Note: A few domestic issues before things get a bit more interesting...
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.
20: Anyone In The World
As he took a few careful yet shuffling steps forward and eased himself down upon the edge of the bed, Remus Lupin eyed the now luke-warm cup of tea upon his wife's bedside table solemnly.
"Your tea shall be cold, darling." he informed the pale-faced witch quietly as she lay back against her pillows, staring blankly up at the ceiling.
Dora Lupin remained mute.
Remus, at something of a loss as to what else to say, reached to pass a careful hand across the top of the cup, and immediately fresh steam rose in twisted ghostly ribbons up into the air. The room was suffocated by silence, that heavy absence of noise that could make breathing it in seem almost poisonous, that lack of sound that sooner or later one feels desperate to fill...
Remus reached to take hold of his wife by the hand, her fingers limp against his palm.
"Talk to me, Dora..." he said, shifting to fix her with a pleading look, but she didn't seem to notice. It was almost as if she simply wasn't there.
Perhaps she wasn't, Remus consented to musing grimly. He wouldn't want to be there if he were her, imprisoned in a body that refused to work, racked with pain and feeling downright betrayed by the one person in the world who swore to stand by you no matter what...
It had been almost an hour since Remus had presented Dora with a cup of tea and the news that he had, without bothering to consult her, owled Ron at the Ministry to say that she would be absent from work due to illness.
And it had been almost an hour since Dora had refused to look at him, let alone open her mouth to speak.
"I did it for the best, darling." he told her, as much to convince himself as to convince her. "I was only thinking of what's best for you..."
His attempts to explain himself seemed to finally goad her into responding.
"What right do you or anybody else have to tell me what's best for me?!" she hissed through clenched teeth, tears prickling at the corners of her eyes as she scowled at the ceiling. Remus' grip upon her hand tightened, just in case she felt spiteful enough to pull herself free from his grasp.
"None, of course."
"Well, then!"
"And of course you have every right to be angry. Just as you have every right to...to try to force yourself into the floo downstairs or ignore all the advice the hospital gives you. You have the right to ruin your body and damage your health because it's your body and your health and you can do whatever you want with it. It's yours, Dora. I'm not going to deny that..."
"Then fetch ink and parchment and..."
"You can do whatever you wish with whatever is yours, my darling. And my heart is yours. You've kept it for all these years..." he trailed off with a despairing sigh as he assured her: "And you can trample all over it and tear it in two, that's your right, that's what you have chosen to do this past week because I can't stand the sight of you like this, doing all this to yourself... as I say, that's your right, no matter how it hurts. But it swings both ways, you see. My heart is yours but equally your heart is mine, you gave it to me back when we were married and I can do whatever I wish with it. That's my right. And what I wish to do is protect it. I want your heart whole and full of life, my love. Because you'll break your own heart just as easily as you've broken mine, and I don't care if you think I'm hurting you, just as long as you can't hurt yourself. After all, broken hearts are twice as tragic in pairs."
Dora Lupin had always been acutely aware that she possessed a self-destructive streak that was indeed so engrained into her very being that her entire life was a collision course into one thing or another. Even when she had been a child, whimsical and carefree as any other, she had known deep down that there was something different about her, something buried deep inside that made her barrel through life where others simply took a gentle stroll...
The older she got, the more Dora came to realise that it wasn't that she had something that propelled her forward towards oblivion, it was more that other people avoided such trauma because they had something that she did not.
It was an off switch, a brake, a moment's pause.
Dora had been born missing this one crucial key to self-preservation. She didn't know how to switch off before life spiralled out of control, how to slow down when the world was moving at dizzying speeds, how to pause long enough to take stock of her surroundings and decide what truly was the best thing to do next.
And so she kept going, kept moving, kept striving no matter what goal had appeared upon the horizon. She knew how stopping worked, she understood the principles, the importance, she could tell when life was about to overwhelm her and yet she simply couldn't...
"Stop." Dora whispered, eyes squeezed closed as she reached to clutch at Remus' arm with one hand. "I can't stop...I know what it'll do to me...what it's already done, Remus, but I can't stop..."
Remus' grip upon her hand tightened until it was almost painful.
"Dora," he said, managing to inject such grave seriousness into just two syllables that his wife winced a little. "I need you to listen what I'm saying..."
"You're not listening to what I'm saying!" Dora interrupted miserably, voice raised in frustration. "I heard you, I'm listening but I don't know how to stop! What would I do if I did stop?! What would I...how would I..."
"It doesn't matter what happens afterwards, darling." Remus insisted firmly. "All that matters is that you stop. Stay at home, stay in bed, don't owl the Ministry, don't do anything at all, concentrate on relaxing, rest your body and rest your mind. Don't think of what comes after..."
"How can anyone ever not think of what comes after?" Dora interrupted, utterly at a loss, only for a careful palm pressed to her cheek to silence her. As she instinctively leant into his touch, Remus merely told her:
"Trust me."
Dora didn't know what she would do if she didn't have Remus to trust in. He knew all about stopping and being careful and not being rash or disregarding. She needed him to survive, she had no doubt about it, she needed his love, his steadying hand to guide her away from self-inflicted oblivion. So many people had commented over the years that Remus was dreadfully fortunate to have a wife like Dora to keep his head above the tumultuous, stormy waters of life, and yet Dora was certain that despite his reliance upon her, it was in fact Dora who needed Remus more by far.
Because Dora liked diving, deeper and deeper until her body ached and stiffened and she ran out of air, and only Remus seemed capable of dragging her back from the brink, back to the surface, back to life...
Some things simply didn't require words, and yet she felt so shaken that she said them anyway.
"Save me, Remus." she whispered, weary eyes drifting closed in defeat, and her husband's fingers smoothed the hair carefully back from her brow as he whispered:
"Do you love me, Nymphadora?"
