Dora was in the office when he got back from his morning classes on Friday, spreading out a blanket on the floor for lunch. For a moment, Remus was just glad of the company, then he checked the calendar.

"Already?" he asked.

Dora looked up. "Nice to see you, too."

Remus sighed and took the thermos she offered him, wrinkling his nose at the bitter smell of the Wolfsbane Potion.

"I think you don't like my cooking," Dora said lightly as he drank it. "Really, the faces you make. And here it's fresh off the fire." She grinned.

Remus swallowed the last bit and tried a smile, which felt like it was twisted into something resembling pulled taffy. "Delicious," he said. "Really. Wonderful."

Dora started taking plates and forks out of the basket, along with serving dishes, glasses, and a bottle of wine.

"Er, Dora... I'm in the middle of a work day. At a school."

"Oh, it's just juice, honestly. I just bottled it for the sake of presentation." She pantomimed waving a wand to show that she'd transfigured the original containers, and mouthed, "pumpkin juice."

"Oh. Well, in that case, certainly."

"If your head is anything like my cousin's today, a bit of juice won't hurt you much."

"He drank considerably more than I did," Remus said quickly, wanting to get off of the subject.

"He's doing that a lot, isn't he?"

"Maybe not a lot, but more than he should. I need to keep a better eye on him. I mean... you know what I mean."

"We."

"What?"

"We need to. I'm his family, too, you know. You can let me look after him sometimes."

Remus shook his head. "He barely tolerates it from me. From you, it would be an insult. He still thinks of you as his little cousin."

Dora raised her eyebrows. "Does he?" she asked dryly. "How odd."

"Well, you are a bit younger than we are."

"I hadn't noticed." Dora opened one of the serving dishes, and the wonderful smell of roast beef filled the office. "Molly came by the office this morning with lunch for Arthur, and she brought enough along for two of me. She thinks I'm too thin. Or knows I'm seeing you, one or the other. At any rate, there's quite enough." Someone knocked at the door frame. "Even for guests," Dora added. "Come in."

A large boy who only looked vaguely familiar to Remus looked curiously into the office. "Er... Mr. Lewis, right?"

"Yes."

"Is Mr. Garvey here?"

"No. He should be along soon, if you needed help."

"No. I'm all right with calculus... he was going to come to the boxing match this afternoon. Against Greenfields. Mr. Baden said to tell him it was at five-thirty, not six." The boy waved a grinned, the disinterested expression never leaving his face. "I best get to practice."

He didn't offer his name, and backed out with a sharp bow to Dora.

"That's not one of yours, is it?" Dora asked.

"No. A-Levels aren't required in any subjects. He must have opted out of history. Wonder what Joe thought." Remus toyed with the pennant, then reached up and put it on Alan's desk.

"Are we going?"

"What?"

Dora ladled out some vegetables. "To the boxing match. Seems we've managed to cheer on everyone but Dudley so far. It shouldn't seem too odd to be there."

"I hadn't thought of it." Remus wrinkled his nose. "Boxing. Couldn't he have been in dramatics club?"

Alan came in five minutes later, enthusiastically supported Dora's suggestion, and sat down on the floor to even more enthusiastically share lunch. "Would you tell Anna she should do this?" he asked. "Really, it's great fun."

"I should tell Anna?" Dora repeated.

"Aren't you in their little breakfast circle?"

Remus felt his eyes narrow, and fought an urge to ask what Alan could possibly mean by that, but Dora was entirely unfazed. "We have enough to talk about without passing each other messages from our own husbands," she scolded. "Really, Alan. Try inviting her."

Alan grumbled something and continued to eat. When he'd had his fill, he went to his desk to mark homework, and Remus helped Dora clean up from lunch. On the way out to her car, he raised the question. "Breakfast circle?"

"Oh, right. I forgot. I've been meeting the ladies for breakfast. Twice a week for two weeks now. It's a club. There are some marvelous places to have breakfast, really. We talk about books. We're reading one now called Rose Madder. Bit violent, and the magic is impossible, but it's interesting enough. Really, though, I don't see why Rosie didn't just leave Norman in the first place--"

"Dora, you're meeting the ladies before work and talking about a book?"

