Dreaming Of You

Dreaming of You

Part 9 - Depths of Denial

Chapter 18

When you feel all alone

And the world has turned its back on you

Give me a moment please

To tame your wild, wild heart.

"Um... excuse me?" Erin stared at the woman. "Do I know you?"

"Well... probably not..." She shook her head slowly. "It's just - you look exactly like Erin Connor, twenty years ago. You've got to be her daughter, or something."

Erin frowned. "My mother's name is Rosemary. I'm the only Erin in my family, and I wasn't alive twenty years ago. Who are you?" She tried to ignore the strange feeling that she ought to already know the answer to that question.

"You're Erin?" The woman might as well not have heard the question. "But... but..." She stopped with a sigh. "All right, I am officially confused."

You're not the only one, Erin thought. "Look, I guess I have the wrong house," she said quickly. "Can you tell me where - well - " Erin realized that she would look really stupid asking which house belonged to Remus Lupin, " - never mind, I'll find it. Goodbye!" She started to back away.

"Erin, don't go!" the woman cried in dismay. "Look, Erin - it's me! Lianne!"

Erin froze. "That's not funny. I don't know who you are, or how you know about Lianne, but making jokes about a girl who's missing is just wrong."

"I'm not missing, I'm right here!" she insisted. "Erin, is it really you? How come you look so young?"

"Because I am so young?" Erin suggested, with Autumn's usual sarcasm. "Lianne is three years younger than me, ok? And I'd really like to know how you know about her in the first place!"

"Because I'm her!" The woman scowled. "I'd believe you, if you were telling me this!"

Erin rolled her eyes - then caught herself. The woman really was awfully like Li. She could very easily envision Lianne standing there, having this conversation. Lianne wouldn't have the faintest idea why a twenty-year age gap would be such a problem in accepting this story, either.

And she does look like Lianne... Erin couldn't help noticing that she moved and spoke just as Lianne did. Her hair was cut in almost the same short, layered style, though it had grown out a little so the layering looked odd. And her eyes were the same green. She was even the same height as Li. Admittedly, Lianne had never worn the sort of dress thing this woman had on, but that could simply have been because Lianne had never been able to find a costume store that would sell her decent witch robes for a price she could afford.

Of course, the woman couldn't be Lianne herself. That was just out of the question. But she could be a... a relative? Maybe an aunt? That was possible. Erin nodded to herself. That would explain a lot. She conveniently ignored the fact that Li had never mentioned British relatives - or any relatives, for that matter.

"So, do you want to come in?" the woman asked. "I mean, you can stand outside there if you really want to, but I'd rather come in if it was me." Suddenly, she smiled a little. "You really ought to meet the master of the house."

"Um." Erin hesitated. On one hand, she'd been warned thousands of times not to do stupid things like going places with people she didn't know. On the other hand, how many stupid things had she already done today? This woman was slightly psycho, but she had to be a relative of Lianne's, so it was probably the same not-too-dangerous psycho Li was. And once she convinced the woman to stop pretending to be her... niece... or whatever... she could probably use her phone to call her parents. "Hi, Mom, guess where I am!" Won't that be a fun conversation...

Erin sighed softly. "Ok. Sure. I'll come in."

~*~

Lianne's mind was reeling as she led the girl - was it Erin? Could it be? - into the house. She supposed she ought to have asked Remus first, but he had asked her to get the door. It was his own fault.

"Remus!" she called, approaching the kitchen. "You have company!"

"Remus?" she heard the girl echo incredulously.

"Company? Who?" Remus came out to meet them, raising his eyebrows at the girl. "I don't believe we've met. I'm Remus Lupin."

The girl's eyes popped like a cartoon character's. "Oh, Lord, I'm in a house of lunatics," she muttered, running a hand distractedly through her hair.

"With Li here? I won't deny it." Remus smiled in a pleasant, if somewhat confused, manner. "Lianne, is this a friend of yours?"

"Um." Lianne bit her lip. "You know how I said that I knew Erin twenty years ago?"

"What's that got to do with anything?" Remus asked, slightly wary.

"Are you still saying you're Lianne?" The girl rolled her eyes. "Really, that is just - just ridiculous. For one thing, and I know I've mentioned this, Lianne is younger than me. And for another... for another..." She stopped. "Well, that's enough to prove you aren't her!"

