Alex Fawley, quite at odds with what you might have perceived about her character, always loved horror movies.
Vampires and ghosts and Ouija boards and spectres. Something lurking in the dark, hidden under the bed or in the deepest recesses of the wardrobe. Of course, being a wizard, she understood that the monsters in the shadows had the very immediate potential to be real, but her dad also had the Ghostbusters on speed dial, so any of the resulting cringing behind the sofa was pretty much cancelled about.
Werewolves had never scared her in films, but then again neither had zombies, and she was pretty sure that being faced with an entire world of them would be terrifying. As she woke, Alex felt more like the latter of those two creatures than she would have cared to admit.
She was aware of herself before she fully woke up. Aware that she was sprawled across rough ground, aware that there was some kind of material draped over her, aware that she really did not want to be awake. Pain was filtering in a throbbing steadiness down her sides. Slowly, she twitched her fingers, letting her nails scrape against the earth in a way that itched her mind.
"She's waking up." The voice was hushed, a hospital-bedside tone.
"What do we do?" That was someone else.
Alex held herself perfectly still, as still as possible, in the vain hope that they wouldn't take notice of her consciousness.
"Moony'll want to talk to her."
"Oh, a little wolfy get-together. That'll be fun."
"I, um... I left her some of Moony's clean clothes." A new addition informed the group, "We should wait outside."
"Yeah, she probably wont want our beautiful faces round her bed."
"I know who she will want though."
There was the creaking of floorboards around her as the boys stood, and left her side. Alex waited a few moments before summoning the strength to open her eyes. Pain rippled across her body, sending black crowding into her vision for a moment. She pushed through, dragging herself into a sitting position and heaving a relieved sigh. She seemed to be sat in some sort of ratty backroom. The entire place gave off an air of abandonment, even the particles of dust hung undisturbed, as if they had been frozen long ago, with the echoes of a lost age.
Despite the cracked floorboards, despite the peeling faded floral print of the wallpaper, giving way to the rotted boards beyond, despite the frankly rancid odour, or that sofa in the corner that looked like it was make of bits of stitched together skin, it was the curtains that Alex noticed first. Possibly because they seemed like the most modern additions to the room. They were a rich scarlet colour, hanging crisply from a slightly too big fastenings above the window. Around their edges, light was beginning to creep into the room. Light.
Alex pulled her knees up to her chest, noticing for the first time the old patchwork rug that had been thrown over her as it dragged across the floor. Underneath, she could feel the tug of fabric where her clothes hung off her, ripped and torn as they were by her transformation. Folded neatly by her feet was a set of boy's jeans and a plaid shirt that looked far too big. A coat was folded over the armchair to her right, the one that made suspicious creaking noises every now and then.
As hurriedly as the flashes of pain would allow, Alex shoved on the clothes provided for her, revelling in their softness against her skin and the faint smell of shampoo that accompanied them.
Knock! Knock! Knock!
A teacher. God, Alex wished she'd been able to sustain that potion for a little longer. Her fingers were already shaking, whether from cold or nerves she wasn't quite sure. Little ripples of chill ran spider's legs up and down her arms.
"Yes." Alex realised that she hadn't actually responded to the knocking a second too late. Her voice broke halfway through the word, cracked and dry as her throat was, "Yeah, I'm... um, I'm dressed."
The door cracked open a little way, and a head poked around it. Messy brown hair and a rather hesitant, calming expression on that too-old-for-its-age face.
"Lupin?" Alex asked, as if the boy were about to pull off his face mask to reveal Sirius Black had been underneath it all along, yell something along the lines of, And I would have gotten away with it too, if it hadn't been for you meddling kids, and then scuttle off to some little secret base somewhere he could concoct idiotic plans without getting caught.
Alex wasn't exactly sure why she had been expecting Sirius Black, other than the fact of his curious interest in her recently. It wasn't even that strange- loads of people had been noticing her more post-potion. It was just Alex Fawley misinterpreting things the way she always did.
"You can call me Remus." The boy offered, smiling hesitantly as he elbowed the door open far enough to slip inside, "I have a feeling we're going to be seeing a lot more of each other."
"There were," Alex frowned, looking around her. There was a persistent dizziness that seemed to reside in the back of her eyeballs, punishing her every time she moved to quickly, "There were other people, I think. I mean- I heard..."
Remus nodded at her reassuringly, to let her know it was alright, whatever was going on, "Maybe we should take this one explanation at a time? How are you feeling? The first one is always the hardest."
Alex took that as permission to sink back to the ground, which she did gratefully, leaning into the fabric of the armchair and trying not to breathe too deeply, "Does that mean it gets better after this?"
Remus cocked a half-hearted smile, "Would you feel better if I said yes?"
"Probably not." Alex acknowledged, "Wait, you said, 'the first one'. Does that mean...?"
"I'm a werewolf too, yes." Remus was eyeing her cautiously now, aware of every reaction.
"No, that's not..." Alex shook her head, which fuelled the pounding that resided there with a vengeance. She had already deduced that much, it was more specific information that she wanted, "Are you the werewolf?"
The one that attacked her. The one that scarred her face permanently. The one who took away a chance at a normal life.
Remus stared at her a long moment before responding.
"Yes." He divulged at last, measuring her reaction carefully.
Alex nodded slowly, "Okay."
"You aren't..." As Remus searched for the right word, Alex could practically see him searching through a mental thesaurus for the right definition. He finally seemed to settle on the most boring, unemotive adjective possible, "Angry?"
