Fading Memories

A/N: My aim is to have a story that has a beginning, a middle, an end and a good story line. A story that people will like. And here's my attempt, enjoy! Also I should mention that our favourite werewolf, grim look-a-like, metamorphamagus and head master are still alive! Woohoo! Most of DH and HBP are ignored.

Disclaimer: None of it's mine I'm afraid... cept the plot and Amalia.

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Chapter One: The Present

Harry Potter was exhausted. The second war, against Voldemort, of the wizarding world was finally over. Voldemort had been defeated just six weeks, two days and nine hours ago, in a spectacular showdown at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The very moment the Dark Lord fell would be forever burnt into his very soul. He had been completely and utterly defeated, and before he died, he was very aware of this, the object of his downfall.

But that was the past, something Harry was trying his hardest to put behind him, and this is his future. This being a dark, dirty, smelly, ghoul ridden house; also known as 12 Grimmauld Place.

All the cleaning that had taken place during his fifth year had been in vain. It had been two years since he, or any other human being, had been in this house, and because of this the darkness had easily taken back the house.

His Godfather may be happy to live in such disgusting conditions, but once discovering how ghastly it had become, Mrs Weasley had become caught up in a cleaning frenzy, ten times worse than last time, completely forgetting her own house and moving the entire family temporarily back in with Sirius. In the end though it was worth every drop, or river, of sweat. Nearly every room had been thoroughly scrubbed and dusted and it was now easy to see the great wealth and impressiveness that was once the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. Only one room was left; Sirius' bedroom, and at the current rate it looked like it was going to stay as it is, with Sirius refusing to let anyone clean it, or even enter it.

The sound of laughter waffled up from the kitchen where everyone, the Weasleys, the Lupins, Hermione, Dumbledore and nearly every member of the Order sat around the groaning dinner table, eating the delicious food Mrs Weasley had been kind enough to prepare for everyone. For many it was a special dinner, celebrating their victory in war. War against the house that is.

Harry had decided not to join them, choosing instead to search the house for his Godfather. It soon became a process of elimination, as Harry slowly made his way towards the top floor, searching every room as he went, and finally came to Sirius' room. His Godfathers' room was the last room for him to look in, and also the one room he had never been in.

He knocked on the door gently, a part of him not wanting to disturb the only occupant in the room, and slowly pushed the door open. He saw Sirius' outline immediately, for he was standing in front of the window, the only source of light in the room, gazing down into the street below.

Over the past few days Sirius had become moody and withdrawn, like he had been during the war, a stark contrast to the happy, almost youthful man who had been their companion over the last few weeks. The past eighteen years had taken their toll on Sirius, but he now had a chance to get his life back, having cleared his name of all wrongdoing just last week. His face and frame had slowly become fuller and healthier looking, even retaining a glow of happiness, and whilst the dead look in his eyes was not completely gone, it had become dulled and less noticeable.

Harry cleared his throat, beginning to feel nervous for no reason in particular, but Sirius made no motion to show he noticed Harry in any way.

"Sirius," he said, clearing his throat again.

Sirius did not move for a second, the he turned his head slowly towards the door.

"Yes, Harry?" He had carefully made his face blank, showing no emotion, but not before Harry glimpsed some emotion, one he had never seen in his Godfathers' eyes before.

Realising he had been standing there staring at Sirius for over five minutes now, Harry laughed self-consciously.

"I wanted to see that you were okay and to tell you dinner was ready."

Sirius looked at him for a second then nodded.

"I know," he stated simply, and turned back to the window.

In that moment Harry decided to find out what was wrong with his Godfather and try to help him through it. It was the least he could do after everything Sirius had done for him over the years. In an act of boldness Harry strove over to what he assumed was Sirius' bed and sat down, feeling triumphant for no apparent reason. He took a quick moment to look around the room, noticing the posters on the walls, alongside the Griffindor banners. A broken wardrobe stood in one corner of the room, and the ground was littered with a number of newspaper and magazine clippings.

This time Sirius turned his body fully from the window and stared at Harry with his eyebrows raised, slipping a piece of paper into his pocket as he moved.

"Yes, Harry?" He said again.

