Note: So...much...work...
That's right everybody, I'm drowning under the weight of University assignments and should under no circumstances be writing anything at all, let alone a chapter of decent length like this one! Still, I've done it anyway. I'm sure I'm going to suffer the consequences any day now...
This chapter is dedicated to Bekah28, for being a new face (I think)! Welcome to the weird and wonderful world that is my imagination, thanks for reading and it was great to hear from you!
I'm not sure how clear I've made the end of this chapter...I suppose only reviews will tell! I hope you all enjoy this chapter, and thank you all for the kind reviews! You really do make me smile, even with my ridiculous workload!
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor am I making any profit from this piece of writing.
11: A Disturbed Night
She awoke after that first night feeling bemused more than anything else.
When she awoke after the second night having dreamt the same dreams of the wrong boy all over again, she had felt ashamed.
And when she awoke at 2am during the third night, having finally caught hold of the hem of Kit Carter's corded trousers, coaxing him at long last down from his tree only to have him reach to pick a stray twig from her hair that had made her shiver, Carrie Winters felt downright distressed.
And so it was that at two minutes past 2am, Remus and Dora Lupin found themselves roused from sleep by a soft but insistent tapping upon their bedroom door.
"Sod off..." the witch had mumbled resentfully into the collar of her husband's pyjama shirt, and with that she'd rolled over and buried her head under her pillow.
For a long moment after that husband and wife simply lay stock still, listening to the repetitive noise puncturing the peaceful atmosphere of their room, until Remus paused in his frowning into the backs of his eyelids to murmur:
"It's your turn."
Despite apparently still being half asleep, his wife rolled over again so that she could scowl at him through the darkness.
"How in Merlin's name did you figure that out?" she hissed, clutching at the blankets around her as if he might attempt to wrench them out of her grasp. "We don't even take turns, there's no such thing as taking turns...I'm supposed to be resting!"
"You're awake now though, you might as well get up. And anyway, you ate half your bodyweight in bread and cheese earlier, I'm pretty sure that deems you to be pretty fit and healthy..."
"Get up, Remus."
"It's definitely your turn."
"Maybe if we were doing turns, but we're not! Now get up!"
"What's it worth?"
"You get to be the one to open the door and hex Ted into the middle of next week for waking the pair of us up a stupid o'clock in the morning..." Dora trailed off into silence as the knocking suddenly grew louder and a distressed voice from outside squeaked:
"Dora...?"
"Doesn't sound a whole lot like Ted to me." Remus observed, stifling a yawn into his sleeve, and after a brief pause to savour the warmth and comfort of the blankets around him he at long last consented to climbing out of bed. He padded sleepily over to the door and pulled it open a little, and there he found a dressing gown-clad Carrie Winters, whose cheeks looked suspiciously damp and whose eyes were tellingly watery.
"I want to talk to Dora." the muggle informed the werewolf as she hugged her arms tightly around herself, and he had barely opened his mouth to reply when a voice from back inside the room called:
"I'm asleep!"
Remus reached to rub a weary hand across his eyes as Carrie fixed him with a pleading look.
"Please?" she whispered, rocking back on her heels anxiously. "It's...it's important."
"It's two o'clock in the morning, Carrie." he pointed out, leaning heavily against the doorframe with a sigh. It was a sigh of resignation more than anything else, because he'd known from the moment he'd first set eyes upon her that he was not about to deny her anything. She simply looked far too upset.
"It's very important." Carrie insisted with a sniff. "I...I know she's not well but...but...well..."
"Go and steal her blankets." Remus suggested, gesturing vaguely over her shoulder, and with that he stepped out into the sitting room and made a beeline for the kettle.
Carrie shuffled over the threshold, squinting through the darkness as she watched Dora sit up in bed and set about rearranging the blankets around her. Now that she had managed to disturb the witch, Carrie found that she felt rather guilty. It had not taken long for Dora to get over her sudden sickness, for the first few hours after being tucked up in bed that first day she had been violently sick over and over until Carrie was certain it was physically impossible for her to vomit anymore. Her temperature had soared to a raging fever during the first night that had kept her tossing and turning for hours. But since then she appeared to have grown better by the hour and had managed a few small and suitably bland meals as well as the odd leisurely trip outside for fresh air.
