a conversation long overdue

[James Sirius Potter]

Each day in St. Mungo’s had felt a thousand times longer than any normal day – even though he was sleeping more than he had in months. The morning after the rescue mission that had landed him there, while Claire had been at the Ministry to take care of getting reports and files and more in order, he convinced a couple of healers to take him to see Juliette – and that was when he first realized this was going to be harder to bounce back from than even he was anticipating when it took both of the healers to help him move from the bed only a few feet to a wheelchair. After that, once he got back to his room and his bed, he hadn’t tried to get up again for a while, merely giving into his body’s weakened state and sleeping for as long as he could stand to pass time whenever Claire wasn’t there.

Finally, after five long nights, on the sixth evening, the healers agreed he was well enough to go home so long as he continued to rest; although it may have also had something to do with his constant complaining about wanting to go home as soon as he was able to limp across the room without help two days earlier. So that night, with a somewhat pleased look, he had waved his wand at the various things (clothing, toothbrush, shampoo, soap, etc.) that he had managed to scatter across the room and happily returned home with Claire, to sleep in their own bed with her by his side in the later hours, just as he had become used to in recent months.

Sirius vaguely remembered Claire waking him up the next morning as she got ready to go into work for the day – and he only sort of remembered mumbling something about how she should take the day off and stay home with him, only to abruptly change his mind saying “On second thought, make sure no one’s burning the place down… but come home early if you can…” It was not long after he heard her leave that he was completely asleep once again, and he stayed that way for hours. It was almost noon when he woke up again, this time to rolling over onto his stomach, which had until recently been the most comfortable way for him to sleep; but with the wounds still healing on his chest it was more or less impossible to even stay asleep if he tried to lay down that way.

Disgruntled with having woken up from the dull pain Sirius rolled onto his back once again, glancing over at the clock on the bedside table he realized what time it was and decided he might as well get up for a little while – there was no way he was sleeping the entire day away now that he was home. Getting up he limped his way to the bathroom and took a shower, carefully cleaning the wounds on his chest and abdomen that were now much smaller than they had been, healing and shrinking while leaving behind new scars – probably the worst ones he would have, even though it wasn’t quite as bad as it could have been without dittany and other herbs the healers had used.

Once he was finished showering and drying off he went back to their bedroom and threw on a t-shirt and a pair of old jeans before grabbing the small bottle of whiskey that was buried in one of his drawers along with his knee brace, then sitting on the bed and taking a quick swig of the whiskey before wrapping the brace around his sore knee. Sirius sat on the bed for a few minutes after that, pondering what he would do with himself from this point on – and then he found himself taking another short swig from the bottle before replacing the lid and stuffing it in his pocket while thinking about how much he was not looking forward to walking up or down the stairs today because of his leg. In the end, he decided not to put himself through that and he disapparated from the bedroom, reappearing a moment later in the kitchen.

Making his way over to the fridge he noticed that Claire had certainly managed to clean up some since he had been home – the night before he had been so tired he hadn’t fought the suggestion of going straight to the bed at all so this was the first he had been in the kitchen since the morning they got the last letter from Blackwell. It was a bit of a relief that she had already magically patched up the hole his fist had created in her wall that morning – though if she hadn’t he had planned on it, feeling slightly bad for it in the aftermath, even if he didn’t exactly remember the moment it happened.

Sighing as he thought about that morning for probably the millionth time since it happened, Sirius tried to push the thoughts aside and made his way to the fridge and grabbed some things and made himself lunch – a feast more like – now that there were no healers to tell him he needed to pace himself and that half the things he ate were unhealthy (which had in turn made him complain to Claire that they were starving him). Once he had more than enough food made up he sat down at the table with that mornings paper, which Claire had left for him no doubt, and read it over as he sat there and ate until he was past full – for however long that may last.

When he finished eating he waved his wand to clear the mess, using a charm to have the dishes wash themselves, and he sighed – would he regret this next decision? Sirius had been almost certain that any packs of cigarettes he had stashed before his latest attempt to quit were long gone – but on the off chance that he was wrong, he used the summoning spell and sure enough, from some random location in the house a pack with only a couple left in it came zooming towards him. A half smile that was part victory and part disappointment came across his face as he caught them and got up and limped out to their backyard and sat down on the porch and stretched his leg out in front of him.

He stared down the pack of cigarettes for a moment – but eventually he gave in hoping to find that small moment of stress relief that he had associated with cigarettes since he was a teenager; and he put the cigarette in his lips and used his wand to light it – taking a long and slow drag, inhaling the smoke and holding it in for just a split second before exhaling a satisfying cloud of smoke that hung over him for a moment. It only hurt his chest a little – but it didn’t induce a coughing fit or burn or anything else uncomfortable so he took another drag. When he finished the cigarette he didn’t necessarily feel a ton less stressed, but just less stressed enough that he knew that wouldn’t be his last cigarette, no matter what he may have told himself before he lit it.