"I came here for two reasons. The first to tell you dinner was ready, the second to find out what was wrong. So… what's wrong?" Harry blurted everything out in the only was a teenager was able to, and it took Sirius a moment to process what he had said.

"I'm perfectly fine Harry," Sirius said. "Why don't you go have your dinner before everything goes cold, or everybody eats it?"

Harry felt a flash of annoyance directed at Sirius. He could not remember any one ever being so difficult. It was obvious something was wrong.

"No!" Harry snapped. "Sirius, I'm not blind. It's obvious something is wrong, and I'm not leaving until you tell me."

Sirius sighed and for a moment the same unknown look Harry had seen before came into his eyes, but this time he recognised part of it. It was sadness. But a different sadness that Harry had come to know whenever James or Lily was mentioned.

"I think I am hungry after all," Sirius said, obviously avoiding the questions. "I'm going to head down and grab something before it's all gone."

Without another word Sirius walked out the room, the sound of his feet fading as he descended to the lower levels.

Harry did not move for a moment, his eyes trained on the small piece of paper that had fluttered to the floor as Sirius had left, the same piece that his Godfather had stuffed into his pocket, not wanting Harry to see.

Harry bent down to pick it up, and on closer inspection found out it was a picture, and judging from the fact that no body in the picture moved, it had obviously been taken by a Muggle camera. The picture had six people in it. Harry immediately recognised five of the occupants, as they all made silly faces at the camera, but the sixth person was unknown to him. His parents stood in the middle of the picture, with their arms around each other, whilst a tired looking Remus stood on their left, overshadowing the short frame of Peter Pettigrew, who was half cut out of the photo, his portly size not allowing him to be shown fully. Sirius stood on the left hand side of the photo, his arms around the sixth, unknown, occupant, both of them sticking their tongues out at the camera, while laughing at the same time.

Harry frowned as he studied the photograph. He did not know a lot about what went on whilst his parents and their friends were at school, but he had never heard anyone mention anyone fitting the description of the sixth occupant of the photo.

She was short, barely reaching Sirius' shoulder. That was the first thing that Harry noticed about her, other than the fact that she was female. She had straight, soft looking, dark brown hair that reached almost to her waist, dark green eyes, not unlike his mothers and she wore the traditional Griffindor robes

A sudden shout of laughter released Harry from his observations of the photo and he quickly stuffed it into his pocked, instinct telling him that this picture had something to do with Sirius' mood. Taking one last look around the room he left, realising as he did that he was a lot hungrier that he had first thought.

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It took Harry another week to corner Sirius somewhere, to ask him about the photograph. Of course he did not tell Sirius he wanted to talk about that in particular, for he knew that unless he had Sirius firmly bolted to the ground he would find that he had no Sirius and no photo.

Every time Harry did manage to corner his Godfather he always felt that there was something more important he had to do, and it took him another three days of wondering why he hadn't talked to his Godfather to realise that he had been tricked. Sirius, after been cleared of all crimes he had 'supposably' committed, had been given another wand. At first Sirius had moaned constantly about how it didn't feel right, that his other one was better, and how much he missed is other one, but he eventually quietened down and since then used his wand almost constantly. Sometimes Harry thought that it was like he was trying to make up for the past eighteen years of being without a wand. Eventually though, it dawned on Harry, after the fifty-seventh time of attempting to talk to Sirius, remembering something more important to do, and then not finding anything, that Sirius was obviously using a spell to keep Harry away from him.

Smart, Harry thought, but I'm not The-Boy-Who-Conquered-the-Darkest-Most-Evilist-Lord-of-This-Era-or-Possibly-For-All-of-Time-Excluding-Grindewald for nothing. Which reminds me, must find out who makes these names up, they seem to keep getting longer and longer.

Harry also began to curse the amount of people that you can fit into one house. It was nigh impossible to get a room to yourself, and if you did manage to it didn't stay that way for long. Whenever Harry did manage to get a room to himself and corner his Godfather somebody always wandered in soon after.

It was only a matter of time before Harry decided to use those smarts, those smarts being Hermione that is. All it took was the amount of time it took to track down Hermione, pick her brains for all the information she had on blocking spells that made you forget what it was you were doing and begin the search again for Sirius.

