As it was
As the Hogwarts Express pulls up, Matthew feels his pulse quickening.
Remus would be back with Matthew for two whole weeks!
Incase it wasn't already clear, Matthew is ecstatic.
The door opens and students pour out of the train. Remus had said that, this year, not many had decided to stay at the castle.
Hope Lupin sniffels (yet again) and Matthew spins around frantically looking for his brother. What if he didn't come back? sneered the devilish voice in his mind. Just shut up! Of course he came back, The much kinder voice said. Matthew would rather die than admit that, for one, voice were constantly telling him what to do and just plain talking to him, and two, that he had named both of the most frequent visitor.
"Looking for something?" A soft voice said. A voice that didn't cause Matthew to have a panic attak. A voice he would recognize anywhere and everywhere.
"Remus!" The boy with fluffy hair smiled brightly as Matthew basically barells right into him. Matthew releases a laugh that sounds suspiciously like a sob. He isn't crying, he doesn't do that- not since he was four.
"Hey? Theo, look at me." Remus sounds concerned, but when Matthew turns his head towards Remus, he is glad his eyes are dry. Of course your eyes are dry, you aren't a baby anymore Theo, you are to old to cry. He tries to block the voices out, just nothing seems to help.
"How was it Remus, tell me everything, os gwelwch yn dda?" He could listen to Remus talk for hours.
"Iawn, wel-"
"Remus, babi, you're here, finally! I have half a mind to not let you go back." Hope was laughing giddily as she wrapped her arms around Remus.
Remus took Matthew's hand as they walked out of the train station. Remus looks down at Matthew with a smile and Matthew sincerely hopes that he can't see the absolute adoration in Matthew's eyes. Or, maybe he does want Remus to see it.
Once Remus escaped their mam's clutches, they both shut themselves in their room and talked for hours. They mostly talked about Hogwarts. Matthew doesn't want to talk about how life was at home and Remus knows better than to ask. It isn't as though they don't have anything else to talk about, quite the opposite. They talk more about Hogwarts, about it's classes, th grounds, the vast library and of course, Remus's friends. Matthew listens to Remus talk for hours. He never gets bored. How Remus eyes light up when he talks about it all. The fond way he rolls eyes when he tells Matthew how annoying Sirius and James are.
Matthew sleeps in Remus's bed, just like they did when they were younger. He waits until Remus falls asleep until he climbs out of the bed and pulls out his notebook. He writes down every single thing that he has found out about them today.
He has now got pages and pages of how amazing all of Remus's friends are. At the beginning Remus spent a lot of time reassuring Matthew that they will always be best friends and that he will never put anyone above Matthew. But it was fine, because Matthew doesn't mind that Remus has different friends. He just wishes he could be there with them all. But for the two weeks where Remus is home Matthew can pretend that he won't be left here for another half a year. He can pretend that him and Remus are just visiting and Remus will soon whisk him of to Hogwarts.
Matthew has a type of mantra. On bad days he repeats it louder and more often. "Only a few months left", he chants day after day, night after night.
The two boys are talking lightly over breakfast. Hope Lupin bustling around the kitchen cleaning, (for the fourth time this morning) and their father is at work.
Nothing has changed for Lyall, he gets up at the crack of dawn and comes home after dark. Anytime he has to be around his sons he acts as though Remus had the plague and he was trying his best not to get infected. He never addressed him. Lyall also never spoke to Matthew unless he wanted something. At least he said he went to work everyday, eventhough Matthew and Remus both, knew for a fact that the Ministry had Christmas break as well and they didn't work on weekends.
Both boys got ready to go out. There is going to be a christmas sale, where a lot of second hand books will be sold. Needless to say, they are extremly exited.
Matthew smiles, Remus was having a heated argument with someone who wanted the same book as him. It was fun to watch how expressive he was, flailing his hands around. Remus was obsessed with "The Picture of Dorian Gray", they both were.
Remus doensn't show his emotions often, neither of them did, but when they felt safe enough to do so, they were increadibly expresive. Remus was only really himself with Matthew (and his Hogwarts friends) and god, does Matthew feel spoiled. Remus is the most amazing creature to ever be created. He is Matthew's whole world.
In the end Remus gets the book and they both walk back, chatting and laughing. Their happy mood does not last long though.
As they turn the corner they see their father stepping out of a house. A woman waves goodbye and captures Lyall in a kiss before dissapearing back into the house. Lyall fixes his tie and continues walking down the little path. It is almost dark and Lyall is walking back home.
The boys stop dead and slowly turn to look at each other. Matthew can see his thoughts echoed back to him in Remus's eyes. The shock, dissapointment and fear.
Matthew is a very rational person, truly. This year he has made more irrational desicions than ever, but still, he is a very rational person. So he truly couldn't explain why he feels hot rage take over his thoughts as he marches towards the woman's house.
He is almost at the door when Remus catches up with him and pulls him by the wrist.
"What are you doing?"
"Remus, surely you understand what this means!" He hisses pointing at the door.
"Listen, I know you are upset-"
"I'm not-"
Na, cau i fyny!" Matthew's mouth snaps shut and Remus continues, "But, don't you see how this won't fix anything! Like, what are you going to do? Kick the door down and demand to know what is happening between her and father?"
That might have been exactly what Matthew was planning to do, but now when Remus says it, it does sound a bit silly.
"Well what else should we do? Nothing?!"
"I don't know." Mattew huffs.
