"You're early," said Madam Pomfrey.
"Not feeling well," Remus murmured. "Feeling a little dizzy. Could you help me…?"
Madam Pomfrey placed a hand on Remus' shoulder, and Remus leaned on her heavily as she led him to her office in the back and into his regular bed. "You're shaking," she observed, "and very pale. Is it truly that bad this month?"
"Just woke up from a nightmare," said Remus. "I'd like some Dreamless Sleep Potion before the nausea sets in, please."
"Have you had anything to eat?"
Remus made a face. "No. I'd rather the Dreamless Sleep Potion. I'm already starting to feel nauseous; I don't want to waste my last few minutes of relative health on food."
"Waste your…?" Madam Pomfrey shook her head, evidently exasperated. "And I don't want you to waste it on a potion when you need a little bit of light nutrition to get you through the day. You aren't going to be eating for another twenty-four hours, Remus, which is terrifically unhealthy for someone of your age and weight."
"So is not sleeping for twenty-four hours. If I have to choose one, I'd like to sleep."
"No. You'll sleep later today."
"I won't! I can't!" Remus was getting frustrated now. The pain, the emotions, and the utter exhaustion coursing through every molecule of Remus' body were starting to take their toll. He was losing his filter—but he would still keep his secret. He had to. "I've barely slept," he confessed to Madam Pomfrey, twisting the hem of the bedsheets between his fingers. "I've barely slept for the past week. I just lie there, waiting to sleep, but sleep never comes. When it does, I keep having nightmares, and I only sleep for a couple of hours. I'm exhausted!"
Madam Pomfrey stared at Remus. "I can see that," she said. "Have you been using the Pensieve to lighten the load of memories? I remember that helping in your first year."
"Yes," lied Remus. Of course he wasn't going to use the Pensieve. The mere sight of the thing triggered even more bad memories, thanks to Manard, so using it would have been rather counterintuitive.
Madam Pomfrey sighed. "We'll talk about this after you've slept," she said. "Here is the Dreamless Sleep Potion. I'll wake you up when it's time to go to the Shack, if you're not already awake. All right?"
"Thank you," said Remus. His eyes were brimming with tears, but he didn't quite know why. "Thank you."
"No need to worship me, Remus." She handed him the potion. Remus stared at it for a moment, and that—that was when he realized how truly exhausted he was. It felt as if his blood was prickling within him, his eyes felt shrouded in something invisible, and every noise had a type of inexplicable aura to it. He felt sluggish, both physically and emotionally. There was a squishy, dark feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he longed to lie down—he was parched for want of sleep.
He took the potion, set it on the bedside table, and then fell into the sort of deep sleep for which he had been constantly longing.
Madam Pomfrey woke him up.
"It's time to go," she said quietly. "You've been sleeping all day."
Remus groaned. "Five more minutes," he said.
He heard her stop in her tracks. Remus knew why. He usually asked to go to the Shrieking Shack early—it wasn't that he enjoyed being in there, necessarily; it was only that it made him feel safe to be locked away from humanity. Yes, he left hours before the moon rose, but the full moon was an intensely private thing. The symptoms before the event were horrific, and Remus didn't need Madam Pomfrey witnessing them, nor did he want to walk down to the Shack while experiencing the worst of them.
But right now, he couldn't find it within himself to care. He just wanted to sleep.
"Actually, maybe half an hour more," he mumbled, nestling back into his pillow.
For a moment, Madam Pomfrey was silent, and Remus could nearly hear her eyebrows draw together. "All right," she finally said.
Remus closed his eyes, but he did not sleep.
Remus only had to separate it into steps. That would make it easier to manage. It always did.
1. Change into his transformation robes.
2. Walk to the Whomping Willow (a lot harder so soon before the moon, but not unmanageable).
3. Walk through the tunnel to Shrieking Shack.
4. "Do you want me to stay a few minutes?" Madam Pomfrey asked.
5. "No," said Remus.
6. Wait. Wait. Wait.
7.
The all-consuming pain subsided slowly, giving way to both a physical and emotional numbness that hung over Remus' body and clung to his skin. He gazed at the wall. Out of the corner of his eyes, he could see the blood on his hands, soaking through his robes, puddling on the ground.
He was fine.
It wasn't long before Madam Pomfrey entered. "You're awake, but you're not sitting up this time," she said softly. "Are you terribly injured?"
Remus coughed. "Just didn't… didn't feel like sssitting up this time."
"Don't speak. Let me heal the worst of it."
Remus didn't speak. He watched as she patted silver and Dittany onto his skin, carefully pushing aside the blood-soaked robes and rubbing soothing circles into his hand—circles that Remus could not feel through the haze of numbness. "We need to have a chat later," she said.
"About what?"
"Don't speak. And don't worry. You've done nothing wrong."
