Hearing Damage, a harry potter fanfic

Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns Harry Potter and my childhood.

Remus/Sirius. Remus finds out that Lily and James are dead, and that Sirius did it. Months later, he makes a drastic decision. Songfic based on the song Hearing Damage, by Thom Yorke.

I would strongly recommend anyone reading to download or youtube the song 'Hearing Damage' by Thom Yorke, from Radiohead, while reading this fanfiction. It is very good. I usually dislike songfics, but this song is the perfect Remus/Sirius song.

Everything moved in slow motion.

He walked into the Order Headquarters.

A tear in my brain

Allows the voices in

Later, he would remember the scene, as if looking back on it, moving in slow motion, as he was living it, in the present. He walked into the room; he had seen the owls in the sky as he walked up to the shabby building they had all basically been living in for the past weeks. Months.

He walked in and everyone stopped their chattering, some had been hugging, some were crying. They had been cheering, the war was over, it must be!

The members of the Order of the Phoenix turned towards him, he stared back, blankly.

"Remus, I'm so sorry…" said Dorotha, one of the oldest members of the Orders, "what…what do you mean, what's happened?"

At that moment, Dumbledore rushed in and grabbed his forearm, leading him out of the room, into the next. He locked the door. He wouldn't turn around to face him.

Remus wanted to know, like when you see a car crash, and blood on the pavement.

You don't want to look, but you can't look away.

He was scared, who had died this time? He wanted to ask, demand to know what had happened, but he couldn't bring his mouth to open. His heart was beating really fast, as if it wanted to jump out of his ribcage.

Could it be…? But no, no, he was safe. He was home.

He'd already lost so much that was important to him.

"Dumbledore?"

He finally turned to face him, his blue shining eyes piercing his. "Remus, there was an…occurrence."

"What do you mean? What happened? Where's Lily? James? Sirius? Peter?" His heart constricted.

"Lily and James are dead."

Remus' breath hitched, his heart skipped a beat. It couldn't be. It couldn't. Yet…

"Who?" He said shakily, with an anger in his voice he had never heard before.

Dumbledore looked away, "Dumbledore, who?"

"Who?!"

"Tell me!" He became aware he was holding Dumbledore's robe.

"Remus…Sirius was their Secret Keeper. Not Peter." "Sirius….he did it."

He paused. "We haven't heard of Peter either. We can't find him."

They wanna push you off the path

With their frequency wires

Everything happened in slow motion.

He let go of Dumbledore's robes, and they seemed to take a long, long time to fall back into their original position. His hands too, they seemed to fall, fall back….until they laid loosely on his sides. His fingers felt numb, separated from outside himself, as if his arms were alienated from the rest of his body.

He became aware there were tears running down his eyes.

He left.

- - -

He opened his eyes to the daylight. It seemed like years ago that he had walked into his room and laid down. He also felt like he wouldn't get up for years.

An owl was tapping at his window.

He ignored it.

'What's the point?'

'It'll be news of another death, another torture. The war might be over. But it's taken everything from everyone.'

Somewhere in his brain he registered the flawed logic in his thought process. 'Some people are happy that the war is over.'

"No." Everything is gone.

The owl kept tapping. Incessantly.

He wondered how long it would take for the owl to leave. It didn't. The fact that he had to stand up made him tear up again. 'Unbelievable' 'That I have any tears left' He walked over to the window, opened it, the owl dropped the message in his hands and flew away hastily.

He was scared. Who would contact him? Why? Surely not to offer their condolences. Sure, they all had, they had all said how sorry they were. About James, about Lily.

Nobody mentioned him.

Did he want anybody to?

He opened the message. It was a cut out from a newspaper, sent by Dumbledore. 'Always the bearer of good news.'

He did not believe he wanted to speak to, or see, Dumbledore ever again. Some irrational part of him savagely blamed him for everything. That part of his soul that wanted to rip out somebody's body parts in hopes that his own pain would diminish.

He began reading.