Remus threw Lianne an accusing glare. She recognized it from Hogwarts, though Sirius and James had usually been on the receiving end. It was his What-In-The-World-Have-You-Idiots-Gotten-Me-Into glare, that had generally appeared right before detentions were given.

"What, was I supposed to send her away?" Lianne asked defensively. "She's one of Erin's relatives, or something. She's got to be!"

"What makes you say that?" Remus asked, just as the girl cried "I am not!" in frustration.

"Then who are you?" Lianne demanded, her attention turning from Remus. "And how come you look exactly - and I mean exactly - like her?"

The girl shook her head. "Look," she said slowly, as if talking to a child, "my name is Erin Conner. I know a girl named Lianne. She disappeared three days ago. She is fifteen years old. You do look a lot like her, but you are not her. Are we clear on all these points?"

"No," Remus said, forehead wrinkling in a frown of bewilderment as he stared from Lianne to the girl.

Neither paid him any attention. "Do you mean Lianne... as in, Lianne Treyvan?" Li asked. "Because that is my name."

"Yes. But... it's a coincidence. It's got to be." The girl's voice was slightly higher-pitched with stress. "I mean, people don't disappear one day, and then turn up a few days later looking twenty years older! And people don't just find themselves in England all of a sudden, when they were just trying to walk to the bus stop, and they definitely don't get picked up by enormous purple monstrosities that take them halfway across the entire world! Normal people don't meet people who ought to be characters in books, and they don't get mysterious letters in locked drawers, and they don't have crazy things like this happening to them all the time! Why can't my life just go back to being normal!"

Lianne stared at her. "Erin?" she said finally, amazement coloring her voice.

"Yes!" Erin all but shouted. "Yes, of course I'm Erin! That's what I've been trying to tell you for the last ten minutes!"

"Um... excuse me?" Remus interrupted, his face very white, "but did you just say that you are the one who's been getting my letters?"

~*~

This was not happening. This was not happening. Remus swallowed hard. This girl - this young, innocent, eighteen-year-old girl - couldn't be the one he'd been writing to. She just couldn't.

Except... she sounded so sure...

"What do you mean, your letters?" Erin looked at him suspiciously. "It's all very cute to pretend to be Remus - "

"Why should I want to pretend?" Remus interrupted, baffled. "It - it's probably someone else, anyway. I've just been getting some - odd - letters lately, and when you mentioned locked drawers I thought you might be the Erin who wrote them."

"Odd." Erin's voice was flat. "Odd how?"

"Oh..." Remus felt rather reluctant to tell someone he'd just met about these letters. Lianne was one thing, but this girl... no. "Nothing. Forget I mentioned it."

"Right." Erin studied him a moment longer before looking back at Lianne. "Can I use your phone?"

Lianne giggled. "Remus hasn't got one," she said, eyes dancing merrily. Remus sighed softly. Li was always delighted by the fact that wizards were hardly ever very clear on how Muggle objects worked. He didn't have the heart to tell her that, while he didn't own a telephone, he knew perfectly well what it was and how it worked. She'd be so disappointed.

Erin stared. "You're joking."

"I'm afraid not," Remus told her. A sudden frown creased his forehead as a realization hit him. This girl was a Muggle - that much was obvious. She'd have to be, if she really was Lianne's friend from America. Normally, he didn't have a problem with Muggles... but if she really was the Erin he knew, being a Muggle was just one more reason he'd better stop himself from falling in - in whatever with her.

If he could.

"All right, fine." Erin sighed. "Can you give me directions to a store or something?"

Lianne frowned. "You want to leave? You just got here."

"It was an accident," Erin said sharply.

"How can you get here by accident?" Li asked. "Either you meant to or you didn't." She tilted her head a little to the side. "Shouldn't you be in America?"

Erin went white. "Oh, stars, I forgot about that."

"Forgot about what?" Remus glanced from Erin to Lianne. "Look, if you two are going to have a long discussion, why don't you come into the kitchen? I can finish making that tea, and you can sit down."

"That works." Lianne shrugged and went on ahead into the other room.

Erin watched her go a moment before turning to Remus. "She doesn't really think she's the same Lianne I know, does she?" she asked, her voice almost pleading. "I mean, she can't be... she can't, right?"

Remus hesitated. "I... I really don't know," he said at last. "It does seem unlikely, but... well, I've seen less probable things come true. Especially concerning Lianne."

