If In The Past

Chapter One: The First Day

Dear Remus,

For some inexplicable reason, parchment and quills are readily available in Azkaban. They charge enormous prices for them, of course, knowing that those of us with the money will pay anything for something that will help us maintain our sanity just a little longer.

I write this to you, Remus, not because I expect you to ever read it, but because I need to record my memories before the Dementors take them from me and I'd like to think I'm telling them to a friend, not a cold blank unfeeling piece of paper. That is, if you still are my friend. You probably think I killed Lily and James, just like the rest of the world. And I don't blame you. How should you know I didn't, we've barely seen each other all year. And the last time I ever shared anything really personal with you was that night in our sixth year. Yes, that night - the one when we ended up kissing in the Shrieking Shack. The night when you said you loved me but couldn't be with me, because people would treat me like a freak.

God, Remus, I was so stupid. All I could see was that you'd given me the one thing I'd always wanted and never hoped to get and then taken it away. I couldn't see that you didn't want to do this to me, couldn't see that, in pushing me away, you were showing your practical side once more. Maybe I got the better grades, but you were more mature. You knew that if we became lovers it could bring more grief than happiness.

I screamed at you. I told you I had never loved you, that I had lied. If I could go back in time and change one thing, I'd be James and Lily's Secret Keeper. But if I could change two things, I'd never have said that I didn't love you. Do you know that that was the real lie? You must, you must have known that. Please know that.

My mind wasn't clear that night, Remus. Forgive me.

After I ran out of the shack, I tried to kill myself. There's something you never knew. I tried to drown myself in the lake. James and Lily pulled me out and saved me. I learned later that they'd seen me on the map going into the lake and had rushed out immediately, sensing something was wrong.

It wasn't until December of our seventh year that I knew you didn't know. I had assumed James had told you; how else can you explain a friend in the hospital wing with pneumonia for three weeks without telling the truth? We were reading in History of Magic about Patricius the Passionate, who submitted himself to the claws of a hippogriff upon learning that Demetria of Coventry, his betrothed, had eloped with Aquario of Lancaster. "Can you imagine," you said, "someone actually killing themselves over another person? He must have really loved her." I was silent.

When you and Peter were asleep, I confronted James. "You never told him," I hissed through clenched teeth. "You lied to him, told him some story."

James looked me right in the eye. "Yeah, I did, and I'm not going to tell him the truth, either." Before I could speak, he continued, "Sirius, he won't be able to take it. He refused you because he didn't want you to suffer; it'll be unbearable for him to know that something he did made you so miserable that you didn't want to live anymore. If you still love him, don't make him suffer too."

I digested his words for a second. Then I said, "How did you know he refused me because he didn't want me to suffer?"

"You talked in your sleep the first few days in the hospital wing. I went to see you every day after classes for the first week."

"You did?"

"I did."

"I only remember you there once. And Lily, I remember Lily. Did...did Remus come of see me? And Peter?"

"Of course they did," said James.

A half-forgotten memory flashed across my mind. I remembered you sobbing by the side of my bed - or else I remembered a dream, I wasn't sure which. And then I had a memory so strong it was almost a flashback. Commotion. Blood. Madam Pomfrey's eyes widening. A knife. Screams. Hazel eyes spilling tears. Bandages. You. And a voice...a voice saying, "I did it. I did it myself." You in a bed across from mine, curled up and weeping.

"Remus cut himself, didn't he."

"Yes," said James, startled. "He did." He looked old suddenly, forty instead of eighteen.

"Why didn't anyone tell me?" I whispered.

"For the same reason he doesn't know you tried to kill yourself."

I can write no more today.

Sirius