Alex thought about it for a second, taking note of her internal feelings. Angry, she was pretty sure, was red and white and thudding and pounding. Alex was more of a grey in that moment. What she was was... tired. And hungry, definitely hungry.
"I don't think so." She decided at last, looking up at the Gryffindor's confused expression with an almost identical one of her own, "Is that bad?"
Remus gave a short huff of a laugh and flopped down on the floor next to her, "You think I know?"
Alex shrugged awkwardly, "So... I'm a werewolf."
"Unfortunately. Yes." Remus gave her a sad smile.
"And there's..." Alex swallowed against the dryness of her own throat, "There's no way to cure it, or..."
"I'm sorry." Remus really did sound genuinely upset for her. Alex thought that maybe that was either the best or the worst way to receive news, and she didn't know which one she was experiencing.
She stared at the floor in front of them both for a moment, at the cracks and weathered signs of age that had probably been there since before either of them set foot on this planet. She thought of the stars, so far above, so cold and uncaring in the face of all the things that humanity has lost, burning away in their little spheres. They would keep burning regardless of Alex Fawley, regardless of Remus Lupin, or Sirius Black, or werewolves or wizards or humans or earths, until they didn't burn anymore.
"So." Remus tried to build a jolly tone, and although it fell slightly flat, Alex appreciated it, "What do you want to know?"
They sat there for hours, the two wolves, and talked about moons and pain and friends and precautions and timings and what you could do and what you couldn't and even briefly about how to stream the latest Doctor Who episodes to your phone on the Hogwarts Express so that you didn't feel like you were missing anything at school. Alex thought that Remus seemed nice, and nice in her books was all you needed to fly to the stars. Remus thought that Alex seemed brave, and bravery of that kind was something he hadn't seen in a long time.
"I think," Remus said at last, "That there is someone who wants to see you."
As if cued by this line, the door, which had fallen shut under its own weight, once again creaked open, although this time the revelation was of a large black dog, tongue lolling out of its great mouth.
"Snuffles!" Alex exclaimed excitedly, forgetting that Remus was there for a moment.
The boy choked back a laugh, looking at the dog with renewed amusement, "Snuffles?"
"Is that not their name?" Alex asked, glancing up at Remus, "Sorry, I just, I named them a few-"
"No, no." Remus raised his hands palm up in denial, "Snuffles suits him perfectly."
Seeing that the canine looked dangerously close to mistaking his leg for a lamppost, Remus made several hurried excuses and left the room with a parting smile for Alex, and a final, dark, I-will-remember-this expression for Snuffles.
The familiar animal had slightly windswept fur, as if he'd been running fast recently. There was a cut on his nose, and he had shifted his weight off one of his hind paws, but he looked fine. He looked more polite than Alex had ever seen him, sat prettily in front of her like a drawing in a textbook for kids.
Alex looked at Snuffles. Snuffles looked at Alex.
"Does this mean that I'm a dog too now?" Alex asked jokingly.
As if that one sentence had broken some kind of rope keeping Snuffles tethered to the spot, the dog leapt at Alex, tail wagging frantically. Her back hit the arm of the chair with a soft thud under his sheer weight. Alex made an 'oof!' noise to illustrate this to the animal. He didn't seem to care, nuzzling his face into her shoulder with puppy-like enthusiasm.
"Hey!" She laughed, and though the sound tore at her throat, it also sent a warm feeling buzzing through all the hollow parts of her. She wanted- she needed - to laugh again. So she did. A sort of dry chuckle. And then again. Alex laughed until tears of exertion ran down her cheeks and she wasn't exactly sure that they were just because of the laughter. She laughed until her hands were spasming in mid air and she had to grip onto Snuffles' fur to still them. She laughed until it didn't feel like laughing, but yelling into the darkest pit she could find.
Snuffles just looked at her with those big, dark eyes that she felt could see so much more of the world than she gave them credit for.
"I'm sorry." She mumbled pathetically.
Snuffles snorted, Why?
"Because I messed up. I messed up, and..." Alex sunk backwards, exhausted, "And I'm talking to a dog."
Snuffles nudged her hand, Never bothered you before.
"Maybe it should." Alex whispered, so that even she could barely hear it, "Maybe I should be bothered by all this. I just... I just wanted to go home. That's all I ever want. To go home. And also maybe some Maltesers. But mostly the home thing."
Snuffles gave a sympathetic puff of air.
"And I know it's self-centred." Alex couldn't seem to stop now that she'd started, "I know. I know. But everything's just so much easier there. I can just... exist. And I don't have to worry about whether my skirt is too short and whether I'll trip over if I walk up to the front of the classroom to put something in the bin and whether people will laugh. Is that too much? Can't everything just be easy?"
She didn't need to look at Snuffles to know what his response was going to be.
"Yeah." She murmured sleepily, leaning her head back against the arm of the chair. The floor suddenly didn't seem so uncomfortable. And Alex was so tired. She gave a stifled yawn, "Yeah, I know."
Alex wondered briefly if maybe she would wake up one day and discover that the last five years of her life had been a dream, and her life really was as simple and happy as the Disney movies had said it would be. Of course, she knew that wouldn't happen. But it was time like that, when you were that close to the edge of sleep, and words start b l u r r i n g on the page, and any second now you could just drop off... Like nothing... Was ever wrong in the world...
And she was gone.