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In the early years following his escape from Azkaban, Sirius hadn’t had the time to pay much attention to the weather. Well, he had paid attention to the weather – when he’d been living rough after escaping, and when he’d been in a cave outside of Hogsmeade to keep an eye on Harry in the Tournament, he’d been intimately acquainted with it whether he wanted to obsess over it or not. Even when the rain wasn’t blown right into the mouth of the cave by the wind, the little hollow in the rock collected the damp and sent it straight to his bones, leaving the stone covered with a wet sheen on the way. It had reminded him uncomfortably of Azkaban, but, well, everything had been shit so it had been easy to just bury it in the general misery of being hungry and tired and frustrated. The same thing had happened when he was imprisoned in his mother’s house: every day had been hellish and gloomy enough indoors to remind him of dementors and the North Sea.
It was once he was exonerated that he started to notice it. The war was over, everyone was getting back to their normal lives – they had normal lives to get back to, planned and regular events that spun them through the year with their families. Well, Sirius was building his normal life and his family, almost from scratch, and as tricky as that was (learning everything about Harry, coming to terms with an Andromeda who was now a grieving widow in middle age, going into training for the law at the advanced age of 38) he mostly managed to hang on by his fingertips and take each day as it came.
As the summer shifted into autumn, though, he felt himself … backsliding. It was almost never properly sunny or hot at his Camberwell flat, even at the height of August, but a perceptible change occurred sometime in late October – a general time he wasn’t likely to be cheerful anyway. He spent one Sunday morning incoherently furious with everything in his kitchen as he tried to make breakfast; he flung himself into the armchair by the window only to realize that the milk he’d put in his tea had been spoiled. It was just – fucking everything. A glance out the window told him it was pissing down, because of course it was, from an iron-grey sky that didn’t even have the decency to put up a lightning show. Something kept him looking up rather than out, at the clouds that could so easily be covering Azkaban. The temperature, the damp, the … the atmospheric pressure, it was all so achingly familiar …
Sirius didn’t realize that he’d spilled the sour tea or how tightly his fingers were clenched on the chair’s arm until the sound of his flat’s door unlocking broke through to his conscious mind, and he forced himself to – well, if not relax, recalibrate. Part of him wanted to jump for his wand, take a dueling stance, prepare himself to fight the intruder, but another, more sensible part reminded him that the war was over and it was almost certainly just Harry, who it did in fact turn out to be.
“’Lo,” his godson called out as he entered, holding a small bundle up to his shoulder. “I left the pram out in the corridor, and the umbrella. Think it’s safe?”
“Mrs. Harvey next door looks a bit fiendish, she could be a secret umbrella thief,” said Sirius with half-hearted jocularity, swallowing down his low mood. “She’s a muggle, but I think she knows a few hexes, too. How’s the little one today?”
Harry gave Teddy a little bounce against his shoulder, drawing out a cranky bit of babble, and turned him to face outward with a practiced arm. “Bit fussy. I thought he might like to see his Uncle Sirius – you always cheer him up.” And indeed, once Harry slipped Teddy into Sirius’s waiting arms, the little boy let out a much happier noise and then nuzzled his forehead into the hollow where Sirius’s shoulder met his neck, which was so adorable that he couldn’t help but smile.
“It’s chilly in here,” Harry went on now that he was unencumbered, walking a few steps toward the barely functioning radiator and turning back. “Andromeda was very strict with me about temperature – mind if I do a few warming charms?”
“Oh, no, that’s – that’s a good idea.” In a matter of seconds, Harry had the flat as cozy and snug as though there were a roaring fire in it, and the charms even seemed to sink into Sirius’s skin, banishing the chill that had settled in his bones. Something in his back unknotted and untwisted between his shoulder blades; he slowly sank into his armchair again, bringing Teddy down to sit on his lap. “Thanks.”
When Harry turned to look at him again, there was a glint of understanding in his eyes, which … It was uncomfortable, Harry was a kid and he had no business figuring out Sirius’s stupid instinctive response to being reminded of his years rotting in prison. But then, he reminded himself, at eighteen Harry was technically not a kid, and even if he were, he’d been through enough on his own to be allowed to be perceptive about Sirius’s problems. So he settled for a fake glower before leaning down to babble back at Teddy, who was now beaming up with that smile he’d inherited from his dad. Merlin, if he inherited anything of Remus’s personality, Teddy was probably going to be seeing through Sirius just as well as Harry by the time he started talking properly. That’d be something to look forward to.
“I could put the kettle on,” Harry suggested next. “Make a fresh pot of tea.” He otherwise called no attention to his wordless spells to clean up the spilled mug, the surreptitious pointing of his wand, which Sirius very much appreciated.
“Oh – the milk’s gone off, actually. I should really go out –” But Harry shook his head with a smile as Sirius made vague gestures toward getting up.
“Don’t worry about it. You stay here with Teddy, I’ll run to the shop down the street.” He hadn’t taken his jacket off earlier, so he was halfway out the door already. Then he bent down somewhat and raised his eyebrows to address Teddy. “You look after Uncle Sirius, okay.”
“Harry,” Sirius started, then realized he had no idea what he meant to say next. But Harry’s look was as warm as the charms he’d placed in the chilly flat, and another knot inside him loosened. “You don’t have to …”
“It’s not a problem. I’m just – I’m happy you’re here.” And then he was gone, ducking out the door and closing it behind him. Sirius could hear his footsteps echo down the corridor until they reached the stairs, and then sighed. Teddy burbled something, his hair turning bright grass-green, and Sirius couldn’t help but grin down at him.