As the rest of the day drew on, Sirius found himself increasingly bored – there wasn’t much he could do from the house right now; planning for the Order was something he really needed Claire for, so the only thing left was to look over files that he had copies of again, and again, and again, desperately hoping to find something he missed all the other times he had combed through them. Then he came across the file that had caused all the trouble between him and Claire the day before they fought Blackwell – Claire must have brought it home just to keep something so private and important out of the office or something – it was the file with all the letters, all the photos, everything he had hid from her and all that guilt flooded back and intensified by the fact that he knew this was still something the two of them had not resolved between them. Instead they had chosen not to speak about it while he was in the hospital – it wasn’t that important compared to what had almost happened – but now, he couldn’t keep ignoring it.

It wasn’t like the thought ever left his mind – but instead of trying to apologize again or anything of the sort he simply tried to push the thoughts away, instead focusing on getting well enough to go home – and today by doing anything to keep his mind busy. Yet look where that had gotten him, looking over the same file that he had spent months staring at while trying to figure out what his next move had to be. Now he only felt more guilty and more frustrated over the fact that they still had not talked about this at all. Had things gone normally that day, they would have gone through a few days of complete awkwardness, anger, disappointment and cold shouldering from Claire and desperate attempts to make things right from him – instead they had ended up forced into another life or death situation and now they had been ignoring it for being there for each other through this.

Sirius ran a hand through his long hair, pushing it off his face and sighing as he sat at his desk staring at the file – he knew they were going to have to talk about this eventually, and that it was going to continue to drive him mad until they did. He could go on continuing to ignore the subject – but that would do no good for either of them in the end and could even turn into a whole new problem if left alone. Neither Sirius nor Claire was necessarily the best at talking and discussing feelings – but he had been married once and he did know that if they didn’t address a problem like this then it was bound to become something bigger eventually.

He spent the rest of the afternoon between trying to distract himself with other files, attempting to nap on the couch, reading more of the book he had been working on and periodically sipping from the small bottle of whiskey in his pocket. Eventually he stepped outside for another cigarette before coming back in to lay on the couch again – glancing at the clock on the wall as he did so, wondering how much longer it would be before Claire finally came home. It was killing him to be stuck at home by himself for one, but to be stuck there with his thoughts, worries and guilt over their recent fight all gnawing at him was more than he had expected.

Stretching out he groaned softly because of how sore he still was – hopefully a few more days of getting up and wandering around the house would have him feeling well enough to go out and do something with himself. Sirius adjusted pillows behind his head, trying to find a position where he would be more comfortable as he sat there lost in thought – what could he do to make sure Claire trusted him? Would she try to avoid this conversation if he brought it up when she finally arrived home? Or would it put her back to how angry and upset with him that she was before, like simple flip of a switch? No matter how it turned out, whether he – or she – liked it or not, he knew they had to finally talk about all this – because not ever talking about it, leaving the situation completely unresolved, might drive him mad.

[Claire Pierce]

After a few long days of working at the auror department and returning to the hospital at night, plus a weekend of using Sirius’s hospital room as her office because she wouldn’t go home all day, Sirius was permitted to leave, although he still was not in great condition. He came home with Claire, and it felt like an age since he had been there, even though it was only six days. Only a week since their fight, which felt so strange to her. Still, it felt so good to go home with him, and to sit in bed reading while he fell asleep beside her a few hours later. Despite the unaddressed fight and events, Claire felt more settled than she had in the last week; some things were right again, back with Sirius, back at home, back to some semblance of health.

The next morning, she skipped her run and stayed in bed until she really had to get up for work. While she pulled out an outfit for the day, she thought Sirius was still asleep until she realized he had woken up at some point. He mumbled a half-asleep stream of comments about how she should stay at home with him instead of leaving for work, but he seemed to perhaps wake up a bit more when he said, “On second thought, make sure no one’s burning the place down… but come home early if you can…” Laughing lightly, Claire said, ”I’m sure there are some fires to put out. They can’t make it easy for me, can they?” When she came back from the bathroom, fully dressed in her work clothes and her hair pulled back, she leaned down and kissed his forehead. He was mostly asleep again by then, but she said, ”Go back to sleep. Rest today. I’ll be home later.”

Before she went to work, Claire left notes for Sirius, one upstairs in the bathroom, beside the potion he had to drink that morning, and another down in the kitchen, detailing the healer’s orders and schedule: potions, when to take them, guidelines for the first few days at home. Claire had no doubt that he would probably disregard the healer’s guidelines, as was his custom, but she had to try as always. She was a control freak, a total type A worrier, a fan of schedules and lists and orders. Sirius had never been spared that tendency, whether it was recovery guidelines or what he needed to do at work or planning a prank together as teenagers. When she was satisfied, even though he would probably ignore them, she left for work, which had been chaotic since the event the previous week. The search was still on for Blaine, and a pair of minor but suspicious incidents had occurred over the past few days, and Claire was still handling those, the fires she had been putting out.

Because Sirius was stuck at home, she was stuck with extra work, balancing both of their workloads as she had been doing for the past week, but it also meant she wanted to get home on time for once; Sirius was probably going crazy by now, trapped in the house and alone for more than a few hours. As time ticked by, Claire tried to get her work done, moving between meetings and briefings and time in her - their - office, going through piles of paperwork and files, analyzing evidence and reports as she tried to make progress with cases. All things considered, she was doing fairly well with time and productivity, until one of the aurors dragged someone in for questioning and Claire had to join him. By then it was around 4 o’clock, and all plans of leaving at 5 were soon thwarted. It was almost 6 by the time she was done with that, ultimately a dead end, and still had to wrap up a few things that absolutely had to be finished before she could leave. After that, though, she stopped at what had become the bare minimum for the day and packed some things into her bag for her late night work.

