His father’s corpse lying, crucioed and sectumsemprad and avada kedavard, on the floor at his eighteen year old self’s feet. A non-human man with his porridge colored skin and nose slits and rotted flesh below his robes which Severus had been forced to see one time. His husband, not yet husband, just barely boyfriend, in wolf form, leering over him, ready to pounce.
Severus was asleep, and then he was awake. What order did those events happen in his dreams? All at once, or split up? He did not know.
He was awake now, though. Awake and terrified and silent. He didn’t scream from nightmares, never had. Sobbed and begged and whined, but didn’t scream. Didn’t even cry anymore.
“Big boys don’t cry.” That’s what his father told him. Age three, first broken nose of many, neighbor’s son threw a baseball at him. First and last piece of advice his father gave. He’d never forget.
He wanted to say he was aware after nightmares, perfectly, great instincts. But, he couldn’t say that—anymore. His therapist banned him from lying.
Not aware. Scared, fight or flight, head clutched to hide from beer bottles swung over it decades before.
But, then he was aware. Adrenaline fueled, shaking, hands grasping blankets to keep them from his head, aware, but aware nonetheless.
He was asleep, then awake, now aware. The circle of life. The alphabet running through itself again and again.
He was wet.
He had woken from nightmares wet before, from sweat or a leaky roof, but this was different. Too sticky, too cold, too much to be sweat. And a leaky roof was preposterous, this was the magical world for God’s sake.
Except there was nothing else it could be. He had never done that before—not even as a toddler—and he sure as Hell wasn’t starting at forty-five.
Except he was. He had. And right next to Remus for fuck’s sake!
Awareness began to slip away, back to mindless terror, but he wouldn’t loosen his grasp on it. Fuck his elementary school teacher’s and their lies that awareness was an abstract noun, not solid. He could feel it in his hands, where he planned on keeping it.
Magical world. No leaky ceilings and no reason Remus ever had to know for a second what happened. Sure, maybe actually putting the linens in the washer would be cleaner, but seeing as this was never happening again, a tergeo and air freshening spell would be just fine, thank you very much.
So the bed was clean and Remus hadn’t even been affected in the first place, great, but what about his own clothes? Tergeo wouldn’t work here, nor scourgify or any other cleaning spell. All magical homes had a washboard and bucket, or more recently trending, a washing machine and dryer, for a reason.
Putting them in with the rest of the laundry would surely be fine. Sure, Remus washed all their laundry, but he wouldn’t dig through it, looking at every single piece before putting it in the machine. Right?
Of course he wouldn’t, that would be a waste of time. But, he would definitely recognise that Severus was wearing different pajamas thanks to his stupidity of wearing his only pair that weren’t white or black or cream colored. A bright fucking pink tee-shirt and lime green sweatpants; bought out of spite from a second hand shop after Remus complained about the lack of color in his wardrobe.
He couldn’t get dressed either, though, it was only 2:49 A.M. Even more pathetic—he had made it less than three hours before defiling his clothes like a two year old being potty-trained. Neither got up before 7:00 at the earliest, and Remus was always first, so he couldn’t even use that.
Awareness. Awareness. Awareness.
He would not let go.
Everything was fine, really. He just had to keep telling himself that. Everything was solved except what he would wear until morning, and one problem really wasn’t so hard.
Then it hit him.
He was Remus’s husband and he wanted to be a good husband and what did good husbands do? Make their spouse breakfast in bed!
He had about two hours to shower, get dressed, whatever he wanted. Then at five he’d begin breakfast—anything and everything Remus could ever even think about wanting.
Tea and orange juice and coffee with that new chocolate caramel creamer and water because Remus would need something to counterbalance all the sugar and flavor. Then to eat? Eggs—fried and boiled—toast, sausage, biscuits, gravy, fried bologna, fried hotdogs, bacon, hashbrowns—surely that would be enough?
What if it wasn’t? What if he also wanted cereal and oatmeal and—
What if it was too much?!
No.
There wasn’t time for this. He’d make what he thought of and if it was too much he could just put a stasis charm on it and they’d have it later, and if it wasn’t enough he’d just make more.
Anything to make up for his biggest crime yet. To clear his conscience for ruining Remus’s stuff. Not to matter that it wasn’t ruined and was also his.
