Too Late
Sunlight poured in through the kitchen window, and I reached up and turned the crank, letting in the morning air. It was refreshing. Inhaling deeply, I scanned the cabinets in the vast stretching kitchen and looked for a mug.
As far as I could tell, I was the only one here. I had stood outside for a few minutes with no answer, and, although I felt bad for entering without permission, I unlocked the front door with my wand, and came in.
"Is anyone home?" I shouted once more, just to ease my uncertainty. I didn't want to take anyone by surprise. Tension was so high these days that it was almost dangerous to catch someone off guard. Especially with my family.
Getting no answer still, I shouted one more time. "It's Jaclyn!" Having announced my presence and straining to hear anything from the far reaches of the large manor, I resigned to the fact that I was the first one here.
I had apparated longer distances that I was used to today. I had made two trips back and forth between France and England in the space of a half an hour. The effect left me with a slight headache and an ache in my chest from the continual compression and expansion of apparating.
Right now, all I needed was some tea and to sit down somewhere. I found a mug on the top shelf of a tall cabinet and levitated it down. Waving my wand a few more times, I heated the water a conjured an earl grey tea bag.
Once it was finished, I grabbed it and pulled out a chair at the table, prepared to wait. "Where is everyone?" I wondered. I wanted so badly to put my head down on the table and sleep, but I couldn't bring myself to let my guard down like that.
The little voice of worry and apprehension in my head prodded me awake, and try as I might, I couldn't relax the tense strings holding my shoulders stiff and alert. There had been too many attacks in the last year for me to even relax over a cup of tea; the enemy was in a violent upheaval of late, and no one knew quite why.
The Hogwarts express should have arrived an hour ago if I remembered correctly. I had attended Beauxbatons while I was in school, and it had been four years since I had last met the Hogwarts express.
I sipped my tea again and scolded myself mentally for letting my worries overtake me. Still, my eyes flicked around the room at intervals, and my ears remained intent in picking up any noise. I reassured myself that it wasn't fear that motivated me; it was my 'Constant vigilance.'
The minutes ticket past without occasion though, and, only half realizing it, I let my head drop heavily into my hand.
"Click." The soft noise jolted me back to awareness. My eyes sprang open only to meet the sight of a soft red canopy around me. I had drifted off, I though guiltily as I pushed my long hair behind my shoulders hastily. Uncle Harry would be so disappointed.
Although, I thought, as I pushed my chair back silently and padded quickly towards the wall, I had awoken with my hand gripped tightly around wand. Fighting to suppress a small smile, I inwardly praised my developing auror reflexes.
Pressing down on the instincts that twitched at my wand hand and urged me to curse the first person that stepped through the kitchen door, I breathed deeply and silently. Eleven months of training with Uncle Harry had taught me, as an Auror, to never, ever jump to conclusions. I smirked; it was how people lost a buttock.
My breath hitched in my chest as I listened to the noises coming closer towards me. One set of footsteps echoed through the long hallways. The visitor left their identity unknown, and silently moved from room to room, as though searching for something, or someone.
I prayed to hear the sound of more voices, loud, and boisterous, and familiar. The sounds that would mean my large family had arrived and that this intruder was simply my grandfather, or my Uncle Percy. Yet, I heard and saw nothing save the clicking of male boots closer and closer to the kitchen.
As I pressed myself against the wall next to the door, the logic flashed unwelcome across my mind. Of course today would be an ideal time for someone to enter the manor unknown. The entire family was assured to be away, all at Kings Cross to greet the Hogwarts express.
There was so much to gain by searching this house, I realized as I slowly raised my wand, and so much to loose by having it attacked. Everyone in my family was a member of the Order of the Phoenix, and although Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny's house was headquarters and unplottable, the home of Ron and Hermione Weasley was an ideal target.
'And I'm all alone.' The thought flashed through my mind before I could squash it. I thought of my family as the boots drew within feet of the door, and as the knob slowly turned, I raised my wand and set my face with the firm resolve I felt surge through me.
The kitchen door swung open and like a silent animal-like predator, I swung, wand first, ready to attack.
Oh, Merlin. A wave of fear like none other I had ever felt coursed through me in a passionate sweeping motion and I felt my heart explode in my chest. Standing before me, in what could possibly have been the cruelest twist of pitiless fate, stood Sirius Lupin, in all his windblown, wide-eyed glory, my wand tip pressed against his throat.
Time seemed to blow across me as a slicing wind, picking up my world and spinning it around and leaving me paralyzed and aching, all at the same time. With no regard of my emotions, I felt them slip out of my control and display themselves across my face with no regard to situation or moment.