Remus had just attacked himself all night in a murderous rage. He thought that constituted as "wrong", albeit uncontrollable, but he didn't say anything.
Madam Pomfrey helped him back to the castle and into bed, and Remus passively waited until she'd helped him as much as she could before he was allowed to drink the blessed Dreamless Sleep Potion. He fell asleep, dried blood still in his hair, still aching with exhaustion.
He was fine.
When Remus woke up, Madam Pomfrey was sitting next to his bed.
"G'morning Madam Pomfrey," he mumbled.
She wordlessly pointed to a glass on Remus' bedside table, and he reached for it with clumsy fingers and brought it to his lips. It took some maneuvering, but he managed to drink the whole thing without sloshing it all over his front (he only spilled a little bit). "Thanks," he said. The taste of blood still lingered, and he pressed his lips together. "May I have another one?"
She refilled the glass and placed a hand over Remus', helping him drink. "Better?" she asked.
"Yeah. Thanks."
"There's toast with jam there, too."
"I know. Thank you. How bad was it?"
Madam Pomfrey stared at him. "I'm going to be honest with you, Remus, because you deserve my honesty," she said. "It was bad. You broke a dozen bones, probably won't be walking quite right for a while, have bruises all up and down your body, and sustained a deep enough wound to an artery that I thought you would bleed out."
"I wouldn't have," Remus mumbled. "Werewolves don't kill themselves on the full moon. Instinct and all that."
"You woke up a few hours ago. Do you remember that?"
Remus filed through his memories, one by one. "No," he admitted.
"I didn't think so. A major head injury, in addition to the blood loss, rendered you completely delirious. I couldn't even tell what you were saying. Sounded like you were reciting a poem."
"Ah. I probably was."
Madam Pomfrey shook her head and patted his hand. "I'm sorry, Remus, but you'll be in the Hospital Wing for a long while."
"Oh." Remus usually dreaded Hospital Wing stays. Usually, whenever he considered the prospect of lying in bed and being waited on, for days on end, with nothing to do and no one to talk to, stripped of his freedom and independence, he complained. Last month, he would have begged Madam Pomfrey to let him leave. He would have assured her that he was feeling okay. He would have bargained, pleaded, and complained to his friends via enchanted notebook once she refused to comply.
But this month, all he felt was… relief, sort of.
He did not want to go back to everyday life. He did not want to face Manard. He did not want to pretend to be okay in front of his friends. It was exhausting, and Remus was so tired. He could stand a long Hospital Wing stay this month. Honestly, he preferred it.
"Where's the whinging?" Madam Pomfrey asked.
Remus shrugged. "Whatever you think is best," he said.
She stared at him for a moment, and then she handed him his toast. "I think it's a good time for our chat, don't you?" she asked. "Look, Remus, I know that something is wrong. I'm not sure what it is, but you're not well at all. I highly suggest you start talking."
"What? Of course I'm not well. You said it yourself: last night was bad, and now I'm injured."
"You know what I mean. You've been quiet and morose for weeks now."
"I'm always quiet and morose. It's sort of my thing."
"Remus." Madam Pomfrey moved her chair closer; it made a harsh squeaking noise against the floor, and Remus winced. "I've had three teachers and one student come to me about you. Four people. Four people thought that you were in a dark enough place that I needed to be notified. You think you're hiding it, but you are not."
Remus swallowed. "Who?"
"Professor McGonagall. Professor Leek. Professor Flitwick. Peter Pettigrew."
"Oh," said Remus. He couldn't help but feel a little betrayed. He'd told Peter what was wrong (well, he hadn't, but he'd come up with a very good excuse that wasn't entirely untrue). And McGonagall, Flitwick, and Leek knew full well by now that Remus didn't like being watched and coddled. "What did they say?"
"They said you've been participating in class far less frequently."
"I'm tired."
"They said that you've looked sad."
"I'm tired."
"They said that you don't talk to your friends as much."
"I'm tired."
"They say that you don't smile or joke as much as you used to."
"I'm tired."
"They say that you haven't been turning in your homework."
"Oh." Remus thought about that. He'd missed a few homework assignment here and there, yeah. But why was that such a problem? "My friends miss homework assignments all the time," he said. "Do the professors contact you when James doesn't turn in an essay?"
"Of course not, because Potter almost never turns in homework. It's not about the action in and of itself; it's about the fact that you are doing things outside of your norm—things that you never would have imagined doing only a few years ago."
"I'm doing a lot of things that I never would have imagined doing a few years ago, Madam Pomfrey. I have friends now. I have a life now. Of course I don't care as much about school as I used to—there's more to do."
"Yes, there is more to do. But you haven't been doing any of it. You've been spending every waking minute sulking and staring. Something is wrong."
"Nothing is wrong!"