She gave a feeble huff of amusement that he felt the need to ask.
"With all my heart and soul."
"Well then, my love," the werewolf concluded simply, "consider yourself saved." And with that he leant to press a kiss to her forehead before rising carefully back to his feet. As he turned to head for the door, Dora opened an inquiring eye to wonder:
"Where are you going?"
"To fetch my shining armour." came the ambiguous response.
Dora managed to follow Remus' advice for the majority of the morning. She slept for several hours, awakening near noon at which point she managed to persuade her husband to pen another note to the Ministry listing the tasks she had hoped to fulfil that afternoon. Remus sent the instructions off to Auror Headquarters and then insisted there be no more mention of it for the rest of the day. Dora slept again for another half hour, awakening to find both her husband and son stood peering through the bedroom doorway at her, midway through a hushed conversation.
"...Carrie could come for the evening once we've popped over to see Pan...we could even bring Pan over, if you like..."
"No," Remus murmured, "you had best leave Pan where she is. She's a walking reminder of the whole sorry situation, after all. As much as your mother would love to see her, I don't think it will help."
"I could send Immy over after dinner, she can tell you both all about her first day in her new job! Did Carrie mention it?"
"She did owl earlier, yes...goodness!"
"That'd surely perk things up a bit."
"I'm sure."
Feeling both wizards' eyes upon her, Dora kept her eyes firmly closed. There was a long silence before Teddy muttered:
"Merlin, Dad, the state of her! You will do it, won't you? Like you said..."
"I fear I may be too late, Ted. And she'll not thank me for it..."
"But try! Promise you'll try, just...just look at her!"
Remus gave such a sigh that it made Dora's stomach twist into apprehensive knots.
"I shall certainly do my best." the werewolf murmured grimly.
There came the rustling of parchment and Dora dared open an eye to squint through the dim light of the bedroom. She spied Teddy pressing a large envelope into his father's hand.
"Ron and Kingsley have listed today's goings on and who's doing what based on what Mum suggested this morning. We thought I might bring a copy over so she can stay in the loop...when she's ready for it, that is. We've sent the same to Harry, they say he's on the mend...he's in better shape than Mum is, I should think!" Teddy reached to retrieve his pocket watch and observed the time with a frown, before deciding: "I really ought be getting back, Dad. Kingsley has decided to give me the dubious pleasure of addressing the Wizengamot in Mum's absence this afternoon..."
Dora listened as the hushed conversation grew faint as the two wizards turned and headed back out into the sitting room and towards the front door. She felt relief that she had seemingly kept some semblance of control over the hectic goings on at Auror Headquarters, and yet whatever plans Remus and Teddy were busy making for her filled her with dread, no matter how good their intentions were.
After all, Dora mused dully as she shifted uncomfortable under the bed linen, attempting to drop off to sleep again, they say the road to Hell is paved with good intentions...
...whoever they are...
She was awoken again some two hours later by a gentle hand upon her shoulder, and as she groggily battled the sleep-induced fog from her mind and dragged an eye open she found Remus leant over her, his expression grave.
"Wake up, darling."
The room seemed unnaturally quiet, it was as if a shadow had crept over the cottage and frightened away all the birds, stilled the wind and left foreboding to reign. Dora felt immediately uneasy.
"What's wrong?" she whispered, not daring to look away from Remus' face, and the werewolf managed a slight shake of the head.
"Nothing's wrong, Dora," he assured her, though the attempt was entirely unsuccessful. Apprehension clung to the air like dust. Then he told her: "We have a visitor. I...I wrote to St. Mungo's this morning and...and they...thought...perhaps...maybe..."
As Dora turned to look towards the bedroom doorway, Remus trailed off into uneasy silence.
And she saw it.
Mortality, staring her right in the face. It seared her eyes and made them water, leaving the terrible sight to swim before her. Yet there it was, solid and real and no matter how distorted her vision grew it remained there, staring at her, a monstrous blight in the doorway, a terrible mirror of withered, wizened flesh and wasted muscle cloaked in a metal, mechanical facade.
Dora had never seen a more horrifying sight in all her years.
As she stared, open mouthed at the stranger stood in the doorway holding onto the wheelchair's handles, Dora felt Remus' hand grip her trembling arm.
The Auror shook her head vigorously.
"No..."
"Dora," Remus began, voice the model of calm, "listen to me..."
"GET OUT!" she shrieked, troubled when the man from St. Mungo's did not so much as flinch at her outburst, and Remus' grip upon her tightened as he asked the healer:
"Might I have a moment alone with my wife?"
Dora couldn't breathe. She was sure she couldn't breathe...
"Certainly, Mr Lupin." the man said soberly, and with that he backed out of the room, taking the prison on wheels with him, the door swinging softly shut after him.
Once she and Remus were alone, Dora turned to stare up at the werewolf in complete and utter mortification.
"How could you?!" she cried, eyes wide in incomprehension that he of all people could do such a thing, could bring that thing into the house as if it were some sort of joyous solution, some sort of answer...!
"Calm down, Dora." Remus said simply, and she found the suggestion entirely offensive. What a thing to say at a moment like this! How could he say such a thing?! Him of all people, it was almost like...almost as if...
"I...I don't think I...I even know who you are!" she exclaimed, the whole situation entirely alien to her, and Remus squeezed his eyes shut.
"I think you know precisely who I am." he said half-heartedly, but when he opened his eyes a moment later he seemed recovered from her verbal blow. "Darling, I know you're upset, but..."
"Upset?! You think...y...you think I'm upset?! I'm more than upset, Remus, I'm..."
"I know. That's perfectly understandable, but remember, my love, you must trust me..."
"Why?!"
"Because I only ever want what is best for you. You know that."
In her fury, Dora wanted to question this statement of fact, but the words would not form on her tongue.
Remus sunk down onto the edge of the bed beside her, reaching to smooth the hair from her brow.