Emotions that I had spent months of my life living, dealing with, and finally suppressing sprang forth from the walls I had built around my heart. Hope. Mortification. Misery. Anger. Regret. And then…nothing.
The cold hand of apathy that I had survived on for the last year enclosed its grip once more around the struggling recesses of my mind, and I closed my eyes as I forcibly poured the freezing waters of time and healing over that broken and burning part of my heart. I searched for a mask to cover my naked face, and found one of cold hard indifference. With every ounce of control I possessed, I cemented this mask on my face, and met his eyes.
Trying not to show the exhaustion brought about by that resurgence of old emotions, I let my wand fall away from his pale neck and to my side. I knew in an instant that my decision to meet his eyes was a mistake. As many emotions as I had been coupled with seconds ago met their equals in his extraordinary eyes. They flashed from brilliant shades of sapphire blue, to rigid deep pools of water, to light and inextinguishable shades of azure.
I knew his eyes were the only part of him he was gifted with the ability to metamorphose, and I also knew that he only let that happen when his heart far succeeded the control of his consciousness. I knew too much, I realized as I turned my face away from his, too much to be safe.
I would have fought a group of intruders to the death before this; before I let myself show heartache in front of Sirius Lupin. With all the dignity I possessed, I willed my feet to propel me casually forward to the cabinets, where I got out another mug.
I kept my back to him, and, without apology, without explanation, asked as emotionlessly as I could manage, "Would you like some tea?"
I couldn't see his expression behind my back, but his silence was answer enough for me. I was sure he was embarrassed. He had probably been caught as off-guard as I had, I told myself, willing my heartbeat down and holding my breath. I waited for an answer, my breath still held tightly in my chest.
I heard him start, take a ragged breath, and stop. Pressing my eyes tightly closed to suppress a tear, I thanked Merlin that my back was to him. I cursed the inside of my eyelids, yet kept them closed. Images of color played themselves on the screen of my closed eyes. The many colors of Sirius Lupin's eyes…the colors of his heart.
I heard him let the door fall shut behind me, and hesitant footsteps drew closer to my back. Forgoing a response, I began to furiously prepare another mug of tea, fighting the urge to make it scalding hot. Boots clicked painfully slow across the cobblestone kitchen floor, each inching step marking reluctance in him, and nervous anticipation in myself.
He was almost to me now as I finally opened my eyes. I tried to convince myself that the threatening tears were stress induced and not those of long forgotten heartbreak. I looked down with fury and shame at my shaking hands and let the cup clatter against its saucer on the counter.
The quickened beating in my heart told me his presence was now a mere foot from mine, and without second though, I left the steaming mug on the counter for him to fetch himself, and spun around.
"Careful, it's hot," I said, before brushing past him and sitting stiffly in front of my own cup. My eyes lingered on his face for seconds long enough to catch the expression of hurt before I forced them to gaze out the open window.
'Good,' I thought bitterly. My days of being hurt were over.
Although I refused to watch his movements, I heard him scoop the steaming mug off the counter and felt his shadow cross in front of my sunlight. 'Would he want to make conversation?' I worried. I willed my cold resolve to hold as he pulled the chair across from me out with a scrape.
It had been a year since I had heard a single word from Sirius Lupin's lips. I had nothing more to say to him. There were words I had spent nights on my knees praying for him to appear and say to me. But now, it was too late. The fire in my heart protested once more, and I pressed down on it again. Too late.
"Thank you." His words came out of his mouth slowly, and yet they still caught me off guard. They didn't sound forced, or angry. On the contrary, they had a slight hint of a plea within their core. I looked up at him questioningly, and he gestured to the untouched tea in front of him.
I didn't know what else to say to him. "You're welcome." It was unemotional and empty and my lips felt numb with the cold of my own words passing through them.
The sun behind him glinted against his vibrantly black hair. He looked better than I had ever seen him, I thought against my will. His appearance was healthier and stronger than it had ever been. He was, if possible, more handsome. It was what a year apart from me had done for him. I cringed at the angst in my thoughts.
"You look good," he said softly, almost caressingly. I lifted my eyes behind my cup and studied his features. He was sincere. His face was tilted to the side and he looked…hopeful?
Hopeful for what, I didn't know. What could he possibly want from me when I had once given him everything I had to give?
Again, I didn't know how to respond. I could never repeat back to him the words that I had just been thinking about his stunning appearance, so I smiled simply, and remained silent.
