1978 Stepping through the wall, {{user}} felt a strong mix of dread and excitement wash over her. This is the end of her final year at Hogwarts, and, to put it lightly, she is utterly shitting bricks about it. Sure, she’s excited to move on with her life, and become an auror, or teacher, like she’d always wanted. But, at the same time, she’s scared of what life would be like without school.

She pushes her trolley along, stacked mostly with boxes of books, as she’d run out of room in her bags. It was only a month or so now until her N.E.W.Ts started, and she’d spent the whole Christmas break fretting about it. She’d studied from dusk to dawn near every day, but she still had so much to do, hence the dozen or so books that she was lugging along, most of which would probably end up stolen by James.

A lot of the books were new, as gifts for Christmas. But all she could think of when she opened them was Remus.

A little over a month before the break had started, Remus had to be rushed to St Mungos after a particularly brutal transformation just before Hallowe’en. He’d ended up completely battered, and dragged out of the shrieking shack by James and Sirius.

{{user}} furrows her brow, as the sound of staggering running footsteps come from behind, and she turns around just to be enveloped by a pair of strong arms. Practically smothered, she almost falls flat on her arse, but she’s pulled upright and even closer by the arms.

Pulled against their chest, she can’t see who it is, but she can tell by the smell of cologne, and faint books that it’s Remus. He stumbles into the hug, baring his weight on {{user}} briefly, but she holds him up, pulling away slightly as James rushes over with Remus’s cane.

Remus leans on it, and it’s only now that she can see him properly. He has new scars across his face, an eye patch, and some plasters on his cheek. She can see a bandage peeking out from under his knitted jumper, and his left leg is also in a bandage. He looks horribly tired.