"It would simply be a temporary arrangement," he told her calmly, "so that you might not stay stuck in this bed for days on end. The hospital assure me it wouldn't be permanent, it's just until your legs recover, you'll be back walking soon..."
"N...no I won't! Not if you put me in...in one of those things!"
"Darling..."
"Y...you sit in it and...and that's it! You don't stand up ever again! It's true...it's...that's what happened to...to Burton Hayes, you know! And...and Whatshisface from Magical Creatures, they told him he'd walk again too but...but he never did! I'd be stuck in it! And...and then that's it, isn't it You just...just waste away..."
"It would be like nothing of the sort..."
"Y...you can't do this to me!"
"I'm not doing anything to you, Dora. Nobody's going to make you sit in that wheelchair if you don't want to. It's your decision."
"Then make him take it away! I don't want it!"
There was ringing silence as Remus' gaze dropped despairingly to his lap. After a long moment of considering his next move, the werewolf coaxed:
"Might you at least take some time to consider it? I could ask Healer Wainsworth to leave it in the sitting room until you've made up your mind..."
"No! I...I don't need to think about it, Remus, my mind's already made up and I won't change it!"
Remus sighed heavily.
"Well that really is quite a shame." he confessed bleakly. "Teddy was really quite hopeful you might take to the idea..."
"He put you up to it, didn't he?! I...I bet it...it was his idea!"
"Not at all, darling. It was entirely my idea, but Ted thought you might make it back to the Ministry in no time at all if you had a little help..."
"I wouldn't be seen DEAD at the Ministry like that!" Dora snapped, grabbing fistfuls of duvet in abhorrence at the mere thought. "What would people think?! What sort of an Auror would I make like that?! It was...was bad enough shuffling around on...on bloody sticks!"
"They're after your mind, Dora, just as Harry said, nobody cares about the rest of you. And your mind would remain far sharper and more focused if you could spend the day in comfort instead of wasting your body away to nothing."
"It's all a show of strength, Remus! The Aurors need to be seen as strong! The department leadership ought embody that, it's important! It might be a sham, that much is true, but people need to see strength to believe we'll keep them safe! I can't do all that sat looking like some sort of warmed up corpse in a bloody chair on wheels! People won't buy it! Jeff Fawley won't buy it either!"
Remus turned to gaze down at his wife somewhat critically.
"Then perhaps you entirely misunderstand and underestimate quite what the public perception of you currently entails. You've made a mark so deep and profound on that office that nobody shall forget it in a hurry! They'll always see it, Dora, no matter how you seem to them now."
"What if I can't see it myself?" Dora wondered dully, head slumping sideways to rest against her husband's arm. "What if I forget what I am?"
"Then there are countless people in this world who might remind you." Remus assured her quietly.
And that was when an owl arrived at the bedroom window, bringing with it a reminder from a person precisely like that.
POTTER TO LUPIN: HANG ON IN THERE!
HEAD OF AURORS' MESSAGE TO STRICKEN COLLEAGUE FROM HIS HOSPITAL BED BOLSTERS SOLIDARITY OF CRUMBLING DEPARTMENT LEADERSHIP.
Head of Aurors, Mr Harry Potter, has written to Acting Head of Aurors Mrs Nymphadora Lupin with encouragement following increased troubles at the Ministry, where the Auror Department leadership is under great strain. Mrs. Lupin, already in poor health following her injury during the Diagon Alley blast, stepped in as Acting Head of the department after Mr. Potter was rushed to St. Mungo's having suffered a gunshot wound, rumoured to have been acquired during a run in with notorious arsonist Jeffrey Fawley. However, there was no sign of the Acting Head of Aurors yesterday morning at the Ministry of Magic and sources tell us that Mrs. Lupin, former British Duelling Champion and member of the Order of the Phoenix, was absent due to ill-health. This has left the public wondering how Auror Headquarters will continue to function efficiently in order to apprehend Fawley and indeed other Dark Wizards at large at this time. With the department seemingly thrown into disarray, there is increased fear that Fawley may once again strike whilst the department's leadership is diminished. However, Mr. Potter, speaking to our reporter at his hospital bedside when questioned about Mrs. Lupin's absence from work, insists that the Auror Department remains a force to be reckoned with.
"I have written to Tonks this afternoon and told her to hang on in there." Mr Potter said, his own recuperation these past days having been hindered by infection which he insists he is in the process of successfully fighting off. "I have every confidence in her and indeed the rest of my department. Anybody who thinks the Auror Department is about to crumble is entirely mistaken. Tonks is, and always has been, a force of nature. She'll smash through any obstacle put in her way, and what people must appreciate is that smashing through obstacles leave cuts and bruises. The intensity of her resolve, her hard work and determination has now had consequences. But I know she'll hang on in there and she won't give in. It's not in her nature and when I return to the Ministry, which I intend to do very soon indeed, I can only hope that I am able to match her strength and leadership so that together we can apprehend Jeffrey Fawley and restore the safety of our community. It does not worry me, nor should it worry anyone else, that she needs to take some time away from the Ministry. It is important that she puts her health first at this moment in time, there is only so much a person can take and it is crucial that she does not end up in such a bad way that her judgement is compromised. The department does not need a broken leader, it needs somebody with a clear head and the ability to focus. This is why I passed over control to Tonks in the first place, I need time to recover myself. I trust Tonks will take the time to do the same thing. I have her to support me and there are no doubt plenty of others ready to support her too. I count myself as one of those people. I will return to the Ministry soon, I have promised her that I will. She only has to hold everything together a short while longer. I have complete and utter faith in her and I hope that she remembers that. I hope it can be an anchor for her in this storm of ours."
Mrs Lupin, whose youngest granddaughter Pandora is alleged to have been in a relationship with Jeffrey Fawley, has reportedly been working over twelve hour shifts since being called out of retirement, and since Mr Potter's hospitalisation has been working late into the evenings too.