Thinking of Sirius at home, Claire grabbed her coat and bag, turned off her office light, and left for home at last. She found Sirius on the couch, stretched out and looking like he was lost in thought. Breaking into his concentration, Claire said without preamble, ”I tried my best to come home on time, but you know how it is. Things happened.” Looking at him across the living room, she pulled off her shoes and deposited her coat and bag on a nearby chair, musing, ”I didn’t yell at anyone, but I don’t know if that strong behavior of mine will last until you get back.” 

Crossing to the couch, she leaned down to kiss his cheek, finally saying, a delayed true greeting, ”Hey.” She was smiling, even as she noticed that he smelled like smoke, the unmistakable scent lingering on his skin and clothes. Claire sighed and commented, without a fight in her voice, ”It cannot have felt very pleasant to smoke with your chest healing from being ripped open.” It was just a dry observation, one she couldn’t bite back; Claire couldn’t pass up the opportunity to say something about this bad habit she hated, of course. With that, she pulled away and settled onto the free spot on the other end of the couch, leaning back into the cushions and feeling herself relax, just a bit. It was good to be home with him, especially after a day without him at her side.

”How was your first day at home?” she asked, worried eyes sweeping over him again. ”Did you rest? How do the wounds feel?” Furrowing her brows as she studied him, still thinking about the strange contemplative state she had found him in when she returned, Claire wondered how many cigarettes he had had, if he had found some alcohol as another form of self-medication, when he had taken the potions he was supposed to have, if he had pushed himself too far that day, if - no. She needed to stop worrying. But she couldn’t. It wasn’t in her nature to stop worrying, to stop thinking, because her brain couldn’t be shut off or controlled like that. There was a lot of things when it came to Sirius, but worrying had become a main activity recently, although it certainly wasn’t a new occurrence. He somehow always managed to make her worry about something. Claire did make herself stop voicing her worries, though, even though they had spilled out more than she had ever wanted, in general. She probably drove him insane, but for some reason he wasn’t sick of her. So she tried to stop looking at him in that sharp, worried way, instead nonchalantly settling into the couch with her legs pulled up. ”Sorry,” she said, a cross between offhand and embarrassed, as she took her hair out of its tight ponytail and cut off her inquiries.

[James Sirius Potter]

It’s not like he had expected that his first day home would be particularly eventful, or even really all that enjoyable – one thing he never did well was sitting on his own for hours on end – but he had at least known it would be more comfortable than the hospital, have better food than the hospital and he would no longer have healers watching over his every move (or at least that’s how it had felt to him). Upon waking up and finally dragging himself to the shower he had noticed a potion on the counter and had immediately rolled his eyes as he read the note beside it while getting undressed to shower. This was no doubt only one of many things he would find throughout the house, all left by Claire in attempt to oversee his healing even when she wasn’t physically there to do so.

Sirius choked down that first potion before jumping in the shower – brushing his teeth almost immediately to remove the intensely unpleasant aftertaste it left behind – then continuing on to wash up, get dressed, and take those first delicious, slightly burning sips of whiskey he had had in a week, feeling content as it settled warm in the pit of his stomach. Upon apparating downstairs, making himself enough food for three and continuing to eat all of it, he noticed another couple of potions, and a couple of papers – all stuff Claire was hoping he would read and stick to no doubt, even though she knew most of it was unlikely to happen.

Over the next several hours, as he made his way back and forth across the house from the coffee table covered in open case files (which he had summoned from his desk upstairs, no way was he dealing with those just yet), attempting to focus on reading and even at a couple points trying to take a nap, he did manage to remember to take the other potions – and for the most part around when he was supposed to. As far as resting goes, he was pretty satisfied with himself – he gave in, his body said no stairs and that certainly meant no running or even none of his usual excessive pacing out of frustration and an inability to sit still. While he hadn’t spent the day in bed by any means, he still felt he had done a fairly good job of not pushing it for a change.

Not long after he had laid down on the couch again, stretching out and attempting once more to get comfortable, Sirius heard the ‘pop’ that most certainly meant Claire had just apparated home from work and he smiled as she came into the living room, her voice already hitting his ears before she entered the room. ”I tried my best to come home on time, but you know how it is. Things happened.” Claire explained, and he knew all to well how easily things could get away from you in that office – and now she was doing twice the work until he was allowed to return to work. ”I didn’t yell at anyone, but I don’t know if that strong behavior of mine will last until you get back” she added and he couldn’t hold back a light chuckle.

