IMAGINE ｡ SIRIUS BLACK

04. HOGSMEADE

chapter four ; hogsmeade

SIRIUS BLACK'S FACE WAS TAUNTING.

Tempest stared back at the HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WIZARD? poster with a deep frown on her face, almost as if she were ashamed to recognise it. He looked the same, but still so incredibly different. Where his skin was once clear and youthful, it had become aged and stressed, half covered by an unkempt beard. His greasy hair was still of a questionable length, hanging just above his shoulders in an untidy fashion. 

But, what cut her most deep were his eyes. Even though the moving image was in black and white, she could still envision the colour and the way they used to crinkle when he laughed. Now, he still laughed, but it was mocking, derisive and almost insulting. There was a sickening feeling in her stomach as she watched the picture play over and over again, not being able to understand how he had become like this. 

She remembered the way he used to look at her with those same eyes like she was the only person in the world -- she used to look at him that way as well. She wished she still could see him the way she did when she was twenty, but she knew she never would. Now, his eyes had lost their innocence and now appeared to look like he knew something she didn'tShe still remembered the night it all happened, the night he betrayed two of her best friends and then proceed to kill a third, as well as twelve muggles. 

Even though he had obliterated the trust she had in him that night, there was still something deep down that wished there was a way he could be proved innocent. She knew there was nothing she could do, for he had made it quite clear he was on the side of the Dark Lord when the Wizarding War ended. She didn't know how she could have missed it -- she was with him almost always, but he still managed to deceive her and the others she loved. 

Though what hurt most, was that she could have stopped it. If only she had noticed any giveaways that he had been speaking to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named secretly, she could have stepped in the way and made a difference. Harry Potter, her godson, could have had two healthy, living parents to raise him rather than his cruel muggle relatives. 

"Do you really think it's the best idea to torture yourself before we go to Honeydukes?" Remus asked as he came up behind her. Tempest whipped her head around to see the tall man smiling softly, though his eyes were understanding and concerned. The woman sighed quietly, and her friend placed his hand on her drooped shoulder, squeezing it comfortingly. "Are you alright, Tempest?"

"I don't know," she shrugged, her eyes flickering back across to the poster, the same sneer on Sirius' face. The same familiar guilt and nauseating feeling stirred inside her, and she felt the urge to rip the paper down from the notice board. "He still haunts me, Remus. Every night when I'm sleeping, I see him."

"What does he do?" Remus asked, stepping up beside her, though his eyes fell on the side of her head as she hesitated before replying. 

"He was just...him," she whispered, slipping her hand into her friend's, needing the assurance that he was still there. "That's what was so horrible. I see him laughing, talking with James and Lily, as if he wasn't about to have them killed. I can't move or say anything when I try to warn them, and every time I wake up I remember that I didn't actually know him the way I thought I did. He lied to everyone around him for so long, and nobody realised."