Chapter Twenty-Three

December the Twenty-Sixth, Nineteen Seventy-Eight

"How is she?" Davie asked, coming up behind James with her arms crossed -- Lily had fallen asleep on the couch in Davie's receiving room, with James sitting on the table in front of the couch watching her, looking quite weary as he rested his head on his knees. His eyes gave away his exhaustion -- it was now nearly four in the morning and it appeared that Lily had been the only one the entire night who had gotten any sleep after crying for what had to have been at least an hour straight. Still, he managed a weak smile in Davie's direction.

"Good as can be expected," he said weakly, running a hand over the sleeping girl's hair. "I -- I think she'll be fine. You were fine, weren't you? After a while."

"Fine is a funny word for it," Davie admitted with a sad smile. "But -- yeah. Yeah, I was. After a while. After a long while."

Indeed, they all seemed fine -- but very tired. James was the first besides Lily to fall asleep, sitting on the floor and resting his head on the couch where he girlfriend was resting. Remus fell asleep in one armchair, while Sirius and Davie somehow managed to both fit into another.

Davie, however, did not manage to stay asleep for long -- though the bones in her arm were healing on their own, the feeling of them repairing was a strange dull ache that was difficult to ignore. It was this ache that caused her to be awake to her a soft knock on the door.

Momentarily, she wondered if it would be safe to open the door -- but if it were an attacker, she rationalized, they would not be likely to bother with niceties such as knocking on the door. Sliding out from under the arm Sirius had draped over her, she put on her slippers and tiptoed quietly through the door, careful not to wake anyone.

Closing her hand around the doorknob and twisting it, her eyes took a short while in the dim light to recognize what she saw, but once she did possess any recognition of the situation, she was unsure of what response it deserved -- there, standing on her doorstop in a black traveling cloak was Severus Snape.

"I don't suppose you're turning yourself in," Davie snarled in fury, whipping out her wand, but nonetheless shutting the door behind her. If this was meant to get ugly, no one else had to be involved. "I know you were there tonight --"

"Lily is alive, then?" Severus interrupted carelessly. "I am here for no other reason --"

"STUPE--"

But Snape raised his own wand and sliced it through the air, silently cancelling Davie's spell. "Lily --"

"Lily is alive. She's inside, and you are staying away from her. Forever, unless you want me to kill you." Davie said, giving her wand a hard jab in Snape's direction; the wind blew a tendril of hair across Davie's face, then with another sharp gust, cleared her hair away from her face; her features seemed colder, sharper than Severus Snape had ever seen them. For the first time, Davie Maddux did not look like a child to him. "You have no right to be here -- I know you were there tonight --"

"The letter," Snape said, still not caring for a word Davie said -- Davie looked at the same time infuriated and affronted and -- surprised at the fact that after months of training, Snape still elicited some level of sympathy from her. "Did you give her the letter --"

"She doesn't care about your bloody letter," Davie hissed angrily. "She just lost her parents, and you expect her to care what you have to say? I never gave her the letter and I never will because you don't deserve her."

For a moment, Snape's expression quivered as though he were pained - but in Davie's mind, he should no longer be capable of feeling it. Not after what he was doing with his life now. He had honestly never had high praise for Davie - it was the reason Snape gave for the fact that the silly girl wanted to be friends with him. In his mind, she was nobody except for Lily's best friend. And now even she loathed him -- instead of confusing him, it seemed to make everything clear. He had nothing left to draw him to this ruse of the side of 'good'.

Instead of saying anything, doing anything, he let out a ragged breath and disappeared with a pop.

Davie simply stood at the doorstep in disbelief, pulling Sirius' shirt more tightly around herself as she stared around the empty space around her home -- it was cold, and the sky was now turning a hazy shade of indigo instead of pitch black. The only thought that came to mind was that it very lonely, and very quiet --

-- until, when a small rock fell downward from the balcony, and Davie's gaze shot upward; she saw Remus standing there, staring down at her questioningly. In the blink of an eye, he disappeared, reappearing right in front of Davie, crossing his arms.

"Are you keeping secrets from us, Davie? About Snape?" Remus asked, shaking his head quietly. "I heard everything --"

"I know, I ought to have hexed him. I ought to have killed him," Davie said in a low, hostile tone. "But -- Remus, you can't tell Sirius, but… Severus and I were friends. They can't know about this. I didn't think it would come to this. And I think you know, it's hard for me to just forget about a friend. Especially not after what happened to Romnic. So much has happened Remus. I don't even know how to describe it to Sirius anymore."