“Well, I could always come back to work a little sooner… Ensure you don’t lose it on anyone and ensure I don’t lose it due to boredom. I’ll even do my own paperwork, so I’ll be spending plenty of time at my desk, where I can rest just as easily as I can here I might add.” Sirius said with a grin as she came around the couch and he could finally see her as she finally greeted him with a short ”Hey,” and a quick kiss – before adding, ”It cannot have felt very pleasant to smoke with your chest healing from being ripped open.” He had known she would notice right away, she always did, yet this evening the usual tone, the one that was ready to fight on the subject, just wasn’t there. Letting out a short sigh, he said shortly, ”Unfortunately, it wasn’t entirely unpleasant either… I only smoked two all day if that makes you feel better at all…” he already knew the answer was no, it didn’t make her feel better; but he also knew she would be wanting to ask him how many he had smoked, even if she was going to hold back when it came to actually asking him.

Sirius watched as she moved just past him now and settled into the cushions at the other end of the long couch, past his feet. Almost as soon as she was settled into the couch she looked immediately just the slightest bit more relaxed – and he smiled a little seeing it – after the week they had both had, it was much deserved. ”How was your first day at home?” she asked, worried eyes sweeping over him again. ”Did you rest? How do the wounds feel?” There it was, the worry that had been in her tone all week – that she would try to hide on and off until it was physically apparent that he was doing fine, because he would never stop trying to convince her he already was. However she seemed to notice that perhaps it was a bit much sometimes, and she apologized.

“No reason at all to be sorry love – but it’s been incredibly dull,” Sirius admitted about his day – and he knew that wasn’t likely to change over the next week (or weeks, the healer’s really hadn’t been clear on that) until he was allowed to return to the office. Even if he didn’t get cleared for field duty, being back in the office where he had more resources, more minds to bounce ideas off of and less sitting alone would be enough to keep him from dwelling on every last thing that had gone wrong lately; because then at least he would be trying to do something about it. “Yes, I rested – I slept late, ate a ton, it was a plenty rest-filled day,” Sirius said in response to her first question, quickly following with, “Still uncomfortable, still sore, still manageable…”

Since she had asked him to try and be more honest, and to put down the invincible act in front of her, he had at least been toning back his facade of enthusiasm for how he was feeling – this was more of a middle ground answer; admitting he was still uncomfortable and hurting, but assuring her that it was nothing he couldn’t handle at the same time. As he smiled at her, in the back of his head he was still debating on how to go about bringing up the difficult subject they had both been avoiding. Then he spoke again, “and since I’m sure it’s been driving you crazy all day, I did take all the potions you had out, yes, I took them in the right order, and for the most part I was on time. However, those other papers, I didn’t finish reading those…” he explained – he had gotten through the first few paragraphs of the paper with the list of things he was supposed to avoid doing and had quickly discarded it before heading outside for that first cigarette.

Eventually, he knew he would have to get them talking about what had happened last week, about all of it, but most importantly about everything he had hid – but for now, Claire had just gotten home and settled into the couch; the worried look on her face seemed to subside some, though he knew that was partially her trying not to be too overbearing when it came to asking him questions (even though she surely wanted to know whether or not he had drank today, had he really rested today or had he overdone it as he so often tried to do, and much more). For now, he was going to let the two of them settle into the evening a little, perhaps that would make the conversation he was worried about a little less hard on them both.

[Claire Pierce]

Taking off her coat and putting down her bag, Claire spotted him stretched out on the couch, probably leaving little room for her to occupy, but she was small and would force him to move a bit if she had to, despite the injuries and recovery. Now that she was out of the office and away from the concerns and stresses of auror work, especially while running the office solo, Claire felt some tension slip away. Instead, she thought of the night ahead: dinner, considering what work she would tackle later, how she should put the work away for a while, at least until Sirius went to bed. It was nice to be home with him there again, a fairly normal evening, after a week away and long days without him.

Sirius chuckled and said, “Well, I could always come back to work a little sooner… Ensure you don’t lose it on anyone and ensure I don’t lose it due to boredom. I’ll even do my own paperwork, so I’ll be spending plenty of time at my desk, where I can rest just as easily as I can here I might add.” She rolled her eyes as she moved over to the couch and said, ”Doctor’s orders.” Before leaning down to kiss him, she added, ”And forgive me if I’m skeptical that you’ll happily only sit at your desk, doing paperwork.” As she pulled away after commenting on the obvious smoking, Sirius responded, ”Unfortunately, it wasn’t entirely unpleasant either… I only smoked two all day if that makes you feel better at all…” ”Not really,” she admitted, lightly enough, allowing the conversation to settle, so that it wouldn’t turn into a fight they had already had hundreds of times. Claire really wasn’t in the mood for that tonight, and instead she chose to be glad it wasn’t more, that it wasn’t three or four or, hell, a whole pack - she wouldn’t put it past him, even when he was like this.

By the time Claire had settled down by his feet and turned back to him, Sirius was smiling at her, even as she launched into her questions and then reined herself in. “No reason at all to be sorry love – but it’s been incredibly dull,” he said, echoing the reality of the last week and probably the next couple of weeks. Her response would ordinarily be that were books, so many books, in this house, among the other ideas of how to spend his days at home, but she still knew what it was like to be stuck at home, and Sirius was always particularly dejected about it. ”You’ve obviously occupied yourself,” Claire replied while she eyed the many case files that laid on the coffee table. ”You do have a desk, you know,” she commented teasingly as she leaned over to straighten them up so it wasn’t a complete mess. ”Make any progress?”

