L Y C O P H O B I A

1. Life Goes On

A/N: (519 words); I do not own the art nor the characters. All rights to their respective owners. This goes for the entire fanfiction.
This story deals with self harming and suicide, read at your own risk.
Enjoy and be safe! 💜

Behind the amber colored eyes that sparkled softly with joy, and light brown hair that already had some grey specks in it, lied a whole other person. A person who wasn't as happy as he faked, a person who had entirely given up on life.

Professor Remus John Lupin wasn't as happy as he seemed. Sure, he was smiling during feasts and meals, and he had fun in the classroom, teaching his students new things in a creative way, but behind those smiles hide a thousand lies.

He may look calm and reserved, in his mind he's one step away from losing his temper, and lashing out at people.

He may act as if the Slytherins comments on his tattered robes didn't hurt, but they sure did. It brought him back to his years at Hogwarts. Even as a kid he always had robes and books that were second hand, and again the Slytherins bullied him for it.

He may act as if he's content with life, but.. He sure is not.
Before Dumbledore offered him this job, he was living in poverty. Hardly ever getting something to eat, he was - and still is - Remus doesn't gain weight that easily - as thin as a stick, and always looked pale and sick.
He couldn't find a job with his condition, people didn't want to hire a werewolf.
He went to abandoned houses for his monthly transformation, and locked himself up there while he was a monster. Otherwise he lived in an old cottage, that was even closer to falling apart than Remus himself.

When the headmaster offered him the place as a D.A.D.A. teacher, he didn't want to accept at first. He didn't want to endanger kids and other teachers. He didn't want to bother Dumbledore and Madam Pomfrey again. And he sure as hell didn't want to encounter Snape.
But Dumbledore offered him a limitless supply of the new Wolfsbane potion, a potion that made him keep him human mind during full moons.
It took Dumbledore many minutes to convince him, but at the end he took the job. And now he's glad he did. He hasn't attacked anyone in his wolf form (yet?), and the students seem to love him, that is, except for the Slytherins.

But Remus knew better than anyone what would happen if the school found at that he's.. This beast.

He'd be forced to resign, before the angry parents would send howlers and letters to the school for letting a dangerous werewolf near their kids.
Snape would laugh at him, right in his face. That after all these years of being below the Marauders, now he'd be above them.
And Remus would end up as a starving, filthy, pathetic person.
When he can't take small jobs anymore, and can't find a normal job as well, he'd be unable to pay rent and buy food. He'll end up on the streets and starve to death, if not freeze to death. Even though, he believes, that's what he deserves.

And so life goes on, Professor Lupin trying to hide his secret, to save his own life.