But she was still pale, queasy and all together rather feeble. Certainly in no perfect state to have her night's sleep interrupted.
Despite all of this, and despite her earlier resistance, Dora reached to pat the empty side of the bed beside her and murmured:
"C'mon then, before the bed gets cold."
As she shuffled across the room and slipped carefully under the blankets, Carrie supposed she ought feel more than a little childish at the scene, and yet she found that she would rather feel childish than as utterly awful and dirty as she had been lying in her own bed.
"This is awesome." Dora murmured to the muggle's bemusement. "If you were Teddy right now he'd have wanted his dad, and I'd be the one stuck out there making hot chocolate or whatever it is Remus is up to." She offered the muggle a bright smile as if she were in someway grateful for her gender, and when Carrie simply stared at her she rolled her eyes a little and wondered: "So...2am...must be something pretty damn important, hm?"
Carrie pulled the blankets up and over her knees so that she could hug them to her chest, gazing off at the wall opposite them.
"I...I just...I want to ask you something..."
"I'm all ears, love."
For a long moment, Carrie chewed her lip in consideration, attempting to order her muddled thoughts. At long last she drew in a deep breath and wondered:
"Have you ever had a dream...like a dream that when you woke up you wished you never had it?"
There was long and distinctly unimpressed silence, before Dora recalled:
"Mm...plenty of times, Carrie. It's called a nightmare." she turned to fix the side of the muggle's head with a stare. "Seriously, Carrie...two o'clock in the morning...!"
"No, no!" Carrie cried, fidgeting awkwardly. "Not a nightmare, that's not what I meant! I meant...like...like did you ever have the most wonderful, fantastic dream but...but when you woke you realised it was...it wasn't wonderful at all, it was...it was horrible and...and dreadful and...and it was the worst thing you ever imagined...?"
Dora settled herself back against her pillows, yawning widely.
"Why would you suddenly think that?" she asked, and Carrie's grip upon her knees tightened.
"I...I don't know..."
"Of course you do. You know why you think things, Carrie, if you didn't you wouldn't think them in the first place."
Carrie leant to bury her face in her arms. She simply couldn't explain herself, she didn't know how. She didn't want to know how, either, didn't want to admit to her dreams of the wrong boy, the wrong feelings, of all those things that were wrong but seemed to feel so utterly right when she was sleeping...
After a while she felt movement beside her and Dora carefully prised her head back from her arms and set about pushing her legs down under the blankets.
"Alright then," the Auror murmured sleepily, sliding down until she was lying upon her side, arms reaching to pull the teenager down after her. "Let's start from the beginning, shall we? This dream of yours, when did you start having it?"
"Just...just a few nights ago..." Carrie mumbled as she settled her head down upon Remus' pillow. For a moment she felt a sense of calm begin to descend upon her, peering at Dora through the darkness, the warmth of the blankets making her feel safe and secure, a cosy little bubble full of Dora's calm, clarity and common sense. The bubble burst abruptly with Dora inquired:
"And what happens then, in this dream?" When Carrie simply shook her head vigorously, the Auror was forced to admit: "You're not giving me a whole lot to work with here, you know."
"I can't tell you." Carrie whispered, turning her head until it was buried in the pillow, her stomach twisting into knots.
"You can tell me absolutely anything you like, love. Like I've always said."
"Yes but...but I...but I'd not like to tell you this. I'd not like it at all..."
"Why not?"
"Because...!"
"Because what? Because you reckon I'll think badly of you? Or maybe because you think I'd be angry or upset with you?"
"No..."
"No?"
"I mean...maybe."
"You mean yes."
"Y...yes."
"Mm. That's a lie though, isn't it?"
"No..."
"Of course it is. If you really thought you couldn't possibly tell me you wouldn't have bothered to wake me up."
The Auror's unshakable logic was somewhat alarming. Carrie didn't know what to say, so she chose to remain mute.
"Let's try again, shall we?" Dora suggested patiently, pausing to yawn widely. "What's so dreadful about this dream? How does it make you feel, when you wake up?"
"I...well...I don't know..."
"Yes you do. So, how does it make you feel?"