"Really?" Erin raised her eyebrows. "Such as?"

"Oh - " Remus realized that he couldn't actually explain about Lianne arriving at Hogwarts to Erin. Not just because she was a Muggle, but because the explanation rather depended on Sirius. And speaking about someone the rest of the world considered a dangerous murderer - innocent though he was - would not go over well. "That's really up to Li to explain."

"Huh." Erin glanced away. "So, what did you say your name was, again?"

"Remus Lupin."

"Blast!" Erin scowled at him.

Remus leaned back. "What? I'm sorry, it was my parents' fault, not mine!"

Erin smiled a little. "I was trying to catch you. You're very good at that."

"At what?" Remus asked blankly.

"Oh, you know." Erin shrugged. "Faking your name. Are you a professional actor, or something? You have a great straight face."

Remus blinked. "I'm not faking my name, that's really it. Remus Lupin."

Erin rolled her eyes. "Oh, yes, and I'm Legolas Greenleaf. Of course."

"I thought your name was Erin - "

"Never mind." Erin sighed. "Call yourself Remus if you like, I don't care."

"I'm glad to have your approval," Remus replied, smiling at her, though he was still confused. "Why don't we go into the kitchen now? I'm sure Lianne's wondering if space aliens came to kidnap us."

~*~

Lianne was just about to get up and see what was taking Remus and Erin so long when they came in. Remus was looking slightly bewildered - nothing particularly new there - and Erin seemed thoughtful, if a more than little resigned.

Erin. It was really Erin. She could hardly grasp it. Erin was here. And not just Erin, but eighteen-year-old Erin. The same girl she'd known twenty years ago. It didn't make sense.

Then again, her life had stopped making sense the day she read the third Harry Potter book and fell in love with Sirius Black.

"So... I'll see about that tea, then?" Remus headed towards the counter. "You do like tea?" he added, with an inquiring glance at Erin.

"Oh - yeah, I guess so." Erin sat gingerly in the chair opposite Lianne, at the table. Her eyes went briefly to a book, lying facedown on the counter beside Remus, as the picture on the front waved. Lianne shook her head at the sloppy proportioning - his arms only went to his waist, for the sake of the stars! - as Erin shook her head a little, then looked firmly at her hands. Li supposed that was rather a blessing, though. If Erin had decided to gawk at the book, she might have noticed the letters - her letters - to Remus underneath it.

"So you were going to say how you got here from America." Lianne propped her head in her hands, gazing at the younger girl attentively.

"Oh - the bus."

"The bus?" Lianne stared. "Must've been the Magic School Bus or something, cause it flew over an ocean."

To her surprise, Erin nodded. "Three times," she confirmed. "We had to cross the Pacific twice. Some surfer couldn't make up her mind whether she wanted to go to Australia or California."

Lianne blinked. "Um... unless something really weird has been going on in the Muggle world without me knowing, buses don't do that."

"The Knight Bus does," Remus offered.

"Why would the Knight Bus pick up a Muggle?" Lianne began - but she stopped at the expression on Erin's face. "You don't mean it really did?"

"Well..." Erin went back to studying her hands. "Sort of... kind of... maybe."

"Wow." Lianne laughed. "Someone screwed up at the bus company. So you came across the Knight Bus and got on it without looking back?" She grinned. "I'm proud of you, Erin. Autumn wouldn't have done it."

Erin started. "You - how do you know Autumn?"

Lianne frowned. "High school, remember? You, Autumn, Hazel, me? Does this ring a bell at all?"

"But how do you know that?" Erin demanded. "You - you can't. You shouldn't. You just - can't."

"I know because I was there," Li said impatiently. "How did you think? I can't read minds, you know."

"You weren't there," Erin insisted.

"I was." Lianne folded her arms stubbornly. "Go on - ask me something. Anything. Ask me something only I would know, and I'll prove it was me."

"Fine." Erin closed her eyes in a moment's thought. "Hazel's last name?"

"Randel." Lianne rolled her eyes. "Everyone knows that. Ask me something hard."

"I'm getting there." Erin tapped her nails on the table in nervous staccato beats. "All right - what class did we have together?"

"Art." Lianne thought for a few seconds. "It was right before lunch, so... second period?"

"Huh." Erin shook her head. "Lucky guesses, that's all." She smiled slightly. "What was happening to Autumn that was somewhat... out of the ordinary?"

