(A/N) TW: This chapter has mentions of depression and self harm, please be aware that I am trying to approach these topics in a sensitive manner and the topics discussed throughout the next few chapters will be heavy and not meant to for all readers.
Do not forget that there is always help out there if you are struggling, do not ever let anyone make you feel as though your struggles and mental illnesses are not valid!
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It's strange. Strange being in a place you feel obligated to call home despite its persistence to be anything but. Grimmauld Place never felt like home, although that exact feeling was never something I grew accustomed to, whatever 'home' felt like, number 12 certainly wasn't it.
I had unintentionally alienated myself from a place I had never really belonged. Don't get me wrong, everywhere I went was swarming with memories, each room, each door, each creak of each floor board, each gust of bitter draft, everything, was drowning in memory, they just weren't my memories.
It was as though upon entrance I could see the lives, the genuine, happy, once untroubled lives of people who had lived there once before, or at least left a mark in some way, the sound of innocence and naivety trapped beneath the wall paper and the reflection of betrayal bouncing from every surface.
And I could hear her laugh, my mothers laugh, or at least the sound I had envisioned it to be, light and breezy although heavy all at once, soft and persistent, so fucking persistent.
Like a kind of alarm you can't quite shut off, or can't find the strength too, as though there was just as much torture as there was comfort to it, and no amount of balance allowed that to reflect into sanity.
When Dumbledore had suggested I take time to rest and refrain from returning to school until after the easter holidays, I hadn't quite acknowledged the implications of his suggestion, my agreement sort of slipping out before I summoned the ability to catch it.
And when Remus decided that it was too in his best interest to accompany Sirius and I at Grimmauld Place, in order to 'take care of me' despite my detest for pity, my discomfort only intensified, because in a place where I was being suffocated by my mums image, her memory nothing but a bedtime story, it was hard to escape the feeling of being watched, being mothered, and no one mothered quite like Remus Lupin.
When I was seven I fell off a muggle bike Remus had gifted me for my birthday, scraping my knee in the process, and Remus refused to let me move for three days, bringing each of my meals to his bed in which he let me sleep, and pouring me enough cups of tea to sink a large ship.
When I was ten, a girl in the village, no older than myself, had called me disgusting and a freak, and since this took place at at time in which I had not yet learnt to stand up for myself, Remus comforted me for hours, constantly assuring me of the faults in the girl's words. Except the thing I hadn't told Remus was that the girl had not called me those things, but it was Remus she had insulted after a particularly bad full moon, I just didn't have the heart to tell him.
And when I had my first panic attack, just before Remus was due to meet with Tonks when there was original speculation of Peter Pettigrew being very much alive, Remus showed no indications of hesitation when he cancelled his meeting with Tonks, and he stayed with me, and held me as though he didn't possess the ability to let go.
So when I enter a place, Number 12 to be exact, that reminds me heavily of a woman I never knew, that's drowning in the essence of being "mothered", you can imagine why Remus only intensified that situation, and I was rather quick to make that apparent.
"I haven't finished clearing out just yet, and we still need to furnish and re-decorate, so you can take my bed Ari" Sirius asserted, stepping past the threshold and motioning for Remus and I to follow.
"And where will you sleep?" I asked as I followed Remus and Sirius, running my finger along the wallpaper leading towards the kitchen, attempting to control my hammering heart as it relentlessly assaulted my chest.
Sirius stammered slightly, not offering a certain answer, just busying himself with taking my coat and pulling out a chair at the table in the kitchen.
I scoffed, "You haven't thought that through then, have you? I'll take the couch and you two share Sirius's bed until we adjust the arrangement" I suggested causally, hoping that if my tone was nonchalant then the setting would feel as such.
"Ardelle don't be-" Remus began with a slightly forceful tone, shrugging off his coat and throwing it over the chair beside him, his tendency to resolve and overbear shining through impeccability without missing a beat.
"I'll be fine Remus" I whispered with a bitter tone I wasn't quite intending, or maybe just failed to conceal, as I made my way over to the kettle and began to fill it with water and place it on the stove.
I felt a steady breath growing nearer as a shadow cast itself across the wall ahead of me and it was evident someone was standing behind me, lingering but not quite ready to intervene.
"Ardelle, let me make that tea" Remus offered with a heavy sigh, his exhaustion evident at the use of my full name, both of us known for clutching to the reliance of tea to dampen the severity of any intensive situation.
