ALWAYS THERE

Chapter Two: Again and Again

Any and all reviews welcome, even if they seem like a waste of your time I'll cherish them and take all advice and suggestions to heart. Flamers will be laughed at- you can't possibly say something I haven't already though of myself! (I wrote this story a few years ago.)

A special thank you to: Pistashimo and Ramzes for the kind reviews. It was for you two that I'm posting this as soon as I got back from vacation.

'Words in between half quotes and in italics are thoughts.'

Disclaimer: I own nothing you can find in any book or other copyright material. Yet. Just you wait.

end of author's rant

November of 1981-just after Harry's parents died and Sirius sent to Azkaban.

Remus lay on the couch in the apartment he had once shared with Sirius. 'Sirius has betrayed us.' It was the only thought that had entered Remus's brain for the past three weeks. 'Why? What did we do to make him go dark? How could we fail to notice all the signs?'

Remus was sitting on that same couch again, just like had three years ago, but this time in the dark. He didn't have enough money to pay the electricity bill, so he kept flashlights about. In truth, he never used any of them, but the muggles that he rented the apartment from would think it odd that he could light a wand, or that he didn't need light at all.

Suddenly, there was loud knock on the door. Sighing Remus pushed himself off the couch and grabbed a flashlight. Slowly he opened the door. "Is the electricity out in your apartment, or something?" The strange man asked. He was less than two meters in height, which Remus found reassuring because he still half expected to see the werewolf slayer every time he opened the door.

"No," Remus whispered, "is there something I can help you with?"

"Sir, you haven't paid rent for this month and unless you can pay it by Saturday, then I'll have to kick you out."

"Rather blunt, aren't you?"

The man nodded, completely unabashed, but didn't verbally respond.

"Very well, I shall send in the rent by Saturday."

"Good day to you, Sir."

"Good day."

Remus closed the door and strolled back into the apartment. 'Good day indeed!' he thought savagely. 'What can I sell to pay the rent?' He went from room to room looking for something to sell, but he had sold most of the things that weren't nessecities already. Finally, upon finding nothing, he entered Sirius's room, a place he had avoided at all costs ever since the news of all that had happened had reached his ears.

Looking around the room, he saw many things that he could sell right off the wand (or bat if you're a muggle J). The lamp that he'd never use again was one item to go. All of Sirius's jewlery for another: the earrings for Sirius's single pierced ear, chain necklaces, and rings. They were mostly made of gold, and there wasn't a piece of silver in sight, something Sirius had made sure of since his flatmate was a werewolf. Remus wondered why he had done it, but wrote it off as something to help Sirius to keep up the charade of being a caring friend. Remus tiredly and stiffly opened the closet and was greeted with a colorful array of robes. Casting an eye over them, he say he could tailor a few to fit himself, but the more expensive ones would bring in enough money to feed him for a month for every robe he sold. Remus picked out the ones he was going to keep and lay them on the bed. There was still another sixty robes in the closet. Remus wasn't consience of it, but the robes he had picked to keep were the ones with sentimental value: The robe Sirius had worn when they had all gone to a bar for the first time, (Sirius had been sick all over it afterward, but none of that remained even to the werewolf's sensitive nose) the robe Sirius had worn most when he had sat next to Remus through various illnesses, and the robe that Sirius wore during one of Remus's remarkably painful transformations- after which Sirius had cleaned him up, helped him back into bed, and been there when Remus woke up.

Remus picked up all of the robes, the lamp, the jewlery, and several other things and went back to his room, closing the door to Sirius's old room. Some demons he honestly wasn't ready to face. He laid the robes that he was going to keep over the old wooden chair in his room. The rest of the robes he folded nicely for his next trip to London.

scene change

Two days later, only half the stuff was sold, but it was more than enough to pay the bills for the next couple of months and it was the full moon again tonight.

Remus put together the rent money and readied it to be sent to the collector dude. Glancing at his watch, Remus realized he really should apparate to the old shed behind his parents' house for the transformation. So that's what he did.

As Remus staggered up to the shed he watched the horizon. The sun was inches from sinking below the horizon. Remus finally stumbeled into the shed, and locked the door behind him. He carefully placed his wand high up on the shelf in the corner, and hurriedly stripped and folded his clothes and swiftly flung them next to his wand. Just as he'd thrown the last rebelious sleeve ontop of the rest of his stuff, he felt the pain deep down in his gut that told him the transformation was starting.