Moments passed me by with painful slowness and neither one of us spoke. I allowed myself to become lost in my sea of thoughts when his voice broke through my reverie.
"You're angry." It wasn't a question. The hope from his eyes was gone, replaced by what looked like agonizing hurt. The sympathy of affection threatened to overwhelm me, and I tightened my mask about my face.
"No," I answered. It was true. I had overcome 'angry' long ago. Wounds may heal, and the pain and anger may subside, but the scars are always visible. I should have known he would be able to recognize my scars…like I recognized his eyes.
"You should be…" he whispered. The tone of his voice was gentle and ashamed and it threatened to crack at my resolve. Once again, I was left with no idea how to respond. I knew it was true.
I remained silent and impassive, and he spoke again. "Listen," his voice was hoarse and almost frightened, "I'm sorry I never…"
He stopped and I realized I had been shaking my head slowly. I didn't want to hear this. I couldn't hear this. Not now; it would be too much.
"Please, Jaclyn," I pressed my teeth together at the pain within his plea. "I need to tell you something…"
'I can't hear this,' I thought frantically. My scars are too fresh, too vulnerable. I knew my mask wouldn't hold. He seemed to be waiting for acceptance and I drank my tea in a large gulp, trying to bide my time and hide my face.
I stood up from the table, and brought my cup to the sink, once again turning my back to him. The sunlight danced merrily in rough contrast to the pin-like teetering of tension between us. I swore within my head as I heard his chair scrape away from the table and him rise to his feet.
I couldn't keep hiding from this, I thought as I tugged at the neck of my blue summer robes which were threatening to spill dangerously low on my chest. I suddenly felt self-conscious of my appearance in front of him. I turned more quickly than I had intended to and found him a mere foot from my face.
My stomach tightened painfully at the sight of his expression, and my hands felt like useless awkward weights hanging daintily at my side. He stared at me in silence for a moment. I watched his hands clench tightly at his side like he was refraining from reaching towards me.
"What?" I hoped he caught the double meaning in my words. The question had come out as though I were questioning his closeness to me, but secretly, in that deeper unmasked section of my heart, there was a fire burning that desperately wanted to know what he had started to tell me moments ago.
Before he could answer though, fate swung yet another awkward slap in my direction, and I heard the front door being thrown open with a loud bang. Both of us whipped in the direction of the door, and the sound of many shouting, bright, cheerful voices infiltrated the house like a violent awakening. They were here.
The brightness of their voices was like a cruel applause to my shattered hopes as the noise flooded through the crack of the kitchen door. Out the window I could hear the sound of multiple car engines gunning out of the sky the pops of people apparating onto the front lawn.
I turned back quickly to face her, but she was already moving past me, towards the door. 'No,' I thought, terrified. I had been so close. This was the moment I had been surviving off of for the last year, and it was slipping from my fingers.
I had spent twelve months living, breathing, and dreaming about her…about coming back to her. I stood rooted in my spot as she passed through the kitchen door and let it fall shut behind her. I felt like I couldn't breathe. 'I'm too late.'
I heard my father outside the window say to my mother, "Sirius' broom is here, he must be inside," and realized I had to face the family. Yet, my heart hurt with such agonizing disappointment that I felt like I would rather die on the spot than step through that door into the face of her cold rejection again.
I ran my hand through the back of my hair and down to my eyes. Pressing my fingers into them I watched the shower of dancing lights appear in front of my eyelids and pressed my lips together to muffle a choked sob of regret.
She was so hard, so distant. 'I made her that way,' I thought wretchedly, inhaling sharply as I remembered the look of misery and hurt on her face when she first saw me. I wondered who hurt more, her or me.
As I dragged dead weight back to the door, I let free the monster of regret from the back of my mind and allowed it to tow me into the painful memory of our last night together.
I apparated noiselessly onto the front lawn of Number Twelve Grimauld Place. The full moon shone down on me mockingly as I sank, exhausted, onto the front steps and let my head fall heavily into my large hands. I felt nauseous and my head spun slightly as I gripped it tightly with my fingers.
It was past midnight, and already I was feeling better than I had hours ago. Still, as I raised my head once more and got to my feet unsteadily, the weakness in my limp muscles made me ashamed.
The house stood dark and foreboding in the moonlight ahead of me as my long, usually powerful, legs struggled to propel me up the steps. I stood in indecision for minutes in front of the door, reading the inscription above it over and over again.
"The noble house of Black and Potter," I read. I repeated it in my head over and over again, not really focusing on the words. My mind and heart were waging a fierce inner battle within my chest and I sought to drown out the echoes of their clashing swords with the words.
