Escape

Escape
Chapter Three
“Grimmauld Place”

Despondent was the only word Tonks could think of to describe the house and the person living in it. The derelict building had once been a palace to the family living there, but over the years had decayed until it was a mere shell of its former splendor.

As for the man living there, he wasn’t much better off. Tonks leaned against the doorjamb, watching her cousin drown his frustration in another bottle of firewhiskey. Like the house, he was only a shell of his former self. He stared into the empty fire grate with haunted gray eyes and a blank expression on his once handsome face. He looked like he hadn’t shaved in a week, and the pile of empty firewhiskey bottles next to the sink confirmed that he had been spending his days sulking and alone.

Tonks didn’t need to ask what he was thinking about to know. Just outside, twenty steps from where he sat, spring bloomed in England. A breeze wrapped London in cool arms, bringing with it the sweet scent of nectar and freshly cut grass. Birds flying back from winter migration chirped welcoming songs to one another while children set free from playrooms shrieked happily in the parks all across London. And sitting in the dark, musty kitchen of Grimmauld Place was Sirius Black.

It was so sad, Tonks thought. Sirius had been a prisoner all his life. Even as a free man he wasn’t really free. The bars of a cell door were gone, but the accusation of murder still locked him away from the rest of the world. He was confined to the place he had never truly called home, unable to help the Order of the Phoenix in any way that he found acceptable.

When Tonks had gone home to visit her parents after joining the Order, she had told her mother about Sirius’s innocence. Andromeda had cried. It was the first time Tonks had ever seen her mother cry. They had spent the entire night in the attic looking through old photo albums. For every picture, Andromeda had a story to tell about Sirius. Years ago, they had been as close as brother and sister, both outcasts and proud of it.

Sirius had been bold and brave, willing to die to protect his friends, wanting to prove that he was a Black in name only. Tonks could sympathize. Every now and again she saw her uncle Lucius at the Ministry. Every time, she felt the urge to shout at the top of her lungs: “I’m not like him! Look! I’m an Auror!” When her aunt Bellatrix and uncle Rodolphus had broken out of Azkaban, she had seen the way Madam Bones looked at her, perhaps wondering if Tonks could arrest her own flesh and blood. It had hurt. It still hurt when she remembered those suspicious eyes. The whole world looked at Sirius that way.

“Wotcher, cousin,” Tonks said, sitting down in the chair opposite Sirius.

The man started, slopping some firewhiskey down his robes. He hadn’t heard her come in, which was a rarity, as Tonks usually managed to knock something over and trigger Mrs. Black’s shrieks.

“Morning,” he mumbled, looking back into the grate.

Tonks sighed sadly. He was wasting away inside this decrepit house, which he had always hated. Why, why couldn’t Dumbledore see that? What was best for a man’s safety wasn’t always best for his sanity. One look at Mad-Eye Moody could confirm that.

“No one else here?”

“Nope. Hasn’t been since Remus left.”

Tonks bit her lip. That had been at least a week prior. She felt a pang of guilt. She would have to make sure to drop by more often, even if she didn’t have anything to report on. Andromeda would be livid if she found out Tonks had been so neglectful towards her only respectable family.

There was a moment of silence between them in which Sirius continued to stare into the ashes and Tonks chewed her bottom lip thoughtfully. She wanted to get to know Sirius, but she wasn’t sure he wanted to talk about himself. So much of his life had been stripped away in Azkaban. She didn’t know if he even had any happy memories left, and she was afraid of bringing up any subject that might cause him pain.

She felt a constriction her chest, an urgent need to make Sirius smile. He wanted so badly to help the Order. He was so willing to die for the right cause that he had forgotten there were also things worth living for. Her first instinct was to drag Harry away from Hogwarts for the day, but she knew she could never accomplish that. Not only would Professor McGonagall refuse to allow it, but ruddy Dolores Umbridge would jump on any excuse to expel Harry and truancy would be a good enough reason.

A sudden burst of inspiration came to her just at the moment when she ruled out bringing Harry to Grimmauld Place as an option. As each second ticked by, the feeble idea grew into a grandiose plan that Tonks was sure would be infallible. It was just so perfect!

“Fancy a walk in the park, cousin?” she asked.

Sirius glared at her, thinking that she was goading him. He had gotten enough of that from Snape and thought Dumbledore took extreme pleasure in lecturing him about staying inside the house as well.

Tonks didn’t cower from his harsh gaze. She was an Auror. A little Black sneering couldn’t put her off.

“Mum told me you were always up for a risky adventure. Getting soft with old age? Or don’t you care for being a dog anymore?”

Sirius’s eyebrows rose slightly, as if surprised that she was suggesting such a thing. He hadn’t expected the child of prefect and top student Andromeda Black-Tonks to have inherited the adventurous gene that randomly skipped around the Black family tree.

“Lucius Malfoy recognized me at King’s Cross station,” he said, taking another swig of firewhiskey. “It’s not really a disguise anymore.”

“Of course he recognized you. It’s not every day you see a great mangy dog hugging Harry Potter.”

A smile tugged at the corner of Sirius’s mouth, but it faded quickly. “He and every other Death Eater will recognize me if I’m seen with you.”