"Telephone calls from Draco Malfoy," Lianne said promptly.

"From who?" Remus turned around, eyes wide. "The little blond prat who was always antagonizing Harry?"

"The same." Li shrugged. "Where he got hold of a telephone, don't ask me - no, wait." She frowned. "Didn't Autumn say something about how he was saying Muggle Studies became a required class?"

"Muggle Studies isn't required," Remus informed them. "The school governors have been arguing about it for three or four years, but they're still undecided."

"Personally, I'm just as glad." Lianne sighed. "If I'd had even one more class, I'd've seriously lost it."

"You've lost it already," Remus said with a grin.

"I'll find it and lose it again," she retorted. "Anyway, Erin - Erin?"

That was when they noticed Erin was silent, not because she had no idea what they were going on about, but because she was staring at the papers underneath Remus's book, eyes wide in shock.

~*~

My handwriting. That is my handwriting. Erin blinked a couple times, but it didn't change the fact that those papers had her handwriting on them.

"Oh, my God," she whispered, hardly aware she was speaking aloud. "Oh, my God." Her hands raised themselves to rest with their fingertips over her lips, her erratic breath warm against them.

"Erin?" A hand laid itself on her shoulder. "Are you ok?"

She didn't answer. She didn't think she could. How could she respond to this? To this - proof beyond any shadow of doubt of where she was, who she was with?

Her letters had come here. She could see that much, anyway. Her letters had crossed an ocean from within secret notebooks and locked drawers to come here - here to this country, this house, this man.

This man. Erin felt faint, her stomach churning with revulsion. Someone - no, not just someone, this man here - had read her letters. Of course, she'd known there was someone out there reading what she wrote down, but still. That didn't make her feel any better.

It was just like when she'd found that first letter from him, all over again. She felt betrayed, and hollow, as though something precious had been stolen from her. She'd thought that feeling had gone, when she'd made up her mind to "make him pay." But no. It was back again, worse than ever. Someone knew. He knew. He knew that she loved Remus - not him, no matter what he called himself, but her Remus, the real Remus - so much it hurt her to think too hard about it. He knew that she wrote empty love letters to her love, because he could never write back. He knew.

She'd always anguish far too melodramatic a word for everyday emotions - but this violation of her secret self was not ordinary, and anguish was the only word that fit. Her breath trembled against her hands, dry, voiceless sobs that matched the heavy tears that weighed unshed behind her eyes. She wanted to cry - wanted very badly to cry - but she couldn't. She couldn't. Nothing would coax those tears forward, to bring the release that weeping often gave.

A voice, almost frantic by now, made its way into her dazed, grief-fogged mind. " - hear me? Erin? Erin? God, Erin, say something! Erin!"

"Lianne?" Erin looked up at her, eyes searching for some glimpse of compassion, some reason to trust. The woman's face was taut with worry, her eyes brimming with the same anxiety her voice had held. And even if it was twenty years older, hers was the same voice she'd heard over the phone, the night she'd gotten that first letter - full of real distress for her friend, with a slight high note of panic, and a determination that nothing should keep her friend in pain, if there was anything she could possibly do about it. "Li - it really is you, isn't it?"

"Yeah." Li nodded, some of the worry fading from her eyes. "Erin, what is it?"

Erin just pointed across the table, saying nothing. Lianne nodded in understanding. "Your letters? Yes, Remus was telling me right before you got here how they were confusing him."

"It is nice to meet the la- the young lady who wrote them," the man who couldn't possibly be Remus added. "I was wondering - "

"Oh, shut up." Erin looked away from him in disgust. She didn't want to look at him - didn't even want to think about him. The worst of it was that he even looked like Remus, and spoke like Remus. It might not have been so bad if he had been red-haired, smart-alecky, and overweight... or maybe it would have. She just knew she couldn't deal with him right now.

"Say, Remus," Lianne spoke up, "weren't you just saying how you wanted to go for a walk?"

"Was I?" He sounded puzzled.

"Yes," Li told him firmly. "A nice walk, for - oh - thirty, forty-five minutes. The fresh air will do you good."

"Aren't you the one who says fresh air is - "

"Remus. Walk."

With a sigh, the man shrugged in defeat and went to the door, muttering about being thrown out of his own home. "I'll be back soon," he said, before leaving.

"Thanks," Erin said, when the door was shut behind him. Everything seemed a lot easier to take, somehow, now that he wasn't there, looking so distressingly like Remus.