"The noble house of Black and Potter," I read for the fifteenth time. Steeling my resolve I stepped forward and traced my warm, damp finger along the outline of a rearing stag to the right of the plaque. "Sirius Lupin," I recited to no one. I then traced my finger along the outline of a large black dog, its teeth bared against the sky to the left of the plaque.
I felt the protective magic course through me, judging me, judging my integrity and intention, red hot and strong against the other poison that ran through my veins on this night. I wondered momentarily if the magic in the wards could sense the venom in my blood, and then the door swung silently open in front of me.
I felt a sense of unease come over me as I realized I was breaking into the Headquarters of the Order of the Pheonix in the dead of night. The hallways stood dark and foreboding ahead of me, and I turned and closed the door behind me as silently as I could manage.
Suddenly plunged into darkness, I felt slowly forward with my feet, not daring to light my wand. When I felt the soft bump of my toe against the stairs, I groped for the slick wood railing and began to tip-toe up it.
During the daylight, I was Sirius Lupin and more than welcome in Number Twelve Grimauld Place, but in the dark of the night, I was simply a young eighteen year old man, fumbling awkwardly in the shadows, sneaking into the home of his equally young lover.
For one so young and stealthy, I thought mournfully as I reached the final step, nearly stumbling in anticipation of another, I felt so old and sick, and my heart felt burdened by the weight of years I didn't possess.
Her room was on the end of the hall. I stood in silent debate once more, engulfed in darkness and fearing that my beating heart would echo down the long hallways to the other bedrooms. My legs itched to turn around and forgo my task and my eyes, I cursed them for being so vulnerable, could barely stay open against the strain in my heart.
I set my mind to what I knew I had to do, and, turning left, found my way automatically to the door I knew was hers. The sweaty pads of my fingers rubbed against themselves, and I reached and turned the knob before I could stop myself.
Once inside, with the door shut firmly behind me, I took in the scene that surrounded me. It would be a scene that would plague my memories for the next year. The moonlight spilled through her open window and blanketed her long layers of red silk in an eerily alluring way as they sank down her pale forehead and off the edge of the bed.
One hand clasped a light white sheet tightly to her chest, and another lay open beside her cheek, pulling me towards it. I had heard the charms of the veela were more prevalent in the cover of night, and what I saw before me erased all doubt I had held of that thought.
Black eyelashes moved more slowly than usual in front of my eyes, and I grasped a hand to my heart and sank back against the door in the pain of heartbreak. As beautiful as she looked now, it was nothing compared to the first time I had seen her.
She had come to stay with Harry and Ginny Potter in their home the summer after she graduated from Beauxbatons. Her choice to become an Auror was cemented when Harry had offered his home and his training to her. Here was where she had stayed this entire, beautiful, fleeting summer…here was where I had first laid eyes on her and discovered what wise fools meant when they called it, "Love at first sight."
I loved her with every ounce of my heart. I sensed it long before I had known it. I felt that same heart rise up into my throat and choke the air out of me. I drifted breathlessly towards the window and put pleading hands against the glass. 'How dare you?' I asked the moon, suddenly filled with a senseless fury. 'How dare you steal this from me?'
As if in answer to my childish question, a cloud passed from in front of a corner of the moon and the pain in my head doubled momentarily before I was forced to look away. I felt the poison surge towards my head and I bent double, sick not only because of the full moon, but because of what I was about to do.
Straightening, I put my large hands against my abdomen to steady myself, and then in three long strides, her hand was in mine. I stroked her cheek, memorizing the feel of her skin within my mind. I wanted it to be forever etched in my memories. I felt her awake under my touch, and I traced her lips slowly with my finger, letting my hand fall down the length of her arm.
"Sirius?" she gasped and started to sit up. I put my finger to her lips. I didn't want Harry to know I was here. No one could know, and I could never, would never, explain. "Sirius…" she said again softly, sinking back against her pillow.
Her hair ruffled perfectly out behind her head and I allowed myself to simply stare at her for seconds before I could trust myself to speak. Wordlessly, I unlatched the golden catch on my cloak and let it crumple on the cold wood floor. Her eyes followed me quietly, trustingly as I untied my shoes and placed them on top of my cloak.
Locking my eyes onto her golden ones, I slipped myself under the sheet she had been grasping so tightly, and laid gently next to her. My heart beat furiously in my chest. This had not been my intent when I had come here. It had been quite the opposite. I needed to part from her, and at the same time, I so desperately needed to be close to her.
