Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. Nope, not me.

A/N: Yay for reviews!

Yay for this chapter being a Sirius interlude!

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"You have a lot of pictures of Harry," Sirius said lamely, trying to change the subject. He really didn't want to have to deal with this right now.

Lily smiled. "He is our son, after all."

Sirius smiled weakly. "Yes."

"We watch him, you know," James said, putting his arm around Lily. "Hardly a day goes by - if days can be said to go by here - where we do not watch him."

"How do you watch him?" Sirius asked curiously.

Lily got up and took a silver basin off a side cabinet. "With this."

"Is that a Pensieve?"

"No," James replied, "but it's similar. We can watch anything and anyone we choose here, you know. But most often, we watch Harry."

Lily pulled her wand from her sleeve and swirled the golden liquid inside the basin with it. "Harry Potter," she said to it clearly.

The surface of the liquid swam, before resolving into the face and features of Sirius's godson. It was early evening, by the looks of the light, and he was walking around a park. The place was deserted.

Lily sighed. "My poor boy. He's so lonely."

"You've seen how they treat him?" Sirius asked.

Lily nodded sadly. "I knew Petunia didn't like me, but she's let Vernon be downright cruel to him."

"He had a birthday party the other day, you know," James said.

Sirius looked up, surprised. "Really? Who gave it to him?"

"Remus and Aemilia," James replied. "Well, more Remus than Aemilia, though it was her idea. They invaded the Dursleys' place and had it in the backyard."

"Harry must have paid for that later."

Lily nodded. "Yes. But it was not as bad as it could have been."

"Thankyou for taking care of him," James said.

Sirius laughed bitterly. "I'm afraid I wasn't much of a godfather, Prongs. Twelve years in Azkaban and then three as a fugitive."

"But you loved him," Lily said gently, "as no-one had ever loved him before. That love you gave him was the most precious gift in the world."

Sirius looked sadly at his hands. "There were so many things I wanted to do for him that I couldn't," he whispered. "Simple things. Come and visit him at school when he ended up in the hospital wing. Take him shopping for school supplies. Watch him play Quidditch. Write indignant letters to his teachers bellyaching about how badly they treated him. Take him to have a quiet Butterbeer in the pub. Talk to him about girls." He looked up at Lily and James. "You know, he had his first girlfriend this year, and I found out about it through Snape? That almost killed me."

"If it's any consolation," Lily told him gently, "you didn't miss much. We watched."

James nodded enthusiastically. "She was a silly bint."

"James!" Lily scolded him, but Sirius didn't care.

For the first time in fifteen years, James Potter and Sirius Black laughed together.

*

But still, the time was bittersweet.

Sirius lost count of how many days he spent with Lily and James. Time ran strangely in the Otherworld. But never once did he eat or drink. That would be making himself a part of that world, and that was a choice he had not made yet.

That was his choice.

He had to choose between life and death.

A life… without Lily or James and quite possibly without Regina. A life where he was persecuted and largely hated, a prisoner in his own house.

A death… where he could remain with his friends. Remain with those who loved him. Watch Harry with Lily and James in their silver basin. And then, one day, they would all pass over too and join him

To live hated or to die loved.

And yet, he knew what his choice was to be. Had always known.

I could leave them as easily as I could leave myself, he thought.

He took up the violin - an exact copy of one he had left at Lily and James's house before it was destroyed - and began to play.

This was a magic that was his and his alone. No-one, ever, in the wizarding world, had ever played the violin like Sirius Black. He knew its wood, its strings, his bow as well as he knew his own thoughts. He had never been a writer, or an artist. He was a musician, and the violin was his weapon, a tool that let him pour out his passion into the world.

And he knew the choice he had to make.

"I have to go back," he said.

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Next chapter… Remus deals with the aftermath of his actions…