Carrie fidgeted, face contorting in embarrassment.
"D...dirty..." she mumbled into the pillow. "Ashamed..."
There was a brief pause before the witch beside her let out a heavy sigh and groaned:
"Oh bloody hell! We're talking about boys again, aren't we?"
Carrie instantly flinched as she felt movement beside her, and she drew her face away from the pillow to see Dora sit up in bed, reaching to rake a hand through her messy mousy brown hair.
"I...how do you know..."
"We're talking about one of those awkward dreams where you're...with somebody you should be or something like that..."
"How..."
"Because, Carrie love, we've all had them..."
"We...we have?"
"Yes, plenty of times...and Merlin help me, you've woken me up in the middle of the night to make me talk about how once I dreamt I walked into my office at work and found Whatshisface lying naked on the rug before the fireplace..."
"You what?" Carrie squeaked in horror, colour flooding her face. "Who was lying there naked?"
"It was...I don't know...not Robert, he didn't have any tattoos...Daniel. It was Daniel..."
"Daniel? As in...as in Daniel...?"
"Anyway, that doesn't really matter. None of it does, Carrie, what matters is it was just a stupid dream! It was just my imagination running away with itself, and who honestly gives a toss what ridiculous scenarios I can dream up in my head?"
"Well...well Remus might..."
"Only if I choose to take any notice of them! I've yet to summon Daniel into my office to demand he close the door behind him and strip for me! Should I ever decide that's a cool idea I'm sure Remus might be a tad unimpressed! But until then, Carrie, it's just some random dream that I had one night. What does it mean? That I might think Daniel's a bit of alright? Sure, but that's not a bloody crime now, is it?"
"Isn't it?" Carrie wondered a little doubtfully, and the witch flopped back down against her pillows with a groan.
"No, it isn't!" she exclaimed, promptly biting her tongue in an attempt to quieten down. She drew in a deep, calming breath before continuing:"There are a whole load of different people in the world, Carrie. Some of them are average looking, some of them fell out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down and others are flawless god-like creatures that blind us with their good looks. And that doesn't change when you're with somebody. People don't just suddenly become ugly or unattractive! We're allowed to think that bloke there has nice looking eyes or that one over there looks rather good in that pair of jeans! I'm allowed to nod at that guy sitting across the room to me and joke to you if I were ten years younger...!"
"But...but isn't that a bit...well..."
"Disloyal? Unfaithful? Insensitive?"
"Well...yes!"
"It doesn't come close, love. Not if you truly love somebody."
"But...but surely if you love them you shouldn't...shouldn't think about...other people like that."
"Like that, Carrie, is only skin deep. What's a fleeting attraction to somebody's appearance that your mind conjured up when you were sleeping compared to the love you have for somebody when you're wide awake? What does it matter that Daniel's good looking? Remus loves me. He makes me feel special without even trying, and then most of the time he tries anyway, just in case! He always knows the right thing to say to make me smile or feel better if I'm having a tough day...and in a split second he can shoot a wad of chewing gum straight up someone's nose...how bloody awesome is that?"
Carrie rolled over onto her back so that she could frown up through the darkness at the ceiling.
Put like that, she realised, it all seemed so obvious!
But then again, everything seemed obvious when Dora pointed it out.
Dora sighed heavily again, reaching to rub wearily at her eyes.
"Two in the bloody morning!" she muttered, shaking her head, and Carrie felt compelled to mumble:
"Sorry."
"You're quite something, you are!"
"I know...I'm sorry."
"D'you know what you are? You're a bloody nightmare..."
"Sorry..."
"Next time you want to wake me up in the middle of the night, make sure the house is on fire or something reasonable like that first!"
"Okay..."
"In fact no, scrap that! If you wake up and spot Voldemort reincarnate peering through your bedroom window you can come and wake Remus up! Anything less than that and I'm going to hex you into the middle of next week, alright?"
"Alright then..."
"Good. Now bugger off and go to sleep!"
As she slipped carefully back out from underneath the covers, cheeks blooming with a flood of embarrassed colour, Carrie felt a hand reach to grip hold of her by the elbow. She turned back to find the Auror peering at her through the darkness, a small smile playing on her lips, the bottom of which still looked a little swollen.
