I never should have agreed to do this, Remus Lupin thought. What in Merlin's name was I thinking?
Sighing softly, he glanced out the window of the empty Hogwarts Express compartment. The train was beginning to pull away from the station, and all at once, Remus felt like he was eleven years old all over again. His gaze inadvertently moved to the compartment door, almost as if he was expecting James to burst through any minute.
Remus frowned, memories flooding him. Why he had taken this job? Dumbledore had asked for a favor, one that Remus surely owed, but teaching at Hogwarts? He had always loved Defense classes at school, but nothing good would come of this. He couldn’t work at Hogwarts; just sitting on the train again was bringing back too many memories. Being inside the castle would be a million times worse.
Signs of the Marauders hid in every hallway and every corner of Hogwarts. They had covered the school inch by inch while there, and Remus knew he couldn't escape the memories once he arrived. Avoiding the pain may have worked for the past twelve years, but it wouldn’t work anymore.
Remus closed his eyes tightly. Don’t think about them now. Think about something else - anything but them.
He drummed his fingers against his battered briefcase, the low taps echoing in the still empty compartment. The briefcase, ironically enough, had been a graduation gift from Sirius.
“For when you we have to call you Professor Lupin,” he had said, correctly guessing what Remus wanted to be. “Just don’t tell them you’re a werewolf the first lesson, eh, Moony?”
So much for thinking about something else.
“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Remus muttered. At the same time, the compartment door opened, and three bodies piled in.
Right before Remus closed his eyes once more, this time to feign sleep, he caught a glimpse of the three students. One had unbelievably bushy hair, the other flaming red hair. But the third, the third had untidy black hair, and a face so familiar, that Remus almost had gasped. Even in the fleeting moment he saw the third boy, Remus couldn’t deny the boy’s likeness to James; it was remarkable. He had Lily’s eyes though, that much was obvious.
He realized with a start that James and Lily’s son would be starting his third year at Hogwarts. With another jolt, Remus become aware that he hadn’t seen Harry since he had been one. It would have been too hard, too painful, to see the Boy Who Lived when his parents had died. And even if Remus had wanted to, Dumbledore would not have allowed such blatant contact with the magical world Harry was supposed to be avoiding.
“How could I have been so stupid?” Remus thought as the three teenagers took their seats. “Of course Harry’s at Hogwarts. Am I that daft that I couldn’t figure out the age of my best friends’ son?”
“Who do you reckon that is?” The voice called his attention back to the other in the compartment.
“Professor R.J. Lupin.” The girl’s voice was matter-of-fact. In fact, with a painful twinge, Remus thought she sounded a bit like Lily when she answered a question in Potions.
Remus continued to listen in amused silence as the three friends talked about him, having to try hard to resist the urge to smile about one hex finishing him off. The full moon had just passed, and he knew he was looking remarkably pale and weak.
The conversation carried on for another moment or two, Remus only catching snippets of it, before he heard one particular thing that almost caused his head to snap up.
“Sirius Black escaped to come after you? Oh, Harry…you’ll have to be really, really careful. Don’t go looking for trouble, Harry-”
“I don’t go looking for trouble,” said Harry, nettled. “Trouble usually finds me.”
Remus was taken aback. He knew Sirius had escaped, but he was after Harry? But now that he thought about it, it wasn’t so surprising after all. Sirius had caused the deaths of James and Lily, so why not finish off the Potter family? A perfect collection, Remus thought with disgust.
Remus’s thoughts about Sirius continued for a while, tuning out the other conversation, which was moving towards Hogsmeade.
Remus hadn’t let himself think about what had happened to him in a long time. It was more than anyone should ever have to handle, and dwelling on it would never bring them back. James and Peter were dead. And Sirius might as well have been, for all Remus cared.
Eventually, he fell into a light sleep, peacefully resting until he woke with a start to find the train dark and frigid.
---
It had not been quite the way Remus had wanted his teaching career at Hogwarts to start, that much was for sure. He had hated Dementors when he had first faced them in the Order “ he didn’t need them to remember the night he was bitten by a werewolf “ and he hated them now. Remembering how it felt to be told your best friends were dead was not something Remus particularly liked.
To top it all off, Remus wasn’t sure how he could handle teaching Harry when he looked so much like James. It would be a reminder of what he had lost every day. At least, Remus mused, he wouldn’t have to teach Harry his very first class. Tomorrow morning, he would have second year Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors to start the year.
Right now, Remus was alone in the small bedroom behind his office, nervously pacing. After the train had arrived at Hogsmeade Station, he had gone to the feast and then been shown his room by Filch, who was openly loath to have a Marauder back.
“Hoped I’d seen the last of you,” the caretaker muttered unkindly. “You four made more a mess than the rest of the school combined.”
“I’m sorry about that,” Remus replied, trying to sound sincere, although he couldn’t have regretted the Marauders’ pranks less.
Filch grunted in response and opened the door to Remus’s office. “This is your office. The bedroom is through the door at the back of the room,” he said, and then left unceremoniously.
