Like Father, Like Son

Twentieth Chapter

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Talking

*

"What the Hell is holding him back?" asked Severus from no one in particular. "And where did Poppy disappear? I thought she would never let us out of her sight."

"Well, I certainly do not know," Remy replied. "I hope she would come and release me, though. I've spent enough time rotting away here."

"Don't say that too loudly," advised Severus with a smirk. "Poppy has a sixth sense that tells her whenever somebody speaks ill of her precious little Infirmary."

"You're always talking about the Infirmary as 'the wretched hole,'" Remy pointed out mischievously. "So, you're really one to speak, Father."

"That's because she knows that she can't do anything about my attitude." With a smirk, he then added, "And besides, if I were you, I wouldn't be in such a hurry to get out of here. Young Miss Green is somewhere out there, remember?"

At this, Remy groaned and hid his face in his hands. "Was that really necessary?" he whined. "Just when I was about to forget it, you just had to bring it up!"

"Remy, in all honesty, I really doubt you had forgotten about her," Severus replied dryly. "If you had, then you've managed to hurt your head as well. If you cared about her enough to go for public display of affection, you won't be able to forget her for a long, long time to come. Or if you indeed are able to do that, then you aren't my son at all -- or Sirius's, for that matter."

"So now you're telling that I have no father?" Remy raised his eyebrow. "For some reason, I dare to disagree with that particular statement. Or was it not you who told me that everybody has at least one father, some even two?"

"I did tell you that," admitted Severus, "and I still stand behind my words. I didn't say that you have no father, I just said that neither I nor my husband are that to you. And it doesn't matter anyway, now does it? Since my statement would only apply if you forgot Samantha, and you clearly can't do that."

Remy glared at him, but as Severus was also a Snape by blood, the glare had little effect. So, the teen jus sighed and glanced down at this hands. "I still don't think I'm the one who should apologize," he muttered sulkingly. "She broke up with me. I'm certainly not going to beg her to change her mind! She has to apologize to me!"

"Well, unless I'm severely mistaken, she doesn't want to apologize," Severus said smoothly. "So, either you go to apologize to her, or you forget her. Simple as that."

Just as Remy opened his mouth to reply, the door banged open. The words, "Well, at last," died on both reluctant patients' lips as they saw who was coming in, and in which condition. Sirius marched in, his face so pale that it was almost grey. His eyes looked almost empty, and his expression was blank. However, what terrified his son and husband most was the thing he was carrying in his arms.

"Is that -- is that Remus?" asked Severus, sounding horrified. He stared at the pale form in Sirius's arms, the closed eyes, bloodied robes -- and bandaged wrists. "He didn't try to kill himself again... did he?" the Potions Master asked then quietly.

"I'm afraid so," Sirius sighed as he placed his unconscious friend on the empty hospital bed next to Severus's. "I called Poppy immediately... she said that a minute later might have been too late." A humourless smirk curled his lips as he continued, "A good thing that I ran the end of the way there, then."

"Merlin," whispered Remy, staring at his older namesake lying motionless on the other side of his father. "He -- he really slit his wrists? But -- why?"

"He blamed himself for Matthew's death, I think," replied Sirius. "He left letters, anyway. One for us, one for Kingsley, and one for Harry. Maybe he tells in those what was his reason for doing this."

As soon as he heard this, Severus reached out his hand. Sirius drew the suicide note addressed to, "Family Snape," from his pocket and gave it to his husband. Severus took the still unopened letter, broke the seal, and read aloud.

"'Dear Sirius, Severus, and Remy,'" he read, ignoring Poppy, who had come in behind Sirius and was now busy looking over Remus. "'At first, I beg you not to hate me for this. Especially you, Sirius -- I know you think suicide is cowardice.'"

Sirius swallowed and closed his eyes briefly. "Never, my friend," he whispered. "Never in my living days would I call you a coward."

"'Why I did it, you probably want to know. Simple, my friends. I've come to notice that my affection only causes trouble and pain to everyone it concerns. I apologize to you for all the trouble I've caused to you during all these years, as well as thank you for doing so much more than I could ever deserve.

"'I hope you won't remember me with hatred, although considering everything I've done, good and bad, being remembered with affection seems highly improbable. Forever and ever, Moony.'" Severus looked up from the letter, his face even paler than it usually was. "Sweet Salazar," he whispered. "Just how depressed was he?"

Sirius looked pained. "I don't know," he said, "I honestly don't know. I can't believe we managed to miss it! Why didn't we see the signs?"