He doubled over as the pain spread to the rest of his body. The claws and the teeth were the first wolf parts to come. They began assaulting the parts of Remus that were still human. Remus screamed at the top of his lungs, knowing this was going to be a difficult transformation. The wolf was already angry and mutilating Remus, and now for the first time in eight years there would be no dog, wolf, or stag to calm it or even simply distract it for a few hours, a few minutes, a few seconds. Remus whimpered as the his bones twisted and reshaped themselves, and still the claws and teeth attacked. Remus began to pray for the torture to stop, as he did every month; his prayers remained unaswered, as they always did.

Finally, fur began growing all over Remus's body. Soon his mind would be the wolf's, no longer human, with a higher threshold for pain. Remus gave one more half-human-half-wolf gasp, and then the human part of him was wholly absent.

The wolf spent all night trying to get at humans. At first he tried to get out of the shack, but his claws, strong as they were, snapped against the steel; his shoulders, strong as they were, dislocated themselves after one too many impacts; and his teeth, strong as they, too, were, eventually were damp with blood from the gums that had been stretched to allow the teeth a longer battle with metal.

Then, smelling human, the wolf began jumping up towards the shelf in the corner for a taste. It is a rather comical sight, a werewolf jumping up and down in place, but no one was there to see it. The wolf's jaws finally clamped down on a sleeve that had flung itself of the ledge. The wolf tore apart the garment in search of the human inside, but upon finding none, turned to the other pieces of clothing that had toppled to the floor with the shirt. Discovering a lack of humans, it tried to smell its prey out. He ultimately found that he stank of human being, too. Wolves in general are very smart, serene creatures, but the werewolf is not. He tore himself to pieces searching for the human inside, but never quite got to it.

Before the wolf could deal himself the final blow before death, the moon sank beneath the horizon, and Remus the human returned. Upon reentering his mind, Remus was in absolute physical distress. Nearly every bone in his body was broken, his clothes had been shredded to bits and pieces, and his wand was still up on the shelf. Remus was not quite sure whether to be appreciative of this last fact or to be miserable about it. On one hand the wolf hadn't snapped it, and he still had a wand, on the other he couldn't move at all, little say stand, and could not reach his wand to heal himself, or to call for help.

Remus lay there for barely five minutes before his exhausted brain caved in and he passed out. Remus lay there alone for several hours before the door creaked and a middle-aged woman stepped in. Mrs. Lupin gasped when she saw the condition her son was in. She took out her wand and did her best to heal some of his broken bones, his dislocated shoulders, and the deepest of the cuts.

As soon as she was sure she could move him without worsening any of his injuries, she picked up her son, and took him to her house. When she had tucked him into his old bed, a bed that had been unused for over half a decade, she cried. She hadn't spoken to Remus in so long. She'd seen him come to the shed every full moon, and then watched him leave with new scars all over his body. She blamed herself for each new scratch and bruise on her precious son. Had she been a more responsible mother, she would have not allowed Remus to play outside on a full moon so near the woods. She knew that Remus had no idea she watched when he left the shed, and if he did, he'd not relish the concept, but now her spying might very well have saved his life.

When Remus still hadn't exited the shed for four hours after the full moon, her worry had peeked. She knew he liked to stay there for a while and heal himself before venturing back in to the harsh world that often turned its back on him, but four hours was getting on the ridiculous side. She was thankful now that she had risked her boy's wrath to check on him.

Mrs. Lupin gathered Remus's torn clothes and his wand and walked back to the house. Maybe it was time she and Remus had a talk.

scene change

When Remus woke up he was in a vaguely familiar room, but his mind failed to dredge up a memory to explain the familiar feeling of it. He lay there, testing himself to see what had become of him. Surprisingly, he was in rather good condition considering what he'd felt like when he'd last been conscious.

When his mother walked into his room, the sight of her jogged his memory and he remembered. His old room…Wow! He hadn't been here for years, yet nothing had changed. The same blue tone to every piece of furniture in the room, the same maple bookshelf -now empty of books- and the same desk that had once been buried under parchment and quills.

"You're up!" Mrs. Lupin exclaimed at Remus.

"Hi to you too," Remus chuckled at her, but quickly resolved not to do that anymore. His ribs still hurt from being broken so recently.

"Are you okay?"

"I've been better."

"Remus," she sighed, before saying the words that strike fear into every heart except those of psychologists, "We need to talk…" She trailed off, eyes boring into the wall, seeing something beyond it.

