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- Chapter Sixty-Six -
"Hungry?"

"So how did you get here?"

Remus had calmed down now, his face was still slightly red but with a cup of water brought to the door by Dobby and the covers of Elladora's bed, it had calmed down and Remus could speak clearly without hiccupping. When the house elf had brought the water, he hadn't seen Remus as Elladora met him at the door and shut it quickly. She felt bad about it but she didn't want to risk him freaking out whilst Remus was still upset.

The two of them were both sat in her bedroom, Elladora sitting cross-legged on her duvet which was covering Remus' legs as he sat up against the headboard with the now empty glass of water next to him on the bedside table. His hair was slightly messy from when Elladora had ran her brush through it, picking out little sticks or leaves that she hadn't had time to get out when she found him the previous evening.

He didn't even want to brush his hair, but Elladora wasn't having him keep his dirty hair when he was awake and well enough to clean it so she didn't hear his objections and practically had to wrestle him down so the brush could get through his hair without him wriggling around. She was sure there was even a few bits of white blossom in his hair too. Apart from the conversation before, they hadn't spoke much and now Elladora was the first to make conversation, her hands fiddling together in her lap.

The news of Hope's death had hit her a bit harder than it probably should have but she kept as strong as she could for Remus.

"It was a full moon last night and I changed in the woods like I normally do when I'm at home and it's a full moon." Remus shrugged and looked out of the bay window, the curtains of the bed had been pulled back so he could see the dark room in full. "I always knew there was a house on the other side of the woods but I didn't know who it belonged to."

"Me." She smiled at him and he managed to quirk one back at the sight of it. "Well, my parents own it but...anyway, I had no idea there were houses around here for miles. I've only been up to the Cherry Blossom tree, never past there."

"That's only about halfway." Remus tilted his head at her and she shrugged, she and Sebastian were planning to explore more but he died before they could. "I don't normally go past the large oak because I don't want to trespass somewhere near here but I guess Moony wanted to explore a little more last night."

"The large oak is my favourite." Elladora smiled, remembering the times that Squirrels had scrambled up and down it whilst she and her brother had their lunch there sometimes. "Lots of memories."

"Happy memories?"

"Depends on how you look at it, for you it could be seen as happy but not for me." She sighed and he fell silent for a second, feeling like he had said something wrong so Elladora changed the subject for his sake. "Why didn't you ask the boys to help you through it if you knew it was a full moon?"

"Nah, I didn't wanna bother them." Remus waved it off with a small laugh and a shrug. "Sirius has got his own flat now, James' mum and dad are always happy to have them round and I doubt Peter could handle me on my own." He said and Elladora stared at him with a smile at the verbal mentions of her other friends.

She missed them all so much. At least she had Remus.

"Don't be daft." She scoffed at him, slapping his shoulder slightly and he grinned down at his lap. "Peter could definitely handle you, his animagus may be small but the smaller you are, the less you're seen and the more places you can get."

"Speak from experience?" Remus asked teasingly, pushing her shoulder slightly as he already began to cheer up.

"You're so rude." She laughed and shoved his shoulder back, though not as hard because she had to be careful of his injuries. "But, no, actually it's just common knowledge. Peter could do a fine job on his own."

"You have a lot of faith in him."

"Of course I do." She furrowed her eyebrows at the boy in front of her who was staring at her interestedly, as though this was their first conversation. Maybe she hit him across the head too hard. "Why do you not?"

"No, I do." Remus argued almost immediately, he had hesitated slightly and Elladora pursed her lips disappointedly at his pause. Peter was just as capable of the rest of them, sure maybe he wasn't that academically gifted like them but he was their friend too.

"It's just..." He continued, sighing and avoiding eye contact. "Normally, the marauders are the only ones that have faith in Pete."

"Well, I am a marauder, aren't I?" She looked down at her lap and glanced nervously back up at him, did she have yet to do an odd initiation?

"Course you are." Remus smiled but Elladora brought the conversation back around to Peter, she was worried for the boy. He hadn't been looking as cheerful before the holidays and although he had tried to make up for it with his grins and his jokes, but every time the conversation started up again after his last one-liner, the light in his eyes would go dark again.

"Plus," She started. "I've noticed that Peter's been a bit down lately, I mean before Easter. He's just zoning out and...fidgeting...I used to fidget and Sebastian said I had to stop so I guess it's a bad thing?"

Remus took a small breath in, deciding not to dwell on the mention of her brother which she seemed so off on talking about earlier. "The thing about Peter is...he has his insecurities, and sometimes they get the best of him."

"What is that?"

"Insecurities?" Remus raised an eyebrow at her and she nodded, her face turned serious rather than a confused expression or a small smile. It scarily reminded him of before she had ever smiled and he dreaded to think about that blank expression coming back into her everyday life. "Insecurities are things about yourself that you aren't confident about, something that makes you a bit shy and sometimes a bit sad, like me with my scars, I don't like them and sometimes they make me sad."