Despite his probably impatience with her and his desire to roll his eyes at her - they were too alike sometimes - Sirius still dutifully reported back to her. “Yes, I rested – I slept late, ate a ton, it was a plenty rest-filled day. Still uncomfortable, still sore, still manageable…” He was trying to be honest with her, she thought, to stop putting on that act of invincibility and strength like she had been asking him to do. He still smiled at her, probably trying to lighten the conversation and smooth over the topic, and she relaxed a bit more as he went on to say, “And since I’m sure it’s been driving you crazy all day, I did take all the potions you had out, yes, I took them in the right order, and for the most part I was on time. However, those other papers, I didn’t finish reading those…” Smiling just a little, Claire said, ”Drive me crazy all day? I don’t know what you’re talking about. Although if you did finish reading those papers, you would know they said not to smoke.” It was a lighthearted dig at him; she wasn’t always critical and annoying and worried, even though she tended to be more worried these days. Claire forced herself to calm down more, to stop talking about the stupid cigarettes, to not ask if he had been drinking today (she could guess the answer, and didn’t really need to ask), to make him read the papers that the healers had given them.

As Claire relaxed more and leaned back into the couch, Sirius drifted back into quiet, much like the state she had found him in, although he was still aware enough that she was there. He had finished answering her questions, she supposed, and maybe he was tired or distracted or just content to lay there. She let the quiet lie between them, before giving up after a few long moments. Then she nudged his foot to get his attention - he was too stretched out for her to elbow him or something - and said, her voice even and light, "I thought you would be more talkative after languishing here alone." A smile played on her lips, and then she asked, "What are you thinking about?"

[James Sirius Potter]

Even as lost in thought as he had been Sirius had immediately brought a desperate attempt to get him out of the house and back in the office sooner when Claire told him how her day at work at been. Though he had expected it he was still somewhat disappointed when she shot him down immediately as well. ”Doctor’s orders.” Before leaning down to kiss him, she added, ”And forgive me if I’m skeptical that you’ll happily only sit at your desk, doing paperwork.” A grin played on his face for a second as he responded with, ”The sitting at my desk part I can definitely manage – right now sitting has been working for me – it’s the paperwork you have a right to be skeptical about.” When they spoke briefly about the fact that he had definitely been smoking today he informed her that at least it was only a couple, but she admitted knowing that didn’t exactly make her feel better about it – but they left it at that. They both knew how each other felt about it – there was no point in dwelling on it and ending up in another fight over something so insignificant.

”You’ve obviously occupied yourself,” she said, taking notice of the case files spread out across the coffee table – Sirius watched as she started to straighten up the files adding, ”You do have a desk, you know,” in a teasing and almost playful tone that made him smile as he said, ’A desk upstairs… Far away from the food and whiskey in the kitchen… I don’t think those stairs and I are going to get along for a little bit, so it seemed easier to bring everything down here.” Then she asked him if he had made any progress, and he sighed. ’No, not really… Unless you consider it progress to start thinking about checking dead end leads a third time for extra good measure…” In all the hours he had spent that afternoon looking over those files, hoping that something they missed before might become apparent to him now, he kept coming back to the same conclusion – they still had nothing.

It still wasn’t easy for him to be admitting that he was still uncomfortable and hurting, but he was trying to let it slip through here and there so she knew he was being honest – mentioning that sitting at his desk wouldn’t be too much of a problem, and that the stairs was something he was avoiding, and finally answering as honestly (and in as few words as possible) how he was feeling when she asked him, sounding concerned and as though she might have been waiting to ask. He also went on to promise her that he had taken all the potions he was supposed to and admitting he had only started reading the papers the healers had given them when they sent him home the night before. ”Drive me crazy all day? I don’t know what you’re talking about. Although if you did finish reading those papers, you would know they said not to smoke.” she had said in response and his grin didn’t fade.

”Well, I realized about halfway into the first paragraph and list that I was already breaking rules, so I figured there wasn’t much point in reading the rest…” he explained in the very smart-assed tone and with the same attitude he had approached any sort of authority with since he was a young teenager – some things just don’t change after all. With that the conversation had settled – she didn’t continue to press questions on his day or how he was feeling – and without entirely realizing it Sirius had drifted off into thought again, debating on how to bring up the touchy subject that neither of them were probably ready to think about right now. It wasn’t long however before he felt Claire nudge his foot and he looked back up at her as she spoke.

"I thought you would be more talkative after languishing here alone." A smile played on her lips, and then she asked, "What are you thinking about?" Had he been that obviously out of it? He hadn’t really realized since that had been his entire day – him left alone with his thoughts, a never ending battle and certainly a large part of the cause for his regular and excess drinking. A short sigh escaped him as he glanced at the pile of files and back to Claire. “What am I not thinking about might be a shorter list…” he admitted. Sirius ran a hand in his hair, uncertain of how to approach the thing that was weighing the most on his mind – but eventually, when he thought maybe he had found the right words, he pushed himself into sitting up, his movements still very stiff and slow, and leaned over grabbing the file that had been the cause of so much tension between them.