"He can be difficult, I know," Remus nodded. "But -- he'll understand you, I think."

"I want to apologize for earlier, by the way -- I don't know what got into him," Davie said quietly, reaching out and giving Remus a pat on the arm. "He's just been worried about all of us. All of this is harder on him than he lets on, but I'm sure you all knew --"

"He didn't spend as much time with us while you were gone -- dunno if he wrote you about that," Remus said, pacing a bit and leaning against the wall of the house with his arms still crossed. "Spent most of his time at the Tonks' house, actually. He was a bit upset -- it's different for him now. James has Lily -- he's never really had to deal with that without you around."

"Well, it's good for us. We have to be ready for anything, don't we? For all of us. I know I needed it," Davie said honestly. "I needed to learn to be on my own, Sirius needed to learn to be on his own --"

"He doesn't seem to have learned much of anything," Remus pointed out matter-of-factly. Davie sighed quietly. "That's the one thing Sirius doesn't ever want to do is change."

"I know," Davie nodded quietly, sighing and relaxing her arms tiredly, speaking to Remus with ease despite not having seen him for months. "And I can't blame him. Changing means growing up. Growing up means responsibility, and expectations to live up to -- he's already worried about that. You know, he never said anything, not even to me, but after --"

"What his mother did," Remus provided knowingly. "I know what it's like -- not to be accepted. But not by my own family."

"But you know what else I realized?" Davie said abruptly, a small smile settling onto her face. "After being away all that time, I realized that I love that prat more than anything else in this world, dysfunctional as he is."

Remus laughed, shaking his head at Davie's choice of words; despite the fact that she worried terribly about what others thought, she always spoke so bluntly. It was the very trait that had always made her and Sirius clash throughout their time at Hogwarts, and yet strangely enough, it was probably a trait they shared that made them right for one another as adults.

"It's freezing out -- your welcome home present is going to be a terrible flu at this rate, we ought to get back in," Remus pointed out, placing his hand on the door handle.

"Are you joking? After spending more than half of December in Bulgaria?" Davie laughed, rolling her eyes, though obligingly allowed Remus to open the door to the house. "This weather seems a bit like summertime, there isn't even any snow --"

"Where've you two been?"

Remus and Davie were quieted when they found Sirius standing in the doorway -- his question was quiet, but laced with suspicion; his gaze was fixed not on Davie, but on Remus. Remus glanced at Davie, and he momentarily considered simply telling the truth about who Davie had gone out to meet, but as a friend, she had made a request of him to keep her conversation with Severus a secret, and Remus could not bring himself to betray her trust.

"Davie wanted some air," Remus explained. Unimpressed, Sirius looked at Davie, who first glanced at Remus, then walked back up to Sirius, touching his arm gently.

"Sirius, I just had a lot on my mind and couldn't sleep. I didn't want to wake you, you were snoring," she explained; it was a half-truth, anyway. With Davie's confirmation, Sirius gave Remus a stiff nod. Remus excused himself from their company, and Davie gave Sirius' arm a swift tug, staring at him appraisingly in the light of the slowly growing dawn. "What's gotten into you?" she asked in concern. "I know it's been a long night but -- bloody hell, Sirius, it's Remus. He's been our friend forever --"

"Something's making me uneasy," he whispered honestly. "I know he's our friend. I'm sorry -- I -- I don't know who we should trust anymore --"

"Trust me when I say that he's still the same old Remus. I can tell," Davie said, halfway between resolution and pleading. "You're getting paranoid, Sirius."

"They killed Lily's parents and they had nothing to do with this," Sirius said -- Davie saw in him a a sort of disillusionment that he had certainly never possessed while they were in school, and she suspected that for once, Sirius Black did not consider something a game. "What about us? You, Lily, James -- d'you think they'll spare any mercy for any of you?"

"No, I don't." Davie said honestly -- and Sirius suddenly saw the difference in her as well. She wasn't crying or cowering, she wasn't shaking. She wasn't looking to be protected, and that, Sirius was sure, was the most unsettling change. If she no longer needed his help, his protectiveness, what good was he?