"I'm kidding, Sweetheart." the witch whispered, raising an eyebrow, and when Carrie managed a small smile in return Dora's grip upon the muggle's elbow tightened, expression suddenly deadly serious as she pledge: "Anything, anytime. You know that, don't you?"
Carrie gave a small nod, still feeling too abashed to say anything, and she promptly found herself being pulled back down towards the mattress as the witch reached to give her a rather clumsy one-armed hug.
"Thanks Dora." she managed a long moment later, just as the bedroom door was pushed open and Remus reappeared, a steaming mug held in one hand.
"Are we all sunshine and daisies, then?" the werewolf asked as Carrie rose to her feet and offered him a bright smile when he pressed the mug of cocoa into her hands.
"Of course we are!" Dora told him, taking the opportunity to stretch herself out under the blankets, stealing a good half of his side of the bed.
"Brilliant..." Remus said, yawning widely, and Carrie hastily shuffled back towards the door.
"Goodnight, then." she murmured, glancing back over her shoulder as Remus sat down upon the edge of the bed. "Thanks for the cocoa, Remus."
"You're welcome." the werewolf told her, sounding remarkably cheery for such a late hour, and Dora called:
"Sweet dreams, Carrie love."
"Sweet dreams." Carrie mumbled back, and with that she stepped out into the sitting room and pulled the door shut behind her. For a moment she stood, clutching the steaming mug and staring at the door, listening to the muffled sounds of movement within...
They were talking. She could just about make our the sound of their hushed voices, and Carrie felt a sudden rush of apprehension.
What if Dora relayed their whole conversation to Remus? Merlin, Carrie couldn't stand the thought...
Except Dora wouldn't. She'd keep it all to herself, it was a girl thing, it was just between the two of them...
But...what if...
Carrie hastily crept forwards and squatted down so that she could squint through the keyhole. In the dim moonlight that had crept through the bedroom curtains she could just about make them out, both lying upon their backs, staring up at the ceiling. After a moment, Remus looked sideways at the witch beside him and murmured:
"What're you thinking?"
Dora let out a loud sigh that made the air catch in the back of Carrie's throat in anticipation.
And then, to the muggle's shock, the witch informed her husband:
"I was just imagining Daniel naked." There was a slightly stunned pause as she waited for this information to sink in, before she rolled onto her side to fix Remus with a bright smile so that she could ask him: "Can we have sex?" And with that, she promptly dissolved into laughter.
Remus turned his back on her, pulling the blankets up to his chin.
"Not for at least a month now you've put it like that." he murmured. "Now go back to sleep."
Dora shifted across the bed until she could bury her face in the back of his pyjamas, reaching to slide her arms around him as she attempted to smother her amusement. As Remus' eyes drifted closed she shifted closer against him, raising her head until her lips were pressed to his ear.
"I don't think you can last that long." she teased, but he merely reached to cradle her arms against his chest and insisted:
"Go to sleep."
They were silent for a long minute, and Carrie was just about to creep back to her room, satisfied that Dora wasn't about to say anything, when quite suddenly the Auror mumbled:
"Remus?"
"Mm?" came the reluctant response, and a frown creased the werewolf's brow as the witch fidgeted against his back.
"You know," Dora began slowly, "back when Ted and Carrie were younger, when we had that bet going about when they'd get together?"
"Mm?"
"Well...did you ever think it wouldn't happen? Did you ever think they wouldn't get together?"
Remus let out a resigned sigh, reluctantly dragging his eyes open.
"Not really, no." he admitted. "I can't say I ever imagined them not being together." When Dora did not reply straight away he closed his eyes again, only for the witch to tell him:
"Sometimes I wonder...what it would be like...you know, if they were still just friends."
"Mm..."
"Sometimes I reckon...well sometimes I reckon it might've been...well...better."
"Better?"
"Yeah..." There was an expectant pause before Remus consented to asking:
"Why would it have been better?"
"Well," Dora explained, frowning a little at the thought. "It would've been simpler. Being friends was more simple."
"So?"
"So...they were less likely to screw up being friends."
"You think they'll screw up being more than friends?"
