swallowed in the sea, 10/??

[harwhon]

chapter ten.

The first few days after Sirius had woken up, James and Lily set up shifts for keeping watch by his bed. It had been slow days, because Sirius still slept most of the time. And James still sat in the same sodding, uncomfortable chair every day, staring out of the window, like he was doing at the moment.

The Healers had done all kinds of tests, to see if Merlin knew what kind of body part still was in good shape. They would get the test results soon, Sarah had said.

Things were getting better, James knew. He could talk to Sirius now, and Sirius did show he understood. He would blink - once for yes, twice for no - and ever since yesterday he could move his arms and head. His facial expressions had fully returned as well.

He couldn't talk yet, but the Healers said it wouldn't take long anymore and James was so much looking forward to that moment. At times, it seemed insanely important that Sirius would speak again. It was like waiting for Harry to utter those first words.

They brought Harry with them to the hospital, almost every day. It warmed James's heart to see how Sirius lit up when the little tyke was in the room. He would swear on anything that Sirius cared nearly as much for Harry as he and Lily did. And that was a whole lot of caring.

James decided that, as far as the situation allowed him to be, he was almost happy. The only thing that kept him worrying, all the time, was the fact that Remus had not yet let hear from him. He'd kept on sending owls to anyone, everyone and no one at all and he was fairly positive that Remus had got some of those letters. Either that or he should consider using a different owl service, because he had checked and three of those owls had not returned their letters.

It hurt James that Remus would so very consciously and openly choose to not be around Sirius. And it hurt James even more that Sirius was in this hospital bed, alone, and that he would have to be the one to tell him that no, Remus isn't coming.

But he'd done enough thinking for today, he told himself firmly. He looked over to Sirius's bed, where Harry was playing with a plush quaffle on Sirius's lap and murmuring to himself, and he looked over to Sirius who was staring at his godson with such a look of awe and love.

Yeah, things were going to be all right in the end.

*

James tried not to make a lot of noise when he stumbled back into the room with a cup of coffee in one hand and a scone (with marmalade) in the other. Lily was asleep, finally, and so were Sirius and Harry. Naturally, as he tried to close the door, he hit his knee on the frame and swore under his breath.

Lily was still fast asleep, and so was Harry. But Sirius was, of course, still lying in his bed, staring at him.

'What are you doing up, mate?' James whispered and smiled. 'You're supposed to be sleeping.'

Sirius raised his eyebrows and rolled his eyes.

'Yeah, you've had two months worth of sleeping, I know,' James admitted and looked at Sirius, who lazily tapped his nose twice, as if he agreed.

James laughed and took a bite from his scone.

'Amazing, how we still understand each- oh, I'm sorry, did you want this?' James asked, spraying bits of pastry over his shirt.

Sirius opened his mouth, as if he were taking a deep breath and closed his eyes. James wasn't sure what he was trying to do, it looked very painful. Just as he was about to ask if he should go get a Healer, Sirius said, 'No.'

He looked up at James and he seemed so happy, it was a look that James had only ever seen twice: the day they had finished the Marauder's Map and the day he'd first kissed Remus.

'No,' he said again.

James noticed a slight slur of the tongue, and his voice was raspy and hoarse, but it was a definite 'no'.

'No.' James started laughing and ran a hand over his face. 'No, you don't want this scone.'

'No.' Sirius repeated and laughed with him. 'No, no scones.'

'I'm going to get a Healer,' James said, not really knowing how he was managing to speak himself. 'I'm going to get a Healer, let her check you.'

He dropped his scone and ran out of the room, beside himself with joy. He could just hear Sirius laugh and say, 'No scones.'

*

'Sirius is all right,' Georgina assured him. 'It will take a while before he can speak normally again. Some words will have lost their meaning and some words he won't know at all. But he'll get there. He's a fighter.'

'Yeah, he is,' James answered.

'There is one thing, though, James,' Georgina said carefully, almost too carefully.

'What? What is it?'

'Well, tests have shown that - and I'm sure Sirius will have noticed by now - he's paralysed from the waist down.' Georgina gave him a compassionate look, but James had the impression she'd a hard time dealing with all this herself. 'We're all feeling very sorry for Sirius. Poor dear's had to go through so much already.'

'Will he ever be able to walk again?' James asked, slightly panicked.

'We don't know,' she answered truthfully. 'We're contacting the best neurological Healers in the country.'

'And who's going to tell him?'

'Sarah has to, first thing in the morning.' Georgina sighed. 'I'm sorry.'

*

'I want to go home,' Sirius said, while poking his pudding. 'They have done enough tests.'