"Liar." Madam Pomfrey glared at Remus, arms crossed firmly. "I have known you for a very long time, Remus. I have watched you endure some tough times, I have had many a heart-to-heart with you, and I am good friends with your mother. You've even been to my house. I know you, Remus Lupin, and I can tell that something is wrong. I am not letting your friends visit until you tell me what it is."
"It's all right," said Remus with a sigh. "They don't need to visit. I'll live."
"Why are you pushing everyone out?"
"I'm tired!"
"It's more than that! I don't ask you this to torture you—I ask you for your own health!"
"If it's my health, then I should get to decide what to do with it."
"You're not of age, and you're very clearly not mentally healthy right now. You're not in a state to be making such self-destructive decisions."
Remus and Madam Pomfrey sat there, eyes locked and narrowed.
The clock ticked.
Finally, Madam Pomfrey softened, and she placed her hand on Remus'. "Please tell me," she said. "I'll never forgive myself if something is wrong and I don't catch it."
Remus sucked in a deep breath and decided to tell her the almost-truth. "Promise you won't get angry, no matter what I say?" he asked first.
"I promise."
"All right, then. I'm fine."
"Remus…" Madam Pomfrey had banned that word in Remus' first year, but she'd promised not to get angry, so Remus was in the clear. "You're not fine."
"No, I am, which is the problem. I'm fine. I'm not feeling terribly, I'm not in mortal danger, no one has poisoned me, and I'm in the best wizarding school in the world. I have friends, I have a future, I have an education, and I have a lot of people who care about me—probably too many, judging by how many people came to you with concerns about me. I have a home, my family is financially secure, and I'm eating plenty. I'm fine. I have everything I need.
"But… I'm not… any better than 'fine'. I'm not sure why. I feel as if I should be eternally grateful that I have all those things, but I'm just… fine. I'm just existing. I feel like I'm physically okay, but mentally somewhere else… even though I should be a lot more hopeful now, the hopelessness I had before Hogwarts is settling in again."
Remus searched her face for any type of emotion, but he couldn't find it. Nervously, he kept talking.
"I think it's something to do with the ten-year anniversary of the bite coming up in February," he said. "I'm not sure. I've just been thinking… there won't ever be a cure. I'll have to do this for the rest of my life. And I can't do this for the rest of my life. I can't. It's terrible, it's painful, and it's unmanageable, no matter how many steps and routines I break it into. I hate it, Madam Pomfrey, and there's never going to be a way to fix it. My life is just one full moon after another, with hardly any time in between, and I'm so… so tired of it all."
Madam Pomfrey was silent.
The clock ticked.
"I know exactly what this is," she said.
"What?!" For a moment, Remus was terrified that she actually did know what it was. What if she knew about Professor Manard? If the staff were so observant that they'd noticed Remus' quiet behavior, then surely they also noticed Manard. Surely they noticed Remus' reluctance around the man. Surely they noticed something… and Remus wasn't sure, for a moment, whether he wanted them to notice or not.
"Yes, I know what it is," repeated Madam Pomfrey. "It's depression."
Remus was silent.
The clock ticked.
"I'm fine," he repeated.
"No, you're not. You've been through several extremely traumatic events, not to mention the full moon every single month. You feel hopeless and stuck in an endless cycle of pain. A war is on the rise, and so too is prejudice against werewolves. Your stress levels are constantly too high to be healthy, and you're always in pain. Nobody needs a reason to be depressed, Remus—sometimes it just happens to people. But no one can deny that you have plenty of reason, which only makes it all the more likely. I've been waiting for this to happen for ages."
Remus frowned. "I don't get it. I've been through much worse. Why now?"
Yes, Manard was a thorn in his side, but Manard's distaste toward werewolves wasn't anything new. Yes, Remus was stuck in a constant cycle of pain and fear, but that wasn't new, either. Yes, memories of Greyback had been resurfaced and heightened, but Greyback wasn't new, and neither was the ever-present fear that Remus was destined to be something like him. None of it was new—it was only presented in a different way—so why did Remus feel like this? He'd been on top of the world during the summer months.
"About seven years ago," said Madam Pomfrey, "an experiment was done in America by a man named Martin Seligman. He placed a couple of dogs in a box that administered electric shocks—"
"What? That's horrible!"
"I know. It wasn't terribly ethical. But let me continue. He put some dogs in a box that administered electric shocks, and the dogs jumped out of the box in order to escape every single time."
"Why did he put the dogs in the box if they could just jump out?"
"I'm getting to that. Next, he put a couple of different dogs in the box, but these dogs had been shocked a couple of times earlier with no way out, so they believed that the shocks were inescapable. So, while the first dogs easily jumped out, the other group of dogs ignored the opportunity, lay down, and waited for it to be over. It's called 'learned helplessness', and it's often linked to depression."
