*TW: Pregnancy loss
Another sleepless night led Harry to be up and early to breakfast.
Normally, on the rare occasion he'd been up this early, Harry found the Great Hall nearly abandoned; occasionally there would be a teacher or two grabbing breakfast themselves, a few students, usually Ravenclaws, up reading as they munched their morning meals. He'd not been prepared to catch the professor who was quickly becoming his favorite teacher locked in a passionate kiss in the corner beside a suit of armor. The two jumped apart at the sound of his approaching footsteps, almost as if the roles were reversed. It made Harry snort to stifle a laugh.
Lupin's wife, Harry noticed, was very pretty, as all the rumors had said. However, in the brief few seconds he caught a glimpse of her adjust Professor Lupin's lapel and hurry down the corridor, presumably to her own job, there was something familiar about her. Harry felt like he'd seen her somewhere before. The Professor in question's face bore a little bit of a blush, and he shoved his hands in his pockets as he walked over.
"Good Morning, Harry!" He greeted warmly.
"Apparently." Harry replied with an eyebrow raised, laughing.
"Jasmine." Lupin answers the unasked question. "She's the children's librarian in Tredegar, where we live, so she leaves early. We-uh- usually don't run into students."
"You don't have to defend yourself to me, sir." Harry continued to laugh. "Must be like re-living school days, getting caught snogging in the halls?"
"We didn't go to school together- but yeah, with old girlfriends, I suppose so." Lupin laughed genuinely back. Harry raised an eyebrow.
"She didn't go to Hogwarts?" Harry ask.
"N-No, she did." Remus confirmed, "Just... eight years after I started."
"Ah." Harry laughed at the second wave of blush creeping across the older wizard's face.
"So what has you up with the chickens this morning, Mr. Potter?" He ask, changing the subject.
"I couldn't sleep. I think I woke up the last time around 4:30, and I laid there for another hour, waiting for breakfast to be open, just for something to do. I'm not really hungry, either. But there will be coffee, and I need the coffee." Harry confessed.
"Why don't we both grab a plate and a cup, and you meet me back at my office. You can tell me what is on your mind, I'd love to help any way I can." Lupin suggested. Harry thought for a second and nodded, following the teacher toward the food.
Rather than sit across from one another on either side of his desk, Remus had Harry sit at one of the corner chairs, himself in the other, as they ate their morning meal. At first, the boy had been quiet and sleepy-eyed; A few sips of coffee in, however, he started to open up.
"Do dreams really mean anything?" Harry spouted, more like pondering aloud than asking. Remus looked the boy over, waiting for elaboration. When none came, he answered.
"How do you mean?" Remus ask gently.
"Even muggles try to read dreams, don't they? It's something nobody can explain... Why do our brains show us what they do?"
"These are some big questions, and I am only halfway into this cup of caffeine, I'm afraid. Could we maybe zoom it in closer to the issue you have at hand?" Remus ask, a bit taken back by the inquiries.
"I dream about a black dog. A fox. A mouse. Or maybe a rat? And then... These two deer... a wolf." Harry said. Remus felt his heart skip a beat, his blood run cold.
"Oh?" he managed to croak. He felt dizzy. "How often?"
"Since I was six or so." Harry shrugged. "Actually..." the younger wizard paused in thought for a moment. "The fox is newer, since I was."
"Fascinating." Remus sputtered quietly.
"For a while when I was younger there was a fox that lived in our neighborhood. I saw it a lot, in our back garden. Then one day, I guess it just moved on. I never saw it again, but it joined my dreams. Sometimes I'm outside and I'm barefoot-" Harry paused and furrowed his brow, "And they animals are all with me. The stag deer always pushes me toward the sunset. What do you think that means?"
Remus sat silently for a moment, genuinely trying hard to come up with some answer- any answer to give Harry.
"I'm sorry, I really don't know." Remus sighed at last. "How does this dream... How does it make you feel?"
"Safe." Harry confessed. He snapped his eyes back to me Remus' suddenly. "Do you think I'm weak or dumb for being afraid of the dementors?"
"What?" Remus ask, confused.
"Other students, they make fun of me." Harry answered. "And you, you jumped between me and the dementor that the boggart turned into... Like you were afraid I couldn't handle it."
