A/N: yes, I am writing this to avoid preparing for my exams.

Chapter 5: Regrets

Remus suddenly regretted everything once he entered that house, not going to the house per say, but definitely leaving that night. And, to be fair, it wasn't this house that he had left, Remus had never been inside of this house before. Of course he hadn't, he'd been dead.

He regretted that night even though he knew that he couldn't, he did what he knew he had to do, but Merlin, living after your death really complicated your feelings on past decisions. He was right in going, he did it for Teddy.

The house wasn't very large, but it was bigger than the house they had lived in when they first had gotten married, which was the cottage that Remus inherited from his parents off the coast of Cardiff.

Inside, the walls were decorated with many, many stationary muggle pictures of Teddy growing up. Many, many pictures of many, many events and milestones Remus had missed. Should he have stayed home that night? Remus wasn't around for much of the battle before…well…but still, the smallest change in a circumstance can have the biggest effect.

The pictures ranged over the course of different years, from when Teddy wasn't much older then when Remus last saw him, to birthdays, to primary school, to Hogwarts, and everything in between. It's what Remus wanted for him, it's what he went to fight for that night, but he couldn't lie and say he wasn't a bit disappointed that he had missed everything. He couldn't lie and say that since laying his eyes on his thirteen year old son that he had not, at least a little bit, regretted the decision to leave that night. He knew he had to, and deep down he knew it was right, but it still sucked.

The rest of the house was not decorated in a Dora-esque fashion. Well, parts of it were and parts of it weren't as if she and another person couldn't agree on the decor. The bright colors of the living room clashed with the sleek, clean presence of the diningroom and kitchen. Remus's hands suddenly got very clammy as his palms began to sweat. She had let him kiss her earlier, but had he overstepped? No, surely she wouldn't allow him to come with her if she had a new spouse in the house, right? Maybe they were an auror too and were working those odd hours she always had.

Remus's throat went dry. He had no right to be upset; he had been dead after all. Thirteen years was a long time to mourn alone, Remus would know. Of course she wasn't really alone; she had Teddy, Andromeda, the Weasleys, and the rest of the Order to help her grieve.

"You alright there," Dora asked, snapping Remus out of his trance as she rested her hand on his elbow. He nodded before walking away from her in the entryway to the living room.

"It's erm…it's a lovely house," he said. He looked at a particular picture on the wall. It showed an about four year-old, sunset orange haired Teddy with a stuffed bear that Remus had bought. He had found it in a muggle shop during the limited outings for groceries during the war. It was a simple brown bear with a purple ribbon tied around its neck; its fur had originally been fluffy, but the photo showed the fur slightly duller.

"He still has it," said Dora from behind him once she had seen which photo he'd been viewing. "It's in his trunk somewhere. He didn't want to leave it behind, but thirteen year old boys can be mean about that stuff I suppose, but it is with him."

"There's a lot of photos," Remus commented, scanning around the room.

"I have more upstairs, moving ones because I think having this many moving pictures on the walls would make me go cross eye," said Dora. She sighed, "I started hanging a lot of them up because Teddy said it may let you see them easier."

Remus was pretty sure he felt his heart shatter just then as tears began to uncontrollably run down his face. "I'm sorry," he cried. "I'm so sorry."

She moved closer to him and wrapped her arms around his neck. She let out a shaky breath, "that's not why I told you that. I wasn't looking for an apology. I know you did what you had to do that night. We both did. Teddy knows that too. That's why I told you that, because you need to know that while you weren't physically here, you are so, so special to that boy."

"He's thirteen,' Remus offered lamely as Dora untangled herself from him.

Dora nodded, "I'm sure that was a bit of a shock."

Remus swallowed hard, but the lump in his throat wouldn't budge. "I've missed so much."

Dora nodded again, "you have, but you're here now." She threw herself into him again, wrapping her arms back around his neck, "god, I've missed you."

