She had cried for days when word of Marlene and her family's brutal murders reached her ears. Shed silent tears at Dorcas's funeral. Wept for Mary—Benjy—Caradoc—and others who had lost their lives in this godforsaken war.
Even the death of Regulus Black—Sirius's estranged younger brother, whom she had never spoken to before—brought tears to her eyes.
So it was surprising, to say the least, that she couldn't (wouldn't) cry as she stared numbly at the grave of her former best friend.
"He was a spy for our side, Lily."
She shifts her gaze to the tall wizard beside her. He peers down at her from the top of his golden, half-moon spectacles and smiles sadly.
"He did it all for you, child."
Child.
They were barely adults. Newly graduated and thrust quite suddenly into a chaotic war—best friends (old acquaintances, really) fighting on opposite sides of the field. She had stopped thinking of him as her friend soon after they parted ways. She had forgotten him. He, it appeared, had not.
She looks at the grave again and remembers a time when they were young, woefully ignorant and carefree (or as carefree as freaks like them could ever be). They were full of hopes and dreams then.
She remembers his shy, awkward smile and black eyes, glittering with excitement as he introduced his new friend to this wonderful new world.
Idly, she wonders what those bottomless black pits (of gloom and doom, she had once joked) looked like in the final moments of his tragically short life. But just the thought of his eyes—once filled with joy, fear, anger, and that intense, unnamed emotion—as they became empty, glass-like black orbs made her visibly shudder.
"Are you cold, my dear?" asks Dumbledore, interrupting her thoughts, concern apparent on his wise, elderly face.
She shakes her head and he waits patiently for her to question him (she didn't feel the sharp effects of Legillimency—was she always this predictable?).
"H…h…how…?" she finally asks, her voice quiet and hoarse.
"You never forgave him, "he says quietly.
"How did he d…d…die?" she asks again, ignoring his statement.
He looks at her (was that pity in those sharp blue eyes?) as if he was attempting to judge her sincerity.
"The boy suffered," he replies at last, "it was the Killing Curse, after several hours of torture—the Cruciatus, among many others. Poppy was rather upset after inspecting the body. I believe she was rather fond of him when he was a student."
She nods dazedly, shuddering again at the image of his body, broken and cold, paler than usual.
"He should have come to see me," she says finally.
Dumbledore looks curiously at her.
"Would you have agreed to see him and listen to what he had to say?"
A long pause, then, "I don't know," she admits, "I'll never know now."
She resumes staring at the cold, gray tombstone and after a moment, pulls out her willow wand and conjures a single, white calla lily. Placing it gently on the grave, she whispers, "I'm glad you came back, Sev."
And here it is— my first fictional story (not counting the one page slightly dark 1920's short that I wrote for a History assignment) since Christmas of 2009. This is my first time writing something this sad, so I hope you forgive me if it's not as good as other stories under this genre.