In the Tower
Chapter Nineteen: Don't Look Back
Summary: I don't remember, I feel dazed and confused.
Disclaimer: Nothing.
Author's Note: Hm… I took a sick day from school. I feel much better.
Previously: James choked on the word and said it so low and so softly, that they barley heard it. But they had, and Sirius sat back in shock, and Lily fell to her behind from her knees, putting her head in her hands and muttering to herself.
What did James say?
She's dead.
"Forgiveness does not always lead to a healed relationship. Some people are not capable of love, and it might be wise to let them go along with your anger. Wish them well, and let them go their way."
James sniffed loudly as he painstakingly wrote the letter, for the seventy-third time, to Katie's parents, telling them the news of her death. The letter had a tear drop every paragraph or so, and his writing was badly scrawled and shaky. He hadn't known what to say the first fifty-seven times, and all the other times he had known exactly what he wanted to say, but couldn't possibly have it written the way he wanted it to say.
Sirius was lost; James figured he was running to the Potters in his animagus form to tell them himself, and let out some tears that he's too afraid to cry here. James' mum was always a good person with a good shoulder to cry on.
Lily told Remus, and his eyes got really wide, I mean really wide, and he ran out of the tower, to what they all thought was most definitely Ravenclaw Common Room. He carried Somailia up to the Gryffindor tower, and the first words that came out of her mouth, were cheerfully perplexed, "Where's Katie?" Lily stared at her, burst out crying, and fled the room. James blinked in surprise at Lily's actions, because he thought that Lily and Katie didn't really like each other that much, and he shook his head at Somailia, and felt the tears spring up in his eyes, and sat heavily on a couch. "What?"
Then, she furrowed her brow, and said perplexed, again, "Where's Sirius? Are they out at the hot spring again?" James shook his head.
"Sirius is at Katie's families house," he said quietly, sniffling lightly.
"Why?" She asked again, pacing the carpet in front of James as Remus sat down next to him.
"She's gone," they both choked out.
"Gone!" She blurted, almost shouting. "What do you mean… gone?"
"She's not here," they said vaguely.
"Oh, gee," she said sarcastically, pacing faster, "that was really helpful guys, really."
Remus and James shrugged ominously in her direction, both staring out at the snowing sky.
"What do you mean she's gone? She left? She's not here? She was taken? She died? She went up to the Hogwarts in the sky? WHAT! Where the fuck is she!" The last two phrases were roared at the boys, and they both flinched, but didn't look at her. She moved forward to them, grabbed both of them by their hair and pulled them until their faces were a scant inch from hers. "WHERE!"
James blinked as he felt the force of the word hit his glasses and him full in the face. Remus, not that lucky, had his eyes water as the air hit them straight on. "Gone." He whispered again.
She groaned and shoved him back so hard he fell over the back of the couch, and rolled until he hit a table leg. James gulped. "It was the, uh, fourth and fifth phrases."
"What?" She growled out between her teeth.
"You said, and I quote, `She died? She went up to the Hogwarts in the sky?' That's what happened." Somailia, not realizing that when she was angry she was very strong, let go of James' hair, making him fall the two feet back onto the couch, and she crumpled onto the floor, crying pitifully, rocking herself into the fetal position. James blinked in surprise.
Remus, getting up, painfully limped over to James, who was massaging his scalp while biting his lip and looking down at the pitiful form in front of him. "My head hurts now," Remus said, and James shook his head.
"That's a bit trivial for you, isn't it, Remus?"
"I wouldn't know, I'm in fucking shock," Remus swore, and James blinked in surprise. And then he decided to himself that he was blinking in surprise too much.
"Shock? We all are. She's fucking dead! Gah!" He screamed, hitting his head hard with his fist.
Remus let him hit his head, stepped so that one leg was on both sides of Somailia, and squatted down over her, and put a hand on her shoulder gently. "Go away," she said pitifully, and James almost forgave her for practically lifting him two feet by his hair.