He wrapped his own arms around her, pulling her close and holding her to his form, having no intent of letting her go soon. That was until he heard movement from upstairs, moving closer and closer to the staircase. He pulled away from her- she did get remarried after all, and her new spouse was definitely not going to appreciate the picture of their wife and her…ex husband entangled in each other.

Dora hadn't been wearing a ring, but she hadn't when they had first gotten married either, when she was still with the Aurors. She had told him that many Aurors did wear them at work in fear of them getting lost, damaged, or stolen. It was probably the same circumstances around her new marriage as well.

Remus wanted to lie, so desperately wanted to lie to himself and say this didn't hurt, that it should be expected of a young widow after so many years. But, holy shit did it hurt so bad. It hurt because if things had gone differently at Hogwarts that would still be him, he hoped at least. Remus would be in the pictures on the walls with his son, and they all would've been hung there because that's where they belong, not for the purpose of the dead being able to see them from beyond.

He wasn't angry at Dora, of course, only at himself, that he couldn't have done better to keep himself alive, so that he could be everything that he had never gotten to steps began to descend down into the living room, and Remus braced himself for the person that would now be married to Dora, a parental figure to Teddy. The person that he so desperately wanted to be.

The person, however, would definitely not be married to Dora, because she was Remus's mother-in-law. He let go of a breath that he didn't realize that he was holding upon seeing the third party.

Andromeda paled quickly, becoming almost completely white. The graceful and stoich presence, however, remained with her even as it appeared that she was about to faint.

"Nympha- wha- what's happening," she asked breathlessly. She looked directly into his eyes, surveying him to see if Remus would vanish. "Remus?"

"Hello," Remus greeted her weakly, much like he did when Dora had introduced him to Andromeda for the first time. It was, he realized, the same way he had been greeting people all night.

"H-how," asked Andromeda.

"It's a bit of a long story, but he's erm…quite solid, I suppose," said Dora, placing her hand on his lower back.

"I-I don't understand," whispered Andromeda.

"Have you ever heard of the Resurrection Stone," asked Remus.

Andromeda looked at him puzzled…well, more puzzled than she looked already, "of course I have. A lot of us know what had happened to Harry that night in the forest, but you were all ghosts."

"Yes, well, it was struck by lightning, and its powers must have been enhanced in some way, so here I am- solid and everything," Remus explained, finishing with an awkward smile, since this was about as awkward as a scenario that Remus could think of. Andromeda didn't hate Remus at the time of the battle, far from it actually, but there was still some lingering animosity from Remus' past choices that had put a strain on the pair's relationship.

"Who was using the stone then? It doesn't just act on its own," said Andromeda.

Dora hesitated for a moment before speaking, "...Teddy."

Remus watched Andromeda's eyes grow wider, a feat he didn't think possible. It was almost as though he could see her heart sink into the pit of her stomach.

"He's fine," Dora added quickly upon seeing her mother's face. "If he wasn't I would still be at the Hospital Wing. He's completely fine, if a bit shaken, but aren't we all?"

Andromeda relaxed slightly, "well it's erm…nice to have you back, Remus. Now, I am going to go back to sleep. I'll see you both in the morning, I would assume."

"We promised the others we would be back at the castle, so we are just grabbing some essentials," explained Dora.

"There are others?"

"James and Lily Potter, and Sirius are all alive and in the Room of Requirement," Remus told her.

"This is mad," said Andromeda, under her breath, but it could still be heard quite clearly. "Beautiful but mad."

Once Andromeda departed for her bedroom once again, Dora led Remus into her bedroom. It was as colorfully decorated as he expected, some pieces of furniture he even recognized from their own house. She led him past her bed covered in a deep yellow duvet and to a set of two sliding-door closets.

"Please don't laugh at me," Dora warned him.

"Now why would I do that?"

Dora sighed heavily, "I really should've gone through this all by now. I should really have gone through it before we moved here, but it was so close to the end of war. Now it's just all been sitting here for thirteen years, but now it's getting to the point where Teddy wants some of it. All of this to say that almost your entire wardrobe is still in this closet."

