Note: Super Angst again. Sorry! But it's important to the plot, honest! (Besides, you all secretly love it really!)
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor am I making any profit from this piece of writing.
16: The Plummet
There was glass everywhere.
Carrie Winters stood numbly beside Teddy Lupin, staring at the scene before her with such shock that she barely noticed what was going on around her. She did not register Mrs. Lupin's cursing as she staggered over to a chair, a large shard of glass impaled in the sole of her foot. She did not feel Mr. Lupin pushing past her and bolting towards the front door, disappearing into the darkness outside, and Teddy's quiet sobbing at her side fell on death ears.
The sitting room's large window was completely void of glass and the remnants coated the interior like a layer of glitter. It made the room look like some sort of terrible Santa's Grotto, glittering menacingly in the light of Mrs. Lupin's wand. Carrie wondered if anything so terrible had ever looked so beautiful, and how on earth could somebody cause glass to shatter in such a manner? This was no rock through a window, the muggle was sure, and the realisation sent a shiver down her spine.
Carrie tore her eyes away from the room to look sideways at Teddy, who she had barely spoken a word to when they had both thundered down the stairs to investigate the source of the crash, and found that as he stood sniveling, tears running in fast, furious cascades down his cheeks, he gaze was fixated upon the sitting room's wall to their right. When Carrie turned to see what he was staring at, she found herself wanting to frown rather than cry. Upon the wall, glowing faintly in the wandlight, was a large, luminous silver circle.
Having squinted for a long, unsuccessful moment down at her foot, Mrs. Lupin had risen carefully from her chair and limped cautiously back towards the doorway, reaching to envelope her son in her arms.
"It's alright, Teddy love." Carrie heard her whisper as the boy let out a choked sob into the folds of her dressing gown. "It's alright, Dad's gone to take a look, it's okay..."
"M...make him come back!" Teddy whimpered, slumping against his mother miserably. "Make him come back in...inside..."
"Dad can look after himself, Sweetheart. Besides, he's going to put some wards up before the neighbors see. We'll be untouchable once he's finished, you'll see. Your dad knows enough protective charms to keep even Voldemort busy, and these thugs aren't a patch on him."
A series of soft glowing lights outside caught Carrie's attention, and she shuffled sideways a little towards the witch in alarm, only for Mrs. Lupin to reach to draw her into the hug too and assure her:
"It's only Remus, Carrie love. Nothing to worry about."
Carrie allowed her face to become buried in Mrs. Lupin's side, eyes closed as she took a few deep, calming breaths. The fluffy pink material was warm and soft. It smelt of flowers.
She was not entirely sure how long they simply stood there, it could have been minutes, it could have been hours, and through the soft flowery haze a single word dug its way into Carrie's mind and refused to go away:
Why?
Why would anybody do such a thing?
Why would they do it to such good people?
Why could the world be so cruel?
Why?
When Mr. Lupin finally returned, wand still in hand, Mrs. Lupin disentangled herself from the two children and the two adults huddled by the front door and murmured to one another in hushed voices. By now, Teddy seemed to have cried his eyes dry, and he stood, staring down at his feet in silence until his father stepped past Mrs. Lupin and told the children:
"It's okay now, you should go back to bed."
Teddy obediently shuffled towards the stairs and Carrie went after him. They did not speak a word to one another as they went into Teddy's bedroom and climbed into their beds. They lay, staring up at the ceiling and listening to the muffled movements of Teddy's parents downstairs. Carrie wondered if one of them ought say something...though she wasn't quite sure what, until Teddy rolled over onto his side and, peering at Carrie through the darkness, asked:
"What would you say if I told you that my dad is a werewolf?"
Carrie turned to stare at him for a long moment.
Well...she thought to herself as he shifted under his duvet impatiently, that hadn't been quite the sort of something that she'd been thinking of...
Determined to do what she usually did when faced with the bizarre however, Carrie forced herself to offer her friend a smile and replied:
"The same thing as when you said you can fly on a broomstick, or that you're going to go to a school for wizards, Teddy. You're COMPLETELY bonkers!"
Teddy frowned deeply at her smile, but after a moment he smiled too.
