Angsty ficlet
This hit me this morning while listening to the radio. My apologies. It's all angsty and stuff.
Title: Young
Words: 460-ish
Summary: Remus Lupin remembers his friends and wishes things had gone much differently.
There are days like today when Remus Lupin cannot stop thinking about his friends, and on days when his thoughts take a particular turn, like today, he finds he cannot abide himself. But he is stuck with himself and his thoughts, his memories and his wishes that will never come true, and the thought that strikes him today is one he’s had before, one he’s had far too many times.
Remus Lupin thinks things might have been better if Sirius Black had died young.
His memories of James and Lily are almost painfully bright, surreal. He is so far removed from them, so far removed from the time when they lived and loved and made those around them discover the coexistence of deep envy and deep love that he cannot quite believe they were as he remembers them. Surely no one could be that brave, that beautiful, that funny, or that good. Surely they hadn’t been.
He remembers them more as children than as adults, though he himself was never a child like they were children. He was never young like they were young, and he envies that.
His memories of Sirius ought to be such, as well. They ought to be young, blazing, like a hard fast grin that bore no apologies. No regrets. And for the most part, those are his memories of his dearest friend. No apologies. No regrets.
But if he is honest with himself, and he is far too self-flagellating to be anything but honest, there are the other memories, the more recent memories. There are memories of Sirius, the handsomeness he’d disdained so often eaten away by torture and solitude, memories of him looking helpless and hopeless and worst of all, useless. And all those things, he thinks, all those things turned desperate and gave Sirius what he’d lost since his youth-recklessness. And that recklessness had killed him.
It is easy to go on believing, go on remembering that Peter is dead, that Peter, too, died young, for didn’t the Peter they knew truly die young? Wasn’t that Peter gone in a way Sirius had never been? No, Sirius had been ever-present, looming behind bars like a terrible reminder of someone’s trust gone horribly wrong. He’d been the wrong reminder of the wrong betrayal.
Remus Lupin hates himself for wishing his old friend had died with James and Lily, for wishing the better memories could be the only memories, the brighter pictures the only pictures.
And more than anything, on days like today, Remus Lupin hates himself for wishing he, too, had died young.
For only the good die young, it is said, and with thoughts such as his, he knows he would never have earned such a death.
Title: Young
Words: 460-ish
Summary: Remus Lupin remembers his friends and wishes things had gone much differently.
There are days like today when Remus Lupin cannot stop thinking about his friends, and on days when his thoughts take a particular turn, like today, he finds he cannot abide himself. But he is stuck with himself and his thoughts, his memories and his wishes that will never come true, and the thought that strikes him today is one he’s had before, one he’s had far too many times.
Remus Lupin thinks things might have been better if Sirius Black had died young.
His memories of James and Lily are almost painfully bright, surreal. He is so far removed from them, so far removed from the time when they lived and loved and made those around them discover the coexistence of deep envy and deep love that he cannot quite believe they were as he remembers them. Surely no one could be that brave, that beautiful, that funny, or that good. Surely they hadn’t been.
He remembers them more as children than as adults, though he himself was never a child like they were children. He was never young like they were young, and he envies that.
His memories of Sirius ought to be such, as well. They ought to be young, blazing, like a hard fast grin that bore no apologies. No regrets. And for the most part, those are his memories of his dearest friend. No apologies. No regrets.
But if he is honest with himself, and he is far too self-flagellating to be anything but honest, there are the other memories, the more recent memories. There are memories of Sirius, the handsomeness he’d disdained so often eaten away by torture and solitude, memories of him looking helpless and hopeless and worst of all, useless. And all those things, he thinks, all those things turned desperate and gave Sirius what he’d lost since his youth-recklessness. And that recklessness had killed him.
It is easy to go on believing, go on remembering that Peter is dead, that Peter, too, died young, for didn’t the Peter they knew truly die young? Wasn’t that Peter gone in a way Sirius had never been? No, Sirius had been ever-present, looming behind bars like a terrible reminder of someone’s trust gone horribly wrong. He’d been the wrong reminder of the wrong betrayal.
Remus Lupin hates himself for wishing his old friend had died with James and Lily, for wishing the better memories could be the only memories, the brighter pictures the only pictures.
And more than anything, on days like today, Remus Lupin hates himself for wishing he, too, had died young.
For only the good die young, it is said, and with thoughts such as his, he knows he would never have earned such a death.