Padfoot?
by
Padfootz-luvr
A/N: To those who have beared with me throughout the years, I thank you, and I apologize profusely. To those just joining us: Welcome! This story has been a big, fat, work-in-progress for almost three years now, and I almost abandoned it. ALMOST. Then I sat down, re-read what I had written, and, before I knew it, I made the conscious decision to correct all grammatical and punctuation errors, and to add to it a bit, give it more dimension and depth. So now here we are, reader and author, ready to embark on a new, perilous journey. This time, I primise to not abandon the wheel of the ship.
Disclaimer: :le sigh: I don't own Harry Potter or anythign else you recognize, blah, blah, blah, etc.
Chapter Seven:
Padfoot?
"No more memories..."
-Phantom of the Opera, the ALW musical
"Harry...Harry...can you...Hear me?"
Harry opened his eyes groggily, and gradually the world came into semi-focus; it was still quite fuzzy. There was a shape of a person's face above him, surrounded by some black-Harry assumed that was hair-and behind the shape Harry could see a huge looming mound of brown topped with a mass of black.
"Who are you?" Harry asked. Or, at least, tried to ask. From the perspective of the two raven-haired men before him, it came out as: "Hrr...yumm...?"
"Uh...wha...huh?" the man closest to Harry responded.
"He said something like 'hrr yum'...'least that's what it sounded like t'me," the hugeblobin the background said.
"Thank you for that translation, Hagrid," the closerblob said sarcastically. Harry could practically hear the guy's eyes rolling.
The young boyblinked a couple of times, realizing he couldn't see because of his glasses, or lack thereof. "My...my glasses..." Harry mumbled.
He felt the man closest to him start, as though shocked. "Oh, yeah...yeah, of course...um..." he appeared to bend over and fumble with something.
Then he sat back up and leaned forward, slipping the glasses back on over Harry's ears.
Everything immediately came into focus as the man pulled back.
Harry observed him for a second: what about this man had triggered such a strong surge of emotions and memories-where they memories? Were they figments of his imagination or shards of long-forgotten dreams? Harry pondered these questions as he studied the man's face, trying to remember his name; the shock of those long-forgotten memories-or were they just silly fragments of dreams?-must have addled his brain a bit.
The man closest to him had a young-looking, handsome face, with very defined features: everything about him was sharp and dark, from his stormy grey eyes to his jet-black hair to the charcoal-colored stubble along his jaw. He looked as though he hadn't had a good, decent meal in a while, however, and was very thin. Dark circles were forming under his eyes, too, as though he hadn't slept more than four hours, or so, in a while.
"Who are you?" Harry asked once he had found his voice. Both the men looked startled, and the huge giant, the one called Hagrid, opened and closed his mouth like a goldfish Dudley had once had. It had died within a week after Dudley forgot to feed it.
"Um...we're...I'm..." Hagrid stuttered, while at the same time the closer, younger man said, "He's...we...why...we already told you. Sirius, Hagrid." Sirius gestured to the reespective owners of the said names, staring at Harry as though he were worried about amnesia or something of the like.
"Yes," Harry exasperatedly, staring contemplatively at the two as they stuttered oddly, "I know your names, but what I mean is who are you and how do you know my name?"
"We're...well, I mean, we're not going to hurt you," Sirius explained, his hands gesturing to go along with his words, "if that's what you mean."
No, that's not what I mean, Harry thought, though he realy longed to say it. Years of being punished for speaking his mind, however, told him not to, so he didn't say anything.
Harry was still confused, but for some reason he believed this complete stranger. He didn't know why he trusted them; Harry certainly wasn't a trusting person, but he felt like he had met them before, and because of their almost playful demeanor, wasn't afraid in their presence.
Sirius looked at Harry again, straight in the eyes, and Harry almost jumped: this man's eyes were exactly the same as Padfoot's, his dog's!
It had always been a subject of pondering, Padfoot's eyes...they were a stormy grey that always seemed to convey his emotions, and yet, even when they seemed angry or sad, they held a spark of laughter. The inside, near the pupil, was a fierce, dark, stormy grey, forming a sunburst shape around the black void that was the pupil, and then it faded into a light slate color with spiderwebs of black, and then the merged back into black around the rims.
"Padfoot?"
A/N: Love it? Hate it? Etc...If this chapter is weirdly incompatible with the last, please inform me! I was trying to look them over, as it is my revised edition, but I kept stupidly mixing up the revised edition and the old edition. By the way, this will be OotP and HBP compatible. I shall be incorporating theories! (See profile for more info...)