”Mostly I keep thinking about this… and how I should’ve seen it for the psychological trap it was from the start…” he explained, admitting his mistake in a way he hadn’t been able to before, when it had only started becoming apparent to him when Claire had put the idea in his head. Before that he had been sure of the fact that he needed to keep playing along with Blackwell’s game to keep Claire and Juliette safe – instead it put his guard down, he had seen Juliette earlier in the day and yet Blackwell had still gotten to her. The more he had thought about it over the last week – and even if they weren’t speaking about it to each other the issue had lingered in his mind practically from the moment he had woken up in the hospital – the more he started to realize that it was a game, but it was all mind games.

This man knew what to do, who to get near and what to say to trigger the worst and most irrational responses from him and that terrified him, not that he was ready to admit that out loud. Sirius wasn’t looking at Claire anymore, but down at the plain file folder he was holding, thinking for a moment. ”I really am sorry I went all nut-case and hid this from you… I clearly wasn’t thinking rationally… and sometimes I need to remember that’s one of the many reasons I need you… Had I brought this to you from the start things might be a hell of a lot different right now for all I know.” It wasn’t often that he let down his usual defenses of sarcasm, and being an ass to admit that he had done something entirely stupid – but after all the time he had spent thinking about the whole situation, the more he started to question every move he had made from the time he had gotten the first letter until he was later defending each of his actions to Claire a week ago.

[Claire Pierce]

It was calming to come home to Sirius, even if she would have prefer to have him there across from her all day, even though he was complaining and would continue to complain when he was able to return. He replied, ”The sitting at my desk part I can definitely manage – right now sitting has been working for me – it’s the paperwork you have a right to be skeptical about.” He grinned a bit as he said it, and she rolled her eyes in response. ”I know from experience,” she said dryly. He was bad enough on a normal day, but itching to leave the office with her when he wasn’t able to tended to make it even worse. Claire would already be looking forward to Sirius’ impatience and frustration at being shut in the office once he returned, but it was too quiet and lonely without him.

“A desk upstairs… Far away from the food and whiskey in the kitchen… I don’t think those stairs and I are going to get along for a little bit, so it seemed easier to bring everything down here,” he explained, a fair point. ”It’s as if you slip those comments in and think I won’t notice them,” Claire said mildly. ”I’d say the walk might deter you from the whiskey, but then you could always summon it.” She sighed, surprisingly far from a fight; it was just her usual distaste for his drinking habits, the relatively light response that came from years of this worn-out argument. She focused instead on the files on the table next to them, noting which ones he had selected. No, he hadn’t made any progress, Sirius told her, ”Unless you consider it progress to start thinking about checking dead end leads a third time for extra good measure…” ”My day was full of dead ends too,” she sighed.

”Well, I realized about halfway into the first paragraph and list that I was already breaking rules, so I figured there wasn’t much point in reading the rest…” Despite herself, Claire snorted, thanks to that smart-ass tone that had worked itself back into his voice. This was Sirius, all right. ”Don’t say that to your healer,” she replied, a bit of her own smart-ass self there in her voice too. But this faded away from both of them, as Sirius drifted into thought again and Claire went quiet along with him. After a while, though, she broke into the silence. Sirius answered, "What am I not thinking about might be a shorter list..." It seemed to be a self-conscious admission as he jolted out of his thoughts and glanced back at the files and then at her again. ”Same with me,” she said, a bit of an understatement. Sirius sighed and ran a hand through his hair, a typically nervous gesture, and Claire let him be quiet, as she watched him try to find the words to go on. When he did, he forced himself to sit up, which she tried to stop, wordlessly stretching out a hand to push him back, but then he was sitting up and grabbing a file from the table.

Of course, it was the file of photos and letters, the one that had started the issues between them. Sirius seemed to want to talk about this, which she wasn’t sure she quite wanted to talk about, but she supposed it had to happen sometime. An involuntary sigh escaped her when she recognized that file though, as he then said, ”Mostly I keep thinking about this… and how I should’ve seen it for the psychological trap it was from the start…” He was admitting the mistake in a new way, addressing it differently than that night, when he hadn’t seemed able to do it. ”Yes, you should have,” Claire said, a bit stern and tightly but not angry. ”And if you hadn’t been able to see it, then I would have been able to.”

Sirius went on, and unlike that night, Claire let him this time. She was quiet and tense, but trying to not withdraw and get angry again, as he said, ”I really am sorry I went all nut-case and hid this from you… I clearly wasn’t thinking rationally… and sometimes I need to remember that’s one of the many reasons I need you… Had I brought this to you from the start things might be a hell of a lot different right now for all I know.” This is what she had been saying to him that night they had fought. She knew things would have gone differently, and it would have felt differently to her if he hadn’t hidden it for so long. He had apologized that day she had found out; he had apologized all night, when she allowed him to get a word in, and the next morning, before everything had happened and their worries had shifted away from their fight. But in the hours following her discovery, Sirius had sought to explain himself. He had still attempted to justify and defend his actions, but she hadn't wanted to hear that.

