Growing Up

Part 64.

Harry awoke to the sound of muffled yelling and the feeling of a damp bed underneath him. Disgusted, he looked down and realized he was drenched in sweat but still shivering cold. He ran his fingers through his hair and nearly gagged at the layer of sweat coating his hand. He sighed, getting up and changing his clothes. The yelling persisted, but Harry was unaware of the topic. Something had made a loud noise, perhaps a drawer slamming, that spooked him to the point of his quill ink falling off of his desk, bouncing and rolling to the other side of his room. The aforementioned bickering only got louder. For a moment, he thought he was still in a dream. Harry opened his door, his head pounding.

"Kreacher," Harry whispered, his eyes darting from the door across the room and back to him. Kreacher lifted his wrinkled head and shrugged.

"I had a feeling you might wake from them. They're not as quiet as they said they'd be."

"What are they fighting about?" Harry asked, growing increasingly more anxious as the muffled voices went back and forth.

"No reason to worry, Harry. Grown up stuff."

***

"We're not going. That's final."

Sirius frowned at Remus in anger and looked away, shaking his head in disbelief. They had been arguing for days and pushing off the topic when it became a screaming match. They didn't have the time to continue as such, they would decide today.

"She's my cousin! She's one of my only living relatives! We will go."

Remus tried to think of his living relatives that were left. He thought back to his father, Lyall Lupin. Lyall had a sister, he could recall. Focusing on her, he remembered that his aunt had contracted dragonpox many years ago and had died from it. Family wasn't his thing, but this one was. How could he allow Sirius to so selfishly put them in the direct line of fire when they tried relentlessly for years to stay out of it? It was a direct contradiction to everything they had ever preached.

"You know where you come from, and you know who will be there. How am I supposed to ignore that?"

Bella was at the top of the Deatheaters, if not one of the highest reigns there was. She knew everything and she saw all. All Black and Malfoy family members were genetically predisposed to join the decrepit little hateclub, so Bella would've exceeded many in that hierarchy. She was manic and unpredictable. A day centred around her would only elevate this impending issue.

"They know very well what I would do if something were to go sideways. Have you forgotten my near imprisonment half a decade ago?"

Remus thought back to 1981, seeing Sirius' porcelain face in the cloudy moonlight, his hands digging into the dirty ground by his knees as he wept. it was a treacherous memory that he did his best to shield himself from.

Sirius' angry glance faded as the door opened, a pair of bright green eyes peering through the illuminated crack in the door.

"Moony? Padfoot?"

Their previous conversation and any tension left from it faded completely when Harry walked into the room. He was the first priority, he always would be.

"I don't feel well," Harry rasped quietly, wiping his nose with his wrinkled shirtsleeve. His voice sounded like sandpaper on rocks when he spoke, bringing his hand up to the base of his neck in confusion.

"Awh, Bambi," Sirius empathized with the sickly boy, his smile warm as it gazed upon him.

"You look like death warmed over. Lets fix that." He glared at Remus with a blank but heavy expression and walked out.