Requiem

Harry is silent.

All day, he has been silent.

Ron spoke on his behalf, Harry's hand curled into his as they sat beside each other, between Hermione and me, on the second pew from the front. I don't know what's happening between them. I don't think Harry knows.

I open the door, push it ajar for him. His face is blank as he stands in the hall.

Silence.

"Do you want a cup of tea?"

Nothing.

"Ron can come and stay here tonight, if you'd like..." I trail off as he blinks.

"Do you want something to help you sleep?"

Slowly, he shakes his head.

"Dreamless sleep?"

"No."

"Harry..." I falter. What is there to say? He has lost three parents in his lifetime. I cannot be the one to say the words he needs to hear.

He takes a breath. I do not hear him let it out. He climbs the stairs slowly, deliberately, and disappears to his room.

I suppose it is cold, but I don't notice. It was drizzling slightly outside. Awful weather for an awful day.

The couch feels the same. The same newspaper is strewn about the floor. The carpet is still threadbare beside the fire. There are still dishes on the bench. The photo of James and Lily is still stuck to the fridge, its edges still ripped and still yellowing. And I expect that outside, it is still raining, that people are still at work, or shopping, or sleeping, that spells are still going wrong, that Voldemort is still planning, still waiting.

But nothing is the same. Nothing can be the way it was.

I stare at the wall. It is not the same.

"Remus." Whispered, from the doorway.

I turn, too quickly, glad of a distraction. "Yes?" I answer as gently as I can.

Harry takes two steps towards me, then stops again.

"I'm sorry," he says, and squeezes his eyes shut for a moment. "I'm so sorry."

"What for?" I ask, crossing the space between us, taking him by the shoulders, leading his across the room and pushing him softly down to sit on the couch.

"You loved him. I mean, you were in love with him." He will not meet my eyes.

I nod. "Always."

It comes out of him in a rush, all sobs and screams and tears. "And I killed him! He died because I was stupid, and he cared about me, and now you have no one! I'm so sorry, Remus, I really didn't mean--"

I cut him off. "Harry."

He climbs into my lap suddenly and curls up. "I'm sorry," he says again.

"This is not your fault, Harry. This is not your fault."

"It is my fault."

I hug him to me. "No. It's not. It's not your fault. For all his good points, Sirius was too hasty, reckless, irrational. He chose to follow you. You didn't kill him, Harry. And you mustn't worry about me. I'm not alone. I have Albus and Molly and Arthur, and, well, Severus, sometimes, then there's you, Ron, Hermione, Tonks and even Moody. It is not your fault that Sirius died, Harry. Not your fault."

He sighs, a long, ragged, bitter sigh.

There is a knock at the door.

I sigh too, but mine is the sigh of someone who is left with an estate to deal with, someone who must comfort other mourners and pretend to take comfort from those that visit.

Harry slides off my lap to the couch.

He follows me to the door.

It's Ron. "Hi," he says. "I didn't want to Floo, I mean, I thought it would be more polite to knock..."

I smile at him. "Come in."

He shakes the rain from his hair. "Um," he says.

I look at Harry. His eyes are closed.

"Here," Ron says, and takes Harry's hand. He leads him up the stairs.

I stare at the rain for a moment, then close the door.

Then I go upstairs too.

I wish there was someone to lead me, someone to undress me and put me to bed and lie beside me, whispering and soothing and smoothing back hair.

But there isn't, and there never will be again, and we have all lost.

We have all lost.