Carve Me Open / r.l. + s.b. /

FUBAR

If you've still got some light in you then go before it's gone
Burn your fire for no witness, it's the only way it's done
-via Angel Olsen, White Fire

A/N: I'm sorry but this had to be done. It pains me, but... Think of it as ripping off a band-aid. *frown* sorryyyy. To make up for it, I'll make it an extra-long chapter or do like a double update.

▬▬ι══════════════ι▬▬

Lupin Cottage, December 1973

Remus woke with a jolt, hyper-aware of the world around him all too soon. There was a dryness in his throat that, no matter how hard he swallowed, decided it wanted to stay. His now shoulder-length hair was knotted from twisting a turning, in dire need of a good washing. The sheets around him were tangled between his long legs, fisted in his clammy hands. There was another bad dream. He felt the ache in his bones; the Full Moon was tonight -- Christmas Eve. How lovely.

As he adjusted, he could hear the rumble of a row just below him in the kitchen. Hope and Lyall always had their arguments in the kitchen. It was a seemingly sacred place where their harsh words were unleashed and encouraged. Every argument Remus could remember was in the mornings in the kitchen, and they always stopped as soon as they heard Remus's feet hit the floor. It meant he had woken up and, therefore, would be able to hear them.

This morning, however, he decided he would not slide out of bed so soon. The topic at hand seemed rather interesting. Painful, yet interesting.

"This has been the fifth Christmas, Lyall," Hope shouted angrily. Remus had never heard her so upset. Sure, she and his father had their moments, but it had never gotten as bad as this. He'd only heard a snippet to understand that Lyall had done something terribly wrong to get this sort of rising out of his wife. "Your son needs you."

"He's a man. He doesn't need me," his father fired back, attempting to sound as nonchalant as possible. 

Remus was not fooled, and he doubted his mother was either. In any other circumstance, Remus might have felt a bit of pride blossoming in his chest. The man who hardly regarded him anymore looking at him as an equal instead of an inferior – how Remus lived for the day. Yet, in this context, it made him want to wither.

"He isn't even fourteen yet," Hope screamed. She had a valid point. "You can't keep ignoring it, Lyall. It's who he is, who he's always been."

"My son was not born a monster," he growled. 

Remus heard the echo of heels pacing the linoleum floors anxiously. His mother always had a nasty habit of chewing her nails while walking to and fro nervously; it was a habit passed on to her son. Idly, Remus chewed on a hangnail, ignoring the black mass of anger swelling in his chest.

I am not a monster.

"No, he wasn't," Hope snorted, "and he still isn't. He's our son, Lyall, our baby boy. You only have so many more years with him before he'll move away, get a life of his own."

There was a derisive snicker, so soft that Remus barely caught it. "What life, Hope? What life could Remus possibly have in the Wizarding World? He's a goddamn beast. What upstanding company would want an animal to work for them, eh? The zoo, maybe. Perhaps we could send him to a circus for the kiddies to prod him with sticks and throw popcorn at him."

"Don't talk about him like that," his mother cried, but his father pressed on.

"Oh, I forgot, he's liable to rip through the cage and maim every last human within a fifty-mile radius!"