"Yes."

They reached the car, and Dora popped the bonnet open. Remus put the basket inside it and didn't look at her. "Dora, do you think you're... well, that we're taking this a bit too far?"

Dora frowned. "Get in the car, Raymond."

Remus went around to the passenger seat and got in. When they were securely inside, Dora did a quick Muffling Charm. She rubbed her temples, an uncharacteristic anxiety trait that reminded Remus strongly of Andromeda when her patience was close to the breaking point. He opted not to tell Dora that.

"I'm not doing this for the assignment," Dora said. "I like them. That's all there is to it. Anna has a really bawdy sense of humor, and Miriam--"

"That's not the point."

"It is the point. You treat me like I'm not really in this. I'm in it as much as you are. I mean, you don't tell me every match you go to."

"That's true, but some of them, I might decide to attend during the school day when you're not here. If I were really your husband, I would notice if you weren't home for breakfast twice a week."

She set her jaw like she intended to say something else, then shook her head and sighed. "I see your point. I suppose I just wanted to get that out."

"All right. Point taken."

They sat awkwardly for a few minutes, Dora with her hands on the steering wheel and her head tilted backward, Remus sitting in the passenger seat, feeling chastened.

Finally, Dora looked at him and smiled in a tired but more normal way. "I'm sorry," she said. "It's work business. The Ministry, pretending to look for Sirius, pointless arrests of harmless old crazy ladies... I suppose I drop into Dora Lewis for a bit of a break."

"I understand."

"I just wish you-know-who--"

"Voldemort."

"--would come out of the woodwork, so the Ministry would have to see him." Abruptly, she threw her head back and banged it on the back of the seat. "I'm sorry," she said again. "I'm not being cheerful Dora here, am I?"

"You don't have to be cheerful Dora all the time."

"I don't like Not-Cheerful Dora. I'd rather be cheerful." She straightened up and shook her shoulders, tossing the grumpiness off like a cloak. Remus wondered how often she did this when no one was looking. "So," she said, "Boxing this evening?"

"You want to come and watch Dudley Dursley hit people."

"What better way to spend a Friday night?" She smiled. "Is it a date?"

Remus rolled his eyes. "It's an appointment."

She nodded gravely. "I'll mark my calendar."

He got out of the car and leaned through the window. "I am sorry if you feel I've been somehow neglecting your--"

She shook her head. "I was just complaining. Forget about it."

"Really, I--"

"Don't force me to make you forget about it," she said, toying with her wand and smiling.

Remus nodded. "All right. Forgotten. I'll see you later."

He watched her drive away. As she pulled out of the car park, he heard the wireless in the car go on, playing something catchy and bright. She reached out of her window and waved jauntily.

He waved back.

When Dora came back a few hours later, the evening's Wolfsbane Potion camouflaged as another thermos of soup, she seemed to be back to her normal state of mind--though Remus reminded himself of how easily she had adopted it earlier, like pulling on a cloak, and wondered. As they walked across the grounds to the gymnasium, he found himself glancing at her when she wasn't looking, to see if the smile faded, but it didn't.

"I've never seen a boxing match," she said as they reached the front steps. Students ran up and down around them, some waving to Remus. Most weren't precisely his crowd, but boxing here was apparently a fairly big draw. "A pub fight or two, but never a match with rules and so on."

"When did you see a pub fight?"

"Bill Weasley and Connie Peale got into a good one their last year. Over a girl, I think."

Remus raised his eyebrows. "An actual pub fight? Not..." As subtly as he could, he mimed drawing a wand.

Dora raised her fists and mimed fighting while she nodded. "They broke four chairs and tore the draperies at the Hog's Head." She blanched momentarily, but there was no reason to worry. The Hog's Head wasn't a particularly unusual name for a pub, or at least not unusual in a way that would catch attention.

Remus shook his head. "Molly must have been thrilled."

"I think Molly was a brawler in school. Can't you see it? Someone says something off to Arthur, and out comes Molly, fists up..."

The image was both too ridiculous and too perfectly plausible to not laugh at. "Who won?" he asked.

"Connie. Turned out the girl just fancied him more than she fancied Bill. All the beatings in the world weren't going to change that."

