Who: SiriusKnap and SiriusSwap What: Re-meeting. Kind of. When: Backdated to June 21 Where: Outside Warnings: None
It wasn’t that he was avoiding the fact that Sirius was back -- well, that was exactly what he was doing. He just didn’t know what he could possibly say in her journal. He had seen the throngs of people who had welcomed her back, including unwind Sirius and colour Sirius. All of them were instantly best friends again, and he had closed his journal instead of doing anything.
It hurt him badly that she didn’t remember him. There was a sort hollow ache in his chest, because it was just like he had feared. She might be back, but everything that had existed between them before this moment had been wipe cleaned. He was a stranger to her again. And so days started to pass since her reintroduction into the compound, and the longer it was, the harder it was for Sirius to fathom saying anything to her.
Which, in the end, he realized was quite stupid when he ended up almost nearly running into her while in town.
“Queenie,” he’d said, voice belying his shock. He winced almost instantly after using the nickname.
***
Since she found out about the disaster that was her future, Sirius was spending the majority of her time as a dog. She wanted to scream and cry and do some damage, but her feelings were too raw, too wild, and she longed the simplicity of bare emotions. There was too much to feel, as a girl. Betrayal, heartache, anger, and despair were all trimmed down to a simple sadness when she took her dog form. Her tail was tucked between her legs, and she was making a miserable keening noise every time the feelings swelled up inside her, but mostly, it was easier to manage. The other Padfeet banded around her, and other times, she followed Hannah around, mesmerised by this girl who meant so much in her future, but who she didn’t know yet.
Days passed, and finally, Sirius found the strength to be a girl again. She sat in the shower until the water turned cold, unable to think past the dull ache in her chest, the hum of depression in her brain. Shivering, she left the shower and pulled on black clothing, her hair sticking in wet coils to her face. Somewhere underneath the aching, she felt a queasiness. It had been a long time since she ate properly, and though she wasn’t at the stage where she really wanted food, or was able to eat her feelings, she figured she ought to eat something sooner than pass out.
Sirius ventured into the town that she had only explored as a dog, following her nose in the direction of food. A word stopped her in her tracks, tugging at something in her memory, but it dissipated like smoke. Sirius looked over her shoulder and saw him then, another Sirius, more rugged looking than the others. It was clear he was one of them, though. There was a look about him that Sirius instantly trusted, something sad in his eyes that led her to believe that they needed to talk.
“Queenie?” she said, the ghost of a grin tugging at her lips for the first time since she heard the news. “I like it.”
*** “An old nickname,” he said in a sort of automatic way. He tried to smile as he said it, but just couldn’t quite manage. It was too overwhelming. He didn’t know if he wanted to tell her everything or just turn and run. It was hard, he knew, coming back here when you didn’t remember everything. He hadn’t done it -- hope to never do that, as a matter of fact. But in some ways, he understood entirely, having people around you who had memories you didn’t have anymore. All those expectations of someone you weren’t even sure you were anymore, if you had ever been.
“I’m Sirius from kidnap world,” he said a few moments later. It was obvious he was a Sirius, but somehow he felt the implicit need to introduce himself properly anyway. New starts and all that. Yet, he couldn’t bring himself to use the cute name their world had earned. It seemed almost childish in light of the fact that she had been the one who had taken him in despite knowing what world he was from, decided to give him a chance anyway.
***
“I know who you are,” Sirius said, walking toward him with all the swagger that only a Sirius could pull off. “I’ve seen you about while I was Padfoot.”
Contrary to popular belief, Sirius could read. She enjoyed it, to an extent, though only when the topic was something she chose, and not of the homework variety. Usually, she kept the bookish stuff to Moony. When she discovered that her journal could show her snippets from her life there before, she was initially interested, but it freaked her out too much, seeing her handwriting scrawled across pages and pages of conversations that she didn’t remember. This Sirius popped up often enough, but Sirius didn’t remember any of the words that were passed between them, or knew how strong their relationship was before she left. She could tell from the look on his face, though, that she was either very dear to him, or greatly disliked.
