Golden Boy [Remus Lupin]

10. promise

Remus half expected Elio to go back to ignoring him the next day. He woke, a heavy weight on his chest at the prospect, heart light still contrastingly as he recalled fleeting touches. Dancing across a scarred torso, creeping around a neck, and wrists, tracing words of invisible stories on arms.

Elio assured Remus he had not forgotten as the boy with the golden hair and amber eyes caught him in the hall before first period, a grin on his face.

Remus hadn't even managed to open his mouth to greet the boy in any capacity before Elio was kissing him, palms as they never knew callous from cut raising up to catch Remus' cheeks between them.

It was short and fleeting but said everything that needed to be said. When Remus finally regained his bearings, the boy had slipped away back into the crowd, rushing forward to catch the carriage waiting outside.

He was leaving.

He told Remus last night. Somewhere between being pressed against the wall and the following conversation they shared before a tea Remus was convinced was pure magic.

"How's Quidditch?" Remus had clumsily asked, grappling for any topic as he fought to subdue the flush residing stubbornly on his cheeks.

Elio smirked as if he knew just what kind of effect he'd had on the boy. He did, of course. He always seemed to know just how to make Remus react the way he wanted to.

"Fine." Remus hadn't been to a game since the Astronomy Tower. "I'm leaving tomorrow," Elio said. "I think you should know that."

"What?"

"My family summoned me. A lot of kids are going home. Dumbledore is giving some of us a week off."

"Why?"

"To talk of the coming war, mostly. Loyalties and such. But I have to talk to my parents about a matter beyond as well. I want to know if my name in the family tree will be scratched out if I do this."

"Do what?" Remus asked.

Elio had responded not with words but with another kiss, softer, lips pressed on his, and Remus was left with the tingling feeling and the remnant taste of herbal leaves and cigarettes on his tongue, a stupid grin on his lips.

He had gotten his answer.

"They'll come back in a week," Sirius said, bringing Remus back to the present as they began begrudgingly walking to class. Sirirus would remain here with the rest of the students. He refused to talk to his family through letters or otherwise. "And when they do, there'll be an uprising I'm telling you."

Peter paled. "There wouldn't be one here. Dumbledore wouldn't allow it." He glanced around as if expecting a monster to appear out of the flock of conversing students.

Sirius all but snorted. "Dumbledore knows he can't do anything. He's got pressing issues with the Ministry constantly. Angry parents, worried students. There's only so many things he can focus on and control at once before something slips through his fingertips."

James was away with Lily. If he were here, Remus didn't doubt that he'd ease the tension with a rubbish joke or something according.

"Then we have a week to do... what?" Remus asked, ignoring all the states he was getting. He supposed kissing Elio Falwey in public was enough to capture the attention of people. At first, he would have paled at the prospect of all those eyes on him but now he felt oddly smug, like he had just become a prestigious Auror or won the Triwizard tournament.

"There's not much we can do." Came the reply. The professors may alot more class time for DADA and charms, giving lectures of the importance of safety. They might also send all the students home but Voldemort would have to do something profoundly vile for that to happen.