"She takes mounds of work home with her each evening." Auror Albert Diggory told reporters as he himself left the Ministry yesterday night. Mr Diggory, who joined the British National Duelling Team the year Mrs. Lupin was captain, expressed deep regret that the Acting Head of Aurors was at present unable to come to work. When asked who was in charge in her absence, however, he simply told us:
" Tonks is." As he pushed his way carefully through the crowd and headed for home, Mr Diggory was heard to add: "Consequently I suggest Mr. Fawley watches his back."
Imogen Lupin gazed down at the front page of the morning's Daily Prophet as she set it down upon the workbench in front of her and shrugged the cloak from her shoulders. She thought the paper's account of Harry's letter to her grandmother, which the young witch had read herself the previous evening, was somewhat sugar-coated. The actual letter itself had been far more grim. Encouraging, yes, but grim nevertheless. It had been somewhat more rambling than Harry usually wrote and Imogen had never seen the word 'please' used so often on a single sheet of parchment.
Please don't do anything stupid, Tonks, it had pleaded. I know I have relied on you to do just that, but please for all our sakes don't do it. Living with myself is hard enough as it is, not that you should give a single thought for me. Think of yourself, please. Just think of yourself. I'll be back at work soon, we'll fix all this together. Two heads are better than one, no matter the state of the bodies that come along with them. Stay strong just a little while longer, won't you? You can do it, I know that you can. Be strong and be careful, play the long game if you must and keep it together. Please do this for me, Tonks, and most importantly do it for yourself. Please don't crash and burn. Please just hang on in there...
Imogen had found the letter almost more depressing than the sight of her grandmother, but Remus had insisted that Dora had taken a lot of courage from Harry's words. She had agreed to keep the wheelchair, though refused to actually sit in it, and so Imogen had walked down to the local muggle village near her grandparents' cottage and bought fish and chips. She'd sat upon the bed at Dora's side whilst Remus sat in a chair by the window and the three of them had eaten dinner together, Imogen babbling mindlessly about her first day at work, how friendly all the other staff were and what a good day it had been...
Most of the staff at Silver Chalice Potions seemed friendly enough, though Imogen found those who she shared her specific work area seemed to be wary of her. There were three other young witches and one wizard in his mid-twenties working in the Ingredients Stores, all of whom Mr Selwyn had introduced Imogen to on her first morning. Whilst Michael Vance, the department's only male member, kept himself to himself, working in one corner and barely breathing a word to anyone, the three girls seemed to be extremely firm friends and not in any particular need to add an extra member to their clique. There was the fiery red-haired Sharon Wilkins who spent the majority of the day counting down to her lunch break and, later, the end of the working day, the pale, floaty figure of Lena Swift, who though definitely the quietest of the three was never silent, for she was always humming one tune or another, and the rosy-cheeked, persistently giggly Tabitha Stiles who lived to laugh and truly did little else. Imogen thought them all cheery enough, indeed she was quite happy to be left mostly to her own devices, though she couldn't help but think the other girls were busy dissecting every inch of her appearance and every movement via hushed gossip over their work. She thought perhaps she might befriend Michael, given time, and learn to tolerate the other three without much trouble.
The faint hiss of whispering and giggling had increased tenfold just before lunch on that first morning, upon the arrival of a visitor to the workroom in the shape of Phoenix Selwyn, whose mere appearance in their midst had sent the trio into a whispering frenzy. All three had greeted him with an alarmingly cheery Good Morning, Master Selwyn, whilst Michael had said nothing at all, and when Phoenix had offered a murmured Good Morning, Ladies, in return, Tabitha Styles had giggled so loudly that Sharon Wilkins had elbowed her in the ribs to shut her up.
There seemed no doubt to Imogen that Phoenix had an effect on the female members of his father's staff. She felt somewhat embarrassed at herself that she seemed to be one of the herd, for she had felt herself blush a little when he had announced that he had come to see how she was settling in. It didn't help that Tabitha had promptly given an odd, squealing gasp as if she had just witnessed an overly romantic proposal of marriage. Quite suddenly, Imogen had felt far less silly. As handsome and pleasant as Phoenix Selwyn was, one would never coax a noise like that from Imogen's lips at the sight of him doing something so entirely ordinary and mundane. Or at the sight of him doing anything at all, for that matter!
But she did think him truly charming, there really was no helping that. Imogen liked to think herself insusceptible to abrupt fierce attraction, she did not believe in love at first sight. There was, as her grandmother had once shamelessly uttered over Sunday lunch when Imogen had been seventeen, lust at first sight and not a shred of anything else. That was a fact.
But Imogen had not seen Phoenix Selwyn once. She had seen him three times...
At her attempted reasoning, Imogen simply despaired at herself. She hoped to get over this...whatever it was...
Imogen was first into the workroom on her second day at work, and as she turned her back on the newspaper article to look over at the clock that Sharon Wilkins was so fixated on, noting that she was twenty minutes early, she heard the door in the corner open at the arrival of another early bird. A moment later there was a soft thump and the tinkling of glass. Imogen turned to find Phoenix stood before the bench Michael worked at, having just set a heavy crate of vials down upon scrubbed wooden surface. She studied his carefully combed hair and immaculate robes for a moment as he let out a small sigh to be free of his burden, only for him to turn and catch sight of her watching him.
"Morning!" he greeted brightly, "Merlin, you're rather early, aren't you?"
"I suppose I could say the same for you." Imogen pointed out, and he shrugged, gesturing vaguely to the crate beside him.
"Oh, I was just lending a hand with a delivery."
"I see."
"It's rather thirsty work, in fact. Would you happen to fancy a cup of tea? I'm going to make myself one."
"Yes please, if it's no trouble..."
"It certainly isn't! Do you take sugar, Imogen?"