"It's not your fault," Remy said firmly. "It's nobody's fault -- not even Remus's. There's nothing you could have done to prevent this, Dad. And besides, he will survive." Glancing at Madam Pomfrey, he continued, "He will survive... won't he?"

"Of course he will," the mediwitch replied to the teen's immense relief. "If you think I'm going to let him die, you're severely mistaken, young man."

"Good." Severus nodded. "And now, Sirius... As both Remy and I are confined to bed and prohibited from leaving until further notice, you will have a great responsibility on your shoulders." At his husband's questioning gaze, he finished, "Consider it your personal mission to inform Kingsley and Harry about this."

If only possible, Sirius paled even further.

*

Remy bit his lip as he hurried through the stairway towards his dormitory. He would not make a sound, nor would he look back. Oh, he especially would not look back. That was the last thing he would do right now.

At first, it had looked easy enough. He'd been released from the Infirmary two days after Remus's suicide attempts. Madam Pomfrey had her hands full with the werewolf -- Remus had fallen into a coma -- so when she'd been certain there was no trace of the monster's mysterious poison left in their systems, she had released both Remy and Severus. Careful but encouraged by Hermione's message that the only rumours concerning him were about the monster, not Samantha, Remy had dared to leave to Infirmary to return to the Ravenclaw Tower.

On his way there he hadn't heard anybody saying a word about his and Samantha's breakup. So, he hadn't much worried about meeting his housemates. However, as soon as he'd entered the Common Room, he'd frozen. The first thing he had seen upon entering had been a couple of girls. To be exact, Samantha and Hermione.

For a moment, the time itself had seemed to have stopped. Remy had stared at Samantha, and Samantha had stared back. Neither had done or said anything.

Then, however, Samantha had turned her head away. Seeing that she was clearly unwilling to communicate with him, Remy had hurried past the girls to the stairway, oblivious to Hermione calling his name. And here he was now, running up the stairs. It was funny, really, how only Samantha could make him abandon his Snapish calm enough to run. Only Samantha, in good and bad.

'Merlin,' thought Remy as he opened the door to his dormitory, 'it looks like I'm really obsessed with that girl.' With that, he headed towards his bed. When he opened the curtains around it, however, he noticed something.

There was a golden stuffed bunny sitting on his bed, a bracelet around its round paw. For a moment Remy just stared at it, unable to move. Then, he simply fell to his bed and lay there, unmoving, unseeing. 'I will not cry,' he kept chanting to himself. 'Snapes do not cry, not for anything. I'm a Snape. I will not cry.'

Some time later he felt another body settling on his bed. Looking up, he saw Hermione sitting next to him, a worried look on her face. "By Rowena, you look horrible," Hermione gasped. "If I didn't know better, I'd say that you have cried."

"I haven't," Remy muttered. "I haven't cried. But I do admit being damn near to that."

For once, Hermione didn't even remind him of language. Instead, she just sighed. "Can I do something to help you?" she asked quietly.

"Call Rita Skeeter." As he saw her frown, knowing that she would not agree, he held up a hand, silencing her. "I do not want her to make a scandal about this," he said quietly. "In fact, tell Skeeter that she's not allowed to even mention Samantha's name, or mine for that matter, anywhere without my permission. We saw what she can do last year, and then, it wasn't even true. I don't want her making Samantha's life a hell just because she doesn't want to be with me."

"Woah," Hermione breathed. "You really do care about Samantha."

Remy smirked grimly. "I just want to have some chances to get her back," he replied. "And I will have no chance at that if I allow Skeeter to rip her apart."

"Say whatever you want," Hermione said softly, "but I think that you are in love."

Remy just huffed. However, he did not deny the truth behind her words.

*

Harry glanced down at the white sheets of a hospital bed in the Hogwarts Infirmary. There, on the bed, lay his recently discovered father. His teacher of one year, and a trusted person for several. And now his parent, the only living one, anyway.

Well, living and living. Remus had been tip-toeing on the thin edge between life and death for quite a while now. He wasn't in danger of immediate death, but he wouldn't wake up, either. Nobody could tell what exactly was wrong with him.

Sighing, Harry glanced down at the letter in his hand. He'd opened it as soon as Sirius had given it to him, and what he had read had horrified him. Still, the self-loathing words of his father were floating through his mind.

"Harry," the letter had begun. "At first, I want to apologize. At second, I want to tell you that I'm sorry. At third, I want to tell that I understand if you won't forgive me.

"I'm not a very good father, now am I? I've never been. When you were born, I had to give you up without even seeing you -- I didn't want to, that I can say on my defence, but it still wasn't right. And now, when you had a true family that loved you and cared about you, I tore you away from there with a few misplaced words. For that, and everything else, I apologize to you, my son.