—-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He had ended up making too much, way too much, but Remus was still grateful. Severus still didn’t think he’d done enough. It was all he could think about as he washed the dishes and preserved the food, at the same time Remus was getting ready himself.
They didn’t see each other again until 9:23, when Remus called Severus into the living room, insisting he sit on the couch next to the other.
“What is it?” Severus couldn’t stem the urge to ask, internally cringing even as he did. How dare he ask Remus anything after everything wrong he’d done today?!
“What was with that breakfast?”
Of course, he was such a bad husband Remus was shocked at being made breakfast. Pathetic. That’s all he was now, wasn’t it? Pathetic.
“Sev?” Remus spoke again after going without answer.
“I—I just thought you’d like it. I’m sorry.”
“You’ve nothing to apologize for,” Remus immediately assured, “I did like it, very, very, much. It’s just—you made so much.”
“Well, I didn’t know what you’d want, or how much.”
“Anything would’a been fine.”
“I’m sorry for wasting food.” Maybe if he apologized for a thousand things he’d be forgiven for one.
“You didn’t waste anything, we’ll eat the rest later….I don’t know, you just seem off today….Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“You got up early.” Remus commented after a pause. “Really early. You must be tired.”
“Not really. You deserved it.”
“Doesn’t mean you can’t be tired.”
“I’m not, though. I’m fine.”
“What happened to your pajamas?” The younger changed the topic out of seemingly nowhere.
Severus’s heart went cold and gave the illusion of stopping all together, as his limbs and extensions became numb, along with his ears. “W–what?”
“When I put my pajamas in the basket to be washed later, I didn’t see yours. What’d you do with them?”
A bit of relief entered his veins, but not much. This was still dangerous. “Under my towel. The one I used in my shower.”
“But, they’re not? I put my clothes under your towel so both towels would be together, conserving a bit of space, and yours weren’t there.”
“Oh.” This was bad. Very, very bad. “I don’t know then.” The numbness was growing, beginning to cover his entire body. And another organ went on strike. The lack of collapsing, blue, to the ground meant his lungs were working, but…you could fool him.
“Are you okay? You look sick.”
“I—I’m—” He couldn’t finish his sentence, physically couldn’t. Opening his mouth made him feel like he was going to be sick, and he couldn’t tell if it was words or stomach acid making his throat itch.
“Severus?!”
The world was ending; he was sure of it.
—-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Severus couldn’t tell you what happened past that point, all he knew was that he woke up three hours later, at 1:00, back in bed, alone, and thankfully dry.
God, how was he ever supposed to sleep again?! Let alone next to Remus. All he’d think about was the possibility of doing that again, it being much likelier than he’d ever thought before.
He wasn’t alone for long though, Remus coming in merely a minute or so later.
“Oh! You’re awake.” He really did seem surprised. “I guess coming in every thirty minutes worked out after all.”
Severus just nodded, still too drowsy to really say much. He wanted to sleep more, but that couldn’t lead to good things.
“I hope you haven’t been up long.” Remus sat on the edge of the bed and Severus compliantly moved to a seated position.
“Just a minute.” He rasped.
“Oh, good.” The werewolf said, but seemed preoccupied with other thoughts. “....I didn’t realize that you felt so unsafe with me.”
“What?!” And into awareness he went. “I don’t feel unsafe!”
“Then why’d you hide your clothes?”
All the fight left his body and he dropped his head to look at his hands. He couldn’t answer that. Just wanted to stop wasting time—if he had to leave mine as well do it now, no point in staying an extra hour or so for a useless conversation. He knew how it’d end already.
“Sev? Please answer me….I just want to know what to do to make you feel better.”
“I just want to pack my bags now, please.”
“Pack your bags? What bags?”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have assumed. I’ll just leave it all here, you deserve it more.” His voice was flat, emotion usually left at times like this. It was safer. Emotion was insolence—maybe his father taught him two things after all.
“Severus, I’ve no idea what you’re talking about. Leave it here? You’re not going anywhere.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I.”
“I have to leave, I was bad.”
“Leave? This is your house. And you didn’t do anything ‘bad’, you just had an accident.”
“An accident?”
“I’m sure you didn’t mean to wet the bed, and even if you did, honestly who cares? I’m not going to kick you out over it.”
“I didn’t mean to. I really didn’t.”
