Rain and Regrets
They said graduation was going to be a happy day.
They said being 18 was going to be a good thing.
Remus didn’t think so. Perhaps in another world, it would be exciting to be an adult out of school with his mates. Maybe he’d get a flat in Brighton with Sirius in that other life. Maybe he’d smile at Lily and James’ eventual and inevitable wedding.
But this wasn’t another world. This was the only one he knew as broken and scattered as it was; it was his. It was theirs. Hell would freeze before he let this be the end of it.
The war had begun, a war so damaging that he couldn’t even look his best mates- his brothers- in the eyes without some sort of code. Of course, he had known this was coming, they all had. That’s why they’d jumped on the bandwagon to get into the resistance as soon as they were out of Hogwarts. Remus had been perhaps the quickest- though Sirius and James would argue day and night about which of them had truly taken the leap that the rest followed. Remus wouldn’t bother to tell him that Dumbledor had proposed the idea to him at 17 when his N.E.W.T.s came back.
“You’ve done more than excel here at Hogwarts, Mr. Lupin.” the Headmaster had said to him that exhaustingly hot day in July.
“I feel I had a debt to pay.” Remus answered honestly.
“Repay would be an understatement if I had been looking for reimbursement. You needn't feel indebted to kindness my dear boy.”
That conversation felt so distant now as Remus sat in number 12 Grimmauld Place watching the run tap against the glass of the window panes. His scarred hand running through the soft black fur of the dog laying against him absentmindedly. The weight was heavy, grounding in a way. He had a habit of feeling like he was drowning while sitting alone with his thoughts. How ironic that physically putting weight on him made him feel safer than actual freedom.
Sirius was asleep against his lap, the other had taken to remaining in his animalistic form while here.
Remus couldn’t blame him- the place seemed haunted. He couldn’t imagine trying to grow up here.
“Hiding again?” an all too familiar voice chimed from the doorway. Pandora.
“I’m not hiding,” he protested with a small huff, not bothering to look away from the window, “just thinking.”
“Right, of course.” she hummed, not believing him for a moment.
The Lovegoods had also taken refuge inside the old Black home. Wormtail and Prongs were with Lily in another location that Remus didn’t know the name of yet for security. As were the LongBottoms and so on. Nobody except Dumbledore could know where they all were. The headmaster had believed it was safer that way.
What reason did he have to not trust the man that had given him a home and a fair chance at life?
“Is Reggie back yet?” he asked as Pandora came to sit in the chair near the window seat that Remus was currently sprawled over to compensate for the weight of a rather large dog.
“Not yet, he should be back soon however.” she answered coolly.
“Unless Dumbledore moved him without telling us.”
“It's possible.”
“I wish he would tell us when he was planning something like that- we've got enough to worry about. Dead friends don’t help.”
“You and I both know he can’t risk it. If one of us is compromised then-”
“I know.” he snapped shortly. Remus was irritated, he didn’t feel like going over the same topic everyday. Especially when he had spent the last four months locked up in this damned house. The silence that fell over the two was deafening and Remus hated it. He was too stubborn to break it however. Not when he had been perfectly fine in his own thoughts before the interruption. He held onto Sirius’ fur a bit tighter, eventually turning his eyes to look down at the dog.
'Regulus would be fine.' He told himself, feeling his brows furrow. 'Dumbledore wouldn’t let anything happen to him. He’s fine.' He closed his eyes, taking a slow inhale to stop the swirling worries about a boy he cared for as his own younger brother.
Regulus had graduated early, his skills beyond his years and now found refuge in number 12 Grimmauld Place. Despite it all, Regulus wasn’t a fighter, he was just following his older brother.
Remus just hoped no one would see the boy as a liability for still being in contact with the Blacks. He’d never ask the younger to cut ties with a family that he had known and loved his entire life. He knew how dangerous the Blacks could be- Sirius wouldn’t have run away if they were delightful but he understood that Regulus still found identity in them.
Sirius and Regulus were not the same.