Almost.
"Obviously, Remus, Somailia wants to be left alone right now. If you're best friend died without you knowing, wouldn't you want to be alone and cry?" James said intelligently.
Remus, without looking, reached out and shoved James hard making him keel over sideways. "Shut up, James. I'm trying to comfort my girlfriend." Then he snarled out, "Go find yours."
James almost cried.
But he didn't, and like Lily before him, ran out of the room. But he went looking for her.
After an hour of searching, he found her in a rather obvious place.
Yeah, you guessed it.
She was back in the tower.
Sitting on the tower, with her knees pulled up close to her body so that her chin was sitting on her knees. She was staring out blankly at the barren landscape that lay before the school, not blinking, snow melted all in her hair and the pink from frost noticeable on her cheeks. She didn't know she was shivering either.
He sat down next to her without a word and slung his legs limply over the side, swinging them back and forth rhythmically. They didn't talk, but James began to cry softly, sniffling more than crying. A tear leaked out of his eye as he leaned forward over the giant expanse of ground beneath them, and it fell slowly to the ground, creating the tinniest hole in the virgin snow.
"I didn't know her," Lily said after what seemed an eternity, only an hour. "I hated her for so long, and now she's dead."
"I wish she was back…." James whispered throatily, and they were suddenly caught in a gust of wind, and James was almost thrown off the tower.
She fell asleep on the roof, just looking out at the horizon while James looked up at the stars. James stayed out for a few more minutes before taking pity on her shivering, sleeping form, and he lifted her easily up into his arms, and struggled to open the door to the lower room. He then set her down on the bed, which looked old and dusty, although they were in that bed not three days ago.
He kissed her gently on the forehead and sat down on the bed next to her, watching. He heaved out a sigh, and took his glasses from his nose and cleaned them harshly in his shirt. The lens broke from him pushing on it to hard, and he cursed in three different languages, and started patting furiously around him to look for his wand. Which was not there.
He cursed again, shoved his broken glasses on his nose, set the glass shards in his pocket, which later on he realized was a very stupid thing to do, and blindly stumbled out of the tower and back to the Gryffindor Common Room. He heard her screaming even ten yards away.
He screwed up his face in pain and put a finger in each of his ears and yelled out the password to the Fat Lady. "What?" She yelled.
"Pink pastels!"
"What!"
"PINK PASTELS!" She swung her portrait open for him, even though she didn't even hear him yell out the password.
James walked sideways over to a shock Remus, who was blinking five times a minutes, each time his eyes getting wider in surprise. Always though she was a screamer," he said to Remus, and Remus just nodded his head dazed.
Balefully, Somailia shut her mouth, and both the boys sighed in relief. She glared at James evenly, and told him, "I heard that." But then she looked him right in the eye, and said in a gentler tone, "you're glasses are broken."
"I noticed, thanks."
"Where's your wand?"
James' mind went in the gutter, and he grinned evilly. "In my pants." She rolled her eyes, looked around the common room, picked up a rather heavy book, and whacked James hard in the head with it.
He stood there for a moment, and then said monotonously, "Ouch."
Somailia stepped up and snatched the glasses off his nose, and she looked at it critically. "Where's the lens?"
"In my pocket," he told her defiantly. She shook her head and cuffed him in the ear.
"How stupid are you, really?" She huffed, and held her hand out to him.
"What." He asked, looking down at her hand. She made an impatient noise, and James, confused, looked at Remus, took one of his hands, placed it in Somailia's, and said cheerfully, "I now pronounce you man and wife. Kiss the bride."
"Yes, yes, that's all very pleasant and adorable, but I need your stupid lens so I can fix your glasses. Unless you don't want your glasses fixed…" she said trailing off.
James dug in his pocket and instantly pricked his fingers on many pieces of sharp glasses. He took his hand out quickly and stuck his fingers in his mouth, sucking on them. "Idiot," she breathed out and looked at Remus. "Does he not have another pair?"
