Inmates

Inmates

Remember me?

He whispered the words, a fire burning in his grey eyes.

It had been long. Too long. The distance; the hours and days, the weeks turning into years -excrutiatingly long years they had been apart. It was almost too much to handle.

It was an odd scenario: Him outside the door wearing a warm brown coat, me inside the warmth dressed in a white T-shirt. We were and are so different. Complete opposites. And that's what compels us to meet once again.

After so long I could hardly recognise his face. The few grey hairs amongst his long dark hair, the worried lines on his forehead were all new to me. But his voice; his deep bass voice, which rang through my head like a clear bell on a Sunday morning. That I could remember.

He held me in an embrace. Old friends meeting again... Once I could have said that without it being untrue. We had to much history behind us to leave us as only friends. Soulmates seemed so mushy and peculiar, a word I would never describe us as. Now I wouldn't go a day without using it. Soulmates

We talked together on a grassy lane. A few minutes with pointless greetings and uncomfortable talk. Had we really grown apart? It could not be. Never. Never would we be nothing less than best friends and closer than lovers.

I took his hand and we walked, into the rose garden in the backyard. Into our forgotten sanctuary where we had been free. Free of the world, the cruelties of everyday life and of ourselves. We sat down on the frost covered wilted grass. We did not mind. We did not care. As long as we were together, lost in memories, we were content.

He looked surprised at me, as I suddenly began talking. Not about him and how much I missed his presence but about me. Not those shallow meaningless things like what I had done last week, but about me. Who I was, what I felt, what I stood for. He had forgotten me as I had forgotten who he truly was. The silence streched once again when I stopped talking. He took my hand, his warm hands warming my freezing fingertips. It had started to rain a little by little, the dark clouds racing above us. We really should have gone in back then.

I told him we were going to get sick.

He looked at me and smiled mischievously. A sparkle appeared in his eyes, something I had longed to see for so long, even before we parted. He took off his coat and wrapped it around me. I looked at him thankfully, surprised to see a similar white T-shirt underneath his coat. Perhaps underneath those protective layers we were still the same.

A day can change so quickly. The last memory I had of him was not a real memory. The newspapers claiming they had found the murderer of the Potters - Lily and James, our best friends, and Peter. I remembered seeing his face on the front page, screaming in a frenzied rampage. I choose to remember him like that. Our last meeting face to face had been an unpleasant one. It was dark times as it is once again. Why we must be rejoined in such foul times, I cannot reason. He has spent years locked up in Azkaban, while I did nothing to help him. Slowly forgetting how he looked and smelled and the time he wrote "TITS" on my forehead while I was sleeping.

We stopped before the back entrance of the house. The rain was more forceful now. His soaked hair was hanging in front of his eyes, his soft features serious and contemplative. His thoughts had always been a mystery for me. Now more than ever. His stormy grey playful eyes watched me intently and in them, I saw my own orbs reflected.

Perhaps we were more alike than we thought.

I could not tell how long we had been standing outside, staring into each other's eyes. It felt like eternity and a split second, all at the same time.

Remember me?

While I whispered the words they were carried away by the strengthening wind and rain twirling around us.

He whispered his reply. I heard only what I knew he would say. Our eyes were still locked together, the view blurry from the rain falling between us. My hand sneaked behind my back and pushed the door open.

The heavy, brown coat slipped off my shoulders as I turned around and walked in. I filled a kettle with water and prepared two cups for tea. I raided my mind in a desperate search to remember his favourite tea only to recall he'd drink practically any kind of tea - with as much sugar as humanly possible. I laughed quietly; partly ashamed to have forgotten that about him and trying not to think about everything else I had forgotten.

I could hear the wind hitting the glass windows and I could still feel his hand lingering in mine. He was my inmate. We had always been in the same boat even if we were sailing the opposite way. We completed each other. Apart we were just Remus and Sirius but together we were us.

Earl Grey tea it would be. I shuddered at the prospect of destroying the good tea with a huge amount of sugar, but he was back and that was all that mattered. I poured two teaspoons of sugar into his cup, well knowing he would want more and walked out of the kitchen.

The backdoor was still open and wet by the violent storm raging outside. I slowly walked by the empty living room and towards the open door. The darkness was threatening to swallow me whole yet I couldn't stop my feet from moving.

I stood outside, rain pouring into the cup I was clinging on with both hands and pressing towards my chest.

In the darkness, I could see the contour of a hippogriff and I wondered if he would come back. Come back to his inmate.