"Mom?"

"Maybe you should come back and live here, it would be so much easier."

"Mom, I would really like to be able to live on my own, and I'm here every full moon, so if you want to get all cuddly then you go ahead and do that."

"Remmie-"

"Please don't call me that. Sirius called me that." Remus didn't mention the other name Sirius used to have for him, that one had more painful memories attached to it.

"Yes, well, I called you Remmie first."

"You did?" Remus raked his brains, but couldn't remember her ever calling him that cute, stupid nickname.

"Yes- until you were seven and wanted a more adult name."

Remus chuckled again before remembering that laughing with broken ribs hurt, "Yes, well, he called me Remmie more recently."

"No, I called you Remmie just a minute ago."

"But he called me Remmie for a longer period of time, and I don't want to be reminded of him. At all." Just as she was about to object, he added, "Mom."

His mother rolled her eyes and muttered, "Okay, you win, I'll call you Remus, but I still want you to move back in with your father and me," and she stomped out of the room before Remus could respond. Remus rolled his eyes at his mother's back. "Don't roll your eyes at me, young man!" The reprimand came from the other side of the house. Apparently, she still knew him better than he thought she did. Remus rolled his eyes again, not from a- nonexistent- rebellious attitude, but from habit.

Remus ended up staying with his mother for a couple more days, before heading back to the apartment Saturday night. Remus lay down on the couch. His mother had commanded him to take it easy, but Remus didn't need her voice ringing in his ears to tell him that if he didn't lie down and take it easy, his body would dish out the consequences.

Remus lay there for several hours before his body convulsed. Despite his precautions, he hadn't been well enough to apparate home. 'Great,' he thought sarcastically, 'just what I was hoping for: a visit from my already eaten dinner.' Remus tried to stumble towards the bathroom or even to the garbage can in the kitchen, but he didn't quite make it anywhere beyond halfway across the den. Remus collapsed to the floor and proceeded to be sick. He tried to drag himself to the kitchen after the first time, but was soon sick again. After being sick all over both himself and the den (or living room, whatever you call it) floor several times, Remus lay weakly down on the carpet.

He began wishing that Sirius was there. A logical part of him knew Sirius was in Azkaban and never coming back, and even if he did come back, Remus wouldn't want to see him anyway after what he'd done. The other part, the larger part for the moment, however, said that it didn't care and it wanted his friend there by his side. It wanted to be able to lean back and hug Sirius; it wanted to wake up in the middle of the night and see Sirius sitting there, never having left his side; it wanted a friend to comfort him through all his pain.

That night, Remus managed to clean up his mess, and was going to go lay down in a proper bed, with a garbage can by his side, when a knock came at the door. Unable to imagine who was knocking, Remus hobbled to the door as fast as possible, and threw it open. Standing before him was…(Dark evil music please!)…The rent collector person! (Ahhhh!)

"Sir, you said you'd have your rent in by today."

"I'm sorry I meant to send that in. Hold on, I'll get it." Remus made his way to the kitchen counter and grabbed the envelope from the counter. "I'm sorry, I meant to get this to you earlier, but I had a bit of an accident."

"That's all right, Sir. I said have it by Saturday, and its Saturday, and here it is. Good night."

"Good night," Remus replied before shutting the door in the man's face. He went to bed just after that little episode with the dark, evil rent collector. And just around midnight, Remus opened his eyes and saw Sirius, wearing a set of older robes, sitting in the small chair beside his bed. Remus, on instinct, reached for Sirius's hand only to grasp nothing but air. That was when Remus realized that the robes were empty, they were just the robes he was keeping, and that Sirius would no longer be there to comfort him through anything at all. He realized that Sirius would be in Azkaban for the rest of his short, miserable life- that every time he reached out to look for Sirius he was destined to be disappointed, again and again. Worse was the knowledge that once he'd thought and hoped Sirius would always be there.

To be continued… in chapter 3!

end of chapter; beginning of author's rants

Well? Come on, people! You read it! If you liked something, say so, and if you hated it, then tell me how you think I should improve it! Thanks.

There are two more chapters to this story, both nearly finished. Stick with me until then.

Advice of the chapter: Listen to your parents. They mean well. You should think independently of what they have to say, but their advice is always with the best of intentions behind it. Yes, I tried to tie this one into the chapter. The whole plant thing was kind of irrelavent, wasn't it?