"Funny how that works."

They reached the gymnasium doors and were swept inside in a crush of large boys wearing jackets that bore the Greenlands crest (a sheaf of barley in the shadow of a tree, a marked contrast to the Smeltings crest of a blacksmith's hammer hanging over a forge). Remus was scanning for a place to sit when Dora tugged on his sleeve.

"It's Joe and Miriam," she said.

Remus cursed under his breath. "He shouldn't be here."

Dora had already waved, and Joe was hailing her in return. They picked their way across the crowded room--a large square ring had been set up in the center--and sat down beside the Levinsons, who were in the front row, as close as they could get to the ring.

"Are you feeling all right?" Remus said, nearly having to shout to speak to anyone further away than Dora, as someone had started playing exceptionally loud music, the lyrics consisting solely, as far as Remus could tell, of "We will, we will ROCK YOU, ROCK YOU." There was a verse, but the distortion at this volume, plus the crowd noise, made it entirely impossible to understand. Dora, of course, was rocking her head back and forth to the beat, exactly as Ted did whenever there was a catchy tune playing.

"I think he should be home," Miriam shouted.

"I'm fine!" Joe said. He pinched Dora's arm. "You tell your sister she's a miracle worker. I've felt much better."

"Good!" Dora said. "I'm glad!" The chorus of the song came on again, and Dora mouthed along with, "... Rock you, rock you..."

"You like this?" Miriam asked, wincing.

"It's fun. Come on. Try it." She leaned forward and sang, "We will, we will rock you..."

Miriam winced more tightly and sang along, "Rock you..."

Joe laughed.

They got settled, and after an interminable time, someone cut the music and one of the officials climbed into the ring to introduce the first match. Remus glanced at the program of the event--there would be three matches, twelve rounds each. What constituted a round wasn't any part of his incoming knowledge. Dudley, who held some sort of title in the "heavyweight" division, would be in the final match. Before it, there would be a featherweight match (Smeltings being represented by one of Remus's fourth formers, a quick-tempered and sullen boy whose name was Neville, though Remus had not for even a moment thought of him as resembling good-natured Neville Longbottom) and a lightweight match. Remus hadn't any idea what the difference was.

The first match commenced. Joe Levinson spent more time yelling instructions from the audience than paying attention to his companions. Once, between rounds, while young Neville hung limply from the ropes after a bad blow (there was some discussion of whether or not it was illegal), the boy looked up and saw Joe there, and for the first time in more than two months, Remus saw him smile genuinely. His teeth were covered with blood and his eyes looked dazed and confused, but that smile was unmistakeable.

"Lead with your left, Donaldson!" Joe yelled in a frenzied way. "A good, quick hook!"

From beside the ring, Baden gave him an exasperated frown. He went over to Neville Donaldson and whispered some instruction, which Remus was willing to bet consisted of, Lead with your left, Donaldson. A good, quick hook.

Beside him, he felt Dora shift, and looked over to see her leaning to Miriam, who was saying, "...just hate this, but he loves it so..."

Remus could sympathize. He wasn't overly fond of Neville Donaldson, but watching one of his students being beaten to a faint and bloody mess did not qualify as entertainment. (Not to mention that the smell of the blood--not something Remus normally had to deal with--was a bit maddening less than a week before the full moon, as his body began its monthly nervous ticking.) He kept flashing on Ron Weasley, his leg broken, lying in the dust in the Shrieking Shack.

Or Harry, pale and wan following a fifty foot fall from his broomstick when the Dementors had invaded the pitch.

Or James, slammed in the face by a bludger, the bow of his specs driven into his cheek.

But still--Quidditch accidents weren't deliberate injuries. Remus liked Joe Levinson, but the obsession with this particular sport, of all sports, was quite alien.

Neville ultimately lost his match, but it was a close thing (apparently), and the Smeltings fans gave him a salute by tapping their sticks on the floor in unison.

The Smeltings lightweight champion won his match easily, and Joe merely mirrored his punches in small pantomime, smiling and cheering. It was nearly ten o'clock when the official came into the ring again, a spotlight pinning him to the mat.

"And now, ladies and gentlemen, the Main Event!"