Remus smiled; Filch hadn’t changed a bit. Remus glanced around his office and decided he would decorate in the morning. It wouldn’t take long; he hadn’t had many possessions to bring.
Yawning, exhaustion washing over him, Remus walked through the door that led to his bedroom. He found, and appreciated, that his shabby robes had been removed from the trunk in the office and placed in a wooden dresser.
Changing into his sleep clothes, Remus laid down on the small but comfortable bed and fell asleep instantly.
His dreams were filled with pranks from his schools days that all seemed to end with the joke going horribly wrong and killing one of the Marauders.
Needless to say, in the morning, Remus did not feel rested in the slightest. When he climbed out of bed, a wave nervousness washed over him. He had been so preoccupied with worrying about what he would remember when he came back here, Remus hadn't given much thought to whether or not he would be a good teacher. He had his lessons planned, of course, but what if the students didn't like him? Trying, and failing, to shake the uneasiness, Remus changed into his robes and shuffled sleepily to the Great Hall to eat breakfast.
When he entered the giant room, he automatically made his way towards the Gryffindor table, before realizing he was required to sit at the staff one. Feeling sheepish, Remus quickly took the place next to Professor McGonagall, who was already halfway through her eggs.
“Good morning,” Remus said as he sat down, purposely avoiding calling her Professor or Minerva. Being back at Hogwarts was all too surreal.
“Indeed it is. It’s nice to have you back, Mr. Lu-” She stopped, smiling slightly. “Remus.”
"Feels a little odd, doesn't it?" he asked, returning the smile.
"I certainly feel as if I should be giving you a detention for you start of term prank, at the very least."
Remus laughed and then and began to eat; the food was as good as he remembered. He and McGonagall made pleasant small talk until she left, leaving Remus to finish up his own eggs alone. He was done soon enough, and left immediately for his first class.
Breakfast had done nothing to calm his nerves.
---
The students began to file into the classroom, and Remus’s nervousness mounted. He watched each boy or girl take a seat at the desks from his own. If the students were anything like the Marauders had been, he wasn’t sure he was going to like teaching very much.
When all were settled, Remus cleared his throat and moved to stand in front of his desk. “My name is Professor Lupin,” he began. “I know you’ve had some rather sporadic instruction so far, so I hope you will find this year satisfactory.”
The students were eyeing him warily, and Remus couldn't blame them. Gilderoy was a bumbling bafoon, and Quirell was, well, sporting Voldemort on the back of his head. Surely Remus would be an improvement. But as he stood there, Remus felt, rather irrationally, that they had already guessed that he was a werewolf, which wouldn't be any better.
Trying to shake the paranoia, he suddenly recalled what Sirius had said after telling him not to spill his ‘problem’ during the first class.
“But in all honesty, Moony, you’d be a great teacher,” Sirius said with a smile. “You always knew the best spells to use when we had to duel the Slytherins. I reckon Yaxley still has a mark from that one Stinging Spell.”
A student cleared their throat softly, bringing Remus speeding forward nearly fifteen years. He smiled at his class and spoke again. “As it’s your second year here, we’ll be covering simple defensive spells, as well as basic Dark creatures.
“Today, we’ll be working with the Disarming Charm, which a few of you may have learned last year,” he continued. “Professor Dumbledore said it was taught at a Dueling Club meeting, but I believe it is a very useful spell, and well worth practicing again.”
Remus went on to explain the wand movement and incantation necessary and then paired up the class into twos. After moving the desks to the side of the room, and adding a cushioned floor, the room was soon filled with cries of Expelliarmus!
The students seemed to be enjoying themselves, and Remus enjoyed watching them. Learning Expelliarmus had been the Marauders’ first lesson in their second year, which had led to a severe increase in the amount of flying wands in the hallways.
The rest of the class passed without difficulty, and before he dismissed them, Remus called the class to order.
"I hope you learned something new today," he said. "Your homework is to Disarm three people in the hallways before our next class."
The students laughed and immediately began plotting who to duel, before Remus cut them off. "Just a joke. I won't give you any homework on your next day back. You're dismissed."
The class stood in unison and moved to the door, talking animatedly amongst themselves.
A boy with long black hair waved to Remus as he left the classroom. “Bye, Professor. Fun lesson. I’d never done Expelliarmus before.”
“Thank you, Mr. Barrington,” Remus replied, the boy reminding him strongly of Sirius. “I’ll see you next class.”
Remus watched the rest of his students leave, and then sat down at his desk to prepare his lesson, which happened to be for Harry's class.
He still wasn’t sure why he had agreed to take this job, but maybe it wouldn’t be as painful as he thought it would be.
Maybe, Remus would like being a teacher as much as he thought he would when he was seventeen…
To Be Back by solemnlyswear_x
Chapter Notes: Thanks to wewillmissyou for being awesome and speedy! The dialogue from the train is from PoA, chapter five.