Tonks sighed inwardly. He sounded so defeated; it was heartbreaking. Remus had told her that Sirius wanted to go to Hogsmeade, but Harry, Ron, and Hermione thought it was too risky. It appeared that their good intentions had stung Sirius deeply. According to Andromeda, he had never turned down an adventure, even if it was sure to lead to serious bodily injury, as many Marauder escapades had done.

“What you need is a day outside with company unrecognizable to Death Eaters and Ministry of Magic employees.”

Sirius snorted. “Just where are we supposed to find company like that? It’s not like just any wizard on the street is going to take Sirius Black to the park.”

“First of all, don’t ever talk about yourself in the third person again. It’s creepy. Secondly, I thought you were supposedly top student in nearly all your classes,” Tonks answered. “You’re sure slow on the uptake, dear cousin.”

Sirius cast a bewildered look in her direction. On second thought, it didn’t seem worth the effort, and he turned back to the grate. She decided to try a different tack, as lethargy seemed to have touched his mind.

“Where are we going to find an unrecognizable witch? Where could we possible find someone that nobody in the wizarding world knows by sight?”

Sirius shrugged, clearly not interested in the answer. Tonks gawked at her cousin for a moment.

“I mean, where could there be a person capable of morphing into someone that no witch or wizard has ever seen before? Where could there possibly be a witch that could change her appearance at will, without the use of a wand or potion? How could anyone possibly go unnoticed by her colleagues and friends to spend a relaxing day outside with her cousin?” Tonks asked, sarcasm increasing with each question.

Sirius was regarding her curiously now, a new light sparkling in the gray depths of his eyes. He looked so much younger with the half smile on his lips. Tonks could almost recognize him as the man in her parents’ wedding photographs and playing peek-a-boo with herself as a baby in Muggle home movies.

“You’d do that for me, Tonks?”

The emotion swelling in his voice made Tonks want to pull him into a tight embrace and never let go. He hadn’t shown so much enthusiasm since Christmas, and even then it had waned quickly as Harry headed back to Hogwarts.

“What’s family for if not to change appearance randomly and risk death by leaving the confines of a stuffy old house?”

Sirius gave a bark-like laugh that Tonks had rarely heard before. Pleased with herself, she grinned back. Sirius looked alive again, like he was ready to conquer the world in a day.

“Say when I don’t look like myself at all,” Tonks said.

Sirius sat forward on the edge of his seat, watching intently as Tonks changed her appearance. She screwed up her face in concentration as her pink spiked hair became long rusty red waves, nose elongated, and lips thinned.

“When,” Sirius said, a moment later.

Tonks checked her reflection in the silver pitcher on the kitchen table. She was fairly horrified with the result. She looked studious and rule-abiding, two things she had never tried to look like before.

When Tonks set the pitcher down and turned towards the chair where Sirius had been sitting, she was met with the sight of a great shaggy black dog. Tonks tried to stifle the giggles threatening to leap out of her throat. Padfoot barked happily, his tag wagging his entire hind quarters and his tongue hanging out the side of his mouth. He acted so much like a dog that Tonks didn’t wonder how he had eluded escape for so long.

“All right, Snuffles, let’s go.”

The glorious day seemed made just for Sirius. He rolled around in the cool grass, watching the fluffy clouds move languidly across the cerulean sky. Robins and sparrows swooped through the trees, building perfect nests while long caravans of ants marched dutifully along the edge of the pavement.

When he had recovered from his last burst of energy, he leapt to his four feet again. First he sprinted left, then double back around to bark at Tonks, and then dashed off again. He was quickly heading towards exhaustion for the third time, but that didn’t stop him from thoroughly enjoying this freedom. The day wouldn’t last forever, and Sirius didn’t need anyone to remind him how fleeting this break from Grimmauld Place would be. Just like in his youth, he embraced the mantra Carpe Diem: Seize the day. The words came out as booming barks, but he repeated the phrase over and over again, joy and elation spurring him to run faster and bark louder.

Tonks dropped onto a wooden bench, doubled over with laughter and tears streaming down her cheeks. She was laughing so hard that no sound came from her throat. She didn’t know if she should be happy at Sirius’s uninhibited behavior or downright horrified. Snapping at birds and barking incessantly weren’t exactly dignified behaviors. When he had bounded up to her with a stick clamped between his jaws, she had completely lost control of her giggles.

As other dogs passed, they barked insanely at the giant black dog that was lucky enough to escape their fate of collars and leashes. Some of the owners cast disapproving looks in Tonks’s direction, but she ignored them. She wasn’t about to put Sirius on a leash. Firstly, it would be cruel to stifle his freedom. Secondly, he was strong enough to rip her shoulder out of socket if he wanted to get away. She just watched Sirius loping playfully around the park, occasionally throwing a stick for him to fetch when he got bored with birds.

When the red sun began to sink behind the western horizon, Sirius collapsed on the ground next to Tonks. She peered down at him, her smile widening. He was lying on his side, his four legs sprawled out as much as a dog’s legs could sprawl. His side heaved and his tongue hung out the side of his mouth, but his gray eyes were dancing with mirth.

“Had a good day?”

Padfoot barked happily, his tail thumping against the ground, disturbing the newly blooming dandelions. The white puffs rose high on the wind and floated away. Sirius’s eyes followed their paths until the seeds escaped his vision.