"Remus I've got it" I argued back harshly, the sour tone laced in my words creeping up slightly as I stomached the urge to break.
"Honestly Ardelle, let me help-" He began with a defeated and exhausted yawn he attempted to stifle, and had it not been 3am, and had we not just gotten back from the hospital, and had any of us received a decent sleep the night before, and had I not had two panic attacks in the past four hours, maybe, just maybe I could have bit my tongue, but alas that was not the case, and I snapped.
"STOP, JUST STOP" I shouted far more forcefully than I had originally planned, startling Remus and Sirius and well as myself, "I am not a china doll, Remus. I get that you want to help, and I am grateful for that, believe me I am, but I am not going to break at the hands of a kettle and some tea bags. I am capable of making tea, I am capable of sleeping on the couch and I am capable of existing without needing to be wrapped in bubble wrap, I don't need to be mothered, what about that can you not understand?"
Neither one of them said a word for a moment, Sirius hanging his head as he sat silently at the head of the table, and Remus, who had backed away several paces from me now, stood with his hands stuffed awkwardly into his pockets as his eyes grew glassy and his lip trembled.
I hadn't noticed the single tear that rolled down his drained and porcelain skin until Remus lifted his hand to swipe it away and swallowed forcefully to dislodge the lump that had formed in his throat.
A sickening nausea invaded the cavities in my chest, filling me up and making it hard for me to breath, "I'm sorry Remus, I went to far, I shouldn't have-"
"No, you're right" He whispered dismally, continuing to pace backward until the back of his legs collided with the edge of the kitchen table.
He didn't speak again just yet, although I knew he wasn't finished, the endless string of harboured grievances threatening to spill, the remorseful yet somewhat harsh contortion of his features lingering slightly longer than I was sure he intended, as he drew a wavering breath and spoke once again.
"It was hard for me too you know" Remus rasped, his nose scrunching and his thick brows drawing close as he ran a tremulous hand through his unkempt hair and tugged slightly on the ends, closing his eyes in masked frustration.
"Sorry?" I croaked shyly, panting slightly as I regained my breath that had fleeted at the hands of my recent outburst, my hand placed on my chest whilst the other reached for Fred's locket hanging around my neck, my breath hitching as I noticed its absence although I said nothing.
"Sirius didn't just leave you Ardelle, neither did your mum. And James and Lily, even fucking Peter-" His voice broke at the mention of Pettigrew, and a visible flash of something undecipherable glazed over his eyes for a transient moment, the wreckage of his betrayal still very much evident,
"I was just as much abandoned as you were. You have been the only person that has never left me, the only constant in my life, no one else stayed, no one. Not Sirius, not James, not Lily, not Peter, not Marlene, not Dorcus, not mum, not dad, no one, but you. So forgive me for being mildly overbearing on the basis that I have spent the last six weeks unsure if the reason I'm still alive was going to die or not!"
His chest was having relentlessly and his heartbeat was audible from where I was standing, I wasn't sure if he intended to project his words with such malice, but he did nonetheless, and the edge of each word, each syllable, each sounds, sliced at me, cutter slightly deeper than the last.
I had never considered that having everything and losing it was harder than never having any of it at all, because whilst abandonment was all I had ever known, and I knew nothing different than the life Remus had built for us, Remus had spent the best part of twenty two years with these people, only to be stripped of it all in the space of two days.
And whilst his past life may be unretrievable, and nothing short of a distant memory, and despite his ideology that he had failed the first time around, the least I could do was allow him to do exactly what he had wished all along, to protect.
I hadn't spoken yet, just stared blankly at Remus's expression, racking my brain for an appropriate and somewhat coherent response before Remus awkwardly cleared his throat, his wide and heavy eyes, resembling that of a lost puppy on the side of the road, studying my features intensely.
"I shouldn't have-"
"No. No, you're right. I never thought about it like that. I shouldn't have snapped, I'm sorry" I interrupted with a croaky whimper, stepping towards him slightly, continuing when he showed no signs of protest, until I was close enough to rest my head on his chest, although I refrained from doing so for a moment.
"I know you're not a baby anymore Ardelle, but it's hard for me to watch you grow up. I'm scared one day you're not going to need me anymore" Remus whispered, his tone fragile and vulnerable as he extended out his arms and encouraged me to step forward before enveloping me into a loving embrace.
"I will always need you dad, I'll always need both of you, you and Sirius, so long as I'm alive" I admitted earnestly, dropping my head into Remus's chest and inhaling the scent of english breakfast tea that was not only lingering on the cotton of his clothes but accumulating in a cloud above us as it rose off the fresh cups Sirius had busied himself making.
