Disclaimer: The OC’s and fragments of the plot mentioned in this story were created by me. Everything else in this story belongs to J.K Rowling. Thank you for reading.
For the first time since returning from France, Coralie found herself with time to spare for herself. She’d been so busy lately that she’d hardly had the chance to sit down and drink a nice cup of tea, let alone sit down and read a book for a while. But today, her family were all out of the house. Her mother was out shopping- probably shopping for presents for Coralie’s birthday next week. Jacob had travelled over to Paris for the weekend to catch up with some old friends and do some house hunting with Violet before he planned to move back after Christmas. Angus was spending the day at Diagon Alley, despite the fact he and Coralie had picked up all of his supplies for school, he had decided to spend the day shopping with his friends anyway. Not that Coralie really minded, she was more than happy to finally have the house all to herself again.
She wasn’t even embarrassed to admit that she spent her entire day in bed with her cup of Earl Grey tea and a book on werewolves. Two days ago, she had caught up with Remus in London and the two of them agreed to research the werewolf attacks against Miranda and herself. While Remus still doubted himself, Coralie was adamant that he was not the one who attacked her and so they had begun to research registered werewolves in Britain.
None of the names really stuck out to Coralie- there was, of course, Fenrir Greyback but she knew he hadn’t been the one to attack her. She doubted she’d still be alive if he had. At the time of Miranda’s attack, she thought it was a mistake- just a rogue werewolf who had found her, though she was disgusted with herself when for a brief moment, she had thought of Remus. But after the attack on her- she couldn’t really explain it, but it didn’t feel like an accident. Remus seemed to agree with her.
She had no idea, if this attack was planned, who’s idea was it? It was obvious to her that she was the target- if Miranda had been the target then the werewolf wouldn’t have gone after Coralie the second night. But if that was true, who was after Coralie? One idea had come straight to mind- The Millens, of course- but she had quickly dismissed that idea. So maybe the Millens weren’t particularly found of her, and this was before she and Shelena had called a truce of some kinds. But still, it wasn’t like they would have had a werewolf on hand to attack her. Would they?
She ran her fingers through her hair and leant her head back against her headboard. Now she was being ridiculous. Just because they weren’t all the best of friends didn’t mean that they’d send a werewolf after her to attack her. It was clear that a werewolf attack wouldn’t cure the curse she and Shelena shared after all, it was going to take a lot more than that. At least, she thought it would. The Bennetts had yet to find any mentions of a cure, and she highly doubted that the Millens would have. They hadn’t tried anything in a while- a fact that seemed to make Jacob beyond paranoid at times, which she guessed meant that they didn’t have a clue yet either.
With a sigh, she chucked the werewolf book down to the end of her bed- it was hardly making anything better for her and perhaps it was time that she actually took a break from worrying about everything. She had hoped that her little trip to Paris would have achieved just that, but now that she thought about it she realised just how much stress that had added to her life. She was glad that she’d been able to say goodbye to Emma and that she caught up with Emma’s mother, but the added stress of Nathaniel finding out and Mary’s death and whatnot. She was surprised that she was still standing!
She doubted she’d even be able to get a real break for weeks now- next week was her eighteenth birthday and even though she’d begged for everyone to not organised anything for her, she knew something was going on anyway. After that, she had promised herself to start looking for a job somewhere and possibly an apartment closer to central London that she and Nathaniel could share. Then Angus would be back off to Hogwarts and before she knew it, Christmas would be upon her, then the New Year.
Soon after that Jacob planned to move back to Paris permanently, somewhere near Violet so that the two of them could still catch up but they’d agree that without Coralie, Angus or their mother living there full-time that couldn’t share a house without wanting to kill each other.
That fact hardly frightened Coralie as much as the thought of being practically alone in this being house did. Sure, she enjoyed having the house to herself for a single day every now and again but she hated to think what it would be like all day, every day. Allisyn had moved out years ago but now that Violet had moved out and Jacob was about to- she realised how much she missed her siblings when they were gone. On top of all of this, with Angus back at Hogwarts soon, it would just be her and her mother.
Not that she didn’t like the sound of that, she loved her mother dearly. But she knew Marcelle was just as worried as she was, possibly even more. Marcelle missed her three eldest children enough already- she still hadn’t come to terms with the fact they were all grown-up, a fact that she constantly reminded Coralie and Angus of. She was probably frightened of Coralie moving out now too, Coralie knew her mother realised how serious she and Nathaniel were getting.
Before that thought had any chance to progress, Coralie heard the front door open and Angus call up that he was home. With a smile, she swung her legs out of bed and headed down stairs to meet him. Maybe they were all growing up and going in different directions, but that didn’t mean Coralie couldn’t enjoy a big slice of chocolate cake with her little brother while they were both still here.
Remus broke the uncomfortable silence as he cleared his throat, Miranda's eyes snapped up to his before she quickly looked away.
"You know I'm sorry don't you?" Miranda sighed, reaching her hand over the couch and entwined her fingers with his.
"It wasn't you Remus, and I'm not going to turn at the next full moon- I've only got a few scars now" Remus nodded solemnly but didn't say anything in response, Miranda squeezed his hand softly and he squeezed back.
"I still feel like it was my fault, I should have protected you"
"Remus" She whispered, the sadness in her voice made Remus' heart ache with longing. He wanted to reach over and pull her into a tight embrace and never let her go, but he couldn't. "There was no possible way that you could have known what was going to happen and there was certainly no way you could have stopped it. Besides Remus, what happened can't be changed now- so there's no point you worrying about it"
"You promise you won't hate me forever though?" Miranda chuckled slightly.