"This is not your fault, it's nobody's fault but mine. I would never blame anybody else for my own mistakes. All I can say is that it wasn't in my purpose to do this to you. To steal you from your family and make you a half-orphan, a half-orphan with a name everybody connects to somebody who never even existed, not really. And now, if I'm sufficient, you'll be a full orphan, with nothing and nobody to rely on. For that, I am sorry, and I can only wish your true family still loves you.

"I will not offer you some stupid explanations -- you're an intelligent boy, and deserve more than that. I'm going to leave so I can't hurt anybody anymore. I'll never hurt you anymore, Harry.

"Love,

"Your father."

Glancing again down at the man on the bed, Harry whispered, "And yet you did, Father. Nothing could have ever hurt me more than this." While speaking, he allowed his fingertips trace one of the bandaged wrists. He could almost feel the scars underneath the cloth. Kneeling down, he muttered, "Wake up now, Father. There's nothing wrong with you, you can wake up. This is not funny anymore."

"He won't wake up." Startled, the spy looked up, only to see his carrier's lover standing there. Kingsley looked very tired, but he still managed a weak smile. "I've tried everything I can think of. Begging, asking, bargaining -- he will not wake up."

"It's still worth another try, isn't it?" Harry sighed then, wiping a strand of hair from his face. "I just hope that he would -- What are you staring at?"

"Nothing," replied Kingsley hastily. "When you did that, you just -- you looked so much like Remus. When he's thinking about something." Kneeling on the other side of the bed, opposite to Harry, he asked quietly, "What did your letter say?"

There was no question about what letter he meant. "That he didn't want to hurt me anymore," the young man replied quietly. "That all he's ever done for me is hurting me -- at first giving me up, then tearing me from my adopted family."

"In mine, he said that his love is like a poison," Kingsley said with just as quiet tone. "That everybody he's ever loved has died -- like James, and Matthew. He said he didn't want me to get killed just because he dared to love me."

"And he was wrong," Harry said. "He's hurting us with this -- with thinking that we wouldn't want him to be there to love us." With a sigh, he continued, "It's really strange, you know. Sure, he was my friend even before. However, now I feel like I'd known him all my life, and loved him all that time. Like he'd been my father forever and ever. Sure, I still like Molly and Arthur, but not as my parents. Not anymore."

"That's how the Adoption Charm works," the black wizard said. "But Remus has this ability to make everybody love himself. I first met him when we were both working for the Order in the First War. I fell in love immediately, it just took me time to make him love me." With a humourless chuckle, he added, "And if he thinks he's going to get rid of me like this, he's severely mistaken. I did not wait fifteen years for this."

"Yes. We can't let him get rid of us this easily." Turning again towards his comatose carrier, Harry continued almost teasingly, "Come on, Father. I know you're in there somewhere. Now stop this game of yours and wake up, it's well about the time. We need you -- I, Kingsley, and about everybody else in this whole sodding castle. Remy especially needs you -- he has girl problems, and nobody else can help."

"He's getting insufferable nowadays," Kingsley said, trying to get the same jokeful tone. "As Samantha left him and the boy's too proud to apologize to her, he's pulling pranks to keep himself from thinking about her. I, Sirius, Severus -- we've all tried talking to him, but he just claims that we can't really help because, well, because we all prefer men. You have to wake up before he paints the whole Great Hall pink."

At first, they just both stared at the unmoving man. Then they heard the almost inaudible words, "Well, that's a sight I wouldn't want to miss." Exclamations of joy escaped the two wizards' lips. Then they started a struggle about which one got to embrace Remus first. The werewolf blinked, and then slowly smiled. "You just can't do without me, can you?"

"No, we can't, and do remember that," Kingsley said firmly. "Now, stop this joking... Everybody's been worried out of their minds, nobody could help." With a grateful glance at Harry, he added, "Seemingly only your son knew what it takes to get a Marauder moving. Well, Remy might have known -- if he wasn't keeping himself occupied."

"I said you would bring troubles with your Marauder blood one day, didn't I?" Remus raised his eyebrows, then yawned. "Merlin... I'm sleepy..."

"Well, then sleep," Harry said. "But remember to wake up this time." Although his tone was still teasing, he had to choke back tears. Remus didn't seem to notice.

*

"Come on, dear Mrs. Norris. Come on..." Remy murmured as he stared at the Marauder's Map. He'd once again stolen it from his Dad -- how it had gotten into Sirius's hands, he didn't know, and didn't really want to, either. Instead, he just concentrated on pulling his latest prank with style. And this style included a cat.

