Disclaimer: I'm tired. I'm hungry. I'm listening to "Come What May". I have toenails that I need to cut. Don't even think about suing me.
The song after that is "Come What May" sung by Ewan McGregor and Nicole Kidman in Moulin Rouge.
A/N: Dream talking is in Italics.
Time Is a Pretzel
Epilogue Two:
Light of the Dark Black Night
"Blackbird singing
In the dead of night.
Take these sunken eyes
And learn to see.
All your life,
You were only waiting
For this moment to be free. -"
Blackbird
Innocence. The word rang against the filthy stone walls like a child's deflated ball and fell to the floor in a heap of thickness. Azkaban knew no innocence. There was no innocence here in this darkness.
The only thing Sirius Black was innocent of was the crime he had been condemned for.
'So this is what little Peter was planning for me,' he thought to himself with a sneer. 'No wonder he became a rat. He ratted us all out.'
But that wasn't entirely true. Yes, he may have brought about Harry's orphaning, but he hadn't killed Hermione.
He didn't know who to blame for Hermione's death. That was the source of most sleepless nights. From sunset to sunrise for the past eight months, he had tossed and turned with the entire scene replaying through his head. Each time it was different. Sirius would go to Hermione to find the unmasked Death Eater culprit standing by her and casting the Cruciatus Curse; the Aging Curse barely missed Hermione and either hit himself or Remus; more often now Peter would be standing over them, mocking them that he knew the cure but wouldn't tell them. Sirius hated dreams. They were always lies from your subconscious.
Well… there was that one…
But he wouldn't think about that now. 'I have to keep my mind neutral. If I think about that dream, the Dementors will suck it out of me.'
So instead of thinking about the dream, he transformed into a dog and curled into a thin blanket of fur. He was starting to wear the floor smooth here – it was the furthest away he could get from those creatures outside his cell and perhaps the warmest spot, for it was towards the center of the giant prison. Sirius preferred to think of it as Chateau D'if, for he didn't want to think he'd actually been committed in Azkaban. And he didn't want to think he was in denial, but what else is "rephrasing in the mind to make it more comfortable"?
Too bad Sirius didn't want to dream – because tonight, he was going to dream whether he liked it or not.
~
Sirius was standing on a balcony, dressed in a satin Victorian suit.
Hermione came in the other door, dressed in a white silk dress. Her feet were bare with red painted toenails. Her hair was up in a giant mass of curls, and her eye shadow was a vivid red. Her ears were pierced with ruby studs just as red as the eye shadow. She mouthed one word. "Sing."
Suddenly, his baritone voice broke out with a slow, smooth tune:
"Never knew I could feel like this - Like I've never seen the sky before."
Hermione crossed the room and took both of his hands in her own pale ones.
"Want to vanish inside your kiss. Everyday I love you more and more."
She did kiss him, and it most certainly wasn't the quick peck on the lips she and Remus had shared at breakfasts. This kiss was one of the ones she had given Sirius when James scored the winning goal at the Quidditch Cup. It was deep and probing, and Sirius felt like he most certainly could vanish inside it. He was giving his soul through his lips, and she gave hers right back.
He came up for air and found he hadn't finished singing.
" Listen to my heart, Can you hear it sing? Telling me to give you everything. Seasons may change, Winter to Spring, but I love you until the end of time."
She turned around, but still grasped his hand as if she intended never to let go. She leaned against his chest and rested her head on his shoulder. Sirius had never felt so comfortable and was almost afraid of letting go.
"Come what may! Come what may! I will love you until my dying day!" they both sang together, their voices creating a beautiful harmony and a disturbing wholeness.
Hermione seemed to have the next lyrics in mind. Her leaned so her eyes looked as far up as they could to meet his and her lips ran diagonal to his chin.
"Suddenly the world seems such a perfect place! Suddenly it moves with such a perfect grace."
He knew where she was going with this, and seemed oddly enough to know exactly what she was going to say, because he joined in.
"Suddenly my life doesn't seem such a waste with only those around me.
"And there's no mountain too high! No river too wide! Sing out this song, and I'll be there by your side! Storm clouds may gather, and stars may collide," he sang the next line on his own, then she echoed him, and they finally sang together, "But I love you (echo) until the end of time."
She faced away from him again and began to sing to the sky, but Sirius couldn't tear his gaze away from her beautiful lips. His voice never clearly reached the birds above.
"Come what may! Come what may! I will love you until my dying day!"
It didn't occur to him throughout the entire dream that he loved her beyond her dying day.
"Come what may! Come what may! I will love you until my dying day!"
Her eyes fell from the cloudless blue, and she began to sing quietly to the ground below. "Suddenly the world seems such a perfect place…"
He untwined his fingers from one of her hands and cupped her chin. Their eyes met, and the fire in hers rekindled.
"Come what may! Come what may! I will love you until my dying day!"
She stepped away from him, and a longing ache within his chest filled the empty space inside. She was mouthing more words…
"Sing away. All you need is love. And He's at Hogwarts."
The words seem to make sense, but how he did not know. He repeated it over to himself. "He's at Hogwarts. He's at Hogwarts."
He would wake up saying those words. As the afternoon would wear on in screams, he would receive an issue of The Daily Prophet from Cornelius Fudge, claiming that he missed doing the crossword.
Fate had decided to return Sirius Black to the chessboard of history.
A/N: Whoa!
Sorry it's so short. I'd had so many people nagging me about another fanfic, I just had to go ahead and get this over with.
I've pulled Hermione's last words from movies, and they follow as such:
"Sing Away" - actually "Swing Away" in M. Night Shymalan's Signs.
"All You Need Is Love" - the title from perhaps the second most famous Beatles song ever recorded. "Yesterday" comes first, and I have used that already.
"He's at Hogwarts" - Must I really credit J.K. Rowling? I mean, come on…
But don't forget to tell me what you think, blah blah blah, and the rest of that crap. Thank you, and don't flame me for having Hermione kiss Sirius! I'm just not in the mood right now. And it's not as if I'll deliberately go back and totally redo the story because you don't like it. So put a sock in it, and just tell me about the stuff for which I care.
