Transition

4. Depression

"The simple solution for disappointment depression: get up and get
moving. Physically move. Do. Act. Get going."
--Peter McWilliams

Remus had not come out of his room for days. Bill had haunted the hallway, waiting right outside Remus' door for some indication the man inside was still alive. Bill sat in his chair, staring up at the ornate ceiling of the novel house of Black, thinking carefully about all that had happened since the day he'd found Remus brewing the vol de mort potion boiling on the cook stove of Mrs. Black's decrepit old kitchen.

Harry had come and gone, back to school and back to his friends. Remus had brewed his potion again and again, refusing to believe that his bargain with god would not work. He was offering all of him, poisoning himself with the silver slivers he had to put into it every night, and even then all the gods in this world would not listen.

Finally, Remus had given up. Two weeks after Bill had found the putrid green vol de mort potion on the stove; Remus had thrown away his cauldron and said a pleasant good night to Bill. That had been a week ago. As far as Bill could tell, he had not left the room since then.

If Remus did not extricate himself from his room today, Bill had resolved that he would go inside. Fuck sanctity. Remus' health was at risk here; he had to grow up and get over this. All these months languishing and lamenting about Sirius... he'd lived thirteen years without him, for god's sake.

Around midnight, just as Bill was drifting off into another night of restless sleep, the door to Remus' bedroom swung open. Remus, unshaven and unclean, made his way across the hallway with Sirius' towel tucked under his arm and Sirius' razor clutched in his fist.

"Remus?" Bill asked sleepily. "That you?"

Remus jumped and spun to stare at him, his amber eyes more vacant than Bill had ever seen. "Aye, Bill. It's me."

"Are you OK?"

A smile flickered across Remus' face. "Would you believe me if I said yes?"

Bill shook his head. "You look like shit."

"I feel like shit."

Bill tightened his ponytail. "Do you, um, want a hand with anything?"

Remus looked thoughtful for a second. "I think," he said so seriously Bill didn't know if he was joking or not, "that I can manage to shower myself. Although I wouldn't mind someone changing my sheets."

When Bill pulled the sheets off of Remus' bed, he found it was hard to miss the stains that littered them - blood and semen everywhere. What was the old man doing to himself? Why wouldn't he let Bill in?

Remus came back from his shower clean-shaven and smelling like the soap Sirius always used to use. "We should talk, Remus."

Remus laughed a little and shook his head. "No, Bill, we don't. I know what you're going to say."

"How do you know?" he asked, settling into the chair beside Remus' bed.

"I can't read minds, but I can see inside some people sometimes. I can see inside you. You're angry that Sirius stole my soul."

"Why would I be angry about that?"

Remus pulled the sheet down and slipped between them, pulling them up to his chest and settling back with a giant tome in his lap. "Because you wanted it for yourself."

Bill was silent. He wasn't going to lie. For months he'd been obsessed with every part of Remus - mind, body, soul, and that damned wolf inside, too.

"You want it for yourself and your angry that Sirius still owns it, that I can't move past him and on to you." Remus pulled his glasses off and set them on the bedside table. "Bill, I'm too old and too tired to fall in love again."

Bill wordlessly stood from the chair and made his way across the room to Remus. "You're never too old to fall in love again," he said, and without any hesitance, pressed his lips against Remus', falling into a kiss he'd been anticipating for a long, long time.