Author: jadelitfirefles (yoursunshine on livejournal)
Title: "Fifteen Ways of Looking at an Owl."
Disclaimer: All characters and most concepts belong to J. K. Rowling.
Pairing: Remus/Sirius
Rating: PG, really
Summary: A kind of tribute idea I had involving Wallace Stevens' "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird." Not poetry, though. Whichever capitalization is intended in most cases.
I.an owl flies about the ceiling of his house. this is how it all begins; the owl is flying - owls are always flying - and then there's the letter in his hand.
if there is one thing Remus can look back on, it's this moment. his only letter of acceptance, and the owl twitters and swoop to the open window, escaping.
II.
two hundred, three hundred, a peck of them fly through the Great Hall and one of them to Remus personally. the boy with the long, black hair says, A Letter? From Whom? and Remus rationalizes that the owls know and if the owls know the boy should know, but he holds the doctor's letter to his chest.
the boy has gray eyes and pleads with them. (there is mischief in there, somewhere, as well.) Remus thinks the owls can't possibly know, as they merely soar about with the letter tied to their leg, but isn't sure. and the boy snatches the parchment and there is silence after a confused: "Lycanthropic? What are they talking about?"
and the owl knows.
III.
up in the owlery, they sit on perches in great feathered masses. they remind Remus - vaguely - of the terra-cotta army of Qin Shihuang.
IV.
the wolf and the owl are of different natures, and the wolf and the boy are of different natures. the day before the moon Remus imagines life crawling (and light crawling and small animals with quick pulses running and the lesser creatures of the forest skulking) away from him.
the owls are indifferent, do not approach. watch but do not react, and Remus finds himself appreciating the withstanding panicterrorrushingmadnessfear.
V.
Sirius is a tree, Remus thinks, and only bends, cannot break. Sirius is a strong bit of elastic. An Irremovable Stain.
a tap at the window changes things finitely. an owl drops a letter into Sirius' waiting hands, and Remus notices how they shake just a little. the parchment is unrolled and yes, there is the final blow, there is the casual disownment; there are the pieces of the boy scattered about the room for sweeping.
the owl does not find this significant. the dark creature remains with the curtain-fabric-tatters of his lover and curls inward.
VI.
the boy emerges from the tunnel and the other three are behind him. Remus looks up through the branches of the tree and a cloud of swiftly moving owls streaks by above, fierce and obstructive but not colliding, one body.
Remus is covered in dirt and blood but the angel of death passes over the firstborn and he is unscathed.
VII.
It is playful banter between friends. In their dormitory on a Sunday, and feeding off of Sirius' striped shirt, James places a summoned owl on his shoulder and declares him a "right pirate." Remus smiles and Peter claps his hands, and the latter and James leave to ask Lily Evans if they might borrow a bit of make-up.
Sirius swaggers forward and slurrs in an exaggerated fashion: "How do I look, Moony?"
Remus rolls his eyes and says, you look utterly ridiculous. But Sirius finds this answer reprehensible and closes the gap between them - Remus' heart beats wildly, and he finds himself growing warm in all the expected places - and the taller boy says, "It's Captain Black, if you please," and they kiss.
Hours afterward, Remus touches his fingers to his lips and remembers. He reasons this cannot have happened and as such, needs some kind of proof: a witness, perhaps.
James' owl hoots softly in the corner.
VIII.
Dumbledore finds him in the owlery, as if it is a normal occurrence. When Remus says he cannot understand them, the headmaster finds this normal as well.
"We rely on the owls," he says, "and they are Wizard-Kind's greatest friend. They shoulder a great responsibility."
Remus does not make the obvious connections but allows Dumbledore to continue. His voice echoes and fills the room, his audience of what seems to be a thousand, then thousand inhuman eyes (and he includes his own in this figure) in rapt attention.
"Nearly anyone is reachable through an owl, Remus." He smiles. "Why, I was just about to send a message myself, to an old friend many miles away."
Remus feels spiteful because he knows he will always remember this conversation and that such a thing was Dumbledore's intention.
IX.
on Hallowe'en the owls circle streetlights incessantly, like great moths. Remus is empty, and they offer him gifts of parchment but cannot fill him back up with them.
X.
he spends hours at the ministry before they tell him, and when they tell him he isn't satisfied. he is instead restless and paces before associating the action with the gray-eyes boy-murderer-lover-friend-traitor. and the number rolls about inside his head. even with a location - Azkaban - and a cell number - floor number, tomb number - Remus cannot/should not/will not visit.
Remus thinks and is angry. he beckons the owl from where it has been fluttering at the window and tears a scrap of parchment from a book for the message (it is dramatic enough). but he cannot write the letter, only scratches a weak and frustrated "Sirius" before triple-knotting it to the creature's leg. he barks the directions.
the owl does not return, and Remus is glad.
XI.
Remus is send a copy of the Prophet and a set of talons drop it unceremoniously on his makeshift table at The Leaky Cauldron. tea spills onto his lesson plans.
he takes it with him on the train to the school and buries it and himself under a cloak. he does not want to be seen. the pages burn at him but he lets this happen as a kind of punishment, and when the godson, through some unimaginable coincidence, sits next to him in the compartment, he is left barren; the happiest memory he can conjure to banish the dementor is one he can only feel anymore.
and the owls tell him: Sirius Black Has Escaped From Azkaban.
XII.
Remus is only happy when he is reading.
So, when - at least once every three days - a letter arrives for him, he is excited and drowns in sorrow. He thinks this may be too sadomasochistic to be healthy but the birds Sirius sends are tropical and exotic and full of color. The dread fills him only when he recognizes one or two of them, and then the day comes when the parrots and toucans are replaced by owls and he sinks, sinks, is too tired to reply.
XIII.
the message is short, but he understands it: You will be receiving a guest into your household. Please make all the necessary arrangements.
the scratching at the door should be a relief but it is bittersweet. Remus waves the owl away and for the first time in a long time is truly frightened.
XIV.
he does not allow them in the house. the owls tap at the windows and he ignores them; the cacophony is maddening, but so is the thought of the worn-out, abused words. he imagines "condolences" a hundred-thousand times, a repeating decimal, and aches.
XV.
Remus thinks he has come full-circle.
Everything is in circles, really - Sirius has wedded death, so perhaps rings - from the rolls of parchment to the impossible swivelling of the heads of the owls to the dark sleep rings about his eyes. And Remus hears Dumbledore's voice back from the ghost limb of his past, and the Weasleys' great, aged owl blinks at him across the counter-top, questioning. (Almost sentient.)
And Remus realizes something. He thinks - in this companionable sort of silence - the owl is infallible just as he is the Marauders' static character: the only one uninvolved in the tragedy. He thinks, he has let the owl into the house hoping to find the extent of Dumbledore's "nearly reachable" large enough to encompass death, large enough for message and owl to reach Sirius, but this is silly.
Remus knows that if he sends the bird, the bird will fail (and he is sure the bird would also know this.) And Remus knows this cannot happen, because the owl must be perfect. The wizarding world balances so precariously on its feathered back.
Remus closes his eyes - Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius is gone - but only for a moment, and rises. The owl stirs in response but he does not dismiss it as he would normally have done; instead, he notes the graying of the feathers and the glazing-over of the eyes.
Remus thinks, it is weary. Let it rest. And watches it (like the wind) as it hides itself within its wings and eventually loses itself to sleep.