At last, he saw that the cat had got near enough. A wicked smile spread on his face as he murmured the words that would release the spells he'd casted earlier. What made it even better was that there were a lot of students to witness that he was in the Ravenclaw Common Room, not where the cat-trap was. And still he would get to enjoy seeing Mrs. Norris's fate. Perfect.

Oh, he would not harm the cat, not at all. Just give her a little... ride.

A horrible cat-shriek came through the door of the Common Room. Everybody rushed towards the door, recognizing Mrs. Norris's hated voice. As they filed out to the corridor and saw what caused the cat's agony, everybody bursted into laughter.

The rather sizeable duck -- it was at least as tall as Samantha, although the thought made Remy swallow -- glared at the students. It had a red nightcap on its head, and under one wing, it held Mrs. Norris's clawing and raging form. "You," it squeaked with a very ducky voice. "Tell Filch that if he wants his cat back, he'll have to bring three big Easter eggs in the Entrance Hall by midnight!"

"Easter eggs?" echoed somebody. "Why on Earth would you want those?"

"It's none of your business!" squeaked the duck. "Just tell Filch that!" Then, it flew away -- how it managed to stay in the air with just one wing, the other holding the cat, nobody could tell. However, they all laughed, especially when Mrs. Norris shrieked again from somewhere near the ceiling.

"Now, now, children, do calm down," said a vaguely amused voice behind the crowd of students. "Show some compassion to poor Mrs. Norris, and poor Argus, too."

Now, Remy spun around. "Remus!" he exclaimed. "You're back!"

"So I am, Remy, so I am," replied the werewolf, giving a slight chuckle. He looked still pretty tired, but he was awake, and up and about. "Harry decided to use a Marauder method to wake me up, and, well, it worked."

At the mention of Marauders, Remy smirked. Remus raised his eyebrow. It was clear that he knew who had created the cat-napper duck. Remy was quite proud of it. It had taken a lot of background research and preparations, but was well worth it.

"Professor Lupin!" echoed from several mouths. The students had been informed that Remus was in the Infirmary and would not accept visitors, but the reason and background of his injury had been left untold. However, he had definitely not been forgotten, like was proved when several Ravenclaws now surrounded their Head of House, from all years. Everybody was talking at the same time, all happy.

"I'm sorry, but I have to leave for a little while," Remus said at last with a small smile. "Remy, if you would come? I believe we have something to discuss."

"Of course." Remy followed his lycanthropic namesake out of the hearing of the other students. Then he turned towards him. "Well, what is it?"

"At first, that prank," Remus said, turning serious. "I do not deny that it isn't funny, or that I haven't ever dreamt of something similar. However, it is quite cruel. You know that Argus will be very upset about his cat's disappearance."

"Mrs. Norris will not be harmed," Remy said, shrugging. "The duck will vanish before nightfall and release her, so Filch won't even have to worry about those Easter eggs. I don't see why anybody would have any trouble with it, especially when Filch has always been tormenting us. It's about the time he gets some back."

"I still do not approve." Frowning, Remus added, "I will not take House points away, as I cannot really prove that it was you. However, that prank was cruel, and you know it. A successful prank is one that both the pranker and the victim can at least later laugh at, not something that somebody gets really upset about. You don't want to be a cruel tormentor in Samantha's eyes, now do you?"

Now, Remy flinched. "I can't be anything in her eyes, as she won't even look at me," he snapped. "At Hermione, yes, but not at me. I could just as well be air."

"Well, that brings us to our other topic of discussion," Remus said, raising his eyebrows. "Which is, Samantha. Have you thought of doing something about her?"

"What could I do?" asked the teen, looking even more stubborn than usually. "I will not go to apologize to her when she was the one who left me. I'd lost even the little of my pride that I still have left, and I'm not about to do that."

"Really?" asked the werewolf. Seeing Remy's stubborn expression, he sighed. "Very well, be that way," he said. "By the way... Why hasn't Skeeter written anything about your little breakup yet? I'd think it'd make it straight to the headlines!"

Now, Remy flushed. Remus merely gave him a growing smirk, then sighed and wrapped his arm around Remy's shoulders. "Trust me in this, boy," he said, "girls are tricky creatures. Just when you think you're on steady ground, there's an earthquake, and everything goes into a chaos. Never, ever think that you're all right with your girlfriend, because it's almost certain that you are not."

"Well, I don't have to worry about that, now do I?" asked the boy bitterly. "I don't have a girlfriend at the moment, you see."

"I do see," said Remus, "I do see that, Remy." However, what Remy didn't see was the tiny Marauderish glint in the werewolf's eyes.

*