In the morning on February 14, Remus was awakened by Sirius to find that he had fallen asleep at his desk chair the night before, his parchment for McGonagall's class laying empty under his folded arms, the quill still dripping ink spots on the desk. He blinked blearily at the sunlight coming in through the window. "What time is it?" he asked.
"Breakfast," Sirius answered. He was buttoning his vest. "The other lads already went downstairs."
Remus put his head back down on his arm, watching Sirius finishing up with getting dressed. "I'm not hungry, really," he said, shrugging, "Why don't you go join the others and I'll just have a bit of a lie in and you can come get me after, for classes?"
Sirius hesitated. "Moony, I --"
"I'm alright, Padfoot," Remus said, recognizing the expression in Sirius's eyes to be concern. "Really. I'm just tired, that's all. I was up all night working on this paper... and..." he glanced at the empty parchment, flushed and hoped Sirius hadn't noticed he hadn't written a thing. "And I just need to catch up on some sleep, then I'll be fine. You go have some food, I don't really fancy eating anything right now anyhow. Moon sickness, you know?"
It was clear in Remus's tone that he didn't intend to go along to breakfast, so Sirius sighed. "Alright, but be ready, ok? I'll be back in --" he pulled his pocket watch from his pocket, and Remus stared at it as Sirius held it in his palm, "-- one hour."
Remus nodded, "One hour. Got it. See you then."
Sirius lingered in the doorway as though he expected Remus to change his mind at the last minute, then ducked out and thundered down the stairs.
Remus breathed in relief. He loved Sirius. He loved James and Lily and Peter, too, but blimey did he relish the moments when he was all alone like this in the silence. He got up and went over to the bed, drew his wand out from beneath his pillow, where he kept it when he slept, and he aimed it to the window, casting a charm that blocked out the sunlight and set the room into a dark as if it were night. He sighed and sank into the mattress and blankets and closed his eyes.
It was some time later when the door creaked opened and Remus sat up blurrily. "Been an hour already?" he muttered, expecting Sirius but finding a house elf. "Oh. Hullo," he said.
The elf flapped it's ears. "Mister Lupin is being asked to accompany Jorry to the hospital wing to sees Mister Melachton."
"Who?"
"Jorry is me, Mr. Lupin."
"Yeah I gathered that," he said, "I mean Mister... what was the name?"
"Mister Melachton. Come, come Mister Lupin. He is waitsing for you."
Remus wanted to press further, but the elf was insistent, so he jotted down on his parchment a quick note to the lads that he'd catch them up and went after the house elf, following him through the castle, ducking 'round errant Cupids flapping about the corridors, shooting people with little arrows with rubber suckers for heads, singing messages like they were novelty telegrams. Advertisements had been spellotaped all over about the Valentine's tea that would be held that afternoon, in lieu of afternoon classes.
Jorry led Remus to the hospital wing and he thought they were going to see Pomfrey for some reason (was the elf mad or just daft, perhaps?), but he turned and led Remus into a small office across the hall instead. Inside, an old man whom Remus had never seen before in his life was sitting on a couch by the fireplace, warming his hands in the red-orange glow. He looked up as Jorry and Remus entered, and he smiled and thanked the elf, who clicked his fingers and disappeared with a crack.
Remus stood awkwardly, lingering by the door way.
The old man looked Remus over, "Hello Mr. Lupin... or would you prefer Remus?"
"Remus is alright, sir," he replied.
The old man smiled, "Well then, if we are to be on a first name basis, you may call me Doug. Doug Melacton."
"Okay," Remus replied uncertainly. He stood there for several long moments, this Doug Melachton fellow staring at him, smiling calmly. Finally, Remus asked, "....Who are you exactly? Like... why are you here, asking elves to come fetch me?"
"A valid question," Doug Melachton replied. "C'mon over and let's talk about it?"
Remus shifted his weight from one foot to the other, staring at the spare cushion the old man had indicated on the couch. Finally, he walked over and sat down, though on the edge as though ready to spring back up at any moment. The fire burned merrily before him, putting off a lovely warmth that Remus had to admit felt quite good compared to the drafty, ice-cold of the castle at this time of year. The smell of the fireplace reminded him of friendship and nights camping in the woods with the lads, of him and Sirius roasting meat on spits for nearly an entire summer, laughter and good times that seemed so long ago...
Doug's voice broke through Remus's reverie. "I work with Dorcas Meadows at St. Mungo's," he said. "She tell me that you've been going through some pretty rough days lately, since losing Ned Veigler."
Remus looked at his palms on his knees. "You're a psychologist then."
"Yes," Doug Melachton replied.
Remus closed his eyes at the mention of the name, as though the sound of it rolling from the tongue was physically painful to him. When he reopened his eyes, things were just a teeniest bit blurry about the edges. "Everyone's going through pretty rough days lately, sir -- Doug," Remus murmured. "Dunno if you noticed, but there's sort of a war going on around us, isn't there?"
"Yes, I noticed," Doug nodded. "There's a good deal of pain and suffering in this world."
"You think I'm going crazy."
"No, Remus, I think that you've been through a great deal and that's bound to make anybody sad."
Remus stared into the fire, "Yeah."
Doug Melachton drew a deep breath. "Dorcas was simply worried that perhaps you might need someone to talk to about what happened."
"I beg your pardon, sir, but I don't see how talking about it would help," Remus shrugged, "It's not as though talking can bring him back, can it?"
"If only it could," Doug replied.
"No words, not even magic ones, can bring the dead back to life," Remus said.
Doug said, "No, but it can bring the living back to life." Remus looked up at him in confusion, and Doug added, "Sometimes, the survivors lose their lives just as much as those who they've lost, if they forget to go on living and choose instead to dwell on the past and allow the pain of it to consume them. This, Remus, is when talking is capable of returning life. To the survivors. So they can do more than just survive."