"Do I...? Oh, no. No thank you, I'm sweet enough!"
There was a pause that lasted little more than a microsecond as Imogen felt her face bloom with colour to have uttered her mother's usual quip in response to the age old question of sugar in tea, only to grin when Phoenix promptly chuckled as he turned to head for the door. She could have sworn that she heard him mutter to himself: I've no doubt, but instead she put it down to wishful thinking.
Almost as soon as he had gone, Imogen found herself preoccupied once again with the contents of the morning newspaper. Dora's illness had, at least, momentarily distracted the press from their dreadful interest in Pandora. Some clouds had silver-linings, Imogen supposed, but it seemed foolish to think they were all that way.
When Phoenix returned just a short while later, two steaming mugs of tea in hand, Imogen was gazing blankly down at the newspaper, lost in thought.
"Terrible," the wizard murmured as he set one mug down upon the bench, "the news gets worse every day, doesn't it?"
"Hm." Imogen mumbled, reaching to retrieve her mug and managing a half-hearted smile of gratitude.
"The Aurors have had some successes though, haven't they? My cousin tells me they thwarted another explosion last night! Why the Prophet can't stick that on the front page I don't know!"
"They were too busy attacking my little sister yesterday." Imogen recalled, nose wrinkling in disgust, and he gave a huff and muttered:
"What a thing to write about anyone, let alone a girl of sixteen! I do hope she hasn't seen it!"
"She saw the headline."
"Merlin, that's awful! Only the headline, I hope?"
"Only the headline, but that was plenty bad enough." Imogen took an unflinching sip of her tea, despite it being much too hot to drink. "And now of course they're onto my Nana..."
"At least Mr Potter and the other Aurors were around to put the record straight." Phoenix pointed out, flinching when he too tried to take a sip of tea and got his lips burnt.
"Yes...they were probably worried if they didn't say something my Nana would...and nobody wants that, she utterly loathes them, she'd say the most awful things!"
"Well good for her, I say!"
"It makes for an amusing news article, I can say that much." Imogen muttered, only to feel her spirits lifted almost immediately when Phoenix promptly laughed.
"You remind me of her, you know." he said, leaning until he could rest his elbows upon the bench, smiling warmly as if she had just broken the ice, and to have him move suddenly closer to her, Imogen felt something jump in her chest. "Although of course I've only met her briefly..."
"Oh?" she said, resisting the urge to lean upon the bench too until their foreheads would practically press together.
"You have her single-mindedness."
"Do I?"
"Yes, it's admirable. One moment you've lost your job, cluttered off down to Hexx to get utterly bladdered and wind up...in the Gents...and so on..."
Imogen very nearly dropped her tea, her face blossoming the most undignified shade of pink she could possibly imagine to hear him bring up that dreadful night that she was so desperately trying to forget, and she didn't feel much better when he finished:
"...the next you've waltzed in here, slapped an application form down on my father's desk and bam! You've turned your entire life around in the space of twenty four hours!"
Imogen gave a strained imitation of a chuckle.
"Oh...yes...well..."
He was smiling at her. She thought she might just melt and really wished she could because dissolving into a puddle on the floor just then seemed preferable to the alternative, which was to desperately try to think of what to say. Because of course he couldn't be truly smiling, she thought furiously, what man as decent as Phoenix Selwyn could ever truly think that well of a girl like her after what he had seen that terrible evening? Granted, he probably did think it impressive that she was here now, working for his father. But it was probably more a horrified shock than anything else...
He must think I'm a complete tart, Imogen realised miserably. After all, that was pretty much her own personal interpretation of what had happened, too. She hated herself for it...
How he managed to make polite conversation with her or indeed go as far as to offer her a cup of tea was quite beyond her!
It only seemed fair, therefore, to release him from whatever moral obligation he had put upon himself, and so she put down her tea and reached to fold up the newspaper.
"Well," she said, glancing at the clock and cursing the fact that technically the working day had still yet to begin. "I suppose I had better get on..."
"Right," Phoenix said, straightening up, and just as the workroom door opened and three of Imogen's co-workers came bustling noisily into the room, Imogen finally managed a proper smile to tell him:
"Thank you for the tea...Master Selwyn..."
"Merlin, don't!" Phoenix muttered as Sharon, Lena and Tabitha came to an abrupt halt, trailing off into silence as they stared wide-eyed at the back of his head. "Nick, please. I can't be doing with anything else! I've quite given up with everyone else, but don't copy them, for Merlin's sake! It's just so...!"
Imogen sniggered, wrapping her hands tightly around her mug.
"Then thanks for the tea, Nick." she amended, and the look of relief upon his face was bordering on comical.
"Well do pop in and see me if you need anything, won't you?" And with that, before Imogen could reply he turned on his heel and made a brisk beeline for the door, casting a bright smile at the other girls as he passed, greeting:
"Good Morning, Ladies!"
Imogen waited to hear the usual: Good Morning, Master Selwyn that she had become quite accustomed to despite her short acquaintance with proceedings, but it didn't come. Instead, the three witches merely gawped at him, turning as he passed them so that they could stare until he had disappeared out the door.
No sooner had the door clicked shut, three sets of eyes darted round to stare at Imogen, who felt as if she were being pinned to the spot.
Then Sharon said:
"Oh. My. GOD!"
Tabitha dissolved into giggles and Lena clamped a scandalised hand across her mouth, only for Sharon to silence Tabitha with an elbow to the ribs, snapping:
"Shut up, Tabby, this isn't funny!"
Lena scurried urgently forward until she could lean across the bench, voice dropping as she demanded Imogen tell her:
"Did he make you that cup of tea?!"
"Um..." Imogen said, utterly perplexed by the severity laced into such a simple question, only for Tabitha to cry:
"Of course he didn't! His secretary did!"
Lena ignored her.
"Well?" she said, eyes widening quite madly. "Did he?!"
