writers_muses: 26.6. Time.

[worldfromafar]

Just a quick note from the mun: With this post Remus is back to the house (in grownhp6words 'verse), so anyone in the house is welcome to react to this. Same goes with anyone wanting to just drop by even if they aren't at the house, by the way. Different threads are welcome. Also, the icon does not necessarily reflect how he looks when he walks in the house (saying this just in case); it's mostly how he's feeling internally. This can be used in bendy-time so it can be placed before the protest, etc.


Time. That's what Remus had asked for when he had left, hadn't he? Time to sort himself out. Time to figure out what had happened the night of the full moon. Time to go back to being that person that he had been just a month ago.

In all the time he was away, Remus did learn something and he learned it well. Or, rather, he re-learned that lesson because once upon a time he had been an expert at that subject.

Time had nothing to do with anything. Time didn't really fix things. Time allowed to find a way of dealing with situations, but it wasn't necessarily dealing with whatever the problem was. It was just to find a simple solution; or at least the one that seemed as simple. It was easy to find a way to not focus so much on something.

He had been gone almost a month from his family and, even if he had felt guilty the whole time, he knew he had done the right thing. The children didn't need to see him how he had been and, while he still believed that, Anna Min's gift had jolted Remus in a way that nothing else had. It reminded him that, no matter how much he could try to force himself to remember, or how much he could try to focus on something else rather than the guilt and everything else that was eating him alive, time still passed. Time had kept passing, and he was being a horrible father and husband.

In a way now he had something new to focus on. It wasn't that night where it had all gone wrong. It wasn't the fact that he had woken up covered in blood after a transformation. It wasn't that he couldn't remember what had happened. Now he had to focus on his children. On his family. They needed him, and that was what mattered.

Taking one last glimpse into the mirror, Remus could see the time that had passed reflected in his eyes. That was another reason why he avoided mirrors lately - they showed too much. Part of him was worried he'd look up to see the wolf sketched along his figures, and the other part hated to see what was left behind. He hated to see what he hid from everyone with polite smiles, and normal conversations. Behind all that there was just...nothing. A blank. Time had passed, and it reflected in how weary he really looked once he stopped smiling. His hair had more specks of gray than before, and whatever weight he would normally gain before the full moon was nonexistent now.

He was different. Dora didn't know the details from him on why, exactly, he had stayed away from home but things had changed. Drastically. That much he had said, more than once. To her, and to those he confided in.

Things weren't the same.

He wasn't the same.

Like it had been happening lately, however, as soon as he set foot in the house once leaving Hogwarts, the mask was firmly in place without him being fully aware of it. That had been his way of dealing with things once, and it had stuck for the rest of his life. Time had taught him that. Fit the role, play the part, and do things right. That had been some sort of motto throughout various parts of his life, and this wasn't the exception. He would do whatever he had to do to be like the husband, and the father, he was supposed to be.

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[pinkhairedauror.livejournal.com]

Tonks was in the kitchen, clearing out the table when she heard the crack of apparition, and her eyes shot out the window, out of many years of habit.

And she saw that so-familiar, dark-cloaked tall figure making his way to the door, and her mind exploded.

He's back. He's here.

Home.

What did happen? Will he tell me?

How...

The sound of the shattering of the plate she'd been holding, on the floor, snapped her out that whirlwind. She sighed and closed her eyes, then quickly took her wand and fixed the plate, sending it in the direction of the sink (she couldn't just leave the pieces around, somebody might get cut). And then she walked out to meet him.

She'd seen him at Hogwarts, of course, so she shouldn't be so startled at how he looked, but...

Standing here, home: gaunt, greyer, paler - made her heart twist. She paused for a moment, not certain how much space he still needed, but then something in her snapped and she went to him, wrapping her arms tight around him, her voice soft as she couldn't find better words right then than, "Oy, Remus! ... Welcome home."

[shy-sly-lupin.livejournal.com]

Anna Min thought she heard the crack of apparition, too, all the way from the library where she was curled up in the biggest chair. But she'd thought that a lot in the past month and had taught herself not to trust her ears. She didn't look up from her book -- something by Wodehouse from the Jeeves canon -- but her hand unconsciously moved to touch the tulip set beside her on the seat. Yellow was her favorite but this one was white. A symbolic offering of peace most likely, she thought. She'd shyly asked her mother to charm it so it wouldn't wilt so quickly out of water. It was beginning to look a little rough around the edges anyway but only because she'd been handling it almost constantly.

She heard the crash of a plate and thought that probably meant that Daddy was, indeed, home again and Mum had spotted him. But maybe it was just Mum breaking a plate. It happened a lot. Anna Min's eyes stopped moving on the page, fixing on Aunt Dahlia's name as she listened with a bit more interest. The sound of the front door ... and then voices. One corner of her mouth tugged upward for a moment. She hadn't been hearing things. He was home. He'd said he would be in his note but she hadn't let herself believe it.

Still, Anna Min remained where she was. She didn't want to show too much enthusiasm. Partially because if time away was what Daddy had needed, then that's what she wanted him to have. But mostly because she was hurt and had missed him and was afraid he was just here for a little while before leaving again, maybe for good this time. So instead of jumping up and running full-tilt at her father and launching herself into his arms, Anna Min went back to reading about teetotaler Gussie Fink-Nottle presenting awards while accidentally drunk out of his mind. If he really was staying, Daddy would find her eventually.