Remus considered this a moment. While the words were very powerful and wise, he couldn't quite figure out if they really connected to him, to his own situation. They were the sort of wisdom that applied to other people, but never to Remus himself. "What if that's all I'm meant to do?" he asked, "Be a survivor, I mean."
Doug Melachton shook his head, "We're all meant to be more than survivors."
Something about this hopefulness made Remus angry, and he didn't quite know what it was - the way Mr. Melachton said it wasn't rude or pushy or diminishing at all, it was actually a comforting tone that he was using and Remus ought to have been bolstered by it. He knew that, even as he felt a flash of irritation burn through him. He stared at the doctor, his eyes involuntarily filling with tears and he snapped, "Maybe normal people, sure, but not people like me."
"'People like you'?" Mr. Melachton asked.
Remus's jaw trembled.
"What do you mean by 'people like you', Mr. Lupin?"
Remus hesitated. Then, "You're bound by magic to be unable to tell others what I tell you, yeah? As a doctor?"
Doug Melachton nodded. "Even if it were not by magic, I would keep your secrets just the same. The only exception is if you have murdered in cold blood, or else plan to take your own life. Otherwise, the secrets that pass between us are strictly, magically confidential."
Remus took this information in, dwelling upon it a moment, and then, he replied, "People like me. Like Ned Veigler. Monsters. Werewolves." He stared at Doug Melachton, waiting for a reaction, but the old man's face remained quite still and unshocked. "Do you suppose that someone who is a werewolf deserves to do much else but survive, sir?"
Doug Melachton nodded yet again, "As much as any other."
Remus scoffed and shook his head. "Then you tell the bloody fates how you feel about it, eh?" he suggested, "Tell 'em that the werewolves deserve to be treated like any other human, that the monsters deserve to be men. Tell 'em that it isn't fair, everything they've stuck on us, all the judgement and hatred, all the whispers and cruelty. All the pain. Tell 'em that it isn't right they use the beautiful moon to burn our souls away, to allow a ravenous, horrid beast to emerge... Tell 'em that they're the monsters, that the things they scheme up are terrible and people go through an awful lot without them poking and prodding and making matters worse, that they can't go putting everything they've got for torture onto one person, it isn't fair. Tell 'em that it's enough, that being turned to a werewolf was enough, that taking away a person's humanity was enough, that they didn't have to go and make things worse by taking everything else away, too. They didn't need to take away my mum or my dad, they didn't need to take away Tizzy. Then to take away Ned Veigler, too? My - my brother, my --- he was my -- my family -- the only family I had, the closest thing to it, any rate, and -- I didn't even -- there wasn't -- I didn't even get to say goodbye... and... and-- Just... just tell them that being a werewolf was enough, and there's only so much I have left and -- I'm -- afraid --"
Doug Melachton let Remus speak until he broke, and then he held open his arms and said, "Come here, Remus." And for some reason, some untellable reason, Remus let go and let the old man hug him. The man's yellow jumper smelled like mothballs and eucalyptus and mint, and he was warm in that way that old people almost always are. Doug Melachton patted Remus's back as they sat before the fire, the glow from the flame and embers turning everything orange and casting their shadows against the far wall. He let Remus feel all of the emotions, all the things that he'd been holding back for so long, and he felt the walls crumbling down within the boy, and he held tight, waiting until Remus finally drew back, his face stained with tears.
"I'm sorry," Remus murmured, wiping his face with his fist, knotted up in the sleeve of his jumper. Doug Melachton withdrew a handkerchief, shaking it out, and holding it out to Remus. Remus took it and wiped his face and his eyes cast downward again, back to his feet. "Gods I'm a right prat," he murmured, "Expecting fate to have mercy on me for the things I've been through... when I ought to just be glad that I'm still here at all. Glad that I am a survivor."
Doug Melachton thought for a moment about these words, then he replied, "You are not a prat for having emotions, my dear Remus. Your experiences have led you to feel a lot of things - and for feeling, you should be grateful. Only the good people have feelings and emotions, those devoid of them are as heartless as You Know Who himself."
"Yeah," Remus agreed slowly, staring at his knees.
"You feel quite a lot, which tells me that you're not only good people, Remus Lupin, but you are among the best." Doug Melachton smiled comfortingly, and he put a gentle palm of Remus's knee, making him look up. "You have lost someone very special to you, I know, and there is no pain more harsh, nor as deep, as that feeling of emptiness that comes upon you in the absence of your loved one. No words fill that void, no kindness done to you closes that wound. Being a survivor means you carry a scar forevermore where that person's life touched yours. But I can see from your face that you know all about scars and how they work, Remus, there's no need for me to tell you that however deep the wounds are, if we are survivors, they eventually close, they eventually heal. It may not be the same as it was before, but it heals. The scar is what is left, it's what remains to remind you of the past."
"I've got a lot of scars, sir," Remus murmured.
Doug Melachton nodded, "Yes. And a lot of love, too, Remus. Coming in and going out as well." He patted Remus's knee then drew back, sitting upright again. "When we love, an indelible mark is made upon us - on us as well as the other person, an irrevocable scar. And, like your scars - no matter what happens in your life, no matter what you go through - that person goes with you. Here." He touched his own chest, laying a palm right over his heart. "They may pass on to the next realm, but they never leave us, wherever we go." He stared into Remus's eyes. "Ned Veigler is a part of you, Remus. You keep him alive by living yourself. Not surviving - for ghosts survive, though they do not live. No. Living - truly living."
Remus asked, "Mr. Melachton... how do I do that? How do I do anything more than just survive? I don't know how - it feels impossible."
Doug Melachton smiled and replied, "That's what I am going to be here to help you with, Mr. Lupin."