A roar came up from the crowd.

"From Greenhands, two time Lightweight Inter-School Champion, moving into heavyweight fighting this year, undefeated... Wallace Forrester!"

The Greenhands champion came out to dutiful applause, ran a lap of the ring shaking his gloves in the air, then went to his corner.

"And from Smeltings..."

Roar.

"...the defending Junior Heavyweight Inter-School Champion of the Southeast..."

Roar.

"DUDLEY DURSLEY!"

The gymnasium positively exploded with applause. Dudley might be a bully to the smaller, weaker boys, but he'd apparently won the school over as an athlete.

Remus refused to let his mind make its most obvious comparison.

Dudley did a lap of the ring, glanced over and saw Joe, and smiled broadly.

"You show him, Dudley!" Joe yelled. "Lightweight!"

When Dudley turned, he was looking confident, almost cocksure.

The bell rang to begin the round.

Wallace Forrester immediately landed a punch to Dudley's jaw and ducked one of Dudley's ham-like forearms. Forrester was quick and considerably leaner than Dudley, though Remus supposed they had to be close to the same weight to fight here.

Dudley simply looked surprised for a moment.

Forrester hit him again.

Joe bit his lip. "You can take him, Dudley! Remember to watch him! Watch out for him!"

Whether the instructions were heard over the general din or Dudley came to the conclusion on his own, the cocksure expression disappeared into one of intense concentration. Dudley ducked the next blow with an easy move that was incongrously graceful for a boy his size, and landed a hard blow to Forrester's ribs.

The fight was on in earnest. The first four rounds went back and forth between the two, Dudley winning the first, Forrester winning the second, Dudley the third, Forrester the fourth. In the fifth round, Dudley came out of his corner with a quick, vicious stride, and took Forrester in only half the allotted time for the round. The six round was a repeat of it.

They'd reached the half-way point of the match, and Remus looked down at his hands. He'd been clenching his fists tightly, and his nails had made dents in the skin. Dora looked slightly disturbed, but she was still talking brightly to Miriam. The subject had come around to a book they both carried copies of, whose cover featured a picture of a wrapped painting. They were shouting to one another about a character named Peter Slowik, and whether or not he was a nice man. Or something.

Remus made his way over to Joe, who was leaning on the folding chair in front of him, held by an official during most of the event, watching the ring, where Baden was giving Dudley water and someone was toweling him down.

"Never been to a boxing match?" he asked, cocking his head to one side.

"It's my first," Remus told him. "Not..."

"Well, at your age, if this is your first one, I'm guessing it's not something that interests you."

Remus shrugged. "It's a bit violent for my taste."

"It's boxing. What did you expect?" Joe turned, and Remus noticed that he wasn't letting go of the chair. "It's not a debating society."

"Right. I know... Joe are you all right?"

Joe smiled tightly. "My eyes are getting a bit cloudy. But I'm fine. Just tired. I won't go out after the match. I..." He took a deep breath and leaned over to speak quietly to Remus. "Help me back to my seat. Don't let Miriam notice."

Remus nodded and stood between Miriam and Joe, putting what he hoped was an unobtrustive hand on Joe's elbow. When Joe was sitting again, he stayed there for a moment, so it looked like he would have another purpose.

"I hoped I could tell Dursley how well he's doing. But he can't very well come over here, can he?"

Remus, who had no idea what the rules of boxing were, agreed quickly, as he understood far better than Joe Levinson what the rules of his illness were.

He hoped Dudley would continue to make short work of Forrester in the next six rounds. Joe needed to get away from here. Apparently, this was close enough.

The bell rang and the seventh round began. Forrester, whose coach had apparently been giving him something of a pep talk, came out with the kind of fast, graceful footwork he'd shown in the first round, and Dudley barely managed to block his first strike. They circled one another like birds of prey. Dudley managed to land a single blow, but Forrester avoided the others. Behind his corner, Remus could see the Greenhands coach shouting instructions, though he couldn't hear them.