"That's what friends are for." Lianne looked around. "Do you want tea? There's a whole pot of it. It's really soothing."

"I dunno. I guess." Erin watched Lianne pour two cups of tea and bring them to the table, along with milk and sugar. "I don't need that other stuff."

"That's ok, I do." Li handed her the first cup, which was full, then filled the second, half-full cup with milk. Erin studied the tea dubiously, then took a cautious sip. Li was right, it was soothing. She put her hands around the mug and soaked up the heat.

"Lianne?" Erin looked up at the woman - the older woman. "Can I ask you something?"

"Sure, go ahead." She cocked her head attentively to one side.

"Well... how come you're older than me, all of a sudden?" Erin asked. "I mean, really, you've only been gone a few days - "

"I've been gone twenty years," Li interrupted. "At least, from where I'm standing it was twenty. Maybe it was a lot less for you. Somehow." A light dawned on her face. "Oh - that's why you never came to see me in the hospital! You didn't know I was there, did you?"

"You were in the hospital?" Erin blinked. This was news to her.

"Yeah." A shadow passed behind Lianne's eyes. "After the car crash - which I still don't really remember, but I've been told by competent psychiatrists that I've blocked it out and it's perfectly normal - after the car crash, they kept me there, rather than send me back to an empty house. I don't think I'd have wanted to go back there, even if I'd had the choice. Not with Josh and Mom gone."

"Gone?" Erin frowned. "Gone where?"

Lianne came back from whatever distant past she'd been visiting. "The great beyond. You know - they died."

"But they were fine a few days ago!" Erin objected. "I went to see them, the day you disappeared - they were alive then."

Lianne's face went white. She shook her head. "No - no, you must be confused, or something. It's a mistake. They're dead. Nothing would've happened, if they weren't dead. It must have been after you saw them."

"Um..." Erin decided it would be somewhat tactless to mention the fact that Ms. Treyvan hadn't even been aware she had a daughter. "Yeah." She traced the rim of her cup with one finger. "I'm sorry, Li."

She shrugged. "I'm fine. It was a long time ago." She sighed, then looked back up at Erin. "So why weren't you happier to see Remus?"

Erin's expression went stony. "Li, that is not Remus."

"Sure it is." Lianne tried her tea - her tea-flavored milk, by now - and winced. "Ow, hot. Anyway, of course it's Remus. Who else would it be?"

"An impersonator? Someone who wants to make me look stupid?" Erin suggested.

"Oh, Remus wouldn't do that," Lianne said positively. "I've known him for years. He's a nice guy."

"Lianne." Erin stared at her. "Remus Lupin is a character in a story. He is not real. You do know that, right?"

"No, I don't." Lianne paused for a moment, organizing her thoughts. "Look, Erin, don't believe those books are just stories. They aren't. They are real." She cut off Erin's scoffing retort. "No, they are! I've been to Hogwarts, I've met Dumbledore, I've seen magic - I've worked magic!"

"You're joking." It was the sort of joke Lianne would try, too. Erin held back a sigh of regret. She'd really love for this one to be true, but Lianne had always insisted the world of Hogwarts and so on was real.

But... there was that Knight Bus...

"I swear I'm telling the truth." And Lianne did look as serious as she ever did. "I'll prove it to you, if you like. I'm technically not supposed to, since I suppose you are a Muggle, but if you keep your mouth shut, no one will ever know. If you want to see?"

"Pick a card, any card?" Erin raised an ironic eyebrow.

"No, I can't do sleight of hand." Lianne pulled a stick from a pocket in her grey-green robes. No - not a stick. It had to be a wand. "I was thinking more along the lines of levitation. That's simple enough, and it shouldn't destroy any of Remus's house, either. In case I get it wrong."

"What about that Diana Wynne Jones book?" Erin asked, grinning a little. "Where the kid was just trying to levitate the mirror - "

"Don't distract me." Lianne looked around. "Um... something that won't break... there. The potholder will do." Erin twisted around in her chair to watch both Lianne and the object she'd named.

Lianne pointed her wand at the potholder, a look of intense concentration creasing her forehead and narrowing her eyes. She took a deep breath, and, with a strange swishing motion of her wand - "Wingardium leviosa!" - the potholder caught fire.