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Sirius awoke as he felt the safe hand in his fur stop. 'Had Moony fallen asleep?' He wondered, opening his eyes to see his Moony very much awake and very much unhappy. The slight frown in the corner of the young man’s lips fitted with a signature furrow of his brow that gave him a small line in the center of his forehead.
Very cute in Sirius’ personal opinion.
He could smell someone else here as his Moony’s familiar scent of old books and chocolate was interrupted by something else, feminine. Not Lily, she had more vanilla and hibiscus to her. No, this was pomegranate. Pandora?
He lifted his head to see her, she looked uncomfortable by the silence that hung in the air like a thick cloth. if there was one thing Sirius hated more then his Mother, it would be silence, thankfully he seemed to be the self appointed master of breaking it.
His tail betraying his emotions as always when he looked back at his Moony.
“Morning Pads.” Moony said, the tension in his face easing slightly.
Sirius shook his head thinking of his human face, the sharp jawline that Moony so often traced with kisses, his curly hair that Moony so often braided to keep his hands busy, his tattoos that he’s gotten without permission from anyone but himself. And just like that, he was back, a dog no longer, still curled in the werewolf’s lap.
“Tsk- I thought I told you not to transform back on me.” Moony huffed, pushing himself up against the windowsill behind him a bit more.
“Bold of you to assume I’d listen to that. Besides, you're comfy.” Sirius grinned.
“And you’re boney.” the other boy rolled his eyes.
Sirius smirked, “Oh am I?”
This cheeky remark earned him a halfhearted thwack over the head.
Not that he regretted it in the slightest. Money was already very used to his antics. The two had been friends since their first year and dating since their sixth. That had been two- almost three years ago now.
They say time flies when you're having fun. Sirius disagreed with this, time seemed to fly no matter what while he was stuck sprinting to keep up. He’d been running his whole life, at least it felt like it. If time flies when you're having fun, Moony must not be fun to many people. He seemed like the only person that would stop the racing in his chest. The only one that seemed to make time stop.
Sirius didn’t mind the idea of other’s thinking Moony was boring. Moony wasn’t for them anyway, he was for Sirius. His moony, no one else.
Moony had been cooped up here at Grimmauld place for what felt like forever. Dumbledore had dubbed it “too dangerous” to have a werewolf collecting information or gathering forces. Dumbledore had told Moony that he had different plans for him but Sirius knew better. Dumbledore didn’t want people afraid to join the fight. The headmaster would rather pretend that Moony didn’t exist than explain to people that Remus was a good werewolf and not a monster like the rest.
A load of hippogriff shit if Sirius was honest. Though, as selfish as it was, he’d rather have Moony here anyway. It was safer here. Especially when the ministry was starting to hunt werewolves down to capture and sometimes even kill in order to prevent You-Know-Who from getting more on his side.
“I keep forgetting you can do that.” Pandora murmured and Sirius blinked out of his thoughts. ‘Right, she was still here.’
“I prefer four legs to two.” Sirius shrugged.
He really couldn’t fault her, he and the other Marauders hadn’t exactly gone around parading their ability to shift into an animal version of themselves. He had spent the majority of his time since coming to Grimmauld as a dog too. Being a mutt was just simpler, he doubted even dementors could touch him under the protection of fur and muzzle.
It made the memories here less painful in a way, he could almost forget about all the bad in exchange for the sparse moments he and Regulus had snuck away to make shadow puppets under candlelight. No yelling, no pain, no burns, just him and Regulus.
Moony and the Lovegoods were an addition to that familiarity that he was more than welcome to. It meant that Moony was always just around the corner when he went looking. Though it was a bit awkward to have newlyweds staying in his parent’s old room, he wasn’t going to complain.
Kreacher was an entirely different problem however. The damned house elf was always spying around each corner, muttering slurs under his breath when Reggie wasn’t home. Regulus had been going out more and more recently, Sirius had asked Dumbledore about it but the headmaster had instructed him to not pay it any mind. So he hadn’t. Regulus was stuck up, sure, but he wasn’t stupid. Even Sirius could admit that.
'He probably just wants to avoid this place.’ Sirius would tell himself. He just hoped that that was the real reason his baby brother snuck off so frequently.