The Gulf That Separates Us: July 1994

Disclaimer: I own nothing except any OCs.

Summary: For the first time in twelve years Sirius sees the wife he abandoned. What happened in the moments in between, before that difficult conversation even started?

Part of 'The Lost Years' series, set in July 1994 just after Sirius escapes the dementors and the Ministry at Hogwarts. Imagine he somehow found a way to reunite with the family he hasn't seen in twelve years, after all the truth has come out, at least to those who matter most, surely the first thing he'd do now is go to find them?

Note: The three stories in this series; July 1994, aren't written in the same kind of style as the other one shots but I included them because they are part of the same universe of my story 'Someone to Understand'.

You see her and it's like Azkaban never happened.

Like those twelve nightmarish years were just a dream, a dream which you've only just now woken from.

She's just as you remember her, and yet not… So beautiful, so perfect, so lovely, and yet…so cold. Azkaban has not just touched your heart, it's touched hers too and that was your doing, your fault. You wonder absently if she'll ever forgive you, then muse how little that matters; you'll never forgive yourself.

You want to reach out and touch her, caress that silky skin and gaze into those crystalline depths. It would be so easy, the most natural thing in the world do to, and yet you can't. You lost that right a long time ago, the night you left and never came back.

So much left unsaid, so much time passed, so much water under the bridge. You're not the same anymore, neither one of you. Where once she would have welcomed your touch, now…now she'd probably flinch away…or perhaps you'd flinch from her. You're not the same man anymore than she's the same girl you last saw valiantly holding back tears in a soft white night gown as you swept out of her life for twelve whole years.

This woman before you is not that girl. She is not going to burst into tears, or demand explanations they way she would have done…the way she did. She will wait patiently for you to explain. She knows enough not to hex you on sight, but she needs answers, she deserves answers. The quaffle's in your zone, but you haven't the faintest idea where to start.

Too many half truths and secrets lie between you, you know that no matter what you say, or how you explain your part in affairs that she'll never forgive you. Perhaps she shouldn't, you left her. You swore that you were different, that you'd never leave, would never hurt her…she believed you, trusted you…and apparently you lied since you did all of that and more, abandoned her and Salena when they needed you most, and for what? What did you even achieve? Nothing, that's what, three lives destroyed and it meant nothing, except that a traitor was given the chance to escape. You could kick yourself for your stupidity, you should have seen it coming, should have seen it all, but you didn't. You were so damn arrogant, so damn sure of yourself and look what happened. Gods you couldn't have hurt her more if you'd set out too.

You should have told her the truth from the start, all those years ago. It feels like centuries have passed since then, like another life, like it happened to someone else, because here, now, knowing what you now do you don't know how you could ever have made those godawful decisions. Well they say hindsight is 20-20….

You knew you could trust her, knew unequivocally that even if everything else had gone to hell and your friends were fractured and strange and everything had gone wrong that you could still count on her. She wasn't the traitor, you knew that, and she wasn't some helpless little girl who needed your protection, in all the time you'd known her she'd never been that, and yet you hid things from her, hid the truth. You never told her the prophecy, or about the fidelius and the secret keeper change. She'd have heard about all of that after your arrest, probably from the press or that damned brother of hers. Marius always did hate you. And if only you'd told her the truth, kept her up to date, how much of this disaster could have been avoided if you had?

If she'd known the truth then she could have saved you, perhaps Peter could have been captured back then and then…or maybe things would have been worse, maybe Peter would have found out that as he seemed to find out everything else and her and Salena would have been added to the list of his victims. Which is exactly why you didn't tell her….well not exactly, you didn't know who you were protecting her from, only that there was a spy (Remus you thought), and that the less she knew the less danger she'd be in, that was the theory anyway. That and you couldn't run the risk of her being forced to tell anyone what she knew since it would have put James and Lily in yet more danger.

In trying to protect everyone, you succeeded in protecting no one. You can't know what could have happened but you recognise now that you should have told her, for all the good that does anyone. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, even if there are no shortage of bad ones in the world.

You gaze into those once so familiar cerulean eyes and try to figure out what she's thinking; you don't have a clue. You used to be able to read her like a book, it's amazing what twelve years can do for someone's mental defences, though the gods know your own were shredded by Azkaban.

She's so guarded, so poised, but then she always was, you can't say that's changed, and yet it has, because you know that before you left you'd started to break down her barriers, get her to drop her guard at least with you. But right now you might as well be strangers, whatever trust existed between the two of you it's long gone, and you can't say you blame her for that. You deserve worse, and yet this realisation kills you because even after all this time you still love her…but you can't honestly say whether she loves you or not, how could she after all this? But can you deal with the realisation that it's really over. But is it? There's still Salena…and the bond you two shared was always so strong…yet if it was so strong then why didn't she believe in your innocence? Is it so selfish to be angry, no furious, at how quick she was to believe the worst about you? Not that she didn't have reasons, she did, they all had reasons for acting the way they had done, and look how well that had turned out for everyone involved…. You know this isn't helping, you're only making things worse, but thinking dark thoughts has long been what you do best, why should that change now?

Part of you is furious with her. She left Harry to his own devices, she never checked up on him, never interfered. But did you honestly expect her to? Something that overt would never have been her style; she would never so publicly challenge Dumbledore. What was she supposed to do, take him in and raise Harry as well as Salena by herself? Sirius Black's wife, the Ministry would have never stood for it, and Dumbledore would never have allowed it. If you'd told her the prophecy perhaps things would have been different, but you never did. You always rationalised that it was James and Lily's secret to tell, and Merlin knew James never wanted her to know, but the truth is that you know they half expected you to tell her, after all it's the unwritten rule of marriage, telling a secret to your partner isn't really breaking anyone's trust.

