Disclaimer: Still don't own anything!
Shadowsfriend: Hey Biggi! don't worry I won't stop writing even if I have few reviews. Thanks for telling me I have an original idea though, it really makes my day!
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CHAPTER 5
Down the stairs
When Harry reached him, Ron was already standing in front of Professor Lupin. Strangely, there was no noise in the Gryffindor Common Room. No laughter, no joking, no talking and chatting, nothing. Just many curious glances towards Lupin, Ron, and now himself.
Lupin was standing beside Seamus and Dean, facing Ron, and Harry averted his gaze, though not without noticing that Lupin was unusually pale and looked quite sick.
Then Lupin opened his mouthand spoke ina dry, low tone.
"Mr. Weasley, please follow me," he said, tucking his hands into the pockets of his long cloak.
What, afraid to speak in front of me? Harry thought.
"What's he done?" he cut in shortly.
Lupin was going to be forced to speak to him now. There was no other way, unless he wanted to make a fool of himself in front of the whole eagerly listening Gryffindor Common Room. Harry felt himself taking a step forward so Lupin couldn't talk directly to Ron anymore.
Just say it. Say it you don't want to see me anymore.
That way we'll just declare open war and at least we'll be over with avoiding each other's glances.
Lupin stared at him in the eyes. There was something Harry didn't like in that glance. Something close to hesitation maybe─
You can't hesitate.
You can't do that.
As much as he hated to admit it─ and he never would─ Lupin's thoughts mattered a lot to him. Harry knew he'd never be able to lie to Remus. He would have wished it, but there was something that held him back. If he lied to Lupin ─the only last link to his parents and to Sirius─ it would be like lying to them to.
This paradox beyond his control felt like a never-ending pain in his chest.
"There's been─" Lupin started, but stopped abruptly.
Once again, he met Harry's eyes… and Harry stood there, unable to stare anywhere else. They were void and seemed empty, in a way, and suddenly Harry started to imagine what Lupin's life had been like.
He could see much, much more than before in those eyes. In a fraction of second, he saw his parents at Hogwarts when they were younger, he saw Sirius and Peter chatting happily, careless, oblivious to the events that would happen later.
There were pranks, and games, and fun, and Quidditch, and lessons, and everything else fifteen years old did at school.
That one time seemed to fade away as Lupin's glance grew colder. Sadder. It felt for Harry as if he was seeing Lupin's life for the first time, all spread out before him.
Now Voldemort was a threat. They were still together, all of them. Peter, Sirius, James, Lily, Remus. Lily and the Marauders. Padfoot, Prongs, Wormtail and Moony.
Harry was just born. Still, they held on to each other, but the Dark Side was gaining power…
Death Eaters were everywhere. Fear and dismay. Betrayal and deaths. Forgiveness and punishments, cold-blooded murders and terror. They had killed wizards Lupin knew, and it had hurt him deeply.
But it was nothing compared to what he had felt when Lily and James had died, when Sirius had betrayed them all─ or so he thought─ and killed Peter.
Lupin blinked and the memory changed.
Years later, Remus was teaching Harry in third year; he knew that Sirius was on the run and he was worried… Then there had been the happy discovery that Sirius was innocent.
So why did you end up killing him?
Whichever way he looked at it, Harry knew where it would lead him. It always ended up to the veil. Without it Harry would have ran to Lupin, right now, and maybe─ maybe apologized for having never realized just through how much Lupin had gone.
But the fact was there had been the Department of Mysteries. Harry forgot his previous thoughts; because it always endedat that nightmare. Remus was holding him back, and Sirius was falling.
Falling.
Falling.
Until he was out of sight.
Gone.
Dead.
Reporting his glance with hatred on him, Harry saw Remus still hesitating. What was Lupin waiting for? Why wasn't he speaking? It was weighing maddeningly on Harry's patience.
He meant to open his mouth─ he would make Remus spit out the words because he couldn't bear waiting─ but Ron was quicker.
"What?" his friend said expectantly.
"Just follow me," Lupin muttered.
Before Harry reacted Remus walked in the direction of the rest of the people in the Common Room. "Mrs. Weasley," he addressed Ginny. "Would you please come along too?"
What? Harry stood there, puzzled. There was some sort of mental pressure on his mind now;as ifa part of his body was urging him to understand what was going on, while the other was too perplexed to try and figure out anything.
Why on earth did Lupin want Ginny to come among?
At first, up in the Dormitory, Harry had thought it was a joke. Lupin couldn't be waiting for Ron in the Common Room.
Then, upon seeing him, Harry had believed it had something to do with Ron's work. Maybe a late essay? Though he could think of none, it was the only possibility to explain it all.
But now, Ginny?
The girl looked up at Lupin with surprise then dropped the book she had been holding on the table. It landed there with a sickening thump and from a corner ofhis eyes Harry saw that Lupin hadpaled, if possible, even more. He looked strongly shaken, as though he'd just been slapped in the face.
Who cares?
Don't say that!A part of his brain made him hate himself for his own thoughts.
Oh yeah? WHO CARES?
One of Ginny's friends moved aside to let her pass and, stiffly, she came forward. The Common Room had never been so quiet.
Then, awkwardlly, Lupin turned away from Harry and everyone else and Ginny and Ron followed him.
Harry distantly heard the Fat Lady complaining before the Portrait closed, and only then did he realize he had held his breath for a long time. He drew in a big mouthful of air and, apparently, so did everyone else.
"What's he done?" Dean asked him as Harry was reaching the bottom of the stairs that led to the girl's Dormitory.
Harry shrugged and came forward to Parvati Patil, coming down from the stairs.
"Get Hermione for me, will ya?" he asked. His attempts to make it sound polite failed miserably; he realized it too late when Parvati's face flushed with angry colors.
"Now maybe you'd like me to get you introduced to the word 'please'," she spoke harshly, then ignored him and passed right in front of him.
Girls, Harry thought.
Then he felt a surgeanger rise through him. "Fine!" he said, and posted himself right in front of the staircase.
"HERMIONE!" he yelled. He knew Hermione wouldn't like that─ but at the same time, she would soon understand there were more important things going on.
Half the students had jumped at his first call; now, when he shouted again, most of them stopped whatever they were doing to glare at him in annoyance.
"H-E-R-M-I-O-N-E!" he called for the fifth time.
Finally she arrived.
"What?" she seemed irritated too. "What?" she repeated more nervously, seeing the look on Harry's face.
"It's Ron," Harry took her by the arm and led her in a corner, then launched himself in the story of what had just happened.
By the time he was finished, Hermione's mouth had dropped slightly open.
"So?" Harry said eventually. "Do you get any of it?"
There was a silence.
"I'm afraid I do," Hermione muttered. "Listen, Harry, this might be bad. First the teachers walk out of the Great Hall precipitedly, then Remus comes back here to get Ron and Ginny─"
She left the end of her sentence hanging. It didn't take Harry supreme intelligence to know what she had wanted to mean.
Whatever had happened in the night and that was in the Daily Prophet─ because something had unquestionably happened─ couldn't be something that made him wish he knew.
Especially if it directly concerned Ron and Ginny.
Something's not right, he told himself.
Just what exactly was wrong, he would find out one way or another. Soon enough.
