Searching Light (Remus Lupin)

13: Different Eyes

Sirius' POV

There is a feeling. There is a feeling inside of me that I just cannot explain, something aching, something gnawing at me, and I just can't figure it out.

I stare at the fire groaning in the fireplace. Remus and I have come to spend Christmas with James and his parents; like hell I would go back to the wretched people that sit in my childhood home. I hate that place. It reeks of death and failure and sadness.

Everyone else is asleep; today was the last day of Christmas vacation we had, and it is two days after New Year's. Christmas here was amazing - absolutely heavenly. The food was delicious and the presents were bloody spectacular. I wish Christmases were like this in my house, but none of the embarrassments that call themselves my relatives can ever make a vacation fun. They just ruin it.

I sit in a purple velvet chair and I find myself thinking about Amber. God, Remus is so bloody stupid; he's delusional! He still, somehow, thinks that he's in love with Narcissa. He's never even talked to her, and all of the sudden he says he's in love?! I mean, I'm not stupid, I know it was a love potion. James and I had turned Hogwarts inside out and we just cannot find that redhead who gave Remus the chocolates. And it sucks though, because Amber fancied him: Amber fancied him a lot. She's been acting weird too (besides, well, everything). She's barely talking and acting weird and she never reads books anymore, she just goes to the other side of the lake to "practice magic." I wish I could watch her one day. I've never seen magic like hers that she can do.

She yelled at me the other day, too. Right before we left, I caught her crying in some corner in the middle of the night. I have no idea what it was about, and she just kept crying and I couldn't understand her, but I think she's going mad. She kept mumbling something about her 16th birthday and January 21st and Mutatio, but I didn't really hear because she was sobbing. But anyway, I carried her to the common room (she was an absolute mess) and sat her down in one of the chairs. I looked her in the eyes, and I tried to get her to talk-I just needed to hear everything she had to say. But she wasn't making any sense, so I shook her, and then I lost it. I yelled at her something about the lake and then she started screaming at me, saying crap like what does it matter to you and why are you so obsessed and etc. I felt like I was fighting with a girlfriend or something, but Amber is a distant cousin so I guess not.

But maybe this feeling is that fact that I just feel so bad for her-everything that's happened. The thing with her aunt and uncle and Remus almost killing her and then Remus "fell in love" with some other selfish bitch and the truth is, Amber is just getting a lot of shit that she doesn't need. I feel really, really bad for her, and her life really sucks. I wish I could somehow make it right, but I don't have some magic wand to wave around a fix everything. I mean, I have a magic wand, but all it likes to do is give Snivilus wedgies and prank the teachers.

I kind of love her; I really care about her. She's my family. She's the only part of my family that actually matters to me and she's the only one that I don't want to choke every second she's breathing the same air as me. So yeah, I kind of love her, and I should. So I have to fix this. I have to fix this mess with Remus and I have to get them both to understand how much they like each other, and the second I do that, the faster everything falls back into place again. Honestly, the biggest bump in their relationship will be Remus being a werewolf. Amber is a rectornatura, which is another bump I guess, but I can't imagine she's as dangerous as Remus is. I know that she cares about him and being the person that she is, can look past that and see the beauty in Remus that all of us see, the beauty in Remus that she should see, and the beauty that everyone wishes he could see in himself.