Dudley gained back some confidence, making some sort of aggressive move, but it was apparently what Forrester had been waiting for. He slipped under Dudley's arm and jabbed upward with his fist, striking Dudley on the chin and sending him to the mat, where he hung on his knees, his arms looped over the ropes. This had happened often enough over the course of the evening that Remus knew he'd get up, but he looked off-kilter as the referee counted down.

That was when Joe Levinson tried to stand up.

He got to his feet and raised his hands, as he had during the featherweight event, and started to call out, "You can get up, Dudley!"

But he only got as far as "You can get--"

He swayed alarmingly, and Miriam screamed, and then Joe was falling backward into their circle, his eyes rolling up to whites, his chair skittering away when he hit it sideways.

Remus, whose lap he'd mainly landed on, lifted him as gently as he could, ignoring a rising cry that was coming up in the gymnasium. Miriam pulled the fallen chair over, and Dora helped Remus stretch Joe out across the four chairs.

"We should get him to a--" Remus began, and that's when he felt the heavy hand on his shoulder. He was whirled around violently.

Dudley Dursley stood before him, blood running from his nose and fury in his eyes. "Do you think I don't know?" he demanded.

Remus had no idea what to say. He stammered over "Dudley, I--"

And then Dudley yelled, "You're doing this!" and there was a some kind of quick motion, and then pain exploded in Remus's jaw. The world swam as the officials dragged Dudley back--he was trying to pummel Remus again--then grayed out completely.

Dora's hands.

Remus could feel them, small and warm, before her assumed face faded slowly into view. They skated nervously over his cheeks, tapped a sore spot under his eyes, combed through his hair, fluttered down to his shoulders.

He cauht one of them as his consciousness drifted back up.

"I'm all right," he said. He squeezed her hand, though it seemed to require more concentration than usually. "Really."

"Are you sure?"

Remus turned his head. He as no longer in the gymnasium, but stretched on a vinyl mattress on a trolley bed in a side room. Joe Levinson was sitting on the edge of a trolley bed across from him.

"I'm fine," Remus said. Using Dora's hand for leverage, he pulled himself up until he was sitting. "You certainly trained Dudley efficiently!" He tried to smile, but the pain in his cheekbone made little fireworks dance in front of his eyes.

Joe scowled. "I don't know how many times I told him never to strike outside the ring. Boxing was meant to give him an outlet, not make him..." Joe let out an explosive breath, and swayed on the trolley bed's edge. Miriam steadied him. "He knows he shouldn't."

"Dudley has some conflicts," Remus said quickly.

"The boy's mad!" Miriam crossed her arms over her thin ches. "Blaming you, of all people, for Joe's... spell."

Dora let go of his hand (it seemed in some corner of his mind that she actually pulled it away, but that didn't make sense), and put her arm protectively over his shoulders. "They're suspending Dudley from the team," she said.

Joe frowned. "That's not going to help him."

"I agree," Remus said. "That's only going to make him feel isolated. It's not going to--"

"To hell with helping him," Miriam interjected, her voice strident. "The both of you, honestly... worrying about that bullying... monster!"

The word echoed hollowly in the room, bouncing on the tiles and settling into the synthetic material of the cushions. It drilled into Remus's aching head--absolute, unyielding, eternal.

Monster.

The door opened, and a small man in specs wearing a white coat came in. A rubber and metal contraption hung around his neck like a tie.

"Well," he said cheerfully, "I'm used to treating the students in this business. How are the two of you?"

"I'm fine," Joe said. "I've come around. Look at Lewis."

Remus shook his head. "Really, it's no concern."

The Muggle Healer rolled his eyes at Dora and Miriam. "Well, luckily, it's not up to either you to decide that you're fine." He went over to Joe and pulled out a small instrument that cast a bright point of light, much more focused than a lumos Charm. He shone it in Joe's eyes. "All right," he muttered, examining them. He put his hand on the back of Joe's neck, moved his fingers around. "Does this hurt?"

Joe indicated that it didn't.

"What year is it?"

"Nineteen-ninety-five. November, to be precise. Are we finished?"

Miriam put a hand on his arm and shushed him. She looked at the Healer. "I'll see to it that he sees his own doctor on Monday."

"I'd rather he saw someone tonight."

Joe shook his head. "I can't rush off to the A'n'E every time I get a twinge."

