Forgetting (Almost)

"People always talk about how hard it can be to remember things - where they left their keys, or the name of an acquaintance - but no one ever talks about how much effort we put into forgetting. I am exhausted from the effort to forget... There are things that have to be forgotten if you want to go on living."

-Stephen Carpenter

He thinks, perhaps, that he likes winter best of all the four seasons.

In the winter, everything's covered with a fresh blanket of clean, white snow, and the earth is still and quiet and peaceful for once, and he can forget that their world is a war zone.

During winter, everyone's home, and the black, decrepit old house is suddenly full of warmth, and cheer, and family, and stories told around the kitchen table in the evening, toasty butterbeers in hand, and he can forget all those times that he wanted to cry himself to sleep as a child (wanted, never did; he learned very quickly that weaknesses were things to be concealed).

In winter, there's ample opportunity to hide away in the library, reading books in front of a roaring fire, wearing long socks and drinking hot tea, and he can forget the cold, lonely, empty days behind bars when he drove himself half-mad with regret and wished so fervently for it all to end.

In winter, little Teddy Lupin sits on Harry's lap, giggling happily at Ginny when she hands him a shiny wrapped box from beneath the tree and morphing his hair to match the red of hers, and he can forget that the wee Metamorphagus lad is Remus' orphaned son.

In the winter, Bill visits with Fleur, both of them arriving on the doorstep cold and heavily wrapped in thick coats and warm mufflers that are coated with icy sea salt, and he can forget that underneath the thick purple wool Bill's handsome face is irrevocably torn and marked.

In winter, Ron – who hasn't been fond of cold of any sort since he was seventeen – wears long sleeves and thick sweaters all the time, and he can forget that the boy's gangly arms will always bear scars from just one of many near-death-encounters that his godson and his young friends have experienced, unprepared and on their own.

During winter, the snow is so thick on the Hogwarts grounds that Hogsmeade looks like a fairyland, and the castle is a crystalline ice palace, and it's so god-damn beautiful that he can forget that a red-headed twin and his baby cousin and Moony and countless other people that he knew and fought beside and loved are buried underneath it all.

In winter, Molly and Arthur are always occupied and cheerful and kept in a gloriously family-induced state of hectic chaos, and he can forget that during every other season of the year Arthur looks ten years older than his age and Molly's smiles never seem quite right.

In winter, George and Hermione take long walks in the park, talking calmly until George pelts her with a snowball and she shrieks and throws one back, and so on and so forth until they both end up wet and grinning and he tucks her gently into his side, nestling her closely until she dumps snow down the back of his collar, and he throws backs his head and lets out a loud, echoing laugh and a "Merlin, I love you!" and she claps a hand over his mouth, smiling sheepishly because they're attracting stares from the Muggles nearby. And because of the bright blue earmuffs over the redhead's hair and the deep red gloves she wears to keep her fingers warm, Sirius can forget that the young man (still so, so young) is lopsided in more ways than one and that the little brunette witchling's got permanent scars on the back of her slender hands that command that she must not ask questions and that the world is a pretty fucked up place.

In winter, Harry takes him out every day, disguised as Padfoot, for a romp in the wet, frozen fluff, and when his godson watches the giant black beast of a dog careening gleefully over the ice, startling the nearby flock of geese, and throws back his head and laughs and laughs, without restraint (just like James), the green beanie pulled down over his forehead (the same color as Lily's eyes) lets Sirius forget, just for a moment, that Harry's got a name and a destiny to live up to and was forced to grow up altogether too quickly.

In the winter, there are hand-knitted Weasley sweaters and stockings begrudgingly hung by Kreacher and delicious, happy meals shared with phenomenal company and an enormous, lovely tree that he and Ginny and Charlie spend hours and hours decorating and the possibility of a magic that has no bitter, evil opposition because it's not a tangible sort of charm.

And his heart is so full and his senses are so distracted that he can almost forget that winter comes after fall, which was the first season he had to learn to live without his best friend. He can almost forget that winter marks the end of another year; another year during which he's grown older and older, and farther and farther away from Prongs and Lily, who are eternally twenty-three.

He can almost forget that despite the pain of the countless winters that he's been at it, he's still trying to learn to cope through on his own (he doesn't think he'll ever get it quite right)…

…Almost.