"I didn't hate you for a second"
"Did you know it wasn't me?" Remus asked after a few minutes silence, Miranda nodded- a small smile crossing her face. "The others thought it was me"
"They couldn't have, they know you wouldn't do something like that"
"They did, until Coralie was attacked then-" Remus' voice traced off and he began to play with a loose thread hanging from his shabby jacket. “Can you really blame them? I’m the only werewolf they know, the only one at Hogwarts- let me remind you of that fact. I’m the obvious choice.”
"Nate, maybe, He doesn't know you as well and he was probably driven out of his mind with worry for Cora. You know what happened with his mother, it's understandable that he'd still be a little nervous after that" Remus shook his head. “Besides, isn’t Coralie helping you find out who the werewolf was now? She clearly didn’t believe it was you, not even for a minute. You two will find out who it was and we’ll all share stories about how we knew it wasn’t you! Even Nate, come on- he knows you now, he trusts you!”
"It wasn't Nate, he didn't believe it was me" Remus swallowed before he continued to speak, "It was Sirius, he thought I'd hurt her" Miranda's eyebrows knitted together and she took a deep breath.
"He d-didn't" Remus sighed and closed his eyes before reopening them and staring straight at Miranda.
"He still fancies her, even more now that she and Nate are starting to get really serious. I don't think he ever really stopped fancying her, but he thought I had hurt her because I'd told him to move on" Miranda made a noise of protest but Remus continued, "He didn't talk to me until she woke up, not a single word"
"He was just worried about her, I can tell he still fancies her- I think everyone but Coralie has noticed. He probably just wanted someone to blame"
"He could have blamed Nate for leaving Coralie alone outside that night, but of course, he blamed the werewolf" Miranda sighed.
"Remus, you aren't being fair to yourself. The fact that you are a werewolf for three nights a month doesn't define who you are as a person, unless you let it" Remus nodded solemnly but did not make eye contact with Miranda, she continued to speak, "Remus John Lupin, you are a spectacular person who just happens to have another secret side to him. You're a brilliant friend and an amazing boyfriend, you can't let the werewolf inside of you control your life"
"Thank you Miranda" He whispered, smiling at her as she shuffled closer to him on the couch and wrapped her arms around him tightly.
The little apartment was now silent for most hours of the day with Mary gone. Cory was not quite used to it, nor did he believe that he would ever get used to it. Everything in that apartment reminded him of her, every single waking moment- every single moment of the day as he hadn't slept a wink in weeks.
Every single object had a memory attached to it even though the two of them had only been living there a month. The photo's had lined the walls played back like a muggle film inside Cory's mind, he could still remember the expressions on her face and the words she had said. They haunted him.
In the empty hallways, he could hear her laugh as the two of them chased each other around. He could smell the aroma of the cookies she had made for him two nights before she had been killed. He could hear the lies she told him on the night of her death, she only going to visit Kiki because she was upset about something. At the time, it had seemed reasonable- Kiki had been going through a lot of stuff recently and it had really seemed like that was where Mary was going.
Those lies fell apart that night. He had found a letter from Dumbledore to Mary referring to a 'mission' and reminding her to keep it a secret from everyone. He'd been so angry when he found it, he'd torn apart the living room and was waiting for her return so that he could tell her that he knew. He'd fallen asleep waiting for her and woke up in an even more terrible mood than the one he'd been in the previous night.
He'd flooed to Dumbledore's office, ready to give the headmaster the speech of his life about how he felt about Mary being put on the front line of a war all by herself. He'd made it halfway through the speech when Dumbledore finally broke the news to him- she'd been found dead in front of the Shrieking Shack that morning- the killing curse, Death Eaters, an important mission. Everything blurred into one.
Cory had somehow got himself back home, he sat silently staring at the overturned living room before everything dawned on him. The living room was in an even worse state by the time he had calmed down. He didn't have the energy or the emotional strength to clean the apartment up yet and so it still resembled a battlefield. He couldn’t remember even he’d even moved since- he assumed he had otherwise he would have been dead, he would have been with her.
Mary had always been better and keeping things tidy, while she hated cleaning and was always reminding Cory of this somehow she had taken pride in keeping their apartment sparkling clean all day, every day. Cory had always figured that there was a reason behind it, but he had never stopped to ask- he really wished he had now.
In fact, he wished more than anything that he had more time to spend with her even if they only lay on the living room floor and talked- the way they had on their first night in the apartment. He would have given absolutely anything for just one more night with Mary, but now he would never get his wish. And it broke his heart. It broke his heart more than anything.
Authors Note: So, as you will have read in the chapter summary- this chapter was re-written as of January 9th, 2013. I've decided to re-write chapters four through to fourteen (though some of these are not published) as I realised I couldn't continue writing without changing them. I promise this time around the chapters will be of higher quality and will actually fit in with the first book and (as you will see in the future), later chapters of this sequel. This chapter is quite similar to the original, but others won't be.
I'm not going to make any promises as to when the fifth chapter re-write will be up as rushing to finish chapters is what got me stuck the first time around. I'd also like to apologise for any spelling/grammar mistakes- this chapter has yet to be beta'ed though it will be soon.
Finally, I'd like to thank you guys for sticking by me and I hope you enjoyed this re-write.
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