"Drink this and get some rest, you both need it, you can both head to Hogwarts tomorrow to get anything you need, but right now sleep is top of the agenda" Sirius smiled warmly, handing both Remus and I boiling mugs of tea as we broke our hug, this role reversal a strange but admirable look on Sirius Black as he adopted the sensible and sober characterises Remus typically possessed. It was strangely comfortable to observe.
Remus and I did as Sirius instructed, finishing off our tea, reaping its never ending benefits, before heading to bed, sleeping until the early morning sun disrupted the once embracing darkness, casting alarmingly great although calmingly warm shadows across the hardwood floors.
I groaned as the streams of icy looking sun disrupted the bleak darkness of the living room, the brilliant hues of gold and citrine breaking through the blinds enough to pull my body from the depths of its confining slumber.
I lifted my hand up to my neck, feeling for a chain of any kind to fiddle with as I adjusted to my surroundings, my breath hitching once again when I rediscovered the absence of the locket as my grandfather's ring lay solitary against my sternum, although this time I did not need to defer my worry.
"Remus!" I called in a frantic sort of tone, one that in hindsight I probably should have refrained from using as both Sirius and Remus sprinted into the living room, matching looks of distress visibly drawn across both their faces.
"Is everything alright Pup?" Remus heaved as he perched on the arm of the sofa, his eyes welling with panic as Sirius knelt down at the edge of the couch and reached for my hand.
"My locket" I murmured, my eyes transfixed in a stare on the opposing wall, whilst one of my hands aimlessly trailed my sternum as I distractedly searched for the locket in its usual place around my neck, my heart aching slightly at the notice of its absence, "It's not here. I noticed last night but thought maybe I was just tired and distracted, but it's really not here"
"Maybe Fred had it?" Sirius asked whilst Remus absentmindedly patted down his pockets as though to search for the pendant, whilst Sirius began to trace his hand along the underside of the couch cushions in case the necklace had fallen in the night.
"Why would Fred have it?" I snapped slightly harsher than intended, immediately following my words with a soft smile to soften their landing, standing up from the couch so Sirius and I could begin flipping over the cushions in search.
"Maybe it came off during the accident and he held onto it for you?" Remus suggested, sighing heavily, his search underneath the sofa proving unsuccessful, although suddenly his words sparked a sickening realisation to wash over me and flood my senses.
"Or maybe it's at the bottom of the Black Lake" I sighed in exasperation, slumping down back into the sofa as I ran my hands through my hair in frustration, Sirius and Remus seating themselves either side of me.
"Maybe. But not certainly. So let's go to Hogwarts and gather what we need and you can ask Fred?" Remus proposed, wrapping his arm around my back and momentarily distracting me from the bitter draft floating in through the front window as it traced its minimal yet sharp breeze along my spine, leaving trails of goosebumps in its wake.
I nodded in agreement before following Sirius upstairs, a place I had not been in a manner of years, and thankfully so, but as I stepped into the bedroom Sirius and Remus had been sharing, a small piece of history had suddenly been reframed, even if it was just for a brief moment.
The walls were a light tan colour, not bright and distracting or dark and enclosing, nor was it white and plain enough to suggest that its occupants were monotonous and lacked variety. There was a large open window on the wall opposite the door, inviting pools of fresh light to flood the room, amber hues bouncing elegantly from each surface.
And the clothes thrown about haphazardly strangely radiated a sense of order, the room did not drain you of existence much like the rest of the house, but rather instilled as much as it could back into you.
"This is the first room I've started to redecorate" Sirius noted as I stood in the doorway, my jaw slack and my eyes wide as I lost sense of where I was for a moment, "It's a start, I know it is slightly messy but-"
"No. It's perfect, rooms are supposed to be lived in. I can only imagine the disgustingly formal sense of order you must have had around here as a kid" I admitted, not quite done glancing around, and Sirius seemed to appreciate this acknowledgement.
"Here" Sirius chucked me a pair of jogging bottoms and a Beatles tee that made me think of Fred for a moment, before chucking me some socks and smiling when I caught them with one hand. "I'll leave you to get changed"
"Thanks dad" I hummed, staring down at the clothes, bringing them up to my nose and enjoying their comforting scent. Sirius sighed thankfully at this term of endearment but refused to dwell on it.