"We knew they wouldn't spare a single one of us when we agreed to this Sirius. Remember?" Davie asked, thinking back to the day, just a year earlier, when Dumbledore had called them into his office. Just as she and Sirius both thought of the day, the way Fawkes had flown in the window and across the room, the first beam of sunlight burst in through the windows of the home.

Davie crossed her arms quietly, looking down at the floor, squinting slightly in adjustment to the light. The previous night at the party, it had been easy to pretend things were the same as they had been in previous years when they had been protected by the enchantments at Hogwarts -- but now that they were out of school and back to their real lives, it was clear that they weren't.

Without warning, Davie practically lurched forward, wrapping her arms around Sirius with such fervor that even he seemed confused, to the point that he no longer felt quite as angry. He reciprocated the embrace, resting his face against her hair, huffing audibly.

"Bloody hell, what am I going to do with you, woman?" he asked with a throaty chuckle. "You never were good at staying out of trouble."

"Look who's talking," Davie laughed quietly, still resting her head against his chest. When Sirius gave a loud yawn and pulled away to stretch, he looked up and noticed James stirring. Sirius and Davie moved over to the couch as he woke up, swiping his glasses from off of the table -- all at once, three pairs of eyes caught sight of the bottle of firewhiskey they had been drinking from the previous night. Had it only been the previous night? Davie kicked it away in resentment, sending it skittering across the wood floor.

"What do you think she's going to do when she gets up?" James asked quietly, looking down at Lily, who was still completely out cold.

"Cry." Davie said in a solemn, knowing voice. "Refuse to eat for a short while, be terribly quiet--"

"You don't think --" Sirius began carefully, stepping up and looking Lily over -- she was even more a mess than the rest of them, which was saying quite a bit, considering what they had all been through the previous night. "-- maybe we should just modify her memory--"

"No." Davie said resolutely, shaking her head - her eyes grew slightly teary just looking at her sleeping friend. "Trust me -- it's something you need to face. Something you need to deal with." Davie sighed, glancing at James and scooting closer, kneeling next to him. "I think you'll be the one she'll be most comforted by. Just being there and not leaving her when she wants to cry," Davie said carefully, then, she added with a sidelong glance towards Sirius, "I know that one from experience too."

Standing up quietly, Davie moved back towards Sirius, but still looking at James. "I suspect she'll be waking soon -- I think we'll leave you two. Shall we fix some breakfast or something?" Davie asked Sirius, who assented; the pair departed to the kitchen.

Meanwhile, just as Sirius placed his arm around Davie and left, Lily stirred a bit, rubbing her tired eyes as James watched her anxiously. As her emerald green orbs finally opened completely, glancing at her surroundings questioningly, she let out a shuddering breath, covering her face with her hands - finding herself in Davie's home in the same tattered clothes, with the same bruises and aching confirmed what she had hoped had been a bad dream. It had been Christmas, they had all been together just hours before it had all happened.

"Shh," James said, leaning forward and placing his arms around Lily's shoulders. "Lily --"

"I wasn't dreaming," she said, throwing her arms around James and seeking comfort, hugging him tightly - James was relieved that Lily didn't shy away from everyone the way Davie had. "James, my mum and dad -- it's all my fault!"

"No, it isn't -- Lily, listen to me," he said sternly, holding his girlfriend tightly. "It shouldn't have happened, none of us asked for this. But -- but we have to keep going, right? We're not going to let Voldemort do this to anyone else. Not to any other families. No more."

"We won't," Lily agreed, though she continued to cry, practically soaking through the shoulder of James' shirt. "But --Mum and Dad are gone. Petunia will never speak to me again. I feel so alone --"

"No," James said, pulling back and holding Lily almost at arms' length, gripping her shoulders and looking almost piercingly into her tearful green eyes. "Lily, you will never be alone, do you understand me? Never. I'll be here for you -- always."

"Will you, James?" Lily asked in a vulnerable, pleading voice. "Will you?"

"Forever, Lily," he agreed as he pulled himself on the sofa next to her, pulling her close again and stroking her red hair lovingly. "I won't leave your side, Lily. Somehow -- you and me. We'll find a way to get justice for your parents. For everyone. You and me."

***

A/N's

A lot of talking going on in this chapter, but not a whole lot of action. Bigger events will be happening very soon!

Thanks to siriusfanno1, Little-Miss-Pessimistic, and , for subscribing, and thank you to amrawo for the review!

Keeping the notes short this time, but as always, feedback is appreciated. Cheers!