"Nothing can surprise you anymore, can it?" he said, sitting up in bed so that he could looked at her more easily. "You just...accept everything, nothing bothers you. I tell you my dad turns into a bloody thirsty monster every full moon and you just...just smile at me as if I'd told you the weather's going to be sunny tomorrow."
Carrie felt herself blush at being thought strange and reached to fiddle with the buttons on her pajamas. She was not quite sure what she thought of this new revelation, indeed she was not even sure the news had sunk in at all. It was nothing but words just then. The only way to deal with it was to simply wait, it would make some sort of sense, have some sort of impact once she had time to think.
"Should I be bothered?" she asked, pursing her lips together thoughtfully, and Teddy mumbled:
"Well...no..."
"Good." Carrie stifled a yawn and pulled the blankets up to her chin, eyes drifting closed. "Well...night, Ted."
There was a long silence.
"Is that it?" Teddy asked, and she opened one eye to squint up at him.
"Is what it?"
"Is that it? Is that...all you've got to say? My dad's a werewolf...okay goodnight...?"
"Your dad can be a werewolf, vampire, zombie, whatever Ted, I don't care. D'you know what else he is?"
"What?"
"He's a wonderful person. I wish I had a dad like him."
Once again, there was silence, before Teddy finally mused:
"I've never met a zombie before..."
Even when she looked back on that night, Carrie Winters could never be completely certain why she had chosen to react the way she did. Sometimes she thought it was because she hadn't had time to think through the true implications of the word werewolf. Sometimes she thought she had been simply too tired to be suitably shocked, and sometimes she thought she had known deep down that there was only one reaction she could possibly give that would keep Teddy from bursting into tears all over again.
But most of the time she concluded that she had simply felt compelled to be entirely honest.
Honest or not, she had still spent a long time lying in bed, thinking about what she knew or at least suspected about werewolves, and drifted off to sleep with her mind full of images of sharp teeth and claws. When sleep had completely engulfed her she was disturbed by snapping, tearing, ripping...
She awoke at 3:30am with a gasp, and rushed to bury herself under the blankets, eyes screwed tight shut.
It was just a dream...just a dream...it wasn't real...
Except it was. There were such things as werewolves, and there was one in that very house...
Carrie attempted to focus on what she had told Teddy before they had fallen asleep, what she was sure were her true feelings on the matter, but it was a struggle after her nightmare, especially when somewhere outside a dog barked and startled her more than ever.
She briefly considered the possibility of waking Teddy up and bombarding him with questions about werewolves, in an attempt to dismiss the nightmarish image that was still lurking in the back of her mind. She even considered simply climbing into bed beside him for comfort. She felt horribly conflicted, sleep seemed impossible.
I'm not going to get scared, she told herself firmly, I don't care if he's a werewolf, I don't care...
I like him. He's nice, I've been here a million times and nothing bad has ever happened to me...
He's a good werewolf. Surely there can be such a thing. There are good and bad people, after all, so why not werewolves too?
Logic made her feel calmer, rational, and her mind began to wander to other things, like how dry her throat felt. She needed a glass of water.
Carrie carefully disentangled herself from the blankets and climbed out of bed. She reached to pull the door cautiously open before slipping out onto the landing and heading for the stairs.
She was barely halfway down when she realised that she was not the only one who was out of bed.
Through the sitting room's open door she caught sight of Mrs. Lupin crouched upon the floor, a bucket at her side as she scrubbed furiously at the remnants of the big silver blemish upon the wall.
"Will you let me help you yet?" Mr. Lupin's voice inquired dully from somewhere within the room, Carrie suspected he was either sat on or stood beside the sofa.
"No!" Mrs. Lupin insisted, reaching to dunk the cloth she held somewhat viciously into the bucket.
"You've got work tomorrow."
"Sod work!"
"Dora...please..."
At the sound of footsteps the witch turned abruptly away from the wall, arm raised and wand pointing somewhat threateningly in her husband's direction.
"Don't even think about it!"
"I don't see why..."
"Because that's what they WANT! Well SOD THEM, Remus! You're not cleaning up after them..."