"Come on, let's go home." Remus walks down the same street Lyall just dissapeared down and Matthew goes to follow him when something catches his eye. A postbox. A postbox with the lady's name on it.
Matthew doesn't sleep that night. He lies next to Remus, plotting his next move. Remus had said they should just pretend they never found out, but Matthew was so tired. Tired of all the games, all the pretending. That they were fine, that nothing was bothering them.
Not only that, but he also had a lot of questions. How long had this been going on? Was this where Lyall went when he left them after Remus was bitten? How could he do this to mam?
Matthew might not respect Hope, but he still loved her. Lyall though, well he didn't love Lyall one bit. He stopped doing so when he was four years old.
When he hears the study door open, he slipps out of his bed. He finds Lyall in the kitchen getting ready to leave.
"Where are you going father?"
Lyall starts, "To work, and what are you doing up at this time?"
Matthew rolls his eyes and sits himself down on one of the chairs. "Don't you ever get tired of lying?"
"I don't because I don't lie." Lyall is a good liar, Matthew almost believes him. He kind of wants to. Wants to be assured he isn't a fool for missing the signs.
Matthew starts picking at his nails in a laid-back way. "Sure. Anyway, have fun at Marianne's." He says the last bit with a twisted smile. He is starring at his father and though his lips are smiling his eyes betray the utter hatred he feels for his father.
Lyall doesn't even look surprised or ashamed. He just shakes his head and tutts, then leaves.
Matthew's eyes are unfocused as he stares at where his father was standing only a minute ago. It was the first semi-full lenght conversation he had had with his father in six years.
"Marianne, huh. How did you find that out?" Matthew turns to see Remus in the semi-darkness. He looks so young standing there in his blue pjamas and blond hair, messy from sleeping. His eyes are sad but he has a small smile on the corner of his lips.
Matthew takes the small slip of paper from his pocket and places it on the table infront of them.
"Marianne Salope." Remus humms.
"Yeah." Neither of them really now what to do now. So like any children who have found out their father is cheating and don't know what else to do, they decide to go for a walk in the rain.
Just as they step out, Remus has a brilliant idea. he rushes inside and brings out all of Lyalls' shoes. They spend the next fifteen minutes filling them all with mud.
Christmas isn't normally a particularly happy day for Matthew.
This one may be different, however.
Hope, Remus and Matthew are sitting around the small wooden kitchen table eating Christmas lunch.
Lyall is gone "working", probably fucking that bitch Marianne again. Matthew has found out that it has been going on for a while and Lyall definetly didn't stop when he found out that his sons knew.
After they finished eating, Hope wanted to bring some of her friends her home-baked christmas pudding. Remus stood up and led Matthew into the sitting room. They sit opposite each other and close their eyes befor pulling out the present they got for the other brother. They did this every year.
"Three, two one..." Remus counts down before they both hand each other the present.
Remus unwraps his first and gasps, "Oh, thank you Theo. I've seen The bluest eye in the library, heard it's brilliant. And these biscuits! Thank you so much." Remus's eyes may be slightly wet.
Matthew laughs softly and then unwraps his own present.
"Remus! This is amazing." Matthew holds up the copy of The Picture of Dorian Gray Remus bought the other day and a gorgeous bookmark.
"Lily helped me make that bookmark." It is a truly amazing bookmark. Light green backround with mushrooms and darkgreen frogs wearing golden crowns.
"Thank you so much Remus." Matthew whispers and they sit there repeatedly thanking each other for the thoughtful gifts.
The boys then go outside and play in the snow, making snowmen and snowangels. They later go for a walk around town. Christmas in Wales is brilliant. A very nice lady even gives them both a mug each with hotchocolate and marshmallows.
Yes, this might be a nice christmas.
Remus is hugging Matthew tightly.
"I love you so much Theo, I'm going to miss you a lot."
"I'll miss you to Remus." Matthew squeezes Remus a little tighter, but then he has to go. He boards the Hogwarts Express with a last wave and then he's gone. Matthew won't see him until the summer.
"Remus is going to miss his mami so much and I already miss him so much already." Hope sniffles yet again while they sit at the dinner table. Lyall is there aswell. This might be the first meal he has eaten with his wife and son in four years at least. Maybe six.
"Well, I don't miss him one bit." Now apart from the fact that that is super out of character for Lyall, how the fuck dare he! "He is a disgusting beast and we are all better of without him."
"Shut up! Take his name out of your mouth! What are you even doing here, go away and fuck yr ast honno!" Matthew shouts. The pain shoots up his ankle as he slams his foot on the kitchen foot. His father was just looking at him, compleatly unfazed. Matthew turned to his mother, surely she would help him defend her babi Remus, but no, all he got was: "Theo! Don't you dare swear at your father, go to your room."
He should probably reconsider this wole "I am really quite rational", because running into the room you share with your brother and start ripping everything from the walls and shredding the courtains is not really quit rational.
Especially not when the reason you are doing this is because you are mad at your father for insulting the person you love most in the world and being in the room that belongs to said person reminds you too much about them.
But that's still what he does. He tears the courtains down, his and Remus's sheets of their bedding. He throws his fist through all the paintings that used to be on the wall but are now littered around him.
He screams silently into the pillow, it doesn't matter really, no one would care no matter what volume he was screaming at.
He continues to trash his bedroom, the bedroom that reminds him too much about the brother he is crying about, begging to come back.