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The Darkness Within
"Had I but known how quickly our loved ones can be ripped from our grasp, perhaps I would have…" Done what? Remus asked himself bitterly. There were no answers. He scratched out the words, still wet with darker than black ink, and tossed this parchment into the wastebasket among the others. What the hell are you trying to accomplish with this Moony? He thought to himself.
In all honesty, he was only trying everything in his power to simply keep his head above the metaphorical waters of reality. How writing down his innermost thoughts would accomplish that though, Remus was not quite sure. Perhaps he had read it in a book once. The fact was, however, that everyone he had ever held dear in his entire life was dead to him. Murdered or murdering, it was all the same to him. And here he was, one year later, the lone survivor of what had once been a legacy of love and laughter. Little by little he was being suffocated by the rotting stench of days gone by.
Flinging an already cracked teacup into the sink and pulling a worn overcoat about his gaunt shoulders, Remus fled into the dark, cool night. Both the darkness and the coolness were a relief. These days he shrank from anything too bright, too warm, too alive.
Remus had never been a very religious boy, and neither was he a religious man. It's hard to believe in God, he would tell her, when you are a monster. Nonetheless, standing in the back of the chapel, watching the mesmerizing flicker of the candles, he felt almost spiritual.
He hung back for quite some time, hands shoved deeply into his worn pockets, watching the others shyly, guiltily. He should not have come tonight. He should have known it would be busy. Tomorrow was All Saints Day, after all, and many people had come to pray for the souls of loved ones. He ducked his head in shame as a tear-streaked woman ushered two blonde children down the aisle past him.
His conscience scratched uncomfortably at the back of his mind, reminding him what an imposter he was, standing there in the house of God brimming with anger and despair, not to mention his stomach full of peppermint tea laced with brandy. He hoped the young mother had assumed his eyes were rimmed with red from tears and not that he was a nineteen-year-old alcoholic on the brink of self-destruction. That was assuming, however, that the woman had actually noticed him. People seemed to look straight through him these days. No one would have ever guessed, to look at him now, that there was a time when his honey colored eyes shone with mirth and mischief. He was lackluster now, through and through.
There was a hand on his arm. He jumped, coming almost violently from his reverie. It was the priest, a too thin, but kind looking man, not much older than himself.
"I was going to lock up now. Is there something you wanted to do?" The man's voice filled up the cold antechamber, pressing warmth against Remus' heart. He blinked a slow blink, his wolfish eyes readjusting to his dimly lit surroundings, before nodding.
Hurrying up the center aisle, the priest's eyes at his back, Remus reminded himself that he should not even be here. He wasn't even Catholic, though she had been. It was the only thing he could think of though, the only way to survive the night. The prayer candles, in their red votives, did not mock him as he approached, as he had feared they would. Rather, they beckoned him close, begging him to spill the secrets of his soul. A tear rolled down his cheek. Secrets he had, but the soul, he was not so sure.
"How can you not believe in souls when we are soul mates?" Her voice came screeching through his mind like a freight train, shattering the glass walls of his memory. She had told him that one night when they were laying on a sofa in the common room, noses so close they were touching. A chill went through his body at the thought of it. Or perhaps because he was being touched again, a foreign sensation these days. The priest had a hold on his elbow, pressing a long tapered candle into Remus' hand with which to light one of the votives. His eyes said "it's alright," though he didn't say a word.
Remus' hand shook as he neared the table of candles. He delved deep within himself, searching for some shred of faith with which to perform this simple act. There had been a fire burning inside him once. And now there was just an empty void nothing left but smoldering embers. Yet someone had told him, once, in that melodic voice of hers, that a candle loses nothing by lighting another candle. And he owed it to her, more than anything he owed this to her.
The flame struggled into existence, licking desperately at its oppressively cold surroundings for nourishment. We are kindred spirits, you and I, Remus thought to himself, vaguely aware of how abnormal it was to talk to candles. Nonetheless, Remus felt the fissures in his heart begin to heal a little. Pressing the taper back into the priest's hand, Remus hurried from the church.
On the walk home, Remus passed miniature ghosts, pint-sized vampires, and little beasts running to and fro, bags of candy swinging from their wrists. The older ones remembered this from before it got too dangerous, though for many of the younger ones, this was a first. He wanted to grab them and shake them by the shoulders and tell them his friends died so they could run about, enjoying their All Hallow's Eve. A little angel in drooping wings and soggy pink slippers stopped him though. He'd had a Guardian Angel. Once.
"What kind of Guardian Angel has red hair?" He asked that night; the night after she'd rushed into the library and resolutely told him that she had recently discovered that she was in fact his Guardian Angel. To his question, she could only laugh in response, that nose crinkling, eye dancing laugh of hers. Remus soon found out that Guardian Angels with red hair were the best kind. Two parts Heaven and one part devilish little imp.
Her eyes would gleam, almost maniacally, when she talked about his being a werewolf. In her mind she had built it up as something heroic, something tragically beautiful. He hadn't the heart to explain that there was nothing heroic about it, that it was only primal and revolting. He'd had to eventually, of course, but not without actually thinking it could work out between them. He'd tried to push her away so many times, but she'd only dance back, lighting candles along the way. There wasn't anyone who didn't love her.
Still, it was only after Lily turned into a doe, as she insisted that she too could be an animagus and they could live together that way, that Remus knew the truth. She would one day belong to James. That was the first time his heart ever broke, though it would break time and time again as he pushed her into James arms, as they proudly stood as Head Boy and Head Girl, as they danced at their wedding, the golden couple. I could have been golden too Remus thought to himself as he stood outside the door to his cottage, which was little more than a shack full of silence and darkness. More darkness than silence though. The kind of darkness a thousand candles could never scare away, the darkness within.