"Well yes, he just...offered to make me a cup..."
"And then he went and made it himself?!"
"Well yes, I suppose..."
"Oh my god!" Sharon exclaimed, drowning Imogen out as she came skidding across the room to elbow Lena out of the way, determined to get a good look at Imogen so that she could accuse: "How bloody long have you been here?! About ten seconds!"
"Sorry..." Imogen muttered, not entirely sure why she felt the need to apologise, indeed she was finding the whole exchange baffling. Attempting to impose upon the over-excited girls a semblance of rationality, she wondered: "Hasn't he ever made you a cup of tea, then?"
The three girls exchange a Look.
"Well," Imogen said, still bemused by their absurd reaction to a hot water and tea leaves, "I'm sure he would if he happened to be..."
"She doesn't know." Lena observed pityingly, rather as if Imogen had just proclaimed herself a penniless orphan whose hopes and dreams had been crushed by life's cruel hardships, and Sharon agreed:
"No, I don't think she does."
Tabitha giggled as Sharon leant forward, fixing Imogen with a frank, almost challenging look as she informed her:
"Don't worry, Imogen, you'll get used to the way things work around here. I've worked here for two years, you know, and I know everything about everything that goes on in this place."
Imogen couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at the absurdness of the conversation, only for Sharon to lean further forward until there were precious few inches between them.
"Believe me," she said seriously as behind her Lena and Tabitha exchanged another Look. "Phoenix Selwyn does not just make tea!"
As she sat upon the wall, coat wrapped tightly around her against the persistent rain spitting from the sky, Pandora Lupin hunched her shoulders and complained:
"I really don't see why I couldn't have just stayed back at the house!"
Cleopatra Clancy impaled her garden fork in an unsuspecting flowerbed and turned to offer the teenager a scowl.
"Yeah, you keep saying!" she said, reaching to wipe the rain from her brow and succeeding in smearing mud over her face. "I'm not wild about having you here either, you know! But I don't make the rules, do I?!"
When Pandoa merely folded her arms across her chest with a huff, Cleo went to snatch up an empty garden sack from beside a wheelbarrow and suggested:
"Why don't you just make yourself useful and bag up all those leaves over there? The sooner it's all done the sooner we can get back into the warm and dry!"
Reluctantly, Pandora slid off the wall and went to retrieve the sack. As she wandered over to set about shoving the daamp foliage into the container, Cleo continued to attempt to justify their predicament.
"Your mum says you're not to be on your own and I'm to keep a good eye on you. I can't keep an eye on you if you don't come with me to work, besides, fresh air'll do you and the bump some good. Don't want to be shut up indoors all day long, you know!"
"It's been raining all morning, Auntie Cleo!" Pandora grumbled, suppressing a shiver, only for Cleo to insist:
"A bit of rain never did anyone any harm! Don't be so wet!"
Pandora grimaced.
Cleo, who herself had been worse for wear to say the least first thing that morning, had dragged her house guest out of bed at half past seven, fed her a breakfast of burnt bacon and scrambled egg peppered with muttered expletives and grumblings about the lack of paracetamol in the kitchen drawers, before bundling Pandora into the car amongst a mountain of gardening tools. They had arrived at a house across town at nine o'clock sharp, where upon Cleo had set to work upon the garden. Pandora had grown bored within half an hour...
That had been near on three hours ago.
Having observed Pandora's half-hearted attempts at helping for some five minutes, Cleo again stabbed her fork firmly into the soil with a huff.
"Just leave it, kid." she decided, reaching to rake a weary hand through her hair. "Come on, let's take a break!"
Relieved, Pandora dropped the sack to the ground and shuffled across the damp grass after Cleo who seemed to be heading for the house. Pandora's hopes for a dry seat inside and a hot cup of tea were scarpered, however, when Cleo headed for the side gate leading out onto the front driveway.
"Where are we going?" Pandora asked a moment later when Cleo had walked straight past the shelter of the car and out onto the pavement beyond, and the girl almost groaned aloud when the self-proclaimed witch told her:
"For a walk!"
"I thought we were having a break..." Pandora grumbled, only for Cleo to roll her eyes and insist:
"Come on, Pan, I'll show you something! It's not far, you'll like it!"
They traipsed across the road and across a small green upon which stood a tree, a rotten home-made swing hanging wonkily from a low branch. As they squelched their way towards the road beyond, Pandora thought perhaps the rain was finally beginning to lessen it's relentless fall to Earth...
Then they rounded a corner into the next street and it suddenly occurred to Pandora where they were.
"Oh!" she said, mood instantly brightening at the familiar sight before her, and Cleo grinned and told her:
"I said you'd like it!"
It had been a decade since her grandparents had moved out of their old house in Eddington where Teddy had spent his teenaged years growing up, and Pandora's memory of the place was distinctly fuzzy. Teddy and Carrie's current home was quite a walk away and the old Lupin house was out of the way enough that Pandora had not passed it by in years.
Pandora and Cleo came to a halt at the end of the joint driveway shared by the Lupin's old house and that which Carrie had grown up in all those years ago. Both houses appeared to have been freshly painted, the creepers that had snaked their way around the sitting room window of the Lupin house had been replaced by a neat line of plant pots and the once gravel driveway had been paved over with concrete slabs. Both houses looked so ordinary, so alike all the others around them that Pandora might have struggled to pick them out had she been away and had them fade from her memory much longer. Yet she could recall playing upon that driveway, being chased up and down by her sister as their mother stood upon the doorstep bidding their grandparents goodbye after one visit or another.
Carrie had always lingered on that driveway, Pandora recalled. Even as a child Pandora had felt aware of this, the long backward glances at the old Winters' house and the way Carrie's feet seemed to drag a little as she turned her back on it...