She slid the white door open and, sure enough, most of Remus's clothes were hanging in there. Some of them had been folded neatly on the top shelf, but they were now covered by a chaotic pile of Dora's clothes. It was pretty much the same way their closet had been in their flat when they had first gotten married, before the Death Eaters took over the Ministry and they relocated to Ted's and Andromeda's house.

"I know…I really should have gotten rid of some of this by now, but, then again, I guess I was prepared for all of this," said Dora. Remus was only able to merely stare at her. Merlin, she really wasn't lying when she said that she was committed to this, to him. It was quite touching, but still, Remus couldn't help but think that she had held back on a lot because he had died.

"I thought you would've gotten remarried," Remus admitted.

"Please don't be self-deprecating-"

"I'm not," interrupted Remus. "You were twenty-five, Dora. I just want to be sure you were happy."

She sighed, "I won't lie, there were others after you. None of them ever lasted long, and only one ever met Teddy since he was the only one I was with long enough to bring around him. It was just that…none of them were right for me, and I was perfectly content without them."

Remus nodded.

"Plus, I don't know how kindly they would've taken my collection of my dead husband's clothes in my closet."

"But were you happy," Remus asked again.

Dora contemplated this for a few moments before nodding her head, "for the most part I was happy." She wrapped her arms around his waist again and buried her face into his chest, "fuck- I missed you."

Remus held her body to his; she was shaking slightly from her cries. He didn't know what to say. He had put so much effort into not hurting her nor Teddy with his lycanthropy, but they were both hurting from something that had absolutely nothing to do with Remus's greatest fear. Maybe if he hadn't been too blindsided by that fear he would have seen the greatest threat in front of him that could rip the three of them apart- the war. And it did precisely that.

Dora pulled herself from him, wiping a stray tear from her cheek before restoring her composure- a skill that Remus always respected about her, even if it brought him some mild concerns.

And now, just as quickly as she cemented herself to him, Dora turned from him and toward the opened closet. She pulled from it, one of Remus' favorite, well worn jumpers and a pair of soft, flannel pajama pants that he often wore following a transformation. She handed them to him before busying herself in picking out and changing into her own clothes.

Remus couldn't help but feel that she was distancing herself from him. Sure, she had had several moments in the past few hours where she had melted down to the Dora that he had left all those years ago to fight the battle. However, most of the time tonight she was just colder. He couldn't judge her too hard though, he had walked out and back into her life so many times in the past, and here he was again, doing just that, even if he was supposed to have been solidified as a goner.

Dora seemed angry though. She had every right to be, Remus supposed. He had made her stay home after she had begged him to stay with her. He had walked out for what was supposed to have been the final time and gotten himself killed, leaving her to raise their barely even a week old son. Remus knew she had wanted to go to the battle too. To be quite honest, he was surprised she had stayed home at all. Maybe she hadn't. Maybe she was able to do what Remus couldn't: return home safe, alive.

Then again, maybe she wasn't mad at that. There was a lot in their marriage and entire relationship for her to still be angry at. It may have been the combination of times that he had left both her and Teddy for what he thought was the right thing but turned out to create a cluster fuck of problems that he can no longer fix. He had hurt both of them, just as he had hoped he wouldn't, but it wasn't, however, in the way he expected. He hurt them as a man, not a werewolf.

"Are you alright," asked Dora from behind him. It was then that Remus realized just how long he'd been standing there, staring down at his jumper, when he realized that she was already changed out of her robes and into a pair of pajamas. "If you want to pack some of your stuff and go back, that's fine. I'll help you, but I worked a twelve hour shift on top of all of this, and I would really like to get some sleep sooner or later."

Remus nodded, "I'll stay here. I'll go back in the morning." He hoped he would anyways; he knew there was a likely possibility of him not waking up in the morning. But, if he were going to die again, he wanted to be with his wife before he did. No matter how badly he wanted to be with his friends, he craved to be here with Dora.

