Hate Myself

I.

He counts to ten over and over, and thinks that if he can just get through this hour, and the next, he will be fine, because nothing that hurts this badly can last forever. He feels the others' stares on his bowed head as he stares at the ground, the graves, and feels as though he'll never be able to speak again. Ten and ten and ten and ten. He records the funeral in his mind without emotion and tells himself that someday he'll be able to pass the memory on to Harry. Six and seven and eight and nine. After a while, it's the only thing that matters; drinking doesn't make the hurt go away, but he tries it anyway. Ten and ten and ten.

II.

He counts to ten and the pain blocks out any thought but ten. He can feel the pain, cleanly and without thought, and be alright; he can feel the wind on his fingers, the sun on his face, and keep all the thought from his head. He is alone, and he had just begun to think that he'd never be alone again. That's just what goes to show. He hates himself, from time to time, when he counts to ten and it doesn't help. He hates himself and James and Peter and especially Sirius. It goes to show. It goes to show that he didn't deserve them in the first place, ten and ten, and now they're dead and he's alone. Fuck Sirius and fuck James and fuck Peter and his noble fucking sacrifice. He doesn't even wish that he had been the one who died, not yet. He doesn't wish that it was his finger they were sending back to his fucking family. All he can feel right now is ten.

One and two and three and four and five and six and seven and eight and nine and.

Ten.

III.

There's nothing else he can do about it, he tells himself, than what he's doing. He folds up inside, curling his weaknesses away like so much burned paper, making himself hard. He can't bear the celebration, the joy about the Boy Who Lived and how You-Know-Who is gone and dead. He can't hear it. Not even ten can help. His eyes screw up and he wants to howl and scream and fuck it all let everyone know what he is, but no sound comes out. He is suffocated with ten. He works his mouth and can't even cry for the only people who mattered fuck all in the world to him. Fuck them. Fuck James and Peter and Sirius. Fuck Lily too, while we're at it. He doesn't say "fuck Harry" because even his anger doesn't reach that far.

IV.

Ten helps and he puts one foot ahead of the other as he goes through days. He goes through days just feeling. He can let the emotions overtake him and still count to ten. It is when he starts to think that things fall to pieces and he finds himself with teeth marks in his hands, two weeks from the full moon. Fuck them. Fuck all of them, fuck James and Sirius and Peter. He will think, soon enough, that it should have been him but right now it is still a litany, when ten fails him: fuck James and fuck Sirius and fuck Peter. He can't even cry yet, not even for the only friends he's ever had. No tears, guess Sirius was right. He's a fucking monster after all.

Seven and eight and nine and ten.

V.

Every once in a while he stops and lets thoughts and feelings overtake him. He is swamped and frozen at the same time. He doesn't feel that he will ever be able to move under the guilt until he does. Until he finds himself putting one foot in front of the other and still never feels that guilt release him. It could be ten years later and he could still be saying: fuck James and Peter and Sirius. Fuck Lily. Fuck Harry, the Boy-Who-Lived. And while we're at it, fuck Remus too. You're the one at fault,you drove them all away with your pathetic mumblings about being a bad person. They would have trusted you if you had been less of a whiner. So fuck you too. Sirius was right. Fuck it all.

VI.

He remembers when they found him, looks back to that day and the days before with agonizing scrutiny, plays back everything that Sirius said or did, everything that James and Lily said or did, everything Peter said or did. He holds onto the memories of Harry like a life-raft, when Harry fell asleep on his chest or cried or smiled or only ate his food when Remus was feeding him. He knew when they found him that something had happened, when Dumbledore and two Aurors came to his house and found him naked and bleeding, still in shackles, in his iron cage in the basement. One of the Aurors, the young one with the pale skin that was the only thing he could see through the haze in his mind, looked ready to vomit before Albus spoke of sacrifice and gathered him up in his own rich cloak and said. That Lily and James, the night before. And Sirius and Peter, only hours ago. No more Padfoot, Prongs or Wormtail. No more Moony, that went without saying. He should have known something was wrong, before; it was the full moon and Sirius wasn't with him. Sirius was there, in the morning, he was sure of it. Remus had woken in bed, clean and dressed, with the vague memory of the softest of kisses across his forehead. If he had only - if he - Peter - oh god -

One and two and three and four and five. Six and seven and eight and nine and.

VII.

He thinks of ten but not even that saves him when he is alone at night, staring at the pattern the moonlight - at whatever phase of waxing or waning - makes on his walls. And that is when it finally hits him that he should have died instead of Peter, instead of Lily and James. It isn't even that he would have sacrificed himself for his friends, though he imagines he would have, it is that he wants to die. He's felt like that before, but there were always things that seemed to be worth living for: his mother, Hogwarts, Sirius. He has no friends and he has no job. He was fired two days after James and Lily - oh, he can't even think it. He does not have the money to cover his rent, and doesn't think he'll bother. He's sold most of his things, already. He sits on the floor of his flat and stares at the few things he has left, the suitcase and two robes and the music box. It almost shames him that these pathetic objects are the only things he has to show for twenty years of life, that the sum of all but four of his material possessions didn't quite add up to one month's rent in a tiny London apartment. He doesn't think of ten, then; he doesn't think of anything. It's the first time that he's allowed himself to let go of any of the things he's been feeling, any of the pain or loneliness. It comes with a feeling that has no words, an emotion that somehow makes him feel clean. He thinks that it is because he has no more room for pain, and he has simply become saturated with sorrow until there is no more Remus left to feel sorry for himself.

VIII.

His anger fades into sorrow and then into that nameless and clean emotion and he realizes that he is broken. He can't explain this numbness, can't explain why as he sits on the floor of his tiny Londonapartment and counts down the days until he will become homeless. It has become a different sort of misery since he realized that there is no more Remus left inside him. He doesn't think that he doesn't feel like himself, doesn't even consider leaving his apartment as he counts down days. He stares at his arm in a shaft of sunlight and looks for hours at the soft hair that covers his forearm, bleached white in the sun, and thinks that he has never truly known himself. He doesn't realize that he is knitting himself back together again, as he starts with the hair on his forearm that is bleached white in the sun, and slowly begins to recognize himself again.

IX.

It is days before he can reach out with fingers he knows and touch the only things he has yet to lose. He goes through them slowly and doesn't think about the fact that he has nowhere to go when the full moon comes. He strokes his old robes with two fingers and finally both hands, and surprises himself by smiling when he discovers his suitcase with the peeling letters and thinks that he will need some string to fix it with soon. And it is with that thought that he realizes that the knot in his heart has receded, just a little bit, and there is room to breathe inside of him again. There are days and hours that he slips and feels numb and he wants to scream and howl and fuck it all, but he doesn't count to ten, not anymore.

X.

The owl post says Hong Kong and dragons. Even adjusting architecture to accommodate the dragons from the hills has not pleased them, and his name had good references. He has been doing pest control and "creature management" for years; who knew that a personal interest in defense against Dark Creatures could actually make money? The pay isn't great, sure, but room and board are included and he could almost smell the humidity and the street markets and everything that Englandisn't. He can avoid thinking directly of (fuck James and fuck Peter and especially fuck Sirius) but it is always on the back of his mind somewhere. The thought of ten comes to him unbidden and he shrugs it away without knowing why. He doesn't want to be reminded of James and Peter and especially Sirius. He doesn't think of ten anymore because they are what he thinks of when he counts. He thinks that he will accept the job, and placate the water dragons, and learn to love the humidity and the street markets and everything that Englandisn't. He will learn to count to ten in a different language.