A/N: Gaaaaaah. That is all.
One By One.
by Flaignhan.
The first sign of things going wrong is loud, clear, and painful.
She drops a plate, because she realises that by this time tomorrow they'll be gone. It smashes on the floor, shards of porcelain spraying over her bare feet, leaving tiny cuts in their wake.
A wave of Sirius' wand fixes it and she tries to concentrate on the washing up. It's such a simple task, but she can't do much except stand there with her hands in the soapy water, staring out of the window at the grey, cloudy sky as raindrops splash against the glass.
"Have we had any owls?" he asks. She hears the flick of newspaper pages, and judging by his lack of comment on it, she assumes nobody has died in the last twenty four hours.
Or at least they haven't been found.
She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath.
"Hermione?" he says quietly. His chair legs scrape against the floor as he stands, and seconds later she feels his warm hands on her shoulders. He doesn't say anything, and she won't look at him. He is, apparently, used to this now. He pulls her gently away from the sink and twists her around so he can hug her. It feels like she's not living in her own body. The contact is distant, and it doesn't make her feel any better.
"No owls," she says quietly.
"I sent Peter one a couple of days ago," Sirius murmurs. "I think I should go and check on him."
She says nothing. What can she say?
Don't go.
She'd love to say that. She'd love to keep him here forever, safe from the knowledge of what will take place tonight, safe from revenge, and safe from Azkaban.
She just wants him to be happy, but once he leaves this flat, he's never going to be truly happy ever again.
"If I haven't heard from him by tonight I'm going to find him," he says. "Will you be all right here on your own? I'm sure Frank and Alice won't mind if you head over to their place for a few hours while I'm gone."
"I'll be fine," she whispers.
He gives her a final squeeze before releasing her, and waves his wand so the dishes begin to wash themselves.
Once the roar of his motorbike has faded, she curls up on the sofa and stares at the fire. Slowly, the flames dissipate, until all that remains are a few glowing lumps of coal.
It is another few hours before she hears the distant crack of him apparating, a few hundred yards from the boundaries of the enchantments. Seconds later, the front door opens and slams, and his legs walk into her line of sight.
She can't look at him.
"You've heard," he croaks.
"I knew."
He doesn't say anything, and after a moment, he collapses into an arm chair, buries his face in his hands, and begins to cry. She can't stand it, but he won't want her to try and comfort him. Not when she could have stopped all this from happening.
Eventually, she can take it no more, and she gets up, perches herself on the arm of his chair and wraps her arms around him. Perhaps it hasn't sunk in that it could have been prevented, had she been braver, or maybe he's too distraught to care right now, but he holds her tightly, so tightly it hurts. The pain is almost good though, because it's something different to the hollowness inside her heart, and the guilt that has been constricting her throat for the past year.
She can see sparks flying through the sky in the distance - red and purple and blue and gold. Owls are swooping through the air, silhouetted by the sun that's slowly creeping over the horizon.
It looks warm outside for the first time in years.
"Hagrid's taken Harry," Sirius says at last. "Dumbledore wants to put him with Lily's sister."
"I know," she says quietly, stroking his hair. "He'll be safe there."
"Any safer than with us?" he argues, turning his blotchy, tear stained face to look at her. "I'm his godfather after all. It's my job to -"
"It's really important that he lives with them. With her."
"Why? Why can't he live with us? You've heard what they're like, they won't -"
"Lily's protection will last until he's seventeen if he stays with Petunia. Lily's blood sacrifice extends to her sister. Voldemort can't touch him there."
"Voldemort's gone." It's the first time he's said his name. Apparently grief has thrown things into perspective, and a name is now just a name.
"Yeah..." she murmurs. "But he'll be safe there. I promise."
Sirius takes a few deep breaths, the heels of his palms digging into his eyes as though he thinks he can force his tears back.
"Have you always known?"
She can't do anything but nod, and though he can't see her, he takes her silence as a yes.
"Was it easy?"
"Not for a second."
"You could have -" he stops himself, before he says anything that really hurts. "You always knew Peter was the one? That's why you never spoke to him? Or even looked at him?"
"Yeah."
Sirius laughs, and the sound is slightly mad. "And you just sat there while I came up with this great plan to switch Secret Keepers. I should have known when you didn't say anything that it was a bad idea..."
"It's so important things happened this way," she tells him quietly. "I know it's not what you want to hear right now, but you have to understand."
"You mean I have to forgive you?"
"I don't expect you to do that." She extricates herself from him and stands, moving towards the door. "Get some sleep. I'll explain everything tomorrow."
He stands suddenly and marches towards her so quickly that she instinctively backs against the wall. Something registers in his eyes, and he stops, then closes the gap between them slowly.
"I need to know why it's so important that my two best friends died. Because I can't think of a reason good enough, I really can't."
"You know the contents of the prophecy?"
He laughs bitterly. "You're joking, right? This is to do with the prophecy? You know as well as I do that Divination's a load of dragon shit!"
"It doesn't matter what we believe," she says quietly. "It matters what Voldemort believes. He believes Harry's a threat, but you remember the words Trelawney used - theDarkLordshallmarkhimashisequal,buthewillhaveapowertheDarkLordknowsnot. Between James, Lily and Voldemort, Harry has all the tools he needs to get rid of him for good. Lily's protection will keep him safer than even Dumbledore could."
"What protection?" he asks impatiently, his hands gripping her shoulders. "Whatprotection?"
"Lily died to keep Harry safe -"
"James died to keep them both safe, why aren't both Lily and Harry protected?"
"James never had a choice. Lily did, that's what matters. He gave her the chance to step aside but she refused - he never offered James that. It's old magic, really powerful, and Voldemort didn't understand it." She says it all in a rush, as though it'll make it better, easier, if the words whizz through his ears at lightening speed. It won't though. Nothing will make it easier.
Sirius closes his eyes, his hands moving to the sides of his head to grip his hair. She doesn't know what to do except watch him. It's as though he's trying to process it all in his head, trying to make sense of something that just doesn't want to make sense. And then she realises that he's pushing it all from his mind - the fact that she knew - because that's one tragedy too much for today, and he can't deal with that. He can't deal with the fact that she's been lying to him for so long, and the fact that she can just stand aside and let her best friends die because she's not nearly brave enough as she ought to be.
"I saw him," he whispers, "Just laying there, eyes wide open...his glasses had fallen off, so I put them back on."
Her eyes prickle, tears building in the corners quickly, and before she knows it they're falling down her face like raindrops, as he falls apart in front of her.
"And Lily was covered in rubble from the house - the whole thing was blastedapart. And he was lying a few feet away from her, so I put him in a different room, because I didn't want him near any of them...and Harry was crying and crying and crying...I tried to make him stop but what can you do? His mum and dad were killed right in front of him..."
His words get lost in his sobs, and she can make out something about Hagrid and the motorbike, but then the rest is just anguish with the occasional word thrown in.
The one that crops up most often is 'James'.