I had never felt like this before. My body was far longer than her slender frame and my broad shoulder towered over her relaxed form, yet here, in the place where she slept, my eyes naked in their intention, I had never felt closer to any other person in the world. This was love, I told myself against my will. This was trust.
The trust I knew I must break. I knew I should break. But intead, I found myself pulling her against my body and giving into the need within me. My arms brought her as closely as she would fit, her chest pressed against mine and her small hands grasping at the front of my shirt in response.
I let my eyes hold her gaze for a second more before lowering my lips to hers for what I told myself would be the last time ever. Our first kiss was so soft, so gentle, and so full of promise that I felt myself whispering to her within my head what I could never say aloud.
'I love you,' I thought.
I kissed her again. My lips gently melding against hers in a sweet heat. 'I always will.'
Again I pressed against her, this time with more intensity. 'I will give you everything I have.'
And quickly again, lingering longer and deeper against her lips. 'And everything that I am.'
I brought my lips down fully on hers now and grasped her face with both my hands. I needed her. I needed her to know that I loved her before it was too late. I enveloped her lips fully, now, refusing to separate and I poured every promise that spilled from my soul into her with a deep engulfing passion.
'Please don't ever leave me. Please don't let me ever leave you. I promise that I won't. I could never. I will always, and forever, truly, fully, and deeply love you, Jaclyn Weasley. Only you. There was only ever you. Please promise me that you know that. Please tell me you can hear me. Please, God, please…Have mercy…'
The sudden change in the end of my thoughts shocked me back into time and place. I couldn't do this. I felt sharp pangs all throughout my body. Pangs of need, pangs of desire, and pangs of sickness, and I knew that I couldn't stay.
I released her face from my hands, and pulled away as slowly as I had come. My eyes lingered for a moment on the finger prints on her cheeks, and a feeling of guilt washed over me.
"Sirius," her voice began before I could start. Her eyes looked up at my sitting form and her hand reached up and played with the straight black hairs on my neck. I felt goose bumps arise down my spine and I shut my eyes against it. I needed to be strong.
"Sirius," she said again, her voice soft and attractive in the darkness. "Stay with me tonight." It was so deep, so meaningful, so tempting. She let her hand fall down into mine and her eyes fall shut. For a moment I wondered, as I sat on her bed, my heart pounding painfully within my chest, if she had fallen asleep.
Then she spoke again, so softly that I wouldn't have heard weren't it for the stillness of the night. "I love you."
My heart came pounding to a halt. I knew it was true. She had never said that to me before. I had known she felt it, but hearing her say it, so pleadingly, so hopeful, so honest, I felt my heart shatter into a million pieces. Now, I knew what I had to do. There was no other way.
"I have to go," I said quietly. Her eyes flickered open and looked into mine. I could tell they were searching within mine for an explanation, and I looked at the door.
"Why?" She looked so vulnerable here in the moonlight, hanging on my response. The response I knew would break her heart. But it was better this way. She would hurt less in the end.
"I mean," I continued, not answering her question, "I'm leaving. For good." Her breath hitched in her chest. I could tell she was suppressing the flood of questions only with the pains of disbelief.
"I…" I pressed my eyes shut and turned my head so she wouldn't see the tears spilling from them. "I wont be able to see you again…ever." I knew I couldn't stay here. Every second that passed was causing me a deep physical pain. I couldn't look at her, or the moonlight, or this house any longer.
"Why?" The vulnerability in her voice was gone. I fumbled momentarily with the cloak I was putting on because of the venom in her words. Such cold fury, such hurt. It wasn't a question that could be left unanswered. Her tone demanded one.
"I have," I swallowed against the painful truth of my words, "nothing to give you. Nothing to offer," I said more firmly. I laced my shoes tightly, trying my best to create a pain anywhere else in my body but my heart.
I stumbled slowly towards the door, her silence at my back. Feeling closer to death that I had felt in my eighteen years, I turned the handle on the door and stepped out.
"You have love." Her words echoed against my back, penetrating my long dark robes and etching themselves with their sharp blade into my soul. She knew me. She could see it in me…she had heard my words of love.
Though it was truer than anything I had ever known in my life, I allowed myself only to pause for a moment before hanging my head, and shutting the door behind me. Once outside, I slumped silently against the solid wood, not realizing that I was waiting for her to come after me.
I waited in dark, miserable silence for four minutes without hearing one sound from within her room, and then, when I had almost given up all hope, I heard one strangled sob of utter heartbreak, followed by a muffling of wretched tears. Without waiting for her cries to tear anymore pieces out of my heart, I sprinted down the hallway, and out into the night.