feel that he would die a thousand times and more before stop loving me.

Instead of making me arrogant, as it normally would, the thought breaks my heart. It kills me like a slow poison.

One day, not far away in future, I would betray the eyes I have grown to love.

Yes, with an eerie Gryffindor courage, I accept that I am in love with him. How I wish someone would convince me that this is a delusion! This has to be a nightmare! I have fallen in love with him! This is wrong! I cannot fall in love with him! I am Bellatrix BLACK!

And yet, with him, that holds little significance. He sees through the arrogance, the pride, the vanity… He can read my heart through my eyes. Am I being poetic? Merlin, I am going to crack up any moment!

And yet… he does not change me. No, though I change in his presence, I do not stop being myself.

With him, I learn who I really am.

All I wish was that this… this dream would never end.

But it will – very soon.

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She was very upset about something. But he didn't press her into telling him what it was. She was a strong and would not have liked pity.

The graduation… it was hard knowing that their future was very bleak. There was little that could herald that they would have a pleasant time together like Lily and James, thought Remus wistfully.

He saw her mother during the Graduation Ceremony – very tall, very thin, very high-nosed, very expensively dressed, very aristocratic… and from the look in her eyes… very much a Death-Eater. Not far away was his love, looking at her mother with an expression he could not figure out. It wasn't one of love, happiness or anything pleasant. It wasn't one of hatred, loathing or anything unpleasant. It was more like insecurity, helplessness, as if she was scared.

Breaking away from his friends, he went up to her.

"Bella?"

She didn't hear him the first time. He called her name again.

"Remus?" The helplessness in her eyes pained him.

"What's the matter, Bella?"

"I don't know, Remus. I don't know anything. I don't know what should happen. I don't know if this is right!"

Remus' heart missed a beat. "You… you mean about… us?"

"No. That is right. It feels so right, doesn't it, Remus? But I am not sure that it should feel so right."

"Calm down, Bella. Things will turn out well."

"They won't, Remus. Somehow, I know they won't. And it scares me, Remus. It really, really scares me. I don't know what to do. I have never been so out of depth before."

Neither had been Remus.

Since his parents' death, last year, Remus had nowhere to go. Though only his very close friends knew that he was a werewolf, it still bothered him a lot. For at that time someone called Umbridge was trying to pass a bill against the employment of 'half-magical creatures'. As if! He had always been one of the top students of Hogwarts and was as deft with his wand as he was at potion-brewing.

He wasn't rich and had an uncanny feeling that nothing would improve that condition in near future.

With a sinking heart, he accepted that love does not go by itself alone.

He wasn't even sure that he would be able to keep Bellatrix happy if they had a future together.

Sighing, Remus thought that he was too practical for his own good.

"Where will you be this summer?" asked Bella quietly.

Remus shrugged. "I'll stay at James and Sirius' for a week."

"While finding a job?"

Remus smiled wryly.

Bellatrix restrained herself with great difficulty from hugging him reassuringly. These urges had to be repressed.

Before she could reply, Narcissa came up behind her. "I think it is time to go, Bella."

Glaring at her, Bella turned to Remus one last time. "Maybe we could meet…?"

"I am not sure. But I will try to. Of course."

Bella smiled warmly at him – a genuine, affectionate smile.

She turned to go, but stopped suddenly.

Turning back, she leaned close to him and whispered, "Remus, I really love you."

"I know that. I love you, too."

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Okay, this was it.

Things as they ought to be. Things as they should be. Things as they deserved to be.

Slytherins, by no means, were fighting-for-right people. Certainly not! They valued there life very much, thank you.

But this was different. This was not a matter of life or death. This was a matter beyond all bounds of life and death, beyond all restraints of time. This was a matter of love.

Love… this sounded queer in my mind. I was disobeying my Lord because I think I am in love.

Think? No, I am in love – desperately, painfully.

Even now, I know that this love story will have a painful ending.

Better painful than tragic. Yes, there is a difference. Painful things are not always tragic. They sometimes are extremely important to move on.

So this was the first time I am doing something absolutely selflessly… and I am nervous.

Well, not even that selfless because I am doing this for Remus as I want him to live, because I want him to get what he deserves and I will be happy in his happiness.

The only downfall of this otherwise beautiful plan is that I will have to take help from Mr. Sirius I-am-a-dung-brain Black.

Well, for Remus…

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From the Author:

I am very grateful to everyone who has reviewed. I would like to pre-warn the readers that there is implication of homosexuality in the next chapter.

As usual, more reviews are always welcome.

Thank-you.

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