"Comparing a werewolf to a dog is sort of offensive, you know. Hits rather close to home."
"Oh, be quiet. My point is, your circumstances and surroundings have taught you helplessness. No matter what you do and how you behave, your actions don't influence what happens to you. Now you feel completely helpless when it comes to improving your situation. So, while other people have a drive to fix things, a will to persist, and a desire to find the solution—which, in some cases, is merely happiness—you feel helpless. You can't change it, you think, so why try?"
"I can't change it. It's not a mind-over-matter thing. I literally cannot stop being a werewolf, no matter how many happy thoughts I think. I am helpless."
"Yes, but you are not helpless over your mental state. But you feel like you are, because you've been taught all your life that bad things cannot be helped. Therefore you've become helpless, and you need help."
"But…"
"You know, John Questus used to say that hope was useless. He used to say that nothing would change with the presence of hope—it was only wasting time and energy. He called himself a realist, but he was a pessimist through-and-through. He prepared himself for the bad things instead of dwelling on the good things, remember?"
Remus nodded. He remembered all too well.
"That mindset has benefits, of course, but he failed to consider the fact that hope is not a concept that changes our surroundings from the outside; rather, it is meant to change our circumstances from the inside. The presence of hope doesn't give us superpowers, but the lack of hope can turn you into… well, this."
"But you still haven't told me what's caused it. None of this is new, so why am I like this right now? I wasn't a couple of months ago!"
"Sometimes things take time to sink in. Sometimes this sort of thing happens for no reason at all. Other times, something seemingly small triggers an intense emotional reaction—sort of like how a single drop in a full glass can cause it to overflow. Has anything very small—or large—happened recently that made you feel this way?"
Yes. Yes. Yes. Every single interaction with Professor Manard had made Remus feel totally and completely helpless, almost as much as he felt on the full moon. Remus couldn't tell anyone, but keeping the secret was horrible. There was nothing—absolutely nothing—he could do. He was stuck in a cycle of full-moon-related pain, and he was also stuck in a separate cycle of pain with Manard, one that was unpredictable, terrifying, and utterly inevitable.
"Maybe," said Remus. "Maybe it was just the ten-year anniversary thing."
"Perhaps that's it," said Madam Pomfrey softly. "Remus, you're not helpless. There is always something you can do. You have been happy in the past, and you can be happy again."
Remus nodded, though he didn't really believe it. It wasn't as if he was being deluded now—the delusion had been in the past; it had been what was causing the happiness. No, right now, Remus was seeing the light. Right now, his eyes were opened. This horrible, dark, squishy feeling in the pit of his stomach—this was the truth right here, and Remus preferred the truth over a delusion of happiness.
"Here," said Madam Pomfrey, handing him a bottle, "this will help."
Remus eyed it suspiciously. "What is it?"
"It's a potion. It helps your brain produce serotonin, which will make you feel better."
"Oh." Remus put the bottle on his bedside table. "No, thanks."
"Why not?"
"I don't take mind-altering potions. For personal reasons. You know that."
Madam Pomfrey shook her head. "It's not as if this is going to turn you into a different person or a different species. This potion will not make you helpless to control yourself like the full moon does, Remus—it will make it easier to control yourself. It just clears your head: nothing more, nothing less. You'll make better decisions."
"Still. I won't take it. I want my brain where it is, thank you very much. I will not take a potion that alters my brain functions, thoughts, or emotions."
"Remus, everything alters your brain functions, thoughts, and emotions! A bad mark on a test alters your emotions, falling off a broomstick alters your emotions, your friends constantly alter your emotions… and so does this potion! It's no different from any of that!"
"It is different, and I'm not taking it."
Madam Pomfrey was silent.
The clock ticked.
"Fine," she said. "I won't force you. But you need to do something about it."
"What else can I do?"
"Remus, I know you drown yourself in routines when things don't go the way you want them to. You ground yourself in facts and you break things into perfectly predictable steps. But I don't think it's helping: I think it's reminding you of the inevitable, cyclical nature of your life. Then your routine must be interrupted each month by a couple days here, and then a couple days recovering… no. Routine helps to an extent, but you also need to break the cycle. Do something fun and unexpected."
"And that'll cure me?"
"Maybe. Maybe not. I know hardly anything about mental health." She shrugged. "I read a book last night, and that's about the extent of it. But I can tell you that if you won't take the potion, then there's really not much else I can do."
"Okay."
"Just… remember that you are in control of some things, Remus, and remember that I am always here to listen, should you need to talk."
Remus swallowed. "Thank you," he said.
The clock ticked. Indeed, time marched on and on and on, but nothing was ever going to change.
Routine was both good and bad, and Remus was tired of both good and bad things at the moment.
AN: Happy birthday, Remus Lupin! (One day late in my time zone—let's say I took off Remus' birthday from posting to celebrate!)