Halloween 1981
October 31st 1981, 11:43 p.m.
The telephone rang.
Remus’ stomach dropped. It hadn’t rung in weeks. His owl flew in and out on a regular basis, confusing the muggle neighbours, rarely bringing good news, but also not bad ones.
But the phone had stayed quiet in all this time. He listened to it ring for a couple seconds. Ring. Ring. Ring.
Then it died down and remained quiet.
Remus walked across the small living room – it took him less than 3 steps to reach the other side – and shoved the thrilly drapes aside. The street was dark and almost empty. The iron street lantern lit up a small area, revealing a couple of teenagers, throwing toilet paper between the group as if it was a football. He could her their faint laughter and watched them disappear in a side street.
The phone rang again. This time, he picked up, dreading the voice on the other end.
“Hello?”, his voice was rough, he hadn’t spoken all day. He coughed to clear his throat.
“Hello?”, he repeated.
“Remus-“ Mary’s teary voice punched him in the gut like getting hit by the whomping willow, “Something awful has happened.”
October 31st 1981, 12:51 p.m.
A loud thump from his upstairs neighbour woke Remus. As a reply, he picked up an old battered book and threw it towards the ceiling. It didn’t exactly have the effect Remus had intended since it barely stroked the ceiling and then dropped to the floor, with a couple pages coming out of it. He sighed, rubbed his eyes and then stopped. The phone call. Mary. James and Lily.
The sharp pain in his chest almost catapulted him out of bed. He grabbed the closest pair of trousers he could find and put them on, along with a jacket and a hat, to hide the mess that his hair most definitely was. Angrily, he wiped the tears from his cheeks, that had made their way down. The stubble reminded him that he hadn’t shaved in a couple of days.
After he had put on a beat up pair of sneakers, he swung open the door and stepped onto the dingy staircase. Half way down, he heard another door open.
Hanna and Jack, his neighbours’ kids ran past him. The girl was dressed as a cartoon character that seemed familiar to Remus but he couldn’t quite place her, while her brother had fangs and a ripped shirt, combinated with… werewolf ears.
“Good morning! Happy Halloween!”, they shouted as they dashed past him.
What?
Remus stopped in his tracks.
“That was yesterday,” he replied shakily.
The kids also halted, Jack crooking his head.
“No, Sir. It’s today,” He laughed.
Remus shook his head. “No, really. Today is November 1st.”
“Mr. Lupin, we wouldn’t miss Halloween. You’re being silly with us, right?” Little Hanna had stepped up to him, giving him her toothiest smile.
“Look,” said Jack, showing him his watch, the tiny number showing the date: 31st.
Remus nodded slowly. The kids ran down the stairs, giggling as they opened the door and raced down the street.
Slowly, he followed them out the door. His mailbox was full, spilling with old newspaper and unopened letters, most of them from the bank. It took him a second to sort through the mess until he found the newest paper.
October 31st 1981 was printed in clean, black ink in the righthand corner.
A draft picked up the page and turned to a headline.
It was a report on the cellular telephone system, a network that researchers had setup in Sweden at the beginning of the month. The month being October.
Remus closed the paper and walked back inside, up the stairs and into his apartment.
He turned on the radio and listened while taking off his jacket and shoes. The radio reporter took his sweet time, talking about anything but the date.
“For fuck’s sake,” Remus murmured. He switched the radio station, until he found one that was at the end of the news report.
“… thank you for listening to Artsworth Radio Station. Next up the weather for today. Now, Christoper, tell us, should the kids be wearing their rain coats today while they’re out trick or treating?” – “Well, this is London, so my answer would be yes. The temperature might climb towards…”
Remus didn’t hear the rest as relief flooded through him. It had all been a bad dream. Of course it was. He swallowed hard, as he remembered. He had really believed that Sirius was a traitor. At least, his subconcious was convinced.
He put on the kettle, grabbed a tea bag and threw it in a cup, one that he had clearly already used yesterday, but he couldn’t be bothered to clean it or get a new one.
Remus was lonely. He had been for a while. Sending letters to Lily and James was not the same as seeing them. He hadn’t heard from Sirius in two months, ever since they had decided to take a break. The apartment was empty without him. Despite being actually tiny, it felt huge without him. No leather jackets, no bike keys and no vinyls. He had taken all of them when he left and Remus didn’t have the heart – or money – to get new ones.
So the radio played while Remus skimmed through a report. Moody had sent it a couple days ago, with the strict instruction, that Remus should study it thoroughly and immediately.
He failed to see its relevance, it was a simple overview of deaths within the wizard community within the last few months. Remus had known or at least known of 90 percent of the people mentioned. His heart cramped as his eyes darted over Marlene’s name.
Her death had been the final trigger for Sirius. He hadn’t slept or eaten for days after Arthur Weasley had informed them that she had been killed. Remus had gone out to visit Mary a couple times. She had cried quietly while he emptied his new pack of cigarettes that he had picked up on the way to her place. Sirius had refused to see her, to see anyone. Ashamed, Remus thought about how he had considered that Sirius felt guilty for her death. The idea of Sirius being a spy was so abstract, but still, it floated through his head every now and then.
Now, he hadn’t heard from either one of them in weeks.
The reporter chatted away in the background as Remus lit his first cigarette of the day. It had been years since he had not turned to his bed table to grab one immediately after waking up but today, the fear had won for just a second.
It had felt so real. The details in the dream had been incredible.
Unlike his other dreams, he could remember every single thing that had happened.
The same rough wake up, that he had also received today. The used tea cup in the sink.
The hair on his neck rose as his brain wavered on.
Quickly, he got up and turned on the TV. Two weeks ago he had found the old maschine in the street in front of his apartment. It soothed the emptiness better than the radio could which is why it had been running almost consistently ever since he had heaved it up the stairs and through the door.
He zapped through the channels and then decided on a movie he knew from his childhood.
He lit another cigarette and leaned back. And leaned forward. He had watched that movie yesterday. Or had it been in his dream?
Remus took a deep drag and held the smoke in his lungs until they burned.
He slowly dug his nail across the top of his hand, drawing tiny bit of blood. Then he looked at the watch, at the wall and back at the watch. He could feel the pain and the time on the watch stayed the same. He was not dreaming.
It's a damn rerun. No need to be such a fucking twit about it.
Another drag, accompanied by some ash falling on the rug.
He spent the rest of the day on the leather couch. It reminded him of Sirius.
Whenever he took a deep breath, he was thrown back in time, the smell of leather and cigarettes put him into his 16 year old self, sitting next to Sirius, his head resting on the Remus’ shoulder while they smoked and talked.
The memories stitched his heart back up and ripped them right back open within milliseconds.