Remus expected Miriam to continue protesting, but she didn't. Apparently, Joe's "spell," as she called it, had not been on any lasting duration.

The Healer came over and shone the bright light in Remus's eyes, without even warning him first. For a moment, the pain simply exploded behind his eyes, then the world became a glassy thing, behind a screen of light.

The Healer moved the light to the other eye, blinding him completely.

"Hmm. Good responses." He held up a hand. "How many fingers do you see."

Remus squinted, trying to clear the after effects of the light. "You're holding up three."

"Good." The Healer leaned forward and examined the sore and swollen spot on his cheek. He prodded it with his finger. "Is this painful?"

"It's a bit sore," Remus said, his voice more petulant than he would have liked.

"What are you doing, poking about?" Dora asked indignantly.

"I'm trying to see that his cheekbone isn't fractured," the Healer said. "I don't think it is, but I'd like you to keep a close watch on it. If the swelling isn't reduced by tomorrow night, bring him to your doctor's office. I don't like that bruise, but it seems to be no more than a bruise."

The door burst open again, and the headmaster, Blythe, burst in, looking officiously concerned. "Levinson, Lewis... are you both unhurt?"

Joe sighed. "Don't worry, Gil. I've no intention of making trouble for the school, and I'm sure Raymond hasn't, either."

Remus shook his head, not even knowing what sort of trouble Gil thought he might have in mind. "How is Dudley?"

Miriam let out an explosive breath, but said nothing.

Blythe raised his eyebrows. "Mr. Dursley is entirely unhurt. He's having a long overdue conversation with Mr. Baden at the moment."

"You shouldn't take him from the team," Joe said. "It's all he has."

"Well you look at Raymond?" Miriam said. "Just look!"

"Raymond agrees with me," Joe said.

Remus nodded. The small, sparkly points of light in his vision were starting to clear.

"Dora," Miriam pleaded, "tell me you at least have some sense."

Dora shrugged (Remus could feel the movement of her chest on his back). "I don't know anything about the team. But I'm all for hanging him by his ankles and--"

"Dora."

She sighed. "I know."

Blythe frowned. "Removing him from the team is no longer a question. It's accomplished. My only question at this point is whether or not to expel him for striking a teacher."

"Does the teacher in question have a say in it?"

"Your opinion, which I assume is negative, is duly noted."

Remus straightened his shoulders. "Dudley is confused."

Blythe looked at him for a long time, shook his head, and said, "So am I."

"He needs help, Gil," Joe said crossly. "Not you running about trying to prove you've got power. Did you hear him? He's delusional."

"A wonderful argument for keeping him among the other students."

Remus slid down from his trolley bed. Dora steadied him by holding his arms, but he pulled away from her. "What do you plan to do?"

"I plan to speak to his parents at their first convenience," Blythe said. "The school nurse got them to listen about his weight, perhaps they simply need to be told..."

Remus tried to imagine Petunia's reaction to all of it--particularly if Dudley opted to share the reasoning behind his paranoia. "I'd like to be there," he said.

"What on Earth for?"

"I could explain that there've been some tensions. Tell them what's been happening. Don't be hasty, Headmaster."

Clearly displeased, Blythe nodded curtly. He asked after their welfare again, then left.

Dora and Miriam got their various belongings together, and the four of them walked out to the cars. Joe and Miriam got into theirs and disappeared into the night.

Dora took the driver's seat of Ted's car, and sat there with her hands on the wheel while Remus got settled. "What exactly do you plan to tell the Dursleys?" she asked.

"I don't know," Remus said. "I just want to see them."

Dora turned the key and the car coughed into its tenebrous imitation of life. "He's dangerous, Remus. Dudley, I mean. If you keep letting him do this sort of thing, sooner or later, he's going to kill someone." She pulled out onto the road. "It won't be Harry. Harry can defend himself. But what about your little friend Daniel? What about Miriam? She said she didn't like him, right where he could hear. Or Alan, if he marks Dudley poorly in maths?"

"Dudley isn't angry about maths," Remus said.

Dora looked at him with flat, disbelieving eyes, and then turned back to the road.

Remus watched the heavy lights of the city multiply, and thought of the word monster.