Humming. Soft familiar humming.
A wave of familiarity rushed over Sirius, he had had this dream plenty of times before, and it always ended with him waking up alone in his cell. He kept his eyes closed, he wouldn't let himself, no matter how tempting it might be to open them.
" Open your eyes, Sirius,"
Sirius only scowled and bared his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut, ignoring the lump in his throat and the urge to roar in rage.
She continued to hum to herself as her slender fingers ran through his hair. She had always done that, especially on lazy mornings when they would just lay in bed together.
He felt the mattress dip underneath her weight as she moved closer to him. She continued to play with his hair and sing softly. He knew the song by heart, he knew how she would sing it, he knew how her voice would sometimes crack on high notes and he knew how it would get rough on the low notes. To anyone else, her voice was nothing to rave about, but to him, it sounded like a choir of angels.
" C'mon Sirius, show me those beautiful eyes of yours," she teased with a slight chuckle.
His smile betrayed him and he couldn't resist so he opened his eyes despite his heart screaming at him not to.
Her warm russet eyes met his cool silver ones and her pink lips turned upward into a smile, " Hi." she said shyly.
Sirius said nothing and only watched her. She was as beautiful as the last time he saw her. Her dark brown curls were pulled back with a blue ribbon and she wore light yellow sundress complimented her tan skin. Thick dark lashes framed her large almond-shaped eyes.
Sirius reaches out to cup her cheek but stopped himself.
" You're not real,"
" You're not real," he repeated sternly. Sirius closed his eyes and took a deep breath, " You're not real..."
She sighed and went back to playing with his hair. " Well just because it's a dream doesn't make me any less real to you."
Sirius shook his head, " No, you're wrong."
" No, I'm not, I'm Evelyn- any question you ask I'll answer just as the real Evelyn would, you know that, because you know Evelyn, Sirius."
Sirius opened one eye and looked at her and she smiled down at him, " Now, what do you want to say to me, you've had plenty of time to think."
That was an understatement, he had had twelve years to form an apology, but he still wasn't sure how to say how sorry he really was. There were no words for how sorry he truly was.
" I'm sorry," he breathed, " I'm so sorry, I should've never left you. You begged me not to leave, but I was so angry and I did... I left you, and Ellie. Ellie grew up without a father because of me, we didn't get to be a family because of me- Because of me James and Lily are dead and Harry grew up without either of his parents- It's all my fault...and...and I'm wasting my breath... you're not real and..."
", It's all my fault," he whispered.
There was a moment of silence between the two, they stared each other down as if trying to read each other's thoughts.
"I forgive you,"
Sirius looked at her, " How?" he asked weakly, " How could you forgive me? After what I did?"
Evelyn smiled, " Oh don't get me, wrong love, I'm pissed but I forgive you... we all have done bad things,"
Evelyn looked down at her lap, her eyes shone with guilt as she began to fidget with the hem of her dress but before Sirius could question her words she spoke.
", But you need to wake up Sirius."
His eyes widened, " No, please, I don't want to wake up there again, please." he said reaching out for her, only for his hand to grab onto nothing.
" Sirius, you need to wake up, love."
" Please don't leave me." he pleaded with her, " I don't want to wake up there alone again."
Evelyn offered him a sad smile as the room around them began to fade.
" Sirius you need to wake up," she whispered with glassy eyes," something big is going to happen,"
Sirius felt himself become drowsy and it became hard to move but he managed to say one last thing.
" Please..."
July 1, 1993 -- Azkaban
Sirius woke with a start and for a moment his heart jumped as he thought he saw him and Ev's old bedroom, only to blink and be met with the moldy wall of his prison cell.
He sat up and rubbed his face with his left hand and took a minute to think about what she had said, something big is going to happen, what did that mean? What big thing? Sirius sat in thought, as there was nothing else to do. He kept telling himself it was only a dream, caused by the bloody dementors to tease him.
He began to hear voices, they grew louder with each passing minute, there were people here. Probably aurors coming to do a security check or some shite, Sirius himself didn't see the point as the dementors did pretty damn well on their own without the extra help.
There was a timid voice, someone was afraid. Sirius knew that they would never send a newbie out here, it was usually years toughened aurors who would sometimes mock the prisoners, sometimes even hurting them if they showed any signs of aggression towards them.
" Here we are, Minister, Sirius Black's cell." said an older man.
Sirius felt himself smirk and swaggered over to the door of his cell, " Good morning Minister." Sirius' voice was scratchy from lack of use, but it did seem to startle the small man in the stupid hat, to say the least.
The Minister gave a disgusted yelp, Sirius didn't really blame him- he had never looked worse in his life. " Well it's actually- the um...afternoon." he offered.
Sirius feigned surprise, " Is it? Well excuse me, you can never tell here, really quite the shite hole." he mused. The Minister pursed his lips and looked at the stoned face auror.
" I see you have this mornings paper, mind if I take a looksie? Miss doing the crossword."
The Minister looked rather bewildered but then cleared his throat and stood up straight, " Y-Yes, take it, good day Black." he said before walking to the next cell with the auror.
The silver-eyed man watched them go until his cell did not allow him to look further, he sighed and headed over to his poor excuse of a bed and sat down.
Well that certainly wasn't very big, " You were off a bit my love." he whispered while he unfolded the paper.
The cover read 'Prize Winner Visits Egypt'.
Sirius cleared his throat and began studying the front page, he felt his lip twitch as he recognized the family, the Weasley's. Bill and Charlie were grown, Percy as well- Sirius narrowed his eyes at one Weasley in particular, Fred- well at least who he thought was Fred.
Sirius remembered how 'Toddler Fred' had taken a liking to Ellie, he hadn't had a problem with it really, because they were just kids, but he remembered the day the 2-year-old had kissed his six-month-old on the cheek. Evelyn had thought it was the cutest thing but Sirius had felt something in his gut, like an urge to drop kick the toddler. Later Evelyn whacked him over the head and told him it was an innocent little kiss.
He looked at the rest of the family and saw little Ginerva waving at the camera and then Ronald, Sirius felt himself smirk at the memory of when Ron was 9 months old and Ellie levitated a toy and then threw it at him, he was so proud-
Wait.
Sirius' eyes snapped wide open as he moved the paper closer to his face, his eyes glued to the familiar rodent sitting on Ron's shoulder...
And it was missing a toe.