She nodded and crawled into bed as Remus began to undress himself from his robes and put on the jumper and trousers. They felt slightly thinner than he remembered, but they had been sitting in a closet for the past thirteen years. Remus neatly folded the nice, new robes that he had been buried in and laid them on the dresser.

"You remember the robes I showed you," asked Remus.

"Of course," she responded. "Ginny, Hermione, and Fleur took me into Diagon Alley a few days after the battle; they were trying to get me out of the house, and themselves too, I think. I basically broke down when I saw them in the window, and explained to Ginny about how you said you wanted them. Anyways, Harry bought them for your funeral." She hesitated, "I think he felt guilty."

Remus nodded solemnly. Harry needn't feel guilty, but Remus certainly did.

He climbed into bed next to Dora, just like he had the previous night for him, but he thought of how different this would be for her now. He wrapped her in his arms just as he had on particular bad nights during the war, like when the news of Ted's death broke, when everything seemed to be going against them. The war hadn't been in their favor until the very end.

She was stiff in his arms at first before she began to relax. He kissed atop her head, "I love you, Nymphadora."

"Don't make me kill you when you just came back," she mumbled before her breathing steadied, and she fell asleep. Remus soon followed.

Remus felt himself being shaken awake early the next morning, so he opened his eyes to see Dora, an amused but slightly shocked expression etched onto her face. "What's wrong," he asked groggily.

"You might want to look in the mirror for that one," she told him.

Remus stood up from the bed quickly and walked into the room's adjourning bathroom before looking into the mirror. Remus was shocked to see that his face was now more lined and his hair was almost completely gray. "Oh my…" he trailed off.

He walked back into the bedroom to find Dora sitting on the bed, still in her pajamas and looking quite amused at Remus's expression.

"I'm old," he said flatly. Of course he had always felt old, but now he truly felt he was old, quite literally overnight.

"A bit," said Dora.

"I'm not normally the one to fuss about my hair in this marriage but look at it. It's all gray," said Remus. He was accustomed to premature aging, but it never happened this quickly before.

Dora gave him a playful, suggestive smirk, "I personally think it's rather sexy. She turned serious, "this is a good thing though, right? You're becoming more…solid? Everything's becoming how it should be if you had survived."

Remus shrugged, "I dunno. D'you think the others look older too?"

"There's only one way to find out, isn't there?"

They got themselves dressed before throwing some items in a trunk Remus would need, like clothes, toiletries, and books, to take back with him. He was sure to grab enough stuff for James, Sirius, and Lily. Even though his clothes weren't exactly James and Sirius' style, it would just have to do for now, unless Harry still had anything from Grimmauld Place that would belong to Sirius. Dora even placed a few of her more neutral clothes into the trunk for Lily.

"Harry will probably bring some of Ginny's things, but just in case," explained Dora.

"Harry and Ginny are married," Remus inquired.

"Oh yeah. They have kids, too, two boys and a girl. Teddy's pretty close to them, though I would probably let Harry tell his parents this."

"Of course," said Remus. It was hard to imagine Lily and James as grandparents, probably due to the fact that they barely got the chance to be parents at all. They would be great, he knew, if not a little perturbed that they were now twenty-one going on fifty-one and new, but not new, grandparents.

They were about to leave when they had finished packing the trunk, but Dora opened the closet one last time and took a box off of the lower shelf. She opened it and pulled two ring boxes from it. Remus recognized the boxes instantly as the ones their wedding bands came in. She opened the one box and pulled his ring from it, "I was planning on giving this to Teddy when he planned on getting married, but I think we could use them again."

She placed the ring on his finger before she pulled hers from the other box and put that on as well. Remus cupped her cheek before leaning forward and kissing her gently.

"I love you," he whispered against her lips. Dora leaned into him and rested her head on his chest, and, while it was not said, he knew she loved him too.

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