"Erm…" Remus said, not knowing, just looking at their still entwined hands.
"Nope, I don't." James said, taking his fingers out of his mouth long enough to say that.
She screamed, softly, in frustration, and hit James in the chest to vent her anger. He didn't move, just raised an eyebrow and sucked harder. She ripped his fingers out of his mouth, making saliva fly. "You look like an complete nutter-head doing that," she said, "and I'm sure Lily wouldn't like seeing you like that." He raised his eyebrow farther and grinned cockily. She cuffed him over the ear again, and told him stonily, "take off your pants."
James guffawed and Remus blushed to the roots of his hair. "Excuse?" James and Remus asked. "Really, I'm in love with Lily, and you- ow!" She kneed him in the balls and watched him crumble with satisfaction.
"Look, you're too much of a wimp to get glass out of your pocket, so I'm just doing it for you. You'll put them right back on after I get the glass. Take off the pants," she said firmly.
Remus mumbled out, "…bathroom," and bolted up the stairs to the boys dormitory.
James, grudgingly, took them off and handed them too her. She looked at him over the waist of the jeans, her brown eyes wanting desperately to laugh at him. "Which pocket?"
"Left front," he said, and she reached into the pocket and got out all the glass shards. She put them in her hand and looked at him, sizing him up.
She dropped his pants, "put them back on." She ordered, and she fixed his glasses, holding them while he put them on. He glared at her, or the hazy form she was, while he was putting them back on, and when he was finally done dressing, he raised himself to his full height. She rolled her eyes at him, again, and went on tiptoe slightly, and placed his glasses haphazardly on his nose.
Tom sulked as he tapped his fingers impatiently on the table he was sitting at. That was the only that echoed through out the tiny house. The meeting at Hogwarts last night didn't go exactly as expected. The girl he inhabited for the time to get around in the halls was obviously someone who wanted to live their own life, thank you very much. After Snape, or someone, it didn't matter as long as it was a Death Eater, dragged her up, he was limping badly from where she must of kicked him, and he was purposely dragging her through the blood trail he was leaving. "My lord, someone to…" his lip curled, "inhabit."
"Thank you, Severus. You may go now." The last part had been snapped out, and Severus scurried away in fright. Tom looked down at the girl and she glared up at him, lifted her hand and waved her middle finger right in front of him deliriously.
He jeered, looking her up and down noticeably, "Oh hell, I should just rape you before I inhabit your body." But then he grinned, "Isn't it the same thing?"
"You're a bastard," she had told him simply, and his grin turned into a frown as he kicked her hard in the shoulder.
Tom and Katie bickered endlessly as he took control of her body and made her walk to where the Death Eaters meeting. "You're an asshole," she told him bitterly, "I'm assuming that after we meet them you're going to kill me."
He pretended to contemplate the thought. "Of course." He said, and she mentally shoved him toward the side. Her body stumbled with him and threw itself into the wall.
"Fuck you, don't hurt my body." As soon as she said that, they reached the meeting, and all the Death Eaters were chatting nervously with one another. "Get over here, you stupid fool!" Tom barked, and it came out in Katie's voice, and Katie whimpered mentally. Something moved out of the corner of her eye, and Katie moved all of her attention to it, and cried. Sirius was watching.
"Get over here!" Katie's body barked again.
"Well, it's nice seeing you, my darling," Tom said, kissing Katie's cheek and sliding a hand suggestively down her side, his hand catching her curves. Katie sniffled and a tear leaked out of her eye.
"I hope you die," she asseverated, and then added, "soon."
"Mo duinne," he said to her sweetly, and she shivered, "I can never die." Then he grinned cruelly, "but you can." And he removed himself from her body, sweetly told her, "Avada Kedavra," and she was dead. He looked around at all the Death Eaters. "Dispose of the filth," he sneered, looking at each person gathered around him.