"Drat it!" Lianne jumped up and grabbed a non-burning end to fling it in the sink. "I was sure I could manage that." She sighed, running water on it. "I hate charms. I really, really hate charms."

Erin, meanwhile, was staring in shock. "You set fire to it!"

"Yeah." Li shook her head. "Fire is one thing I can always conjure." She glared into the sink. "Maybe Remus did something to it..."

"But - you set fire to it. You did magic." Erin blinked, rubbing her temples gently. "Li - what's going on?"

"It's a long story." Lianne sat back down beside Erin. "But basically, it started the day I landed in the hospital..."

~*~

"... and then I came to tell Remus about some stuff for Dumbledore and found you," Lianne concluded.

Erin was still stuck further back in the fifteen minutes' worth of explanation. "You got married?"

Lianne grinned. "Yep." She held up a hand to show off her engagement and wedding rings. "See, I even have shiny jewelry to prove it."

"You married Sirius?" Erin shook her head slowly. "My God, Li... you are either the luckiest girl on the planet, or the craziest."

"Lucky?" Lianne sighed. "I don't know if that's what I'd call it."

"You got to marry your dream guy," Erin pointed out. "How many girls get that?"

"Not too many." Lianne grinned. "You will, though."

"What, me - oh." Erin traced a pattern on the side of her near-empty mug. "You mean Remus."

"Sure. He likes you, I know he does." Lianne bounced up and down in her seat, just like a five-year-old child. "You're going to get together with him, right?"

Erin had to laugh. "I don't know. I mean, really, Li, I have to get back to America eventually. And long distance relationships are notorious for failure."

"It could still work," Lianne said optimistically. "It's worked so far, hasn't it? And there's nothing as long distance as the world within a book."

"Lianne... I don't know." Erin propped her head on one hand, looking at the residue in her teacup. She began to grin suddenly. "Say, Li?"

"Mm-hmm?"

"I don't suppose you can read tea leaves?"

Lianne started, then laughed. "Divination? Not really. I mean, I could try, but it would be pretty much just for your amusement. Nothing to base your life on or anything."

"All right." Erin pushed the cup at Lianne.

"Oh, no, you haven't done it properly. I do know this much. Lily - " Lianne glanced down a moment before continuing, " - she read all our fortunes through tea leaves once a day for the week before her N.E.W.T.s." She fetched a plate. "Here. Turn your cup around three times, then dump what's inside on this."

Erin complied, grimacing as she removed the mug. "This means something?"

"I don't know." Lianne grinned. "Let's see..." She squinted at it. "Well... there's a balloon? And a rainbow - no, that's a mountain. No, a rainbow. And that blob there is probably a donkey."

"You're making that up, aren't you?" Erin said, shaking her head.

"Making what up?"

Erin caught her breath as Remus reentered. Now that she knew it really was Remus, her heart decided it was free to flip-flop at the sight of him as it saw fit. He was very good-looking. His light brown hair was going grey already, yes, but she'd known it would be. And it did flop endearingly across his forehead...

She shook herself out of her daze. This was not sensible. She was going back to America soon anyway, and like as not she'd never see him again. There were plenty of handsome men back home.

Of course, none of them were Remus.

Ok, now I'm just being silly, Erin scolded herself. He isn't my Remus, and he's twenty years older than me, and he lives here in England, and he's certainly not going to be interested in a boring American high schooler like me. He had to be a wizard, of course. No telephone, and with moving illustrations on his books - definitely a wizard. He probably already had a witch girlfriend. A pretty witch. His own age. Here in England.

Before she could fall into a deep, completely unreasonable depression, Erin forced herself to listen to what Lianne was saying.

"Erin asked me to read her tea leaves, just as a joke." Lianne pushed the cup at him. "Here, you do it. Everyone said you should've taken Divination."

Remus smiled wryly. "I don't think I'd've liked some of the things the crystal ball would've shown for me," he said evasively. He peered at the plate. "Let's see. A noose? Is that a noose? Yes, it must be."

"It's a branch," Li objected, coming behind him to look over his shoulder.

Remus gave her an odd look. "It isn't. It looks nothing like a branch. I thought it might be a snake, but it's definitely not a branch." He passed the cup back to Erin with a laugh. "Don't believe what Li says, I was never much good at this. If you believe what I was seeing, you're about to take a dangerous journey of intrigue and treachery. Sibyl must have rubbed off on me."