"No...of course not, it's just..."
"It's just...?"
"It just they...well they might. I mean they're very young."
"Yes, they are."
"And they take it all rather seriously, don't they?"
"Mm...they do."
"I mean...it could all go horribly wrong, couldn't it?"
"It could, I suppose."
"And that would be bloody awful, wouldn't it? I mean...what would happen if...if for example we get up in the morning and...and Ted comes in for breakfast and announces they've broken up? What would you do?"
"Dora..."
"Seriously! What would happen? We'd take Carrie back to her aunt's house and then...and then what? We'd never see her again?"
"Well...that would depend, I suppose, on how they were when they broke up...why are we having a discussion about this?"
There was a very long silence. Carrie reached to clamp a hand down over her mouth, her heart beginning to race in her chest and she flinched when Remus abruptly shifted round to face his wife, wondering:
"Have they had a row, then?"
"No, nothing like that." Dora assured him, taking the opportunity to commandeer his chest as a substitute pillow. "I was just thinking, that's all. If they were to split up...well Carrie's been around us for so long now, she's at our house more often than I am! It would be so strange, if she wasn't there anymore...it's almost like...like she'd have dumped all three of us..."
"Dora?"
"Hm?"
"It's almost three o'clock in the morning, I'm tired and this is an entirely pointless conversation that serves only to agitate the pair of us. Just go to sleep."
For a moment, Dora simply frowned as if she wanted to protest, but eventually she sighed heavily and mumbled:
"Right...g'night then..."
"Thank Merlin, it's a miracle!" Remus breathed, dropping a kiss atop her head, and with that he wrapped his arms around her middle and murmured: "Goodnight, Sweetheart."
"Love you."
"Love you too."
Satisfied that her secret was entirely safe, Carrie crept back to her bedroom, an awful sinking feeling in her stomach at Dora's horrible what ifs. As she shrugged off her dressing gown and slid back under her blankets, the muggle gave herself a stubborn little shake.
It didn't even matter, she told herself firmly. Because Dora was entirely wrong. It wouldn't be better if she and Teddy were just friends, of course it wouldn't, that was a stupid notion! And as for them ever breaking up...
She really ought not have woken Dora up, obviously she was over-tired and not making a whole lot of sense.
Except of course for everything she had told Carrie just moments beforehand.
Carrie wriggled further down under the blankets and curled herself up, hugging her knees tightly.
It was probably best to forget what she had overheard anyway, she thought as she closed her eyes in determination to do just that. This is why you aren't supposed to eavesdrop, she reminded herself sternly. You hardly ever like what you hear.
And besides, Dora hadn't said Carrie's relationship with Teddy would fail, she had simply said that it could do. And it could, of course it could, anything could happen in life, Carrie knew this far too well after being around the Lupins for so many years. You might move into a house next to a slightly odd family, and then all of a sudden you might discover they are in actual fact magical and that the whole world is actually partially populated by real witches and wizards. You might go to summer school with your best friend one day and promptly have the life sucked out of you by a psychotic witch from the Middle Ages through a magic mirror. You could even be sat having a chat in your friend's bedroom one moment and be in an entirely different time in the next. One minute you might be living happily with your parents and the next moment they might have had their memories wiped and you might end up living with your workaholic spinster aunt and her unnaturally bad-tempered and ugly cat.
But just because anything could happen, that didn't mean that it necessarily would.
In fact it definitely wouldn't, in this case. She and Teddy would be together forever, she was absolutely sure of it. And that, Carrie thought determinedly, giving an almost indigent fidget, was that.
She was just dropping off to sleep some minutes later when the peaceful silence of the room was disturbed by the sound of movement by the window, the shifting of material, and at the disturbance Carrie gave a heavy sigh.
Surely, she thought as she dragged her eyes reluctantly open, she hadn't forgotten to close the window! It was freezing outside, the muggle recalled as she rolled over to look towards the source of the noise she would surely have noticed more of a draft...
The small shriek of alarm left Carrie's lips so abruptly that the hand she hastily clamped down across her mouth seemed altogether futile.
