Chapter Text
“It’s so hard to leave— until you leave. And then it’s the easiest goddamned thing in the world.” – John Green, Paper Towns.
The dark, polished oak table dominated the Black family dining room. It was easily large enough to fit twelve people, with plenty of elbow room to spare, though at the moment there were only four individuals spaced out around it. It was late in the evening, and the finest china was laid out in front of Sirius, complete with several forks, two spoons, and a wine glass that appeared to be draining by itself—seemingly never full. An oppressive silence blanketed the room, broken only by the steady ticking of the grandfather clock and the occasional clink of glasses. Sirius’s parents were murmuring back and forth and taking well-mannered bites of food in between their caustic comments. Walburga made one such remark now, marking the fifteenth time the word Mudblood had been used since the start of dinner.
Sirius stabbed at his plate, trying to catch one of the stray peas on the end of his fork, and the heavy silver utensil screeched against the garish plate. That earned him a glare full of heavy disapproval from Orion, though Sirius was fully aware that he was getting off lightly. He ducked his head in a false show of contrition, one that conveniently hid his expression from his parents. Once Orion felt certain his son was suitably cowed, he turned back to his wife to reply to her comment about Mudbloods—comment number sixteen—and add in one of his own about blood traitors—comment number twenty-two.
Sirius reached again for his wine glass, and forced himself to sip politely, rather than throwing the last mouthful back like he would have liked to. He glanced over at the clock and grimaced. He was smart enough to know that another glass wasn’t a good idea, even if it would’ve been worth the rebukes about his overindulgence. He reasoned, though, that he had a hard enough time keeping ahold of his temper when he was sober, and he didn’t need any extra trouble tonight—despite that usually being his luck, intoxicated or not.
He hid a yawn behind his hand, and tried not to fidget too much in his formal dress robes, the collar making him itch no matter that it was of the finest silk—it could’ve been made of harsh wool for all that it was agitating him. Sirius hadn’t uttered a single word other than the perfunctory ‘hello’ when he’d sat down, and so far he’d yet to be drawn into the conversation; he took another bite of his food and intended to keep it that way. It wasn’t worth it to start anything unprovoked, and arguing against his parents comments would get him nowhere. One more hour, he kept thinking, almost chanting it like a mantra in his head.
One more hour… Don't snap… One more hour… Don't snap…
“We need to start looking for a potential bride for Sirius; he is almost of age and by then all the… better ones will have been spoken for,” Walburga announced as easily as if she were discussing the weather. His mother leaned forward from her perch at one end of the table, and regarded Sirius with the closest thing to fond acknowledgement he’d seen in almost five years.
As it were, he’d get happier looks from mountain trolls.
“Yes, Walburga. I have been thinking, and Avery’s daughter Rosaline did just turn seventeen. I hear she is exceptionally beautiful, and I am sure Sirius would be very content to have her on his arm,” Orion said, tapping his fingers on the tabletop—the only tick his father has ever outwardly showed. There’s been talk of this kind of marital nonsense for a few years now, but this is the most specific that said talk has ever gotten. His father continued: “Her family has very high status in the Ministry, not as well renowned as ours, of course, but enough to expand our influence even further if there were to be a union. We can organize a meeting next week, have an arrangement written up, and the betrothal set in motion before the start of the new term.”
“Like hell!” Sirius protested, shaking his head and reasoning that this was as good a place as any to interject into the conversation.
“I am afraid you do not have much of a choice, Sirius,” Orion said coldly, not even fazed by Sirius’s language. “It’s Pureblood custom; your mother was chosen for me by my parents, and my mother was chosen for my father by his parents.”
“I’m not going to be carted off with some Pureblood tramp so you can expand the Black’s status!” Sirius exclaimed, outraged at the mere thought. He had likely already reached the point of no return and would surely be paying the price for this outburst before the night was through, but truly? That thought no longer scared him.
He’d had enough. He’d suffered enough. He wanted out.
Sirius was done.
“You will marry whomever your father arranges for you, Sirius Orion Black. You cannot, and will not, go against his wishes. Your duty is to produce an heir and there is no room for your… affliction in this life. You must grow out of it and move on. Rosaline Avery is marriage material and Sir Avery Senior has already had many offers on her! Her bride price is very high, Sirius,” Walburga finished, her voice tight with warning.