"Your mum loved living in that house, you know." Cleo said, shaking her head. "I remember when it happened...the car accident, I mean. I didn't know what to say to her for weeks, to have your parents bundled off into a care home at the drop of the hat and you be packed off to stay at your aunt's...! Lovely lady, your Great Aunt Susan, but she didn't half work hard back then. Your mum barely saw her, she was always home alone...well...not really, I suppose. She was never at home if she could help it...she was always here, at your grandparents' house. I suppose it was normal for her, wasn't it? Being around your dad and his family. Hats off to your Nana and Grandad, they really stepped in, looked after her."
"Nana always wanted a daughter..." Pandora mumbled, hugging her arms around herself as she gazed up at the dark windows.
"I don't think Susan did, truth be told." Cleo muttered, shaking her head again. "Don't get me wrong, she loves your mum to death but the poor woman didn't know a thing about teenage girls...quite frankly I reckon it's shocking to think she was one herself, once! Your mum used to say your Nana and Grandad got awfully concerned about stepping on Susan's toes, but I think she found their intervention a complete and utter relief! They were far more suited to deal with it, after all. Decent sized house, plenty of money I always thought, plenty of time since your grandad was at home a lot, plenty of practice what with having a child themselves...Susan probably thought they'd just waved a magic wand!"
Pandora felt a vague urge to snigger at the naïve assumption that her grandparents had ever been wealthy, and as for the magic wand...
She coughed.
Then she sobered to think that perhaps Great Aunt Susan's situation had not been a whole lot different from the one that Pandora might soon find herself in.
Perhaps like Great Aunt Susan Pandora was about to find herself in charge of a child without much of a plan as to quite what one ought to do about it. Perhaps she was equally as clueless, perhaps she might like to hide away from the child in question and simply hope that someone might wave a magic wand...
In Pandora's limited life experience, despite the existence of witches, wizards, magic and Merlin knew what else in the world, people very rarely waved a magic wand in the metaphorical sense of the word and fixed life's problems. Which was odd, because her father had once insisted that metaphors were a vital part of the very existence of magic in the world.
Because magic, by it's very nature, was a difficult and complex series of notions to comprehend. If there weren't metaphors around to help explain and illustrate it, magic itself would soon disappear. After all, witches and wizards could not practice what they were unable to comprehend. Lack of comprehension and subsequent disbelief was precisely what kept magic hidden from the Muggle world. To muggles, magic simply didn't exist...
Pandora did not believe in the metaphorical waving of magic wands, which meant that whether such magic or indeed what others might term miracles existed or not was irrelevant, to Pandora it was an impossibility.
Despite it being impossible, Pandora found herself wondering aloud:
"D'you think someone might wave a magic wand for me? And make everything better, like Nana and Grandad did for Great Aunt Susan?"
Cleo considered this deeply thoughtful question for a long moment before simply concluding:
"Nope."
There was a long silence as Pandora rocked back upon her heels, before Cleo finally glanced sideways at her and sighed.
"That's not how magic works, kid." the muggle explained softly, and Pandora examined her boots, musing that this was perhaps the only truly accurate fact about magic that Cleopatra Clancy had ever uttered over the course of her long and not in the least bit illustrious career as a self-made witch.
"And nobody truly made it all better for Great Aunt Susan or your mum or...or even your grandparents." Cleo went on, folding her arms firmly across her chest as she went back to gazing up at the houses. "There was still a...a great big hole torn in the middle of your mum's family and it's never been the same since. Nobody involved as been quite the same since! But people learn to adapt, you know? Even your mum...wet blanket she was, when she was a kid, she turned out alright in the end, didn't she? She might've had a bit of help from your dad sticking by her and your Grandad giving her a helping hand once in a while...and your Nana giving her a good kick up the backside when she needed it! But that doesn't mean she didn't have to grow up and learn to look after herself! It shows, too...the way she sticks her nose into my business and tries to act like my bloody mother...!"
Pandora sniggered, and at last Cleo cracked a smile.
"You don't need magic, kid." Cleo said, reaching to sling an arm around Pandora's shoulders so that she could turn to steer the girl back off up the road. "You just need a bit of grit in your blood, that's all. And you've got plenty of that if genetics have anything to do with it!"
"Nana Dora says blood has nothing to do with anything." Pandora recalled as they shuffled along the pavement.
"Blood has everything to do with everything if you let it." Cleo theorised, splashing clumsily through a puddle. "Everyone wants to be independent and be their own person, they don't want to be labelled just because they were born in a certain place or to certain parents. But you know, Pan, if you come from a family you can be proud of, sometimes you need that label so you can try and live up to it."
"I'm not sure I know how..." Pandora mumbled glumly, and Cleo laughed.
"Well maybe you need to be somebody who does." she suggested, and Pandora frowned.
"How can I do that?" the girl asked, feeling irritated at the suggestion.
"Did you ever wish, Pan," Cleo asked, "that you could just...be somebody else?"
"All the time..." Pandora confessed without even thinking about it, promptly feeling her cheek blossom with colour.
"And who would you want to be?"
Pandora considered this odd question for a long moment before mumbling:
"I suppose...I suppose I'd be my...my sister." The girl sighed heavily to recall: "She knows just how to...to be brave and clever like Nana Dora..."
"Well then, we both know you can't just be Imogen." Cleo explained, as if it were all terribly simple. "You can't because she's Imogen and you're Pandora. That's a fact. But who's to say you can't pretend? We spend half our lives pretending we're something we're not, you know. And we learn a whole lot of things whilst we're doing that. That's how we come to realise we're pretending in the first place and then we realise who we really are. I bet, Pandora, if you spent some time pretending to be like your sister you might just realise you're not all that different from her after all!"
They walked in silence for a good couple of minutes as Pandora mused upon this warped theory that somehow made quite a lot of sense, and she was just beginning to ask herself: What would Imogen do, when Cleo wondered:
"If you could be anyone in the world and you want to be someone like your nana...why wouldn't you just pick your nana?"