"Well, what does Peter have to get sad about?" Elladora asked, she wasn't trying to say that Remus should be insecure of his scars but she saw how one could be insecure of them. For Peter, she wasn't sure. He was the smallest of the boys but still quite as good-looking as the rest of them, he had lots of the same humour. They boys were practically quadruplets at times.

"...I don't know." Remus shrugged after a moments hesitation. "He has self-doubt I guess, little patches where he feels vulnerable. I don't know what causes them though."

"He hasn't told you? I thought you guys told each other everything." She said, confused.

"We tell each other everything that's worth talking about." Remus corrected with a small smile but it soon fell as he continued. "And sometimes when someone has insecurities, it doesn't feel worth getting upset over."

"Maybe he's insecure about his insecurities." Elladora suggested and he looked over at her with furrowed eyebrows. "Maybe he doesn't want to talk to you about it because it makes him feel vulnerable, no one can ever truly know. Peter might not know himself and it makes me sad to know that he feels that way. And you-"

Remus widened his eyes at the accusatory finger she had just pointed at him and he glanced between it and her face which was sterner than she had been ever since he woke up in her bed just about an hour prior to this conversation.

"What about me?" He asked, laughing slightly.

"What is all that nonsense about your scars for?" She asked and pushed his shoulder again as he scoffed and shook his head, looking down at his lap for a moment where his hands rested.

"They..." He trailed off, puffing some air in his cheeks before sighing it out and not daring to look up at her. "They make me look like a freak."

The next thing he knew, he was hit in the face with a pillow, his features scrunching up in surprise of the attack. He opened his eyes after another blow didn't come to see Elladora knelt dangerously in front of him with the pillow clutched in her hands, eyes narrowed to slits as she stared at him. Beginning to feel like a reprimanded child, he decided it best not to speak and only stared.

"You listen to me right now and you listen good." She started and he nodded his head, she was scary when she acted like this. "You are not a freak, you're not and you never will be. Each scar, each skin cell, each bit of healed wound, is beautiful. I know first hand how insecure they can make you feel but then...I realised that each one tells a story and makes us who we are. You wouldn't be the Remus Lupin I know without that."

Her fingers went up to his chin and pushed it to the side slightly, revealing the first scar she had ever noticed on him and traced a finger down it carefully, like he was some sort of delicate vase.

"You did that when I-"

"-saved me from jumping off of the Astronomy Tower?" She cut him off, slowly taking her hand away as Remus turned his head back to her, his eyes slightly glassy. "Yeah, I did do that because even back then I didn't see you as a freak. At all. I saw it and thought that it was pretty, no harder touch because I didn't want to get my awkward, weird, fingerprints over it. It's horrible what happened to you and every time my parents even mention Greyback, I want to get out of my seat and make him pay for everything he's done to you, but the horrible things that have happened to you, do not make you who you are. No one deserves to think like that, especially not you."

He was crying again, his brown eyes staring into hers as she gave him that one smile that meant more to him then anything else in the world. Slow tears tracked down his cheeks as he tried not to hiccup and cry at her words but he couldn't help it and there was only one thing that he could think of to say.

"Can I have a hug?" He sniffled, almost laughing at the bad timing of using his mother's last words to him but Elladora didn't mention it, just leant into him slowly and let her arms find the most comfortable position around him as his did the same.

The two fit together like two pieces of a puzzle, it felt like a natural position to be in as Remus cried silently into her shoulder again. This is what he needed, to just get it all out and if it had to take all day plus small intervals of crying. Elladora smiled softly into the embrace, glancing to her left arm that was around Remus' neck as they hugged.

She was snapped out of it by a small rumble and she slowly pulled back to Remus closing his eyes and smiling awkwardly.

"Hungry?" She joked, raising her eyebrows and he laughed awkwardly, covering his red face with his hands and flopping back so he was lying down in the bed whilst she knelt beside him.

"I've not had breakfast yet." He pouted, jutting his bottom lip out and she shuffled off of the bed, chuckling slightly.

"You need to have a bath first, your hair still has a little bit of mud in it." She scrunched her nose up at him, walking over to her bathroom and opening the door wide. "All for you, no ones in the house so come downstairs whenever. Just out of the room, to your right and then the kitchen is through the large doors in the entrance hall and through the door at the back of that room."

"Sounds big." He sat up, tilting his head to stare over at the door out to the hallway. He had to admit, he was quite anxious to see the rest of her house. From what he had heard from her mother when he was hiding in the wardrobe, she seemed scary and he didn't want to get caught. She had said they were out at least.

"Too big." She snorted and walked out of the bedroom.

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A/N: Some Peter insight :) there'll be a little bit more later on so we can understand what went on in that rats head 😃 young Peter is still baby though

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