"About the dementors? From the train? Or the boggart?" Remus questioned, and Harry shrugged. "Harry- the horrors you have faced in your life are not something many, if any, of your classmates have ever had to deal with. Its not something they can understand. Dementors- They're foul leeches, they feed off of despair and trauma, and given all you've endured, they are drawn to you."
"When I passed out- When you stepped in- I could hear this woman... She was shrieking so hard. Screaming my name. My friends say they didn't hear anything. But I swear, sir, there was a woman screaming like everything."
"Lily." Remus gasp under his breath. Harry froze and slowly looked to Remus. Remus looked equally shocked that Harry had heard him.
"You knew my mother?" Harry whispered. It was much less a question than an assumption.
"Y-Yeah. I knew her and your father... Very well." Remus sighed, sputtering his words.
"I feel like maybe you could've lead with that." the younger wizard snapped.
"I can understand you must feel betrayed upon hearing that. But please understand, I didn't want to-"
"No worries, Professor." Harry interrupted suddenly, and he stood from his seat. "I should go."
"Oh- I-"
"Thank you, Professor..." Harry called, hurrying out the door. Remus sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, furious at himself.
Jasmine was fast asleep when Remus came into the room; at least Remus thought she was.
His wife's sleeping form was almost dead center of their bed. Her knees were curled tight into her chest, her hair fallen over her face. There were several books stacked next to her, and two open on the bed- all of them on magical or familial law in the UK. It felt like a rock hit in the pit of his guts as he gently picked up her reading and placed them back in the stack.
"Hey Rem..." She hummed sleepily.
"We gotta quit meeting like this, doll." Remus laughed as she crawled up and into his open arms.
"Mmm." She agreed, nuzzling closer. "Maybe one day our jobs will line back up."
"Maybe sooner than later." The professor huffed, flat and defeated.
"Oh no-"
"Nothing like that." Remus assured her. "I may or may not have revealed to your sister's son that I knew her. He didn't stick around to hear more. Not that there is much more I can tell him, thank you Ministry."
"I can't find anything to help us either." Jasmine sighed heavily.
A silence fell over the moment, Remus thinking hard, eyebrows furrowed heavily together.
"I can't think of a single bad thing that has happened to you since we got together that wasn't directly because of me or what I am."
"Excuse me?" Jasmine squawked, pulling away.
"If you'd not married me, you could've gotten custody from Petunia, Jazz. Not to mention the other things I have put you through." Remus gently stroked his wife's angry, reddening face.
"The ministry wouldn't give him to me because I was homeless, then because I had a 'disreputable employment situation', That has nothing to do with you. You're the only good thing I do have!" Jasmine's large green eyes spilled with tears she couldn't hold back.
"Jazz what about-"
"Roughly fifteen percent of pregnancies end in miscarriage, Remus. You didn't-"
"Maybe if-"
"Shut up." She snapped. Remus looked over her pretty features, at the rage that worked just under the surface. "I have had enough. You don't get to just... Just take all that blame when your body is the one who got everything wrong- twice."
"Jazz, I didn't mean-"
"I said shut up." Jasmine repeated, on her feet now, backing away.
"JASMINE!" Remus' voice was commanding.
"No." Her voice broke. "I can't- I just now was getting to where I could make it through fucking day, Remus." Her voice broke again.
"And yet you've never even thought about the possibility that I AM THE PROBLEM!" Remus yelled. "You always just... you take all the blame, its all you... You never stop to think how- How it's- Something I have to live with- to- To look at you every day and know it might be me that is causing you all this pain? Jasmine- you've never even allowed me to ask if I am why we lost-"
"Save me this shit, Rem." She sighed. "If you really feel that way, why did you even marry me?"
Remus saw Jasmine Evans- not Jasmine Lupin- shatter again before him.
In an instant he was standing in the cold November rain, watching her stand far off her what was left of her family, refusing an umbrella, watching the only life she knew be lowered into the ground. Effectively orphaned twice. He'd made no move to comfort her then- he didn't know how. He was equally outcast to the opposite of the crowd. He'd watched her though- as McGonagall had made her way over and covered the girl after some time, no doubt to escort her back to the school. It was the last time he'd seen her for many, many years.