“You seem a bit pissed off that I’m here, mate,” Sirius said.
*** Maybe he should have expected that she knew who he was. Even when he had avoided all the other Siriuses, he’d had an awareness of them. However, he didn’t know what she entirely meant by that. It was one thing to know who he was, to know where he had come from -- but it was another thing entirely to know what he was to her. That was the part he was upset about her losing, and he suspected, that was the part she still didn’t know anything about.
“Don’t be daft,” Sirius said the moment she said he seemed pissed. (Although, if he hadn’t been so caught up in what was happening, it might have been amusing. After all, the first time they had met, all she had talked about was how angry and serious he looked.)
“It’s good you’re back,” Sirius clarified. “But it’s bloody weird, too, all right?”
***
Sirius frowned, working her fingers in and out of fists as she looked up at the other Sirius. Just barely, she resisted the urge to turn back into Padfoot and leave. She was still hungry, after all.
“To the best of my knowledge, I didn’t ask to leave,” Sirius said, her pretty face still scrunched up in a frown. “I sure as hell didn’t ask to be here. I didn’t ask to find out all the shit that happens back home.”
Sirius scoffed, a half-laugh at the mess that would become her life. She ranked her fingers through her hair, but she wasn’t finished ranting.
“I didn’t know what I was going to do when I left Hogwarts, but Azkaban sure as fuck wasn’t on my wishlist. I wanted to get an ice cream van! I wanted to piss off my parents in the most effective way possible. Fucking Azkaban, my friends either dead, traitors, or convinced I’m evil...”
Sirius let her arms fall to her sides as she stared off into the middle distance. Her anger was starting to tilt in the favour of sadness.
“No, fuck this,” she said, shaking her head. “I didn’t ask for this.”
Sirius spared the other Sirius a glance before turning into Padfoot and running away.
***
It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair -- and he had never really considered that she’d be going through everything that was happening back home for her. Which was remarkably shortsighted of him, but there you were. The moment she started to talk too fast, actually said the word Azkaban, all he wanted to do was wrap his arms around her and hold her close. Sometimes, it had felt like that was all they do to fight against everything that happened to them in every shitty world. Abruptly, though, she was gone, and he was left looking at Padfoot racing down the street.
“Fuck,” Sirius cursed out loud, furious with himself. He debated with himself for only a second, knowing that going after was probably just going to piss her off more. But he couldn’t leave it alone.
He turned into Padfoot as well and went careening down the street after her. It took nearly a block, but eventually he caught up with her. He didn’t do anything at first, no barking, no nudging, merely kept pace, letting her know that he was there.
***
Sirius was too hungry to keep up speed, so when Sirius landed beside her after a relatively short amount of time, she couldn’t run away. She growled a little, but kept walking, and eventually her growls gave way to panting, then whining. Sirius stopped walking, her eyes darting everywhere, her eyebrows arched, then lay on the ground whining, her head resting between her paws.
When the whining subsided long enough, Sirius reluctantly turned back into a girl. She sat on the ground, scrubbing her fingers through the dirt, her jaw clenching and unclenching as she chewed on her vicious thoughts.
“I’m fucking starving,” she mumbled eventually, breaking the silence.
***
Sirius kept just a few paces back, a slight distance, when she resorted to actually walking. He heard each one of her growls, but none of them seemed directed right at him, so he didn’t retreat. When she went down to the ground, Sirius sat beside her, leaning in to drag his tongue across the top of her muzzle. The only comfort he knew how to give at the moment.
When she turned back, he did, too. He remained on the ground as well, cross-legged, watching her intently.
“Let’s go get something to eat then,” Sirius said neutrally. It was strange that he was so intent on sticking with her now -- after days of being afraid to be near her. But, he knew the truth of it was that he would never love another Sirius the way he loved her; she had helped him through every difficult time he’d had here. He wanted desperately to return the favor. They couldn’t ever make things right -- but they could weather through the challenges that were thrown at them.