When Order meetings run late, Remus can see the dark circles under Sirius's eyes stand out in sharp relief against the pale of his face. At moments like those, Remus realizes again that Sirius will never look quite the same. He will never be quite the same, either. He gets tired more easily, and arguing wears him out in a way not always immediately noticeable. Remus tries his best to make him forget.
x
April, 1981
Sirius's face was ashen. Remus had learned the word when he was very young, sitting in infirmary beds with his hands bandaged, and his mother by his bed looking anywhere but at his face. The word came back to him at odd times. His first instinct was to get to Sirius, to be near him, and he stood up quickly but moved no farther than the edge of the couch. He felt helpless, suddenly, statue-like. He asked Sirius, in a voice low and thick with urgency, what was wrong.
"I've never seen so many dead in my whole life, Moony," Sirius whispered. He looked straight ahead the whole time, eyes locked to Remus's, until his outstretched, gripping hands found a chair and he sank himself into it.
Remus found it in himself to move, then, and he was next to Sirius in heartbeat speed—in the time it took for his heart, slowed now, it seemed, with fear—to pound against his ribs only once. He knew his arms and hands and touch and presence could do little. He had to try anyway.
He wanted to ask what had happened, and if James was okay, and maybe if Lily and Harry were okay, too, even though they shouldn't be in danger, secluded in the country as they were day and night. But then, nowhere was safe. His thoughts were not even safe, not the way they ran back and forth and into each other, not with the way he could only care about Sirius, who was shaking but not crying, just shaking so hard it was like he was about to burst.
"Diagon Alley," he managed.
"You don't have to say anything."
"Yes, I do. Fuck, Remus, don't you want to know?"
"I do, but—"
"I can manage it!"
Sirius had been doubled over, curled into the space of Remus's chest, but when he sat up and pushed away it was with unexpected force. His eyes were wild and feral. Remus couldn't remember the last time he'd had that feeling, right in the pit of his stomach, not fear but not unlike fear, as easily described as dread as anything else.
"Remus," Sirius managed. "We didn't expect it. James and I, we were just walking. They came out of nowhere."
"They attacked you?"
"No. They were attacking someone else, someone on the street. I didn't even know who he was. Now he's dead."
"Sirius, stop."
They weren't the words he meant, but it was what he felt in his stomach, and in his head, and in his heart.
"Why, Moony, are you afraid? You should be. It was carnage. It's how it's going to be from now on. It's how it's always been." Sirius was almost laughing, his lips spread in a weird almost-smile, his eyes wide and gleaming.
Like a rabid dog, Remus thought.
"Sirius," he said, speech halting, eyes dashing. He reached out and grabbed hold of Sirius's arms, hands gripping the cloth of his shirt, knuckles white with the pressure. "Sirius. Stop. I mean it, just stop talking now."
"There were piles of dead."
"I know."
"I'm never going to stop thinking about it."
"You will."
"No."
"Sirius."
And the whole time, his hands on Sirius's arms.
Sirius wrenched away from Remus's grip suddenly, a wild burst of energy coiled out from fear and anger and pain. He stood up and started walking, stalking, to the other side of the room. Remus caught up to him quickly. He grabbed him from behind and turned him around and held him close again. It was a violent hold he had on him. It was violent the way Sirius started to shake again, struggle at first and then collapse, standing up only because Remus was holding him. They stayed like that for a very long time.
Remus would replay the images for days: the images of people lying in the street, between the flowers sprouting in the cracks of the sidewalk, under the newly blooming trees. There were still patches of snow, but they would be melting fast as Sirius and James walked past them. People would laugh and smile and talk with each other, and maybe there would be hope, that in this war torn landscape some things could still be good.
What about the days Remus had forgotten? What about moving day, Valentine's Day, hours spent with Harry? Had the knowledge ever really left him? There was a new scar right at his collar bone, and he ran his fingers over it, testing the bruise, the pain. It was new spring outside. The bodies were being moved from the streets.
But the worst was Sirius. He was wild, for a moment, he was over the edge. He was maybe not coming back.
No, that was stupid. That was ridiculous. Sirius always came back to him, always.
x
end part 4/10