“Good! Then she can take one of those men then! Save the unwanted expense!” Sirius retorted. “I’m not going to pay some girls’ father so I can be married to her! Better yet, I will not marry someone that I’ve no chance of loving!”
“Marriage is about more than love, Sirius. Surely you are not so incompetent to believe any different. It can be a positive business agreement between two families to produce a respectable heir. Politics,” Orion informed, his speech slow and emphasized, as if he were talking to a young child. And he could’ve sworn that his mother muttered, “you wouldn’t be paying for it either way.”
“You mean Pureblood marriages are about more than love,” Sirius scoffed, the contempt blatantly present in his voice as he tackled the most obvious flaw in the whole system. “Most people who get married do it because they are in love and they want to be with each other. There aren’t ulterior motives and they weren’t forced together by bigoted parents who only look out for themselves!”
His mother slowly placed her cloth napkin next to her dinner plate, and folded her fingers under her bosom as if she were a queen addressing her court.
“I will not have my son flouncing off to ruin the Black family name! We have had enough of those people already, and you are the eldest of the only two males left to carry on our Pureblood line. You will not betray us like that heinous Andromeda!” Walburga spat her name as if it would do damaging things to have it linger on her tongue for more than a second. “I will not have you besmirching the Black’s name by disobeying us on this matter. And even if it were proper for you to fall for someone on your own, you would be unable to produce heirs anyway!”
“Why can’t you just say it?” Sirius hissed. “I couldn’t have children with him! HIM! And I’ve learned that true family has nothing to do with blood anyway!”
“Enough!” Orion scolded.
Sirius’s back was rigid with tension, and his hands were trembling as he set down his fork; it had already left a harsh indent on his palm from the vice-like grip he held it with in an effort not to draw his wand. He would have pulled out his wand, but this horseshit wasn’t anything that he hadn’t heard before. He also happened to value his existence, and he didn’t want to spend the last few minutes of his life looking at his father’s arrogant face.
This was sadly the routine around the Black home; they talk of the family members that were actually smart enough to get out like they’re nothing more than vermin and then skirt around the true issue at hand. The issue, now, being his homosexuality, which his parents found out by accident and resolutely ignored in favor of marrying him off to a woman. The ironic part, is that they didn’t have a problem with his liking men— just that he’s so adamant about being true to himself. Sirius knew for a fact that his long-passed uncle was gay, but that was a non-issue as he married a woman and had three kids— gay crisis averted.
This was the overwhelmingly painful part; for his family to have such fucked-up morals, embedded so deep into their brains, that they can’t think about anything else. It was so devastatingly wrong it gave him a headache. They were simply too far-gone to even try and save, and Sirius was so goddamn tired of putting forth the effort to try and rectify them.
“The more pressing matter at hand is where you snuck off to the other night… and all the nights before that for the entirety of this summer,” Orion continued, suddenly diverging into a completely different topic as if the last argument never even happened. “Surely you were wondering why I requested everyone’s presence here this evening?”
Sirius picked up his utensils and began to push his food around his plate.
“I’ve been here every night this summer; you know I always ask before I go out or stay with someone else,” Sirius said, his pseudo family voice back in place. It was a sickeningly irritating voice that made him grind his teeth whenever he wasn’t speaking. There was absolutelyno way they could know that he leaves. He always tried to be meticulous with his comings and goings, and the only living soul within this house who even knows that he leaves is Milly. Milly, an elderly house elf, had basically raised Sirius from the age of six when his mother decided it was more important to attend high-society functions, and whore it around with men that she could then blackmail into submission, than to parent him. Raising children was a task that was sent to the backburner; presumably, she thought it a necessary burden placed upon her by the Blacks’ societal standing.
“Of course you ask,” his father began again. “You learned the hard way the first time around, so surely you would not sneak out to go to that filth-owned Muggle… establishment down the block.”
Sirius froze.
“What would make you think that?” Sirius asked, keeping his tone steady and confused. He wouldn’t raise his voice again because he knew that if he did, it would be nothing short of a confession.
“House-elves are bound by ancient magic, Sirius. It is in the archaic nature of their kind to answer any question that the head of house, their true master, poses for them. You do know that I am of higher ranking in this household than you are, don’t you?” Orion asked coldly.