Anyway considering her own childhood she probably wouldn't have seen that much of a problem with the Dursleys even had she known, as far as she's concerned adversity breeds endurance, strength. You can't say she's wrong about that, it's one of the reasons that Harry is so tough, and after all Harry wasn't her responsibility, he was yours. Bearing in mind what you did it is hardly surprising that the last thing she'd have been thinking of with all the other crap going on in her life would be fulfilling your obligations. She let her anger with you cloud her better judgement; let it consume her loyalty and affection for Lily, which you knew she had. She never thought highly of James, and the feeling was more than mutual, but she always respected Lily, and you know that if things had played out differently she would have adored her son, a boy who is sometimes so very like his mother that looks aside it is hard to believe he's James' son. Can you blame her for all this though? For a young boy's pain, yes you can, she was better than that, but for her reasons, no, because in the end it once again all comes back to you and your failings. You failed them both. You try not to let the thoughts consume you, there's too much else going on here for that…

You've dreamed of this moment for twelve years. Every night it was her face you fell asleep dreaming of, it was her memory you held onto, and those memories of her, they weren't happy, the dementors couldn't take them. Every one was tinged with bitter sweetness, with fear, and anguish and pain because their lives were always so precarious, always so dangerous, uncertain. Then knowing you'd never see her again, never get the chance to explain, and she'd die thinking that you'd betrayed her, that it was all a lie, that alone was nearly enough to finish you off, dementors be damned.

You look at her now, and compare her to the picture you've had of her for so long in your mind. She's changed, it should be obvious, but you find yourself caught off guard by the changes. How long has she had those fine lines, the first stage of wrinkles crinkling the corners of her too vivid eyes? They're by her mouth too, just in the corners, you're willing to bet they're not laughter lines, frown lines perhaps but you seriously doubt they have anything to do with laughter, she's had precious little to laugh about and that's your fault, it all is. She's not even thirty four, she shouldn't have wrinkles, not yet, you've done this, marred the beauty of her face, caused premature worry and age lines…and yet these little imperfections don't really mar her beauty as you once so arrogantly thought such lines would ruin any kind of beauty. She's just as beautiful as she ever was, but it's more meaningful now, she's been through hell and back and lived to tell the tale, these marks give testament of that journey, and you love her all the more for them. She seems more real now, less like that eerily perfect statue she always seemed to you to be as teenagers. All that flawless skin and perfect features, always so carefully composed, if not for her eyes, those unnatural eyes, always laughing, and mocking, raging and burning you would have thought her unreal, but now, now you almost feel as though she's mortal, fallible like the rest of you. It makes her seem warmer, which is a paradox since she seems so much colder these days.

Your doing again. How much must your supposed betrayal have destroyed her? You long to ask but it's not appropriate, you don't have the right to ask her questions. You owe her answers, not the other way around, that's how this is supposed to play out. But you know it must have destroyed her, she let so few people in and to have one, the one she trusted most, turn around and betray her along with everything he had ever claimed to believe in, never telling her a word of it, and so soon after loosing her baby sister most have thrown her into despair. You don't know how she survived it, you couldn't have survived the same, you're willing to admit that, but then she always was stronger than you.

She's even stronger now, just as you're weaker, and not just physically, it's a fundamental shift in the balance of power in your relationship and you don't know how you feel about that. You always had the upper hand before, or at least thought you did, and now…now it's clearly no longer the case. Her eyes seem colder, more cynical, even more jaded, if that's even possible, but she's resilient, you'll give her that.

She's tough, but then she'd have to be, she brought up your child alone, had to deal with being the wife of Sirius Black, alone…and she went back to them, her family. That much is obvious; she screams it from every pore, from her impeccable silk violet robes, to the Maycomb crest at her throat, perfect posture and perfect composure. An aristocrat to be proud of.

The only life she ever knew before you, you knew she'd go back, without you she had no reason not to, nothing left for her to hold onto. She always was more circumspect about things than you, so careful not to completely alienate people even while you were doing your damndest to polarise pureblood opinion against you. She was always the cautious one…and though it kills you to admit it she was right, no doubt it was her family (and yours, what's left of it) that saved her, from the Ministry, from the press, from the other Deatheaters. She had her work cut out for her just surviving, but then you never doubted that she would. She's tougher than she looks; you've always known that, even if no one else ever saw it.

You wonder what she sees when she looks at you now, you know you're a wreck, twelve years in Azkaban would do that to anyone. But does she still see that boy you used to be shining through your emaciated mask? Can you two find a way back to each other? You don't know, and the thought that it might be too late terrifies you, what's left for you without her? You still have Harry and Salena to worry about, and of course poor Anne, but what kind of life could you really have without her?

You haven't been complete with out her; it's as simple as that. With all these years between you, all these unalterable changes, this vast gulf separating you, one thing has never and will never change and that is your love for her. She's the other half of your soul, battered and broken though it is now. You hope and pray that she still knows that, even as you see the realisation glittering in her ocean blue eyes, once again alive with feeling, where moments before they had been dead and glum. Perhaps your bond is not as dead as you had thought…

She knows; she still feels it. She sits in silence waiting for you to speak, but no longer is the silence oppressive or cold, now it is tentatively hopeful, almost warm. You can't go back, but perhaps all hope is not lost. Now is the time for explanations, you pray to every deity you've ever heard of and failed to believe in that she will find it in her to understand as you finally open your mouth to speak, her wait has not been in vein…

Thanks for reading!

Please review!

XXX