Queen of Disaster | 𝑅𝑒𝑚𝑢𝑠 𝐿𝑢𝑝𝑖𝑛

Chapter 103

"Yeah, I remember." He grinned. "We even made a bet that if you got a better score than me at the Ancient Runes' exam, I had to show you the passageway."

"Yup. And you said that if you got the better score, I would have to go on the worst date ever with you."

Remus couldn't help but to laugh at the memory. "It was so hilarious and humiliating. I actually felt bad for you."

"No, you didn't."

"No, I didn't," Remus admitted, smiling again.

Diana sighed, looking away from him as she forced herself to remember why she had brought him here in the first place.

"Can we talk now?" she said again, her voice small and wavering.

Remus nodded weakly, gesturing his hand for her to walk inside. Once they had both gone into the passageway, Remus took out his wand from his cloak's pocket and gave it a small wave. On cue, the bricks behind them began to climb back on top of each other to form the solid wall.

Once the wall closed behind them, the passageway turned dim. And so Remus gave another flick of his wand, nonverbally lightening the torches inside the passageway.

At the end of the secret corridor, there was a staircase that would lead them up to the West Tower, where their Ancient Runes classroom was. But they didn't climb up through it. Instead, Diana sat down on the first stair and Remus joined her, sitting right beside her.

     Diana opened her mouth to speak, but Remus was quicker to say, "You're not breaking up with me, are your?"

     Diana turned her head to look at him, recognizing the hurt in his eyes.

     "Why — why would you think that?"

     "Dunno... at the beginning of summer, I really screwed up by behaving like a lunatic. But then even when I apologized, you still didn't return most of my letters after that. And now you're acting really weird."

    "No, of course I'm not breaking up with you!" Diana said, but she then shook her head, looking down at her feet. "I mean, I don't even know what I'm doing myself —"

     "So you do want to break up?"

     "Wha — no! Stop putting words in my mouth!" Diana scolded, pulling at the end of her hair out of frustration. "Can you just let me talk, Lupin? I've been rehearsing the perfect lines for weeks, and now you're making me nervous and I'm starting to forget everything I've tried to memorize!"

     If it were any other time, Remus would've laughed at how cute Diana looked whenever she got angry, but now he couldn't bring himself to even smile.

      "What is it?" Remus asked quietly, his brows furrowed apprehensively as he watched her.

      Diana closed her eyes and took a deep breath as they were both still sitting on the stair. When she opened her eyelids again, she mustered all her courage to look up at him, but gazing back into those chocolate brown eyes made everything more difficult.

      "Okay... here we go..." Diana began. "Before I get to the main part, first I need you to understand something, Remus; I come from a traditional Wizarding family. And being raised as a part of such family means that your family's honor comes before you. Ever since I was a kid, I never got my way. It didn't matter if I wanted to wear trousers, because my family believed that ladies should only wear dresses. I was never allowed to play Quidditch with my boy cousins, because Quidditch wasn't a game for girls, according to my mother. I never had a choice; whether it was the food I liked, the clothes I wanted to wear, how to talk, how to behave, and just how to live my life. I didn't have a choice then, and I'm not given a choice even now."

     "All right..." Remus nodded at her gently to go on.

     "You've been friends with Sirius for six years now, and I'm sure you know what kind of a family he was raised in. So I assume that you know what life is like for people like us."

     "Of course I know," Remus said softly.

     "Okay..." Diana whispered, taking another breath to prepare herself to go on. "I said all this, so you would know that this is not my choice. That I had no say in this whatsoever. That I would do anything to stop this from happening, and I really need your help."

     "Diana, you're scaring me. Please just tell me what's going on," he implored worriedly.

     Diana gulped, before finally blurting out, "I'm engaged to Evan Rosier."

"You're... what?"