Out of the flicker of his eye the shadows in the hall moved, and a boy with long hair emerged, walking quickly over to the girl's body. "Hello, Mr. Black. Pleasure seeing you here." Tom told him, and Sirius froze, but didn't turn around, instead he shifted the girl around in his arms uncomfortably.
"Tom, hello!" Sirius replied with fake cheerfulness. "How are you?" Tom didn't respond, he knew Black wouldn't let him. "We really need to be going, I'm sure my girlfriend needs to sleep," Sirius said putting such heavy emphasis on girlfriend that Tom wanted to burst out laughing, "and it takes me a while to go down to Ravenclaw Common room, you know." Actually, Tom thought, he didn't know. "And please, please, don't make my girlfriend a puppet for you anymore, I would greatly appreciate. Thanks." Black ran off quickly, and Tom smirked.
He would never find out, Tom thought to himself, burst out in insane laughter. And when he would… well, he'll go crying to his dear best friends mother… muwahahah.
Sirius bounded across the smooth terrain, telling himself that he would not cry, could not cry. Being in Snuffles body was almost comforting, and hey, he had a tail to wag. Not that it ever would again… he fought back the urge to cry again and ran faster.
Katie's house came into view, and Sirius, overcome by… something, tripped over a root, and tumbled quickly along, not knowing what he was going to run into or where exactly he was running. And that's when he hit it. A dull thud rang out in the silent, heavy night, and Sirius got up, in his human form, walked in a dazed circle, before he slumped back to the ground again. He looked up at what he hit, and a brick wall jump swam in and out of focus.
"Funny," he said, trying to reach out and touch it, "she never had two brick jumps." Then he looked down at his hand that was reaching out to the jumps. "And I never knew I had three arms…"
"Sirius?" A cool voice said, and he looked up at the voice blearily. Two women were slowly creeping up to him.
"Hello, Mrs. Ah Bleu, Mrs. Potter!" And with that, he sagged unconscious into Mrs. Potter's startled arms.
James looked awkwardly at the doors of the Hospital Wing. Should I go in, or should I not go in? That is the question…
Bah, Shakespeare. Who needs it anyway? Shakespeare was a boring little git who just wrote plays, and more plays and more plays… well, you get the drift. He went in, and saw Somailia and Remus sitting next to the bed that had her in it, they looked up at him and both said flatly, "hi."
"Hi," he said bitterly, and sat down on the bed near her feet. "When's the funeral?" He asked, and Somailia glared at him.
Remus told him, painstakingly, "Wednesday."
"Oh," James said, looking at her face. "And… what's today?"
"Monday." Remus answered again. "Have you sent the letter yet?"
"No," James said, getting up. "I'll do that now." And with one last sad look at Katie's body, he ran out of the Hospital Wing. He passed Godric's portrait… slowed, seeing it was open from when he left, and closed it, patting it reminiscing. He went into Gryffindor tower and finished off the letter writing at the bottom, PS If Sirius is already there, which I'm assuming he is, just let him cry. I'm sure that if he has told you by now, this letter is redundant, but Sirius is not the only one suffering. Professor Dumbledore is hosting the funeral in the Forbidden Forest; yeah we finally get to go in, on Wednesday at ten o'clock. Better make it.
He went up to the Owlery and sent it off with Talons, and watched him go until he was a mere speck in the sky. And when he reached the Head's room, he sat on his bed, put his head in his hands, and went to sleep.
Lily struggled to grasp consciousness as she woke up. She looked around at her surroundings. And laughed out loud. She was back in that bloody tower.
She looked around at the place and made a sound that should be classified as `this-is-pleasant' both sarcastic and for real. Well, it was a very special tower.
Okay, it's a bloody tower, and Lily was going to just… leave it.
Except for the one tiny fact that when she pushed on the wall, it didn't open.
Oh…
Fuck.
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