DracolikesototallyROCKS: Yes, a bus.

Slytherin-Lycan

Allamonella

ProperT: Did I actually mention what bus it was? If I didn't, I like your deduction skills… and I agree, poor kid! I'm cruel, I know…

xxBuffyfreakxx

For all you physics-freaks out there, my calculations are inaccurate, illogical and just plain invented, okay! Oh, and the little mini '1' is a link thing-if you didn't know, and it's at the bottom. Bit of a short chapter this one, but I rather like it.

Disclaimer: I don't claim anything of this story- except for Charlie Granger, the big blue bus and Roger, but I don't really want him… I'm putting him up for sale to pay my rent if anyone wants him…

Wednesday 12:00am

Sirius

Hermione's face broke my heart.

Unlike her brother, Hermione let some a sparse amount of emotion show on her face, and what I could see was hurting me far deeply than any physical wound ever could.

Eventually, after she had demanded my reply, I'd conceded and told her about Charlie; whatever she'd been expecting, I was as sure as hell that it wasn't that.

And I could hardly blame her; in the wizarding world, you didn't usually walk around with the danger of getting hit by something; they were minor injuries, seen as broken bones could be mended in a heartbeat.

But Charlie had been fragile anyway, and it was- ironically- the Knight Bus, and the Knight Bus wasn't your average kind of vehicle.1

The basic explanation is that the Knight has to weigh more than the average bus- around twice as much- otherwise it won't travel according to the earth's magic field (something involving atoms- I think) and it has to build up terrific amounts of speed to be able to pass through the tears in the field. So, a witch or wizard colliding with an average, Muggle bus isn't exactly front-page news, but the Knight Bus? That's something else entirely.

So, Charlie was currently residing in St. Mungo's, with a recently healed collar-bone, several shattered plates in his skull, numerous ribs and two fingers. And a broken pelvis. And that was just the bones.

Nasty, in other words.

"How… how bad are his injuries?" Hermione whispered hoarsely. I bit my lip and looked away. "Sirius." The vulnerable tone disintegrated into a fierce order.

"I'm not exactly sure, but as far as I know, there's no extensive damage or anything, but some muscles were torn and there are lots of deep cuts that will need stitches."

Of, course I wasn't going to tell her about the punctures to his lung and stomach or the haemorrhaging ….

The Healers had described Charlie's condition as critical and hadn't been able to stabilise him, but my information was several hours stale, so anything could have happened between when Tonks Flooed from the St. Mungo's to tell me and now. Everybody had gone except me with Charlie to the hospital, leaving me to watch over the then comatose-stricken Hermione at the eerily quiet Grimmauld Place.

An unfamiliar weight settled on my chest, and it took me a moment to realise that Hermione had wrapped her frail arms around my neck and laid her head on my torso, her breathing deep, monotonic against me. My arms slowly encircled her shoulders and I rested my chin on the top of her head, a wary sense of ease sweeping through me. Millenniums slipped passed as I sat with Hermione draped across my legs, rocking her slowly, almost unconsciously, until a faint, persisting ring made me raise my head.

"Sirius?" Hermione looked up at me questioningly. I shrugged and stood up, glancing out of the door and down the hallway curiously.

Then it clicked.

"It's Tonks!" I practically yelled as I flew down the stairs, Hermione a step behind me. I burst into the vacant kitchen and my eyes were drawn to the kitchen table, where an alien object sat, moving around slowly like a three-legged insect. Except it didn't have any legs at all, just a body that emitted strange whirring chirps.

I studied it warily as it continued to scuttled around the table's surface, occasionally changing colour, patches of it flashing white, then melding into blue, then green in rapid succession. Slowly, I reached out and poked it, then leapt backwards immediately, in case it decided to retort.

"Sirius, what are you doing?" Hermione was looking at me incredulously, like I was behaving in the most bemusing manner, but I wasn't; I mean, there was a huge black legless bug on the table!

"Well, you're the book expert, what is it?"

"Sirius," Hermione said, slowly and deliberately, as if she were talking to a clueless child. "It's a mobile phone."

"Hmm, I see. And what do these, 'Mo Bill Fones' do exactly?" I asked as she picked the insect up. It continued to whir, but the moving ceased altogether. Hermione shook her head despairingly at me and with one flick, sliced the Mo Bil Fone in half and put it to her ear. Immediately, the whirring noises stopped, as if she had cast a 'Silencio' charm. "Hello? Tonks?" Hermione was talking into it. What the hell is she doing? I thought silently as I stared at her. "Oh, Kingsley you want to speak to Sirius?"

Kingsley?

Hermione handed me the 'Mo Bil Fone' and told me to put it next to my ear. I obliged, still bemused. And jumped out of my skin when Kingsley's voice sounded in my ear as clearly as if he was standing next to me.

"Sirius, was that Hermione I just heard?" Kingsley sounded disbelieving and faintly hopeful simultaneously. "Never mind- I was calling to tell you Charlie is doing much better."

If I had been a dog, my ear would have pricked upwards comically, but as I wasn't, I had to suffice with looking slightly more alert and asking, "How much so?" in an interested tone.

"Most of his bones have mended; the Healer said they had to do it in six hour intervals because of the drug he has to swallow to heal them. The punctures are going to be repaired tomorrow- he's been booked into a theatre for two o'clock- and the swelling is receding swiftly. The Healer said he should wake up after the operation."

"That's great news, Kingsley," I said, relieved. "Thank you for using the Mo Bill Fone and telling me."

"The what? On further thought, don't tell me, I'm not sure I'll understand." Kingsley's voice was dry and humorous, and it struck me just how worried about Charlie he must have been. How everyone had been.