He blinked back into the moment at hand.
"Because I wanted you. I selfishly wanted something good and whole and pure- something just once, for me. I love you and I wanted to be-"
Sometime between their arguing, Remus had come to his feet as well, and he stood about a foot from her. Once again, his hand gently caressed her cheek.
"I wanted you, too." She whispered.
"Fighting isn't going to fix anything, it won't bring back what we've lost." Remus added. "We need to just- move forward. We can find some way out of this- You're going to meet him. I will make that happen."
Jasmine roughly wiped her eyes on her pajama sleeve.
"Stop promising me things I can't have." She scoffed. "Its cruel."
"I will find a way. I will." Remus echoed. "Don't doubt me, woman."
"I'm going to sleep now." She sighed, pushing gently past him and crawling up to her spot in the bed, pulling her pillow to her face. The sound of soft slapping on the hard, stone floor signaled that Monty had returned from where ever it was he had been, and he too shoved past Remus, though much less polite.
Remus and Monty had always had a hate-hate relationship. He wasn't sure if it was due to his lycanthropy, or if the overstuffed black and white feline simply saw him as a rival for his mum's attention- and he didn't care. The cat hated him, and he hated the cat. Monty always knew when they'd had any sort of disagreement, and without fail, he would be there to 'protect' her by getting between them in the bed and yowling and hissing if he got too close.
Monty hopped onto the bed and was at Jasmine's side, nudging her arm gently with his overly-large head, and she offered a scratch to his head without taking her head out of the pillow.
Remus cursed himself for ever even starting the stupid argument- but he did feel like it was something they would eventually have to talk about. The loss of two pregnancies now had nearly taken Jasmine from him; the grief was something she was neither willing to share or discuss.
He stood awkwardly for a moment, then gently lifted a pillow from his side of the bed and tucked it under his arm before turning around to exit the room.
"Don't be a coward." Jasmine growled from her cushioned hiding place.
"Three is a crowd." Remus replied dully.
"Monty says fuck you, Wolvie." Jasmine huffed. The cat, as if to confirm this, glared at him, ears laid back.
"Fuck you too, pal." Remus growled back. "And you know what, furball? This is my bed."
As he took his place on the very edge of his side of the king sized mattress, the cat growled quietly and snuggled himself in closer to Jasmine, who gently stroked his back to sooth him.
"Jazz..."
"I'm asleep." She replied shortly.
"Jasmine, we have to talk about this sometime." Remus sighed heavily.
"Not while I'm asleep." She replied, pushing harder into the pillow.
"Jasmine." He pulled the pillow away abruptly, and Monty hissed and swatted his hand. "Control your familiar, witch."
"Leave. Me. Alone." Jasmine spat through gritted teeth.
"No." Remus replied flatly. "We have to talk about this. We have to talk about a lot of things, but Harry and our babies- Jasmine you have to talk to me."
"Please. Just-"
"No."
Jasmine stared at her husband, ignoring the tears sliding down her cheeks.
"I acknowledge that these things are our shared loss, Rem. I just need you to understand that my body was literally meant to do this one job, and it can't even fucking do that. And you want me to talk to you about that like-"
"You act like I don't know the betrayal of your own body turning against you." Remus gently reminded her.
For a long time, the witch before him said nothing. She'd scooped her cat up into her arms and was stroking his fur, and Monty, for his credit, was calmly just enjoying the attention, his large green eyes shut tight as he purred and soaked in the love.
"I'm sorry." She said finally. "I have been selfish."
"I wouldn't say selfish, exactly. Just... closed off."
"This got out of hand." Jasmine said quietly.
"A little." Remus agreed.
"I am sorry." Jasmine sighed, turning and allowing the obese cat to hop onto the floor.
"Me too."
"Hold me?" Her voice sounded so broken, that Remus wasted no time scooping the petite little witch in close and laying back with her.
Jasmine settled in and listened to her husband's strong heartbeat for a long time, then she yawned and looked up at him.
"Tell me about Harry?"
Thanks for coming back- for this rewrite, I wanted to go a bit darker and more serious. I also wanted to take my time with it.
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As always, thanks for reading!