”No, you weren’t thinking rationally at all,” she said, fighting to keep her voice even and normal. ”Things could have gone a lot better if you had told me the truth from the very first letter he sent you.” She looked away from him, up at the ceiling, for a long moment. Now she was the one trying to find the words; she had used up so many of them that night, yelling at him for what seemed like hours, but she hadn’t talked about it since that next uncomfortable morning, just before the course of their day had changed drastically. ”I want to forgive you, you know,” she said. ”I really want to put this behind us. I don’t like being upset or angry with you.” It was true - as much as Claire lived in her extreme feelings and was driven by her anger, she didn’t enjoy it being directed at Sirius. There was an undercurrent of tension and frustration there in her voice though as she continued, ”This is just… very difficult for me. I didn’t expect this to happen, especially when everything had started to go right for us.” A pause, and then she amended, ”Well, personally. Ignoring the general stress, danger, and destruction around us.”

[James Sirius Potter]

When he explained his reasoning behind not reading all the way through the information provided by the healers in a very typical Sirius like fashion he smiled, finally a glimmer of his true personality getting a chance to shine through (which was so far and few between lately with all the chaos of their work lives colliding with their personal lives), but also at Claire’s genuine reaction – a snort of laughter followed by a remark not to tell his healer that. The smile playing on his face twisted for a second into a smirk as he thought about how that conversation would go – he already knew the healers hated dealing with him as it was, speaking his mind like that with them wouldn’t make that any better, but it would probably provide some short-lived entertainment for him.

From there they faded into silence for a bit before Claire finally nudged him and asked what was on his mind – to which he said without much thought that what he wasn’t thinking about might be a shorter list. Claire agreed, and he knew how true it was – neither one of them really seemed to have an “off” switch, and in his case it lead to excessive drinking, and in hers it led to many long and sleepless nights, fueling her decades long insomnia. When he slowly and carefully pushed himself into a sitting position and grabbed the file on the table Claire instinctively stuck a hand out to try and make him lay back down – but that wasn’t going to stop him and she knew that.

Then he went on to explain that he now realized that he should’ve seen it for what it really was – a way to play with his mind, which had been so fragile after losing his family and being unable to do a damn thing about it. It had left him in a state where he wasn’t quite sure why he was still alive, why Blackwell hadn’t just killed him like he had the other three, instead leaving him to die slowly and allowing the chance for aurors to arrive and him to be rushed to the hospital. All that had left him very irrational for a while and that paranoia, that fear of having to relive that scenario again with Claire and Juliette, the nightmares it fueled, it had all taken over his sense of reality and he had been reacting purely out of anger, rage and fear without any regard for whether or not it was a trap.

”Yes, you should have,” Claire said, a bit stern and tightly but not angry. ”And if you hadn’t been able to see it, then I would have been able to.” She was right, he knew it, she was so very right. Claire had always been the rational thinking to his over the top way of doing things – and though in their professional lives he had learned to slow down and think things through at least a little more often over the years, when it really came down to it, if emotions were involved like this, Sirius abandoned rationality and replaced it with recklessness and acting on instinct. It was always Claire who brought him back to the present and forced him to think before he acted – and throughout that whole situation he had acted recklessly, writing back to Blackwell, hiding everything away, not considering for a second that what he thought was protecting them could be putting them all in more danger.

He went on with another apology – but one that was much more thought out than before, and no longer trying to justify every move he had made. There had been more than enough of that when they had initially argued a week ago – he wasn’t making any more excuses for his actions, he had been reckless, he had been irrational and acting on paranoia, all things he hated to admit, but was. When he finally finished speaking he was still staring down at the file in his hands, he tapped his fingers along the edge of it, perhaps nervously, awaiting her reaction and not knowing what to expect at all. They could end up arguing again – although he really hoped they were past that part, and on to talking about it as a means to get past the awkward tension of leaving it as an issue unresolved.

”No, you weren’t thinking rationally at all,” she said, fighting to keep her voice even and normal. ”Things could have gone a lot better if you had told me the truth from the very first letter he sent you.” Sirius glanced up at her when she spoke, just in time to see her turn her gaze away from him and to the ceiling as she went quiet again for a moment – it was her turn to search for the right words for this complication situation they found themselves in. In all honesty he knew she still had plenty of reason to be hurt and angry over the situation – he had hidden things from her, he had lied to cover up the things he was hiding and in all the years they had been friends, even before they were together, they just didn’t hide things from one another like that.

”I want to forgive you, you know,” she said. ”I really want to put this behind us. I don’t like being upset or angry with you.” There was only a short pause before she spoke again, Sirius watched her with a look of uncertainty on his face, fidgeting with the edges of a piece of parchment that was poking out of the file he still held. ”This is just… very difficult for me. I didn’t expect this to happen, especially when everything had started to go right for us.” A pause, and then she amended, ”Well, personally. Ignoring the general stress, danger, and destruction around us.” A small sigh escaped him at first – he had always feared that when he finally decided to give things a real chance with Claire that he would find some way to mess things up. It certainly hadn’t taken long for him to manage that, to some degree at least.

Sirius grey blue eyes darted from her, momentarily back down to the source of all the tension that he was holding, and then back up to her. “I think this probably takes the cake as far as stupid things I’ve done, huh?” A small smile tugged at his lips for a second, then he added, “Things were going great, with the exception of the general stress, danger, and destruction – but we knew what sort of chaos we were signing up for with this job from the beginning, right?” Looking back down at the file for a second he tossed it aside, back onto the stack of files on the coffee table, and then looked back up at her.

