Chapter Thirteen
I’m no longer a kid,
And everything has changed
There’s nothing in my heart
And lightning in my brain
There was a time before Remus became a monster, but it belonged to a life he no longer remembered. He knew he’d never expected to go to school, and by the time Dumbledore visited him at the age of 10, he was already so angry at the world. A troubled kid, was how his dad used to put it.
He hadn’t wanted to make friends at first, either. Or maybe he just didn’t know how. Anyone he spent too much time with, he’d eventually have to lie to. His secrets were like walls around him, and he hadn’t built a door.
Sirius was the first one to find a way in, and he was closely followed by James and Peter. They pulled at the plaster and tore a hole right through his world. The Marauders, they’d called themselves. They saw him fully, and never flinched. When they became animagi for him, Remus’s heart ached from how full it was. He wanted Harry to know that love as it spilled over, and how his father lived on through it. His Prongs, their Prongs.
He was in the midst of reaching into his memory, trying to lay it bare for Harry, when Snape appeared, and very nearly fucked everything up. He watched helplessly as Snape pointed his wand directly at Sirius. His heartbeat was unbearably loud as the truth began to slide out of place, becoming intangible. Sirius seemed almost like a mirage before them, destined to disappear again.
Suddenly, Remus found himself at the end of Snape’s bonds; he felt the physical pain but not shock as their apparent allyship came to an end.
Then, just as quickly, he was released again. Sirius surged forward, pulling off the ropes, not knowing his touch burned more than ropes could ever. Harry and his friends, as if communicating silently, had simultaneously all stunned Snape. It was a night full of unexpected turns. Harry looked over at Remus, and that’s what he had to hold onto. Three children who were willing to listen to an unlikely tale. There was hope.
Finally, finally, it was time for the fourth marauder of the tale to be revealed. The coward who had taken so much from them all, who had robbed Remus of his best friends, his love, and his future. Who had robbed Harry of a happy home. Ghosts of lives unlived were heavy in the air, but Remus did not fear them. They already followed him everywhere. He felt Sirius beside him, alive and heart beating.
“Together?” Sirius’s voice was scratchy, but otherwise exactly as Remus remembered it. It was time. There was a blinding flash of light, and then Peter Pettigrew was cowering before them.
*
Peter Pettigrew was a boy who got everything he wanted. He was no ordinary boy; he was a wizard. A wizard from a strong, pureblood family - but a kind family, too, who knew their position in the world and wanted to use it for good. When he was sorted into Gryffindor, it was the happiest day of his life.
There had been tension, because all his family before him had been sorted into Gryffindor, and it was literally the only thing his best friend James Potter had talked about for the last two years. There was also a secret agitation within Peter, because he sort of hated adventures, and getting in trouble, and was more content to follow a gnome in the grass as the sun journeyed across the sky. Sometimes he just wanted to curl up with a book and read, but for days at a time, which wasn’t normal. James was able to know things without trying, not really, but Peter had to put the work in. These were not traits of a Gryffindor, so he fought against them, hard. His curiosity and his intelligence became things he had to hide, and he started to form this duplicitous character, where he was performing as himself; the self he was expected to be. He never thought he got it quite right, but he’d begged the Sorting Hat, and it had let him through, so he knew it was going to be ok.
By fifth year, Peter was tired of the gang James had surrounded them with. He wanted it to go back to the old days, when it was just the two of them, and everything was easier. This group were always coming up with stupid schemes, that somehow usually ended with him in detention. When they told him of their latest plan, it was so mad that he finally stood up and said no to them. But then Sirius had sneered at him - fully sneered! And asked if he was scared.
Why did he have to say it like that?
So Peter joined them. It would be cool, he supposed, to become an animal. Something big and fast, and powerful. That would teach anyone who tried to laugh at him!
He was a rat. A fucking rat. Of all the things… this was terrible, it was humiliating! James tried to make him believe it was cool - he could get past the Whomping Willow easily now, which none of them could, but it didn’t help at first. However, once he knew he could get past the tree, he started to learn the other places he could pass through unnoticed too. One secret led to another, and he gathered them like stars, filling in constellations of knowledge that were his alone.
Not that he’d wanted to know everything. Scuttling along the library after dark, catching muffled laughter and then whispers; turning the corner to find them - Black and Lupin, locked in an embrace. How long had that been going on? And kept from him too.
Secret pranks for just James and Sirius, and then the three of them all together, laughing at Peter’s latest care package from his mother. Laughing at him. What could he have expected, really, from a monster and someone who would betray his own family?
The worst of all was James. He’d started seeing Lily, and had no time at all for Peter anymore. What did he even see in her? Her family were muggles for god’s sake. One night, he heard James asking Lily to look out for Peter in their potions class, because he was ‘really struggling’. Peter was furious. What could that stupid mudblood teach him - a Pettigrew - about magic?
His nightly wanderings took him further across the castle. He began to overhear whispers from the Slytherin students, about a Dark Lord who would restore order to the wizarding world, putting everyone back in their rightful places… Peter’s first instinct was to turn round and warn the others. But then he remembered the secrets they’ve spun around him, intricate and binding. He doesn’t want to be caught in their web - in his rat form, he is free to set out on his own course. The more Peter listened, the more their words began to make sense to him.
*
As they made their way out of the Shrieking Shack, most of Remus’s focus was on supporting Ron’s leg, and trying not to let his hatred towards Peter consume him. Harry had convinced them not to kill Peter, but it was a decision he wasn't fully convinced of himself. The only thing that really held him back was paralysis from the shock of all he'd found out. When Sirius spoke behind him, he was transfixed. He tried to concentrate on his breathing, calmed by the voice of the man he'd never really stopped loving.
“You know what this means?” Sirius was asking Harry, with a shyness he rarely showed. “I don’t know if anyone ever told you, but I’m your godfather.”
“Yeah, I knew that.” Harry replied, betraying no emotion but making Remus’s heart speed up nervously.
“Well… your parents appointed me your guardian, if anything happened to them…”
Remus began to pant slightly; the walls seemed to be closing in on him. He didn’t want to lose Harry, he realised. Selfish, worthless creature… but he couldn’t help it. He loved the boy.
“I’ll understand, of course, if you want to stay with your aunt and uncle…” Sirius was continuing.
“Actually” Harry swallowed. “I… er… I don’t live with my aunt and uncle. I live with Professor Lupin.”
“With - with Remus?” Sirius breathed his name.
“But why don’t you move in with us? We’ve got a flat in London, he already made an extra room for me, I’m sure he could give you one too!” Harry gushed.
Remus felt like he’d been kicked in the stomach. He hadn’t told Harry it was Sirius’s flat originally. He wondered suddenly if Sirius had tried to come home, and found it missing, protected by the Fidelius Charm. He risked a glance back at Sirius, and was surprised to see that he was smiling. He could see the old Sirius in that smile, and he knew wasn’t lost forever.
For a moment, none of them could speak. They made their way back through the opening to the Whomping Willow, Remus filled with a sense of security and hope. As he stepped out into the night, however, the feeling of an external pressure crushing into him returned. Was he having a panic attack?
No. Remus already knew what this feeling really was. A cloud shifted. He saw Sirius urging the children away; he saw Harry’s eyes widen in fear. And then the wolf took the wheel.