And as Remus and I left Grimmauld Place, I wasn't met with the immediate wash of relief I typically was, but rather a longing to return. A sickening concept I was not ready to accept just yet.
Once we arrived at Hogwarts, exiting the floo network through McGonagall's empty office, I wasted no time in heading straight for the common room and through to Fred's dorm, uncaring for the stacks of books I needed to collect and the heaps of clothes I would struggle without until my return easter, the only thing on my mind being the retrieval of my locket.
"Fred?" I called breathlessly after bounding up the stairs and refusing to knock as I entered his dorm. I called his name again. And a third time. No response.
It was seventeen minutes past twelve and so I could only assume the twins' absence indicated they were in classes, but rather quickly I noted the heavy patter of shower water as it hit the tiled floor, sounding from the bathroom on the opposite side of the room.
The door was pulled too but not quite closed, and the thick and damp steam that leaked from within had fogged up the mirror attached to George's wardrobe. I couldn't help but draw a shape in it as I wandered towards the bathroom.
"Fred" I called for a fourth and final time, bracing my hand on the door as I swung my head past the slight crack. The shower curtain was pulled closed as the body within was concealed, although the small piece of wet fabric did not secrete the only other sound mingling with that of the water continuing pummeling at the floor.
Gentle whimpers, loud enough to be heard over the sound of the water, however they had not grown brutal enough to be caught if you were not standing beyond the entryway of the bathroom, not yet anyway.
He audibly spluttered on the water as it beat down on him, encasing his lungs as he fought for fresh air, air that wasn't laced with the tournament I imagined it was currently. And although I had not yet pulled back the curtain, I knew it was Fred that stood behind it, as his watch sat on the ledge beside the sink, clearly having been removed to avoid getting it wet.
"Ardelle?" I suddenly heard him question through a pained groan, his whimpers no longer so gentle as they began erupting into a violent sound that tore through me.
"Yes Freddie it's me, can I come in?" I wasn't sure whether to ask, fairly confident the answer would be a firm no, but rather I was met with an immediate whimper and croaky 'yes' that I wasted no time in responding too.
I pulled back the curtain, my gaze immediately dropping as it was made evident that Fred was not standing under the water like I had pictured him to be, but rather huddled in the corner of the walk in shower, his legs pulled firmly to his chest, his face tucked into his knees, and his body fully clothed.
There was not a single fragment of hesitation as I slipped off my shoes, kicked them towards the sink, and stepped into the shower, lowering myself onto my knees and sitting down onto them, lifting Fred's chin with my index finger, forcing his gaze to meet mine.
His eyes were raw and tender, his waterline burning scarlet as a mixture of the continuously beating water and the burning heat of his tears cascaded down his cheeks. Much like when I saw him in the hospital, he appeared seemingly lifeless, his body was somehow more drained and stripped further of its once life-filled colour.
Even the bronzy hues of his, once gleaming, eyes were now being darkened by a rusty edge and deep pools of obsidian. Although even then I had never loved anyone more.
His lip quivered as he tried to speak, but no words followed his efforts, as though the words were clinging forcefully to his lungs, or maybe his brain could not process any words at all.
I too struggled to form any kind of response, the sickening sting welling in my eyes only increasing the longer I stayed under the shower, and I could only imagine how comical the streams of black eyeliner Sirius had leant me looked as they spilled down my flushed cheeks.
I sat down beside him and let his body fall into mine immediately, his sobs now nauseating as they grew more violent and agonizing to watch, although I said nothing, and asked no questions. I refrained from asking why he was here, fully clothed and alone, I refrained from asking why he was crying, well rather uncontrollably and brutally convulsing and his throat and chest begging for relief at the sound of his raw cries.
I refrained from asking anything.
I even refrained from asking when he had made the seemingly fresh cuts littered up his arms as his shirt rose slightly as I caught a glimpse of his wrists.
I didn't ask about any of it, not yet. I needed to preserve that moment just a little longer. There was a twisted comfort in not voicing the unavoidable, as though I had the control, even for a fleeting moment.
But soon the questions would turn sour and each setting would grow increasingly bleak. The darkness was already setting in, I could feel it, as though that almost black, midnight blue that filled the sky on December nights, when the sky bared no clouds or stars, as though that exact colour had been twisted and contorted into some kind of corrupt and lingering emotion.
Fred put a piece of himself into that locket when he gave it to me, and I had lost the locket, and Fred had lost that piece of himself.
And despite all of this, despite the fact I knew what was to come, I had still never loved anyone more.