InsaneJournal

Prompt: Wolf/Remus Lupin & Esme Taylor
Requested by: squidtastic

request one here



He thought she didn't notice. She knew he thought she didn't notice. Maybe she was a better liar than she thought she was. Because she definitely noticed. She'd started noticing in second year but she'd never really paid attention to it until they'd started dating, mainly because, well, Esme tended to notice EVERYTHING when it came to the person she was dating.

Maybe someone else might let it go. Maybe someone else might just assume it was some sort of strange coincidence and dismiss it. But not Esme Taylor. Because any irregular pattern in a relationship of hers was like a bright orange sign saying "WARNING--WARNING" and flashing little red lights.

So she was sitting up, awake, fretting and freaking out like she always bloody did when she thought something might maybe be going slightly wrong with a relationship. It was a vice, she knew it, and she knew it usually caused more problems than it solved, but she couldn't help it. Restless, she moved to the window to peer outside at the full moon--gorgeous tonight. Scanning the grounds, she furrowed her brows in confusion as she realized the Whomping Willow had stopped moving. She might have brushed it off as something silly, like the tree being asleep for the night, if she hadn't been awake and done the same thing in the past and seen it very definitely moving. It was the Whomping WIllow. It was always moving.

With so much on her mind, it was almost impossible to resist the temptation to go creep around and see what was going on. She was a Gryffindor, after all, and like many of her peers she couldn't resist a bit of adventuring. She moved to wake Lily, then stopped. She'd been so tired lately. Waking her up just because Esme couldn't sleep would be too selfish.

So, quietly, she snuck out of Gryffindor and down the stairs, out the door, and to the edge of the Whomping Willow. What was going on here, she wondered to herself. She thought she heard voices as she crept down the staircase, voices that almost seemed vaguely familiar. "Hello?" she asked, her voice small, almost too small as she peered in from the top of the stairs.

There was a snarl, so vicious she tried to step backwards and tripped on the stair behind her. Following the snarl was the sound of something breaking, a growl and a snap--somehow different than the first snarl, as if there were two animals with distinct voices. Frozen, Esme considered going down. She considered running. She considered screaming for help.

She considered the options. What if it was a dog fighting ring?, she realized. The thought of forcing two dogs to fight to the death made her stomach turn, especially when she thought of adorable little Reggie curled up on her bed. Disgusting. She had to tell someone, but first she had to see it with her own eyes. She didn't want to bring down a Professor if it was just wild animals fighting.

She started a moment later, when a curly head poked out of the darkness, an incensed scowl lighting on his face. "James?" she asked incredulously. "What the bloody hell is going on? Why are you participating in a dog fighting ring?"

"Dog--what?" James asked--Esme gave him points for being convincing--and he looked at her like she was crazy. "Get the fuck out of here, Esme," he hissed, looking so frightened and worried that Esme actually started wondering if this wasn't a dog fighting ring at all, but something much darker and more sinister. "I'm not fucking joking around. GO. AWAY." Behind him, the snarls continued, growing more frenzied, the sound of furniture breaking escalating.

"I'm not going anywhere, James Potter, until you tell me what is going ON." Her voice was louder now, insistent, and with characteristic Gryffindor belligerence and rash bravery, Esme just barely pushed past James (had he always been so strong?) to the bottom of the stairs.

The sight that met her wasn't any of the scenarios running through her head. Not a single thing she'd planned to say or did in those few moments to prepare herself before going down those stairs was at all helpful. Nothing. Because across the room, twisting violently on himself and a big black dog, was a wolf. And Esme didn't have to go back outside to check the moon to know that it was a werewolf.

Smelling her entrance, the wolf turned sharply from the dog and fixed its eyes on her, ignoring all the dog's attempts to catch its attention again. Its eyes met hers from across the room and Esme's face collapsed into a look of confusion and pain, because--

Because she knew those eyes. And it couldn't be, it just couldn't. It wasn't. It didn't make sense. It wasn't possible. Except that it did make sense. His random weeks every month where he'd get irritable, start pulling away, and eventually disappear for a day or two. The way he always looked more tired or got sick every few weeks, like clockwork. She'd thought they'd been excuses for him to avoid her. But...she hadn't wanted her theory to be true, but if it meant that this wasn't true? She'd take it, because this was...this was...painful.

Someone was pulling her backwards, hissing in her ear and grabbing her roughly, and time seemed to slow almost comically as Esme half-tripped back up the stairs, the wolf leaping from its corner towards her and just missing, so close she could see its claws--bloodied claws--in sharp relief. If James hadn't been pulling at her, and the black dog hadn't been pawing at him, he might have gotten her.

She fell on her hands and knees outside the Whomping Willow. James' curses and warnings and threats fell on deaf ears, because all she could concentrate on was the grass underneath her, the moon above, and the sounds of snarling and thrashing coming from below. "God help him," she whispered, hands balling into tight little fists on the grass beneath them. "Lord, please..."

She was crying, she realized dully. She'd only noticed because a drop had landed on her hand, buried in the grass. James was pulling her up now, telling her to go back to the common room, that he couldn't leave, that if she told a single soul he would KILL her, don't think he wouldn't, don't think he'd hold back just because she was a Gryffindor, or a girl. She suspected that if she hadn't been a good friend and he hadn't been so flummoxed and disturbed and surprised by it all, he might have Obliviated her.

Nodding numbly, she turned. The Gryffindor Tower seemed a long way off from here, but she made it, eventually, and lay up in her bed sleepless all night.

-----------------------------

The next morning, he wasn't at breakfast, and neither were Sirius or James. All Peter would do was give her frightened looks and shrug pathetically when she questioned him. Panicked, she left early without eating and returned to the tower, entering the common room and the boys dorms without a second thought.

No one.

Where was he? She needed to talk to him. Had to look at him, to see those eyes. Where was he?

She found him in the Hospital Wing, looking so fragile and broken that she almost cried again just seeing him. When he saw it was her, he looked away and refused to meet her eyes, refused to even talk to her.

"Remus, please," she said, gripping her knees as she sat in the chair next to his bed and stared at the side of his face. "I don't--I just want to talk about this."

"I don't." he said, and his voice sounded hoarse and scratchy. "Please go away."

"I don' t know...I don't know what I'm supposed to say," she said, voice almost desperate. "But I want so much to let you know..." Lost for words. She closed her eyes tight, like the darkness would help. "...It's. Nothing's changed. You're Remus. You were Remus. You are Remus. You will be Remus." Another pause. "Nothing's changed. Please, please, talk to me."

There was a long, long, long silence where they each just sat there, still as stone. Then, quietly, she broke the silence. "I brought you some chocolate."

She sat with him, mostly in silence, a respectful distance away, until she had to go to class. Then after class, she came back and sat with him again. The next day, she did the same thing, with more chocolate. And when Remus got out of the hospital, he found a small box of homemade chocolate chip cookies waiting for him on his bed. There was a note, hexed to him.