“Of course, Sir,” Sirius responded automatically, even though he knew the question was mocking. “I’m still confused, though.”
“Of course you are,” Walburga chimed in. “I would expect nothing less from a brave and brawny Gryffindor like yourself. Now imagine my confusion when I checked in on you during the night and you were nowhere to be found.”
Sirius let out an involuntary scoff and his mother raised her immaculately shaped eyebrows. The small (almost minuscule—almost completely non-existent) amount of his remaining common sense flew out the window; as he could see no way out of this that didn’t end with him at the arse end of a wand, he decided he was fucked either way and it might as well be on his own terms—meaning, he was going down swinging. Like a true ‘brave and brawny Gryffindor.’
“Your ‘concern’ is touching mother, but it’s quite obvious that you were coming to punish me for some other thing that you deemed to be my fault. I’m positive that I saved myself the pain of a thorough lashing with some new curse your chauvinistic Pureblood mates taught you,” Sirius drawled, dropping his utensils with a clang and lowering his hand to finally (finally) rest defensively over his wand.
“So what Milly told us is true? You spent the evening in the company of Muggle filth?” Orion yelled, making Regulus start in his seat.
“Yes! I go to the ‘Muggle filth’ when you lot are going to give me a beating for something I didn’t even do! And that, once again, so-called ‘Muggle filth’ is named Donald, and he’s twice the man you’ll ever be. He’s been helping me escape your abuse since I was twelve years old and–”
“MILLY!” Walburga shrieked, effectively cutting off Sirius’s speech. There was a loud ‘CRACK’ and a small wrinkly house-elf appeared. The creature gave Sirius a quick once-over before turning back to the woman who summoned her.
“M-Mistress called for Milly?” the elderly house-elf stuttered, bowing so low that her nose grazed the shining hardwood. Her emerald green toga was baggy on her old and fragile frame, causing her to appear even smaller than she already was.
“You have failed to mention that Sirius has been leaving this house, without permission, for almost five years.” Walburga’s voice was frighteningly low and steady. Sirius had realized his mistake too late when the unnatural feeling of chilling goosebumps erupted on his skin—when the hair on the back of his neck stood at attention.
“M-Mistress was not asking Milly how l-long’s little Sirius been goings to’s the pub’s, miss,” Milly whispered.
Walburga’s wand appeared out of nowhere and a bright red light struck the house-elf. Milly dropped to the ground clutching her face, emitting small squeaks of pain. Sirius was at her side in an instant, helping her to her feet and trying to console her.
“Speak up when I am talking to you, house-elf!”
If looks could kill, Walburga Black would be dead on the floor, barely recognizable in all her gory existence. But looks didn’t kill, so Sirius regretfully had to settle for imagining it.
“M-M-Milly is very sorry m-mistress. Milly will speak up when she talks to you’s, Milly will.” The house-elf’s voice still wavered, but her tone was louder. Still, Walburga’s wand twitched dangerously.
“Why have you refused to tell us how long he has been leaving?”
“Milly wishes to protect the young master, Miss. Milly has to serves every family member in this household, so Milly must help little Sirius when he be’s in trouble, Miss,” Milly said, her voice becoming more steady than Sirius had ever heard it and losing it’s stutter for the first time in years. The tiny creature held herself with a seemingly newfound confidence as she spoke to his mother.
Sirius’s affection for her, impossibly, grew.
“Do not move, Milly,” Orion said lazily, leaning back in his chair and sipping his wine. “Sirius, sit down. Now.”
Sirius, reluctantly, moved towards his seat and perched on the edge of it. He had the weird feeling that he was going to have to move very quickly.
“Do you know what you did wrong?” Walburga asked.
“Milly did no wrong, Mistress,” Milly avowed. She was stock-still, and Sirius realized why his father had told her not to move (once again, it was too late).
For the second time, Walburga’s wand moved through the air so fast that Sirius was unable to comprehend what had happened until after the fact. He watched, helpless, as a light struck the elf square in the chest and he watched, in wide-eyed silence, as Milly fell. No sound came from the tiny elf when she hit the floor—and Sirius was already there, cradling her small frame and regretting that he had just barely missed the opportunity to stop her fall. She was limp and