From where he stood, face pressed up against the glass, one hand groping around through the open window to push aside a net curtain, Kit Carter very nearly jumped out of his skin, his forehead colliding with the glass with an audible crack. Carrie drew in a deep breath to shout something suitably horrified and furious at him, only for the animagus to hurriedly press a finger to his lips, shaking his head vigorously...
And for some reason, though she was utterly mortified at the mere sight of him, though she could barely imagine anything more distressing or disturbing than spotting somebody peering through her bedroom window, watching her sleep, Carrie couldn't seem to say a word, let alone shout. The words simply wouldn't form upon her tongue, she couldn't quite think of what to say, what to do, and as she sat bolt upright in bed, staring at her unexpected visitor in silence she heard the sound of muffled rushed movement. The door to the bedroom was flung abruptly open, wandlight flooded the room and for the briefest moment Carrie was blinded by it. She flinched, eyes screwed shut, and when she opened them half a second later she found that Kit Carter was nowhere to be seen.
"What's wrong?" Teddy asked breathlessly as both he and Samuel bolted into the room, wands held aloft, and as she turned to face them, feeling rather dazed, Carrie was vaguely aware of yet more movement as Edwin, Neve, Remus and Dora gradually appeared, clustered around the doorway and peering into the room curiously.
"I...I..." Carrie sucked in a deep, determined breath as Teddy dropped down onto the edge of the bed, reaching to slide a comforting arm around her shoulders.
"Nightmare was it, Carrie love?" Dora called as she took a small step forward to lean against the doorframe, one eyebrow raised, and Edwin and Neve exchanged a weary glance.
And for no reason that she could quite put her finger on, Carrie found herself dropping her gaze to her lap and mumbling:
"Yes, yes it...it was just a nightmare. That was all it was."
"Sweet Merlin...!" Samuel breathed, letting out a large, exasperated breath that he had apparently been holding, and his parents both shot him a disapproving look.
"S...sorry..." Carrie mumbled, daring a glance up towards the adults in the doorway. "I...I'm sorry I disturbed you...silly..."
"Happens to the best of us." Remus assured her, a meaningful hand coming to rest upon his wife's shoulder, and the Auror gave a rather solemn nod.
"Never mind, eh?" Edwin agreed, sounding alarmingly cheerful at this speedy conclusion. "Right then love, shall we?" And with that, both he and Neve murmured their goodnights and disappeared back towards their bedroom. As Samuel followed his parents' lead, Dora took a step further into the room so that he could pass her through the doorway. Carrie watched, as Teddy pulled her sideways into a firm one armed hug, as Dora reached to rake a hand through her disarrayed hair, frowning deeply.
"Merlin, my head..." the muggle heard the witch complain to her husband as Remus stepped up behind her, and Carrie felt oddly calmed as she watched the werewolf reached to sweep the hair back from the witch's face.
"You got up too quickly."
"Mm..."
"Neve said the potions wouldn't wear off immediately..."
"Mm...bloody hell..."
Remus carefully turned the frowned Auror round to face him, leaning to press a kiss to her crinkled brow as he murmured:
"Bed."
"Yes..." Dora mumbled in agreement, and as she turned to shuffle back towards the door, Remus' gaze came to rest upon the two teenagers upon the bed.
"And you." he told his son meaningfully.
Teddy offered his father a raised eyebrow.
"Two minutes." the werewolf insisted.
The youngest Lupin gave a soft snort.
"Bit paranoid, Dad..."
"One minute fifty five seconds."
"Alright, alright!" As his parents disappeared out the door, Teddy leant to smother a snigger into Carrie's hair, but the muggle barely noticed.
She was much too busy trying to convince herself that he had lied with good reason.
Obviously, she told herself as she offered Teddy a vague smile and allowed him to ease her down onto the bed, it had been because of Dora. Because she was, despite first appearances, still ill. Because there had been enough drama. Because Kit Carter was just a strange boy with creepy habits and nothing more. Because it wasn't worth making anybody worried. Because she didn't want to ruin this holiday anymore than she already had.
Yes, Carrie told herself as Teddy tucked the blankets firmly around her and leant to press a lingering kiss to her lips, she had lied for good reason, several of them in fact.
Because that seemed far more plausible than her original theory: that she had lied for absolutely no conscious reason at all.