Almost a week had passed now and Sirius's English - while not yet as fluent as it used to be - proved good enough for making conversations. He'd frown every once in a while, at a word he didn't understand or couldn't find, but he managed.

Just as he managed dealing with possibly never walking again. James didn't understand, at first, how Sirius - the Sirius Black, the human blob of emotions - could remain so very calm about it all.

'It has been enough,' Sirius repeated.

James swallowed. They had not yet talked about Remus, or the war or just about anything that had happened before Sirius had woken up. Sirius hadn't asked and James was in no hurry to explain everything. He just wanted to enjoy these moments to the fullest, so that he could remember them when he started taking his friends for granted again.

'Yeah,' James said nervously. 'Georgina said that once they've-'

'I don't care what Georgina said,' Sirius interrupted him, sounding dangerously reasonable. 'I really don't care much if they are going to have to levitate me out, or build me a wheelchair or whatever they can think of. I just want to leave this place. I'm sick of the smell and the white sheets and the pudding they're giving me every single day. I just want to go home and smell normal smells and sleep in normal sheets and eat normal food.'

'We understand,' Lily said compassionately. 'But the Healers can't let you go unless they're certain you're okay, that you'll make it on your own.'

James flinched. He didn't want to tell Sirius that he'd really be on his own.

'I won't be alone,' Sirius countered. 'I have you and I bet you anything that the rest of the Order members will be more than happy to help.'

'I didn’t mean it like that,' Lily told him with a smile.

'I know what you mean.' Sirius smiled back at her. 'And I know why you're so quiet, James.'

James swallowed hard. He looked at Lily and hoped that she would save the day, once again, but when she didn't say anything, he just shook his head.

'Then you know more than I do, Pads,' he said, but he could tell his voice was too shaky for Sirius to ever believe him.

'Come on, Prongs.' Sirius's voice didn't waver a bit. It was steady and - most surprisingly - calm, not angry, not even loud. 'I might have been out of it for a few months, but I still know what that look means.'

James opened his mouth to say something, but nothing would come out. So he decided to smile and shrug. There was still the slightest chance that Sirius didn't know what really bothered him.

'Do you really think I haven't noticed that you avoided talking about home, or Remus, or the war, even?' Sirius turned to stare out the window. He was so friendly, still, that James almost forgot to react. If they had been in this situation about a year ago, Sirius would have threatened him already - or he'd've walked out on them.

'Sirius,' Lily said hesitantly, 'what you need to remember is that we love you, and so does Remus and that, even though you can't go back to your old place, there's a home for you wherever you go. With us.'

'I do know that,' Sirius said, 'which is why I can only think of one reason for you to keep this from me.'

James and Lily looked at each other. James felt his heart sink; he didn't want to tell him that his partner decided to leave him for no reason at all.

Sirius closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He opened them again and spoke, this time with a very unsteady voice.

'Remus died, didn't he?'

James's eyes widened. 'No! No no no!' he said immediately. 'No, Remus didn't die!'

'Is that what you-' Lily started, but she seemed to think the better of it. She sighed and gave Sirius a compassionate look. 'Have you been sitting here all this time, believing Remus was dead? Why didn't you ask us?'

Sirius bit his lip and shook his head. 'I guess I didn't want to hear. But you're saying he didn't? That he's alive?'

'Yes, he's very much alive,' Lily answered with a small smile. She reached out her hand and Sirius looked very happy to accept.

'Why then?' he asked. 'Why didn't you tell me anything about what happened? Why haven't I seen him yet?'

James could see that he felt immensely relieved. He wondered briefly if it would have been easier if Remus had died. He couldn't imagine how much it must hurt to hear that the person you love chose to not be around you anymore.

'James?' Sirius stared at him, puzzled. 'I want to know.'

'I've no doubt about that,' James told him, with a sad smile. 'I'm just not so sure if I want to tell you.'

He turned to look at Lily, who bit her lip and nodded for him to go on.

'It can hardly be worse than Remus dying, right?' Sirius asked, a little insecurely.

'A lot has happened,' James started, without really knowing how to go on. 'Things have happened and it might be hard for you to come to grips with it. Merlin knows it was hard for us too.'

'I feel very much at ease right now,' Sirius murmured, sarcasm dripping from his voice. 'I'm not worried at all, you know.'

James gave a smile.

'I'm sorry, Pads,' he said. 'It's just hard for me to decide where to begin.'

'How about the beginning?' Sirius asked. 'Does that sound right to you?'

'Know-it-all.' James loved this. He knew he wasn't supposed to have fun at the moment, he was supposed to be telling his friend a lot of horrible stuff that happened during and after the war, but this friendly bickering was one of the things he'd missed most. 'What do you remember?'