Despite her firm hold the wand suddenly seemed to slip from her grasp and Carrie watched it soar up into the air and disappear into a corner. There was a long silence as the witch's eyes widened in shock, before she cried: "I can't believe you just did that!"
"You should keep your voice down." Mr. Lupin told her as he stepped into view. "You'll wake the children up."
"Have I ever told you what a complete and utter git you are?" his wife asked him conversationally, dropping the cloth into the bucket with a soft splosh and stepping forward to slip her arms around him.
"Oh yes. On many, many occasions."
"I thought I had. D'you think you'll ever take any notice of me when I do?"
"It's...unlikely..."
"Git."
"Did you say something, my love?"
The witch let out a soft chuckle, mood seemingly diminished as she rose up upon the balls of her feet to press a kiss to his lips. He reached to wrap one arm around her waist, and Carrie was about to duck down behind the bannister, feeling embarrassed to intrude, when the romantic little interlude was disturbed by the bucket levitating a few inches off the ground and slowly moving forwards until it bumped into Mrs. Lupin's leg.
"Re-mus!" the witch exclaimed as the bucket fell back to the ground with a soft bump, narrowly avoiding slopping a strange looking liquid all over the carpet. "Stop it! I mean it, I'll do it on my own...I...what? What's wrong?"
Carrie watched the werewolf turn his back on his wife for a moment, hand reaching to rake through his hair as she made to reach for him, only to think better of it.
"I'm...I'm making it worse, aren't I?" the witch observed, head bowing shamefully and he finally turned back to face her.
"I need you to stop getting angry." he said as his hand finally dropped back to his side.
"I know. I know you do, it's just it makes me so mad..."
"But I need you to stop. And then I need you to go to bed."
"I'm not going..."
"And when you come downstairs in the morning and find I've cleaned everything up on my own I need you to say nothing. I need you to just let me do it."
Mrs. Lupin thought through the request for a long moment before asking:
"Can't we do it together?"
Mr. Lupin stooped to pick up the bucket and stepped past her to set it down beside the wall again.
"No, we can't. You've already done far too much."
She watched him reach for the sponge and set about scrubbing at the silver upon the wall and in the silence that followed it finally occurred to Carrie what it was that they were attempting to clean away.
It was a giant full moon.
"So...you reckon I should just go off to bed and leave you down here to slog your guts out all night on your own, until you either fall asleep from exhaustion or go in search of the fire whiskey?"
The werewolf began to scrub harder.
"Since when have I ever done something like that?" he asked incredulously, and his wife shrugged, though he could not see.
"Well...since never, I suppose. But I know what rock bottom looks like, love, I watched Sirius plummet into it and I'm not convinced you're not heading the same way..."
"That's absurd."
"Why?"
"Because!"
"Hate to say it, but that's not really a reason now, is it?"
Mr. Lupin said nothing. His wife folded her arms firmly across her chest and watch his efforts for a while before she sighed heavily and said:
"You're gong to move us again, aren't you?"
He paused to dunk the cloth into the bucket again, scowling over his shoulder at her.
"You make it sound like I don't factor your opinion into the equation at all!"
"Well of course you do, but..."
"But we move BECAUSE of me..."
"I didn't mean it like that. I'm not complaining..."
"Not out loud, but you think it."
"Sweet Merlin..."
"Just go to bed, Dora."
"You're being completely unreasonable."
"In which case you should definitely just go to bed."
"FINE! I will!"
Carrie flinched at the sudden shout as the witch reached to grasp hold of the werewolf by the shoulder and turn him roughly around to face her.
"I'll go to bed!" Mrs. Lupin hissed, free hand balling into a fist. "But I'm telling you now, Remus, your marital status doesn't alter with your bloody mood swings! If you want to let yourself crash and burn then that's entirely up to you! But just remember that I love you, we are MARRIED, and if you're going down you're taking me AND TEDDY with you!"
And with that she turned on her heel and stalked out of the room. Carrie made to dash back up the stairs, but found she had barely reached the top when she glanced back to find Teddy's mother stood at the bottom, staring up at the spy with wide eyes.