turning page | A REMUS LUPIN STORY

vii. ARGO

song: je te laisserai des mots by patrick watson.

"You want me to be jealous?"

Adeline Montgomery wasn't religious. She found it to be a muggle concept, religion - an explanation for the magic so unfamiliar to their daily lives. How could she believe in a God when she was capable of such similar power? So easily could she turn water into wine, heal the wounded with a simple spell - Merlin, she was even beginning her career focused on an elixir of life. No, she wasn't religious...but Remus Lupin made her feel as though she could believe in something greater than herself.

Head rested on her hand as she sat at the island in the kitchen, his words replaying over and over in her mind. It'd been a few days, and she still couldn't get them out of her head.

"You want me to be jealous?"

Yes. She wanted him to be jealous so desperately, so violently and chaotically jealous that he thought of nothing else but her, and her lips on his. Kissing him was almost freeing, in a way most unfamiliar to her. Being with Alexander, or Charlie, or anybody else did not bring fulfilment. They didn't cause her heart to thud viciously against her chest, and she didn't dream of them every evening. Rolling over in her bed to find ginger hair instead of mousy brown was almost disappointing. 

Charlie Weasley was a brilliant man, but he wasn't Remus Lupin.

But she'd come to the conclusion that Remus, in all his glory, was ridiculous. If he wanted her as she wanted him, as they had been a few nights before, he would say it. A cowardly wolf, unrelenting and unwilling to take a step forward. 

Truly, she didn't know what to do. The game of cat and mouse was becoming terribly frustrating, and soon Charlie would be leaving, and she'd have very little distraction from the man in the bookshop down the road.

"Adeline?"

He'd kissed her so passionately. Surely he couldn't not want them, her - not from the way he gripped her thighs, kissed her neck, tugged her ever closer...

"Adeline!"

A womanly voice brought her back, eyes snapping upwards to meet the stare of Anastasia. "Yes?"

"You need to wake up! You'll be late."

Ah, yes. Her first day of work - a real, adult job, in a real, adult place. How strange, that weeks ago she was in Hogwarts, and now she'd never return. Today was the day the younger students would be going back, and Charlie would be off to Romania for a few weeks. They'd said their goodbyes the night before, and he sent her a good luck note that morning, as he always did.

"I'm awake, Ana. Promise." she offered a smile, finishing off her mug of coffee before pushing away from the counter, eager to leave. Her friends had been giving her peculiar stares the past few days, and she was sure it was due to her acting slightly off. Like they knew something had happened, but they weren't quite sure what.

Their apartment was lucky enough to be well placed - she still didn't quite understand how Anastasia had found it. Diagon Alley was wonderful, and it, rather fortunately, led almost everywhere. Her new boss, Argo Pyrites, had sent her a beautifully written letter with information of when and where to meet, with strict instructions on what to wear and bring.

Leaving her home, she walked along the cobblestones in a white dress shirt and black trousers, with a dark cloak covering her shoulders for the warm summer breeze. The building was at the very end of Diagon Alley, far past Gringotts and tucked away nicely. A dauntingly big door stood before her, and Adeline twisted the handle, to little success.