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Friday came and went and it wasn't until Saturday night that Harry, armed with his new spell that helped him keep his mission in clear focus, cornered Sirius in the Library. He had kept to his room mostly, with the door locked, or well populated areas of the house, until Mrs Weasley forced her way into his room and it was given a thorough clean. Since then there had been no place for him to hide. Harry was mildly surprised that his Godfather did not just leave the house and hide somewhere in the city, until Mr Weasley told him that Sirius had received the same warning Harry had, that with the amount of Death Eaters yet to be caught, it would be highly irresponsible for them to parade their way through town.

To be on the safe side, Harry also bolted the door manually and locked it using his wand.

"There's no need to do that," Sirius said, keeping his gaze steadily on the flames flickering in the grate. "I'm not going anywhere."

Harry looked at him until his Godfather turned his gaze away from the flames and onto Harry.

"I was hoping that maybe we can arrange a swap. You give me that photograph back, and I tell you who she is."

Harry looked at him, hoping his face was blank, not giving away the guilty feeling he had for keeping the photograph for so long. Harry could not deny that he had been almost obsessing over the stranger in the photo. He would look at it every night before he went to bed, thinking of all the reasons that she would be there, and each night he came to the same conclusion; she was the cause of the strange sadness in Sirius' eyes. There was no other explanation. He knew his Godfather had had girlfriends throughout his time at Hogwarts, it was almost expected really, but he had not seen them in any photo or heard anything about them.

"I…" Harry trailed off, and the corner of Sirius' lips twitched.

"Don't bother to deny it Harry. Now, would you like me to answer any of your questions? I know you've been dying to ask them."

Harry felt a heavy blush grace his cheeks and ears.

"Yeah, I think I'd like that," he said in answer to Sirius' question, handing over the photo before sitting in the chair opposite his Godfather.

Sirius gazed at the photograph for so long Harry began to fiddle uncomfortably, wanting him to hurry up and get on with it.

"How many people have you told about this?" Sirius asked, not taking his eyes from the photo.

"No one," Harry replied quickly.

"Good…" Sirius said softly, his voice trailing off.

He paused for a beat before continuing,

"Her name is Amalia. She was a muggleborn, in the same year as me, and the same house. She was your mothers' best friend, but I did not notice her until our sixth year. She was… funny, smart, brave, everything."

Harry had to interrupt then.

"Wait. No one's ever told me my mother had a best friend."

Sirius looked at him steadily for a moment. "It's a… sore… subject for all of us. Remus and me that is, and your parents when they were here."

"So Remus knows her? I mean, he knows her well?"

"Yes, Remus was the first to know her out of the four of us."

Harry frowned. It still did not explain why no one had ever told him about her.

"Was she at my parents wedding?" Harry asked.

"Yes, she was the one taking the photo's that day."

Harry nodded absentmindedly. That explained a lot. He had checked every photo he had of his parents and their friends but had not seen her anywhere.

"She was the one to take the photos. This photo here is one of the few that had her in it."

Harry cleared his throat. "Was she your girlfriend? Were you serious about her?"

"I was very serious about her," Sirius said gravely. "She's my wife."

Harry's head jerked in shock, and he stared at his Godfather.

"Whaaa…?"

"We were married just after school finished, before your parents."

Harry could not get his head wrapped around this new piece of information, and Sirius seemed to understand.

"How about I start at the start?" He asked.

The sound of someone knocking on the door startled them both. Without bothering to wait for an answer the door unlocked, the bolt slid back and the door swung open. Hermione and Ron stood on the other side, Hermione standing with her wand out, obviously the one to unlock the door. Remus stood just behind them, wearing a slightly grim smile.

They came in silently and sat down on the chairs surrounding Sirius. Remus' eyes locked onto the photo and the same sadness that had been in Sirius' eyes over the past two months were reflected there.

"So, you're going to tell them then?" He asked Sirius.

"Well the plan had been to tell only Harry, but I suppose he would tell them anyway after."

Hermione and Ron flushed guiltily. "Harry forgot the Silencing charm, we could hear everything clearly on the other side," Hermione explained quickly.

"Well, let's begin shall we?"

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