Jesus, the Order had only know him for what, less than a week? Ten days? More? I couldn't remember exactly, but they were already so attached to him.

Like I was.

I clicked the bug thing closed and gave it back to an anxious Hermione hovering beside me.

"Well?" She demanded, and when I didn't answer immediately she glared hotly at me. "Is he going to be okay?"

I smiled warmly at her and replied, "He's going to be fine- almost all of his fractures are repaired, the punctures will be treated tomorrow and the other stuff is mending. The Healers even said he might wake up after the operation."

Hermione relieved grin sent my heart reeling. She threw her arms around my neck again and unexpectedly kissed me.

Don't get ahead of yourselves out there; it was just a happy, friend's kiss that you exchange when you get really good news.

So why was my heart thumping painfully against my chest and my head becoming light with lack of oxygen as I forgot to breathe?

I shook the unnerving thoughts from my head and looked down at her beaming face. She was actually happy; for the first time I could remember, there was a full, real smile on her lips.

I opened my mouth to say something, but then instantly forgot what I was going to say and closed it again. I lowered my gaze to the floor and after several seconds, I felt Hermione's cool fingers under my chin, lifting it up.

"Sirius?" she said softly. "I'm hungry."

xXxXxXxXxXxXx

Hermione was asleep.

Lucky her.

With everything that had happened today, I couldn't force the recollections and thoughts away to some remote corner of my mind where I could ignore them.

Hermione's face when I told her of Charlie's accident…

The genuine happiness when she heard Kingsley's news…

The feel of her lips under mine-

No.

Not that. I'm a grown man; she is a young, tortured girl that is vulnerable. How could I think such obscene thoughts when Hermione had been through so much?

Sick, sick sick man.

Stop this now Sirius.

To distract myself, I meandered listlessly through the deserted Grimmauld Place- the oppressing silence was unnerving, but it helped to block out the terrible thoughts that I was having, thoughts I wasn't allowed to have…

I wandered into Charlie's room. The curtains swished as the breeze from the open window caught them and made them flutter, whispering almost silently.

You filthy person.

How can you even face Hermione after remembering what her friendship kiss was like and enjoying it?

It's not my fault, I thought desperately, turning around the room insanely as things leered through the darkness at me. It's not my fault.

Why not?

Because you're a disgusting person,

Not fit to interact with human beings. To talk to people like you're normal.

Stop pretending to be like everyone else. You're not.

Run away, pervert and hide where we won't have to see you.

"I'm sorry!" I yelled at the empty room, my voice, layered with anger and terror, and most of all, guilt. Guilt because I knew what they were saying was true.

Of course it's true, the room whispered back, the poisonous words seeping through my skin into my body, leeching away the happiness, the sanity…

Am I finally, after all this time, after everything, going crazy?

I collapsed in a crumpled, broken heap on the floor and let the accusing voices swallow me in a mar of vile words, every single syllable picked from the part of my brain that a stowed all my buried guilt and thoughts I wanted no-one to ever see.

I wept as the darkness consumed me.

I found the book later, when time had eroded most of the night and frail, diluted light punctured the room's darkness.

Charlie's room's whispering voices had receded with the dark, and I was now capable of standing and drying my damp face. I cried. I never, under any circumstances, allow myself to cry.

I felt so weak.

That's when I spotted the book.

It was almost obscured by Charlie's pillow, but one centimetre of one corner protruded, and to any with Animagus-enhanced eyesight, was easily seen. With unexplained trepidation, I pulled it out.

It was a notebook- not a poncy, twenty-page one you could buy down at the card shop, but a thick, five-year-diary really- bound with its original gold clasp. Spell-o-tape and even string held lose pages that threatened to fall out at any moment. It was battered, as if it had been thrown across rooms too many times for it to take in its rather short life -it had 2003 written on the left corner in neat gold print. But it wasn't the colour or the word on the cover that caught my eye.

It was the blood spattered on the spine, front and back covers.

With growing unease, I unclipped the clasp and leafed slowly through pages. After several pages, my speed increased in my desperation until I was practically grabbing the pages and throwing them over. Every page was written in with elegant red calligraphy, some neatly, others scrawled as if the writer's hand had been shaky when he wrote it.

Every page was like the cover; spattered with blood of different levels of age.

I flicked to the last page that had been written on and read the date: Monday 2008. The back cover was visible from where I was reading, and I caught the name written in the same handwriting as the rest of the diary, journal, whatever it was.

Charlie Granger.

I'd known anyway, but seeing his name written there in front of my eyes made me choke and cough, pain coursing through my chest.

Charlie had written this, covered every page with his blood.

Part of me screamed to drop the book and run, leaving the diary and its contents alone.

Another didn't. It wanted to read what Charlie had felt when he had cut himself, his thoughts, the feelings that he never allowed himself to express. The words he never let himself say to anyone.

That part won.

Tenderly, with the care of a parent holding an infant, I began to read. To read with the energy I didn't know I possessed.

The energy that forced me to continued reading even when I was numb with horror.

A/N: Bit of suspense to leave you reeling there readers.

And to all you out there who actually care what happens in this story and aren't jus reading this to consolidate me, I can't decide whether to type Charlie's diary entries as a single chapter or as individual short chapters that last per entry- the first will mean it will take a while to update but you'll get it all in one go, or I can do quicker updates with shorter chapters- it's up to you out there. Yeah, review and tell me what you think- it would help a lot.

AT

1- but that's a pretty unnecessary statement; it's not exactly hard to figure out that a bus that can travel across continents in a single moment might be just a little bit special.