“So, it was just an accident. No big deal; it happens to everyone.”
“No it doesn’t.”
“Honey, I’m pretty sure you couldn’t find a single person on the planet who hadn’t wet the bed at least once. Or if not that, then had a day time accident.”
“As a child, maybe some of them.”
“Not just as a child, definitely not just some of them. I mean, I didn’t stop ‘till I was fourteen. And it was every night too. Restarted after the battle of Hogwarts.” Remus revealed. “I was terrified when we started going out again that you’d want to stay over one night and would find out, or that it wouldn’t stop by the time you moved in.”
“But that didn’t happen.”
“You're right, it didn’t. The couple times you stayed over you didn’t notice my diapers and it stopped just a few months before you did move in.”
“Why’d it stop?”
“The first time? Just grew out of it, I think.”
“No, the second time….A couple years ago.”
“Therapy and medication. My nightmares, mostly about the wars, started, so decreasing the frequency of my nightmares got rid of the effects….Did you have a nightmare?”
“Yeah.” Severus hesitantly admitted. “But, I get them all the time. Why now?”
“I don’t know….It might be safety, actually.”
“What?”
“Sometimes people only start having accidents, awake or asleep, though mostly the latter, when they feel safe enough. I took you hiding your clothes as you felt unsafe, and perhaps it was a bit, but maybe just the fact that you wet at all proves the opposite. At least to an extent.”
“Will it happen again, then?”
“Maybe, maybe not. Only time will tell.”
“Do I need to tell my therapist or GP about it?”
“Therapist, yes I would suggest it, even if you don’t have another accident. It might help to talk about how you felt when it happened, your response, etc. As for our GP, probably not yet. Only if it happens more—just to make sure it’s nothing physical.”
“....Okay.”
“Is something wrong?”
“Should I sleep on the couch? I—I don’t want to get you wet or mess up the bed again or anything.”
“Of course not. The couch is way too uncomfortable, and I think I can manage to survive a little bit of urine.”
“You shouldn’t have to.”
“Shouldn’t have to? It’s not like I’m actually doing anything. I promise it’s fine, Sev.”
“I really don’t want to take the chance.” Severus’s voice wobbled. “Please, I really don’t want to.”
“You can’t sleep on the couch, but…there’s other things we can do. You could sleep on a guest bed, or I could.”
He just had to keep telling himself he was too big to cry; he was far too close to it. “I don’t wanna sleep on a different bed than you. The couch—at least it’s not a bed.”
Remus nodded. “There’s another solution, but I don’t think you’ll like it.”
“What?”
“Remember how I said I used to wear diapers? You could too. And before you go on about cost, they’re way cheaper here, I swear.”
“I’m not a baby.”
“And I am?”
“Well, no, but—”
“No buts. You don’t have to wear them if you don’t want to, but if the only reason you don’t want to is looking like a baby, then you should just wear them. You won’t look like a baby and even if you did, feeling safe and comfortable when you sleep is far more important.”
“Except I might not even need them. I won’t need them; it’ll never happen again. So, I shouldn’t steal them from someone who actually needs them.”
“Do you know why everything is so much cheaper in the magical world?” Remus didn’t wait for a response before going on. “Because we can make things ten times faster than non-magicals, and we don’t have to worry about shortages the same way they do. Anyway, you actually need them too.”
“Maybe not.”
“If they’re the only thing that’ll keep you from staying up all night worrying about another accident or getting in trouble for another accident or whatever, then you need them. At least in the meantime.”
“But….”
“But?”
“We won’t be able to have sex anymore.”
“And why won’t we be able to? It’s basically just really thick, absorbent, underwear, so I don’t see what would be different.”
“But you won’t get turned on by me.”
“Of course I will.”
“In a diaper, really?”
“Yes. Not because of the diaper, though some people are into that, and not in spite of it either, just because you’re the one wearing it. I’m turned on by your body, and personality, not what you put on your body.”
“....Really?”
“Really.”
“I’m just trying it, not committing.” Severus warned. “So don’t get used to it.”
“Whatever you want.”
“What I want?”
“It’s your body and your underwear and your bladder, Severus. Only you get to control it.”
“Oh.”
“I hope your reaction to that in the future isn’t ‘oh’. I hope you just know it.”
“Yeah.” Severus swallowed. “....I hope so too.”