"Who?" Erin looked at him in confusion. Did he mean Sibyl Trelawney?

"Oh - someone I used to work with, that's all." Remus shrugged. "I hope you two had a nice chat?"

"Yes, quite." Lianne smiled innocently. "Was your walk fun?"

Remus mock-glared at her. "Ingrate."

"Who, me?"

"Excuse me," Erin interrupted, "but I probably ought to find somewhere I can call my mother from. I'm going to need a way home eventually."

"Oh, that's no trouble," Remus assured her. "Actually, it would probably be easiest if you just used Floo Powder to get back to somewhere in America that you recognize."

"Yeah, they have somewhere in every state," Lianne agreed. "For lost Apparaters, mostly, but they won't care if you use it. I'll take you, if you like. You probably don't want to have to explain to them why you're there, since you are a Muggle and all."

"Um." Erin looked from one to the other. She didn't actually want to leave right then, she'd just thought she should mention it. But really... she didn't belong here. She belonged back in America. Maybe Lianne had been adopted into this world, but Erin herself was an outsider. At least now she knew where Li had been - and that her dreams really had come true. That was enough, wasn't it?

It would have to be. "Sure. I'm ready."

~*~

Remus propped his head in his hands, staring at the empty room. Lianne had gone to take Erin back to America, leaving him here. Alone with his thoughts.

I suppose I should have realized, he thought morosely. Her first letter was typical teenage unrequited love. I should have known she was too young.

It wasn't even that he hadn't wanted to know. It just had never occurred to him. He'd told himself a lot of things - she was engaged, she didn't know who he was, she probably lived thousands of miles away - but that she would be eighteen? No, he'd never even considered it.

Well, it's over and done. Remus sighed. She was back in America by now, back where she belonged. She could meet a nice American eighteen-year-old boy, and they could have a sweet little romance, and she could live happily ever after without ever thinking about him again. And he would get on with his life, helping Dumbledore and the Aurors, fighting Voldemort until he was caught and killed.

Isn't this a pleasant train of thought? Remus picked up a book and idly flipped through the pages. He ought to do something to distract himself, but he hadn't the faintest idea what. Cleaning up the teacups, he'd broken one and cut his palm. Wandering aimlessly around the house, he'd tripped over things he knew perfectly well were there, such as walls. Trying to read, the words blurred into a neat, somewhat angular cursive, and he realized he'd memorized the letters she'd sent him. That was just sad.

What was I expecting, anyway? he wondered. That I'd meet her, and she'd be swept off her feet with love, and she'd be kind, and sweet, and all-around perfect, and wouldn't even care when I told her I'm a werewolf? Or no - if we're going to dream, maybe I'd never have to tell her. She just never questions the fact that, once a month, I disappear. Why not? It's about as realistic as anything coming of this. Even if she were my age, it never would have worked.

He was so engrossed in his thoughts he didn't even realize Li had returned until she spoke.

"Hey."

"Oh, you're back... already..." Remus's voice trailed off as he looked from Lianne, twining a lock of her hair around her wand in a bad habit that only resurfaced when she was nervous, to Erin, staring forward with wide eyes unseeing in her pale face. "What happened?"

"We couldn't find her parents," Lianne said, not even noticing as a shower of indignant sparks from her outraged wand tinted her skin and hair green. "Or her house. Or anything. I'm amazed we found the town."

"What do you mean?" Remus asked, puzzled. "You got lost?" But it hadn't sounded like she meant they were lost...

"No, we did not get lost!" Lianne glared at him. "It's the same thing that happened to me, that time I went looking for Erin and everyone. I couldn't find where they lived, or their phone numbers, or anything. It was as if they'd vanished. Just - vanished, right off the planet."

"Stop it, Li." Erin's voice was, to her credit, only slightly shaky. "Just stop. I don't need you to help me think of horrible scenarios."

"Erin - I'm sorry!" Lianne hugged her fiercely. The younger girl stiffened, but Li didn't let go for a few more seconds.

"How can people disappear?" Remus said. "I mean - they don't, do they? Not anymore..." The words died in his throat, and he met Lianne's eyes in growing horror. "No. He wouldn't. Not just some random Muggles, not over in America. He wouldn't, would he? I mean - there's no reason!"

"Who? What?" Erin stared at him, swallowing hard. "What are you talking about?"