'Too much,' Sirius said immediately, his face expressionless. 'Not enough.'

'Do you remember the ambush?' Lily asked in a calm, soothing voice.

'Not really. I've been trying to remember it ever since I woke up. I've gone over it in my mind like a thousand times.' Sirius ran a hand over his face. 'I know I was trying to get Peter and - Has he been caught yet?'

James and Lily exchanged glances.

'Kind of,' Lily said hesitantly. 'Peter's dead, Sirius.'

'Good riddance.' It amazed James that Sirius could show so little emotion at hearing about one of their friend's death. Then again, he had already come to terms with his treachery. Being attacked in your own home by that very person could do that to you. 'Which one of you killed him?'

'Not exactly one of us,' James said carefully. 'More like Bellatrix Lestrange.'

'What?'

'Yeah, it seems Peter wasn't of much use anymore, so they killed him,' James said, still feeling a knot in his stomach when he thought of it. 'This way he at least served as a distraction while they sent someone to-'

James faltered when he realised what he was going to have to say. Not only did his partner leave him for an inexplicable reason, but his brother was ordered to kill him, as well.

'To do what?' Sirius asked. 'You're a real storyteller, James. Who did they send?'

'Regulus.' James stared at the ground to avoid his friend's look.

'Ponce,' Sirius grumbled. 'What did he have to do?'

'Sirius, I don't know if that's relevant,' James tried. 'You just have to know he-'

'Of course, it's relevant!' Sirius told him. 'If my baby-brother gets sent on a mission by the bad guys, it's very relevant.'

'Okay, if I tell you, will you promise to let me finish the story and that you won't interrupt until you've heard all of it?'

'That's not a good sign, is it?' Sirius turned to Lily, a worried look on his face.

'Well,' Lily answered hesitantly, 'it certainly won't be a story to tell at family parties.'

'With my family, you never know,' Sirius grumbled. 'Fine, I promise.'

'Okay.' James took a deep breath. 'You have not been in a coma for two months because of the injuries from the ambush.'

'What?' Sirius barked.

James threw him a reprimanding look and Sirius rolled his eyes and motioned for him to go on.

'I guess none of us ever considered it before, but Voldemort had - has - his spies in here, as well. Spies that made sure you stayed in a coma. They put something in your medicine every day to keep you unconscious.'

Sirius had a look of disgust on his face and James could tell he had trouble not asking questions.

'At some point, I guess they'd had enough of it,' he continued. 'The war was over and every Death Eater was going to be caught and sent to Azkaban, so if they wanted to go to trial, they'd have to make sure there was evidence against them.'

'Lucius Malfoy planted some diaries and address books underneath a few loose floorboards at Malfoy Manor. The Order checked the addresses, of course, and at one of them in Sheffield, they found Peter's body behind a few rubbish bins. Not a pretty sight.'

'You were there?'

'We saw pictures of it at an Order meeting,' Lily said, a bit shaken from the memories.

'Yeah.' James threw his wife a compassionate look and went on. 'We all were busy checking into Peter's death and the rest of the addresses, but Dumbledore had a hunch it was a ruse, I guess. He'd sent Snape to check it out. He came bursting into the meeting with a huge gash on his back and blood all over him.'

'Regulus did that?' Sirius asked. 'So he is capable of doing good.'

'You have no idea,' James said with a smile. 'He asked to be the one to be sent on the mission. Turns out he'd been writing anonymous letters to Dumbledore and the Ministry to inform them of attacks and stuff.'

'Regulus Black?' Sirius gave him an incredulous look. 'My brother is the anonymous writer?'

'Who would've thought? That's why he wanted the mission, so he could boycott it,' James told him. 'And he succeeded, I guess, though he and Snape got into a fight. You should've seen the wall, they blasted it to tiny-'

James stopped abruptly, realising he couldn't keep it from Sirius now.

'Wait,' Sirius said. 'This wall? As in the wall outside my room? Why would he be-'

His eyes widened in understanding.

'They were going to kill me.'

James looked around uncomfortably. What was he supposed to say to that?

'Bellatrix wanted Regulus to, yes,' Lily said soothingly. 'But he didn't and he wasn't planning on it, either. Now, I know that James doesn't trust him completely, but this proves something, at least.'

'Yeah,' James chimed in. 'If it weren't for him, we wouldn't have known you weren't in a real coma and worse things could've happened.'

'Such as?' Sirius asked, horrified. 'And what's Remus got to do with this?'

James sighed and rubbed his eyes. This was going to be a long, hard night.