“I can’t promise I won’t ever do something stupid again, but I can promise that I won’t do something on this scale of stupid again… It was hard to do, it didn’t feel right… It clearly wasn’t the right thing to do… and you know me, sometimes I have to learn things the hard way…” It wasn’t quite him trying to make light of the situation, so much as he was trying to make the conversation easier on the both of them – more calm and almost casual, but still trying to address what needed to be addressed. This was never going to be an easy conversation for either of them, but it could at least be a little more comfortable, the way it should be when they were talking to each other. They had already had their fight, their chance to yell and debate over what he had done from different perspectives – now was time to talk about how they move on from here and make things right between them again.

[Claire Pierce]

Sirius had pushed himself up into a sitting position, similarly seeming to push himself to start the conversation they had both been ignoring. Everything had been crazy and stressful over the past week, but there had still been opportunities for this inevitable discussion, if only they had wanted to have it in the hospital or the previous night at home or some other time. Both had been carefully avoiding the subject, with Claire trying to steer clear of any mention of the fight or her current feelings on the issue. Her feelings had evolved a bit since her initial reaction, but they were still hard to work out, uncertain and disappointed and frustrated.

He was fidgeting with the file and she could feel his eyes on her, but she kept her body still and her eyes on the ceiling. For some reason, she felt completely unable to look at him and see his gaze - probably apologetic and uncertain and worried. Claire wasn’t a vulnerable person; she had always been impossible to hurt, in impeccable control of herself, someone who compartmentalized and became icy and detached over the years. But he had hurt her with this, and that hurt was what ran below the anger that had ebbed away now, leaving her to sort through what came after her anger. That wasn’t something she would reveal willingly, even though it would be impossible to hide from him. Things were always simultaneously easier and harder with Sirius. “I have always trusted you,” she said, “with everything.” Every detail. All her secrets and feelings. Those things she kept hidden. Her life. “I have never had a reason to not trust you.” Her voice was steady and quiet, but not soft and forgiving. It sounded a bit removed from the situation, clear that she was trying to control herself and keep everything in check.

Claire still trusted him, deep down; she wasn’t sure if anything really could shake that trust so drastically it would be destroyed. Maybe he would have to sell her out to Blackwell, but of course, that was far out of the realm of possibility, and she knew that. But her deep trust in him was threatened, on slightly less firm ground now, and that was a first. It remained to be seen if she would trust everything that came out of his mouth. After all, how would she know if he was hiding something else from her? She didn’t want to have to actually read his mind, like he often joked she could. (She did know some legilimency, naturally, and his mind would be so familiar to her, but no - she wouldn’t. She didn’t want to have to do that.) It was hard to remember that she trusted him.

Sirius was smiling a little, probably unable to help himself, as he asked, “I think this probably takes the cake as far as stupid things I’ve done, huh?” ”I’ll have to adjust the rankings,” she said in what would have normally been a joke but fell utterly flat now. ”We’ll see where it ends up.” He went on, though, talking about their relationship. “Things were going great, with the exception of the general stress, danger, and destruction – but we knew what sort of chaos we were signing up for with this job from the beginning, right?” ”I don’t think we knew at seventeen that this is what we would be facing,” she pointed out. ”But yes, things were going pretty great,” she admitted, and then amended, still unsmiling but genuine, ”though I wouldn’t say things are terrible or a lost cause now.” She was determined, beyond the frustration and the sting of betrayal and distrust that accompanied all of this, that things would return to normal, as much as they could achieve normal these days.

“I can’t promise I won’t ever do something stupid again, but I can promise that I won’t do something on this scale of stupid again… It was hard to do, it didn’t feel right… It clearly wasn’t the right thing to do… and you know me, sometimes I have to learn things the hard way…” Sirius said, obviously attempting to be calm and collected in his apology and way of moving forward. ”I know you’re going to do stupid things again,” she replied, in a way that wasn’t mean, suggesting Sirius only did stupid things, or upset, but just stating a weary fact of their universe. Claire sounded pretty detached from that too, as she tried to stay composed. ”But I hope you remember this in the future. Like the next time he tries to manipulate you.”

Now Claire looked away from him again, this time down at her hands, away from his face. She steeled herself, aimed for control, no anger. It only somewhat worked. ”There can’t be anything else like this,” Claire said. ”There can’t be anything else you’re hiding.” Her voice had gotten a little desperate, and she was glad she wasn’t looking at him; it would be too hard, and she wasn’t sure what would happen to her voice or her face or her words if she did look him in the eyes. ”Promise me - promise me there isn’t anything else. And that this won’t happen again.” It was hard for her to say this, in such a different tone than the night she had yelled and screamed at him, consumed with fury. She was less angry now, but very tense; she was still frustrated and overwhelmed by worry that there was more, that this would happen again. Claire didn’t know what to do in this situation, having never expected Sirius to lie to her about something like this. It seemed to shift her world a little, and she was trying to reset it, but she wasn’t sure how to actually do that.