"No - there's no reason," Lianne agreed, ignoring Erin. "It - it would be too much of a coincidence, wouldn't it? That of all the people in America - in the world - he'd pick Erin and her family?"

"Who?" Erin demanded. "Stop acting like I'm not here!"

"Erin - there is a very evil man - " Remus began.

"Voldemort," Lianne interrupted, an odd, intense look in her eyes.

To Remus's surprise, the name actually seemed to register with Erin. She shivered violently. "Why the hell not?" She covered her face with one hand. "Why shouldn't the villains be real, too? And now you're going to tell me that I'm really the chosen heir of Godric Gryffindor or the great-granddaughter of Merlin or the goddamn Miko of Suzaku, aren't you?"

Lianne didn't say anything, just touched Erin's shoulder sympathetically. When Erin finally looked up, Li said, "We don't know it was - Voldemort - you know. That was just the first thing that came to mind. It's pretty clearly magic, though."

"You're sure?" Remus asked.

"It's like everything we knew was totally erased." Lianne nodded grimly. "It had to be magic. I'm sure."

"Should the Aurors be told?" Remus wasn't convinced Li hadn't just gotten lost, but he thought the idea ought to be brought up. "Just in case?"

"Um." Lianne looked at Erin. "What do you think?"

Erin shrugged. "I really don't know. Just - whatever. Do whatever you think."

Lianne looked rather indecisive, so Remus nodded firmly. "The Aurors. I can't see how erasing something's existence could be anything but Dark magic, and that is their area of expertise. And anyway, neither of us is exactly in the Ministry's good graces at the moment. Going to them would probably just result in more trouble."

"You're in trouble with the government?" Erin looked mildly horrified, but not particularly surprised.

"Long story." Lianne sighed. "So. Guess you're staying on with me till Wednesday, Erin."

"Here?" Erin asked.

"Oh, no, we couldn't possibly impose on poor Remus," Lianne said angelically, as Remus made a face and mumbled about how that had never stopped her. "I've got a hotel room nearby."

"You have?"

"Yes, I wanted to be around when your company arrives," Li told him.

"I'm having company?" This was news to Remus.

"Yeah, Sirius is going to stay here. He didn't let you know?" Lianne rolled her eyes. "Figures."

"Well - I don't have room for all three of you, so you'd kind of need to stay somewhere else." Remus breathed a soft sigh of relief. He really, really did not want Erin at his house overnight.

"So." Lianne turned to Erin. "I don't suppose you happened to have been carrying around several changes of clothing?"

"Nope." Erin had to smile.

"Well..." Lianne squinted at her. "You might fit into some of mine, if we alter them a little."

"You're going to do clothing magic?" Remus asked, alarmed. That was mostly charms, which had not been Lianne's strong point at school.

"Yes, I am," Lianne said defensively. "I think I can manage Stretching Spells and Mending Magery."

"Huh." Remus shook his head. "If you say so." He shrugged. "See you on Wednesday?"

"Probably before that." Lianne grinned at Remus's wary expression. "Well, Sirius is going to be here, isn't he?"

"Um." Remus glanced somewhat awkwardly at Erin. Should they be talking about Sirius in front of her? He couldn't see it going over too well, that her friend had married a known murderer, especially after the shocks she'd already had today.

But she surprised him by, once again, knowing exactly what she couldn't possibly have an inkling of. "Won't this be the first place government people look for him? If I were on the run, I'd go see my old friends."

"They did," Lianne said calmly. "About a year ago, after Remus left Hogwarts. Sirius was with me by then, so they were disappointed. And they decided Remus was clean. Relatively."

"Ah." Erin nodded. She smiled a little. "He's as wonderful as you thought he'd be?"

"More than." Lianne grinned. "Does Remus here measure up to your expectations?"

"Lianne!" Erin didn't turn red, but the expression of horror on her face could put a Petrified person to shame.

Remus blushed enough for the both of them. "This is really not the time, Li," he managed. "Weren't you saying you'd better be going?"

"Oh, yes." Lianne's grin widened. She is doing her bloody best to cause trouble, isn't she? Remus thought darkly. Really, Lianne ought to have more sense than to try to play matchmaker with him - a thirty-five-year-old werewolf - and a sweet eighteen-year-old girl fresh out of Muggle America. She could at least pretend to be a responsible adult! "See you soon, Remus!"

"Yeah." Remus sighed as Li and Erin walked out the front door. "See you."