Pandora looked at Cleo as if this were quite possibly the most stupid question that anybody had ever asked her.
"Well that's obvious, isn't it?" the girl said as they turned the corner and crossed over the road towards the rotten swing. "Who'd want to actually be Nana Dora? She's a complete and utter fruitcake!"
It was there again as soon as she felt consciousness creeping back over her, and it didn't matter if her eyes were still closed, she could see it. Feel it.
It had her marked.
The panic had dulled that morning, she'd kept it smothered, kept It at bay behind a closed door...
But now she was alone. Remus had left the house some while ago, she'd been roused by the flashing of cameras and raised voices as the small cluster of newspaper reporters seemingly camped out in the front garden had attempted to mob the werewolf as he had set off for Diagon Alley. She'd found a note left upon the bedside table, he'd been off to fetch dinner and visit the bank and apothecary and would not, he promised, be gone for long...
But Remus being gone for any length of time was much too long, and worse still he had left the bedroom door open...
And she could see it through her eyelids.
She was beginning to think it could see her too.
It could see right through her, right into her very soul, right to the End.
And she couldn't open her eyes, couldn't truly look at it, because it was like a mirror, she'd see the End too...
She couldn't think about it, either. And yet there it was, in her mind, wedged in there like some sort of tumour, growing inch by inch, the pressure swelling in her head as the minutes ticked by...
Tick, tick, tick...
Ticking and ticking, right towards the End...
And it was driving her mad, she was mad, she could feel it, she couldn't think, couldn't reason, couldn't...
She just couldn't anything. Anything at all...
But there was, Dora Lupin realised wildly as she fumbled blindly with the bottles and vials upon the bedside table, knocking a book off onto the floor with a hefty thud, just one thing she could do. One thing she could manage.
One thing to make it go away.
One thing to stop staring her own mortality straight in the face...
It wasn't that Dora was afraid of death in particular, it was more the slow, steady decline that seemed destined to accompanied it, the waiting for it, the being so consumed and fixated on it...
She'd always hoped for something a bit more sudden, some freak accident or sudden condition to snuff the life out of her in an instant...
Instead she had death on wheels, staring at her for hour after hour until the sight made her positively tremble...
She downed a clumsy mouthful of sleeping draught and very nearly choked on it.
And then, quite ironically she thought looking back on it some hours later, she slept like the dead.
It was dark outside when she woke again, Remus shaking her gently by the shoulder. He sounded worryingly solemn when he spoke, he seemed to be making a habit of being solemn these past few days, and Dora felt immediately suspicious.
"You've a visitor, darling." he informed her carefully, and she failed not to sound accusing when she asked:
"Who?"
Remus straightened up a little and turned to look over towards the doorway, half-whispering:
"Well I did tell Ted it perhaps wasn't a good idea, but he says she insisted..."
Dora blinked the remains of the sleeping draught from her bleary eyes and looked over towards the doorway.
There stood Pandora, her hands clasped nervously together in front of her as she stared at her grandmother lying upon the bed.
"Hello Nana." the girl said, shifting her feet a little awkwardly.
Remus and Dora had agreed, or at least Remus had insisted and Dora had failed to comment, that Teddy and Carrie ought not bring Pandora over to visit until Dora was...Dora frowned to recall the phrase her husband had used...rather more herself. Apparently this was all entirely for Dora's benefit, as Remus seemed to think that Pandora's presence would only make Dora feel infinitely worse...
He wasn't wrong, Dora reluctantly realised as Pandora cast a glance over her shoulder to where her parents stood behind her.
Both Teddy and Carrie mumbled greetings of their own, sounding rather as if they were already regretting the visit. Dora barely noticed them, however, for she was too busy staring at Pandora and feeling the weight of failure dropping down upon her shoulders...
Merlin, the Acting Head of Aurors mused dully, the poor girl looked white as a sheet...
...I'm letting her down...
"Pandora has some news for us, she says." Remus explained, smiling encouragingly at their granddaughter despite his apparent apprehension, and Carrie reached to slip a hand through the crook of Teddy's arm as the Auror agreed:
"Yes it's...it's not really right to put in a letter, is it Pan? You wanted to...to tell Nana and Grandad yourself. Isn't that right, Sweetheart?"
Pandora visibly gave herself a little shake before stepping carefully into the room.
"That's right." she said, coming to stand at the bottom of the bed so that she could look her grandmother straight in the eye.
For a brief moment, Dora looked startled, only to force herself to relax a little. She managed to quirk an eyebrow, and Pandora visibly relaxed too.
Pandora stared into her grandmother's dark eyes, before glancing sideways to offer her grandfather an equally bold and determined look...
Because she'd been thinking about it all day.
All day in the rain with Auntie Cleo, bagging garden debris and helping clear up the garden. Steadily working, steadily thinking...
Thinking what Imogen would do, what Nana Dora would do, what anyone would do...
What Pandora would do...
And there was no going back, not now. Not now that she had made up her mind...
She'd told her parents the moment they had arrived to see her that evening, before demanding they take her to her grandparents so that she could tell them too.
And once they all knew there would be no turning back.
After all, one cannot make such a solemn vow in front of one's ever-loving grandparents and then proceed to lose one's nerve...
And Pandora was not going to lose her nerve, she had decided. A day of thinking and self-determination had seen to that.
She looked Nana Dora straight in the eye again, dark eyes upon dark eyes, like looking in a mirror...
Dora gazed steadily back.
And then Pandora unflinchingly informed her grandparents:
"I've made up my mind and I'm going to keep the baby."
There was a very long silence as this information was left to sink in, and when Remus failed to say anything, Dora forced her groggy mind to think of something, anything to break the silence...
The Acting Head of Aurors wet her lips in deliberation, before settling on:
"That's nice, love..."