BLACK MURDERS 13 AND A WIZARD, TO BE AWARDED FIRST CLASS MERLIN.

He dropped the piece of paper.

He stared blankly ahead.

Wait. There's something else you must do.

He picked up the paper once again. He couldn't bear to read, but he had to know. He had to.

Had to know whether the last remaining shred of his childhood, (his life), was gone.

"Peter Pettigrew, long time acquaintance of Black, appeared

on the scene once the sighting was reported…"

It was.

- - -

And you can do no wrong

In my eyes

- - -

Sometimes, in blinding moments during the night. When he would wake up screaming and find his mattress covered in sweat (tears) he would jump awake. Stare ahead like a crazy person. And the mattress would remind him, of times, in the middle of the night, when he was covered in sweat, when Sirius was.

He would then jump out and walk out of the room.

He was scared. He wanted to forgive him.

You can do no wrong

In my eyes

- - -

"Remus"

"Remus, darling, you have to leave the house."

He knew he was being rude, he couldn't believe he wouldn't even stand up to greet Molly Weasley. But he couldn't.

"I know that…" She teared up a little. "Look, we all lost something! Someone…"

She paused.

"But you've got to move on, you can't live like this forever. You have to find a purpose for your life again."

Gin bottles littered the floor. He had been outside. To the liquor store. "Molly" He heard his own voice say, the hoarse voice of an old man. "Please leave."

A drunken salesman

Your hearing damage

Your mind is restless

She stared at him. She walked forward and dropped the brown grocery bag in the table. She made a jerky move towards him, as if she intended to hug him. But instead she just put her hand on his shoulder and squeezed. She walked out.

- - -

Life went on. It always does.

He was hurrying down a street away from a job interview. He was sure he wouldn't get the job.

If this kept up, he'd be homeless soon.

It was a windy day. His worn coat wasn't the windbreaker it used to be. Vaguely, he remembered Lily had gifted him this coat. An old newspaper blew by him,

"…convicted without trial…"

He knew whom the paper was talking about; he'd read the article. It hadn't been that long ago.

He stopped short, then realized somebody from across the street was calling his name. It was Arthur.

"Hey!" He crossed the street.

"Hey, how, how are you?" Arthur said with a nervous smile "Molly said she went to visit…"

"Yes, she did. Thank her for the groceries."

"No problem at all…hey listen, are you...? I mean, how… what've you been up to?"

"Well, just came from a job interview."

Arthur's face lit up. "That's wonderful! That's so good. You know, I told people you were going to be…I mean, that's good. Its just, good to get out of the house, you know? You…you look better."

Remus was horrified.

"Thank….thank you, Arthur. I gotta keep moving, I have….thing…" He rushed off.

They say you're getting better

But you don't feel any better

He ran all the way back until he rushed inside his apartment and his back hit the back of his door. Then he knelt down and wanted to weep, but instead just screamed.

He screamed and screamed, something inside him, his larynx, or something else, broke.

He was hurt, and incredibly offended. He wasn't better. He would never be better. He ran ahead, picked up an old chair and savagely threw it across the room.

Your speakers are blowing

Your ears are wrecking

Your hearing damage

'You have to find a purpose for your life again…'

Never, how could he? It had always been him. Always. Ever since the first day. 'Hey, wanna sit with me and my mates on the train?' How could he have done this? His heart tore at the way he had just forsaken him, forgot about him.

Him rotting away in that impossible cage. Millions, it seemed, of miles away from him. How? He couldn't. He couldn't.

You wish you felt better

'You have to find a purpose for your life again…'

'Lily….James….' He had always been his only purpose. To be with him. To love him. To take care of him, as he had always taken care of him.

He stopped short.

You can do no wrong

In my eyes

You can do no wrong

In my eyes

He would break him out.

He would break Sirius out of Azkaban. Even if that was the last thing he did.

Everything moved in slow motion. 'You have to find a purpose for your life again…'

He smiled.

In my eyes