BEFORE BEING BITTEN, REMUS LUPIN LOVED TO WATCH THE MOON. He was a very small boy, and he used to sneak out the house and climb it to reach the roof undetected, or so he thought. Being only four, his parents tried everything to keep him away from this hobby, but since the day he learned how to walk and jump, they couldn't do anything to keep him still. He soon discovered he was a very good climber, and some scratches here and there could have never stop him.

He adored being out during the coldest nights, sitting on the chilly tiles of his childhood home while wearing an inhuman amount of wool jumpers to keep his body warm. Nothing ever made him feel at peace as well as the moonlight bathing his skin, or the soft strokes of the wind through his hair. He cherished the silence, as the silvery blanket kept him company, imagining what kind of magic would hide in the shadows, or into the vibrations that would ripple through the air.

Into the rich tapestry of blue, the gentle Moon took all of his attention. After the first time he gazed at her, he couldn't stop himself from trying to get another look. He always felt a magical kind of pull towards her, a strange sensation of floating a millimetre above the ground.

And so, he found himself out on the roof each night, hugging his knees tightly close to the chest, and as small as an ant, he stared at the great mass in the sky. Remus, ever the inquisitive child, memorized every dip and curve on her surface, and he couldn't deny the Moon was marvellously infinite.

She became his silent companion, and often called to him, easing him into an embrace of blackness and starlight. When Remus was a kid, he made himself her knight, unaware that she wasn't going to honour their friendship, leaving his heart beaten and blue.

When he was bitten, the Moon became an hostile destroyer of his humanity. A betrayal he promised could never forgive.

She decided to take everything from him, the gentleness forgotten. For the new turned werewolf, it was too painful to know that a once dear friend, still intact in majesty and beauty, now made him a monster. That those brilliant specks of stars, now were reflecting the horrors of his transformations, and the pain, and his fears.

After all, Remus Lupin had always been an unlucky wizard; he believed this misfortune planted its origin when he was seven, when Greyback trashed his childhood home and cursed his blood, and the Moon became an eternal enemy. He grasped it when he survived that first night, instead of rotting on his mother's shaking arms.

He knew that when he couldn't bring himself to look at his father's eyes anymore. Lyall Lupin, despite being a lovely husband and father, was disgusted of having a werewolf as a son. Not that he ever said it right in his face, but Remus had always been terrified by that knowledge. He grew up hearing from Lyall's mouth that werewolves were evil, worthless, dangerous beasts; they simply didn't deserve to live among a proper society.

A vision shared by most part of the wizarding world, apparently.

He knew he was unlucky when he thought he couldn't bear the pain during those nights, and yet his body never shut down completely, as if to mock a child of his disgraces. Or, when after his first transformation, he fortuitously cut himself across the face; the day after, a neighbour saw it, and was so disgusted by its vision that they let out a shrill so loud Remus could still hear bounce in his nightmares often times.

After that, he couldn't bear watching his own reflection anymore, no matter how many times his parents told him he was still beautiful, that he was still him, despite the scars and the bloodied eyes, and the fear and violence on his hands.

Then it happened again,

and again,

and again,

until Dumbledore took such pity on him and admitted the young werewolf inside his school. For the first time, he thought he could change his destiny when he got his first real friends, when they made the unattainable possible by loving him even during his monthly bestialization. That's until the war, when the hurt and mistrust prevailed; when they all died, physically or allegorically.

Heavy from the ache inside his veins, Remus surrendered to a lonely and miserable life. Certainly, he couldn't expect that his story was going to take a full turn when Dumbledore had escorted him to the person that would soon become one of his most loved and trusted.

In the early hours of November 2nd 1981, the old Headmaster silently conducted him through the Mould, where houses of black, brown, red bricks were sleeping flouting the fear that came with the terrors of the world. They didn't stop walking until the outskirts of the village, on the far opposite end of that Turner's tavern Remus had visited that night.

Just a little way from a decaying building, was a little cottage hidden by high overgrew vines that had made a sort of nest around it. A bike the colour of strawberry was resting against them, and the clouds above it opened up as the two men neared the entrance, welcoming their magic inside.

Engulfed by the whispers of the adjacent river and the glow of little fireflies, stood Damocles Belby's home.

Those were the images Remus protected with his mind like a little fortress, recalling them in his dreams as a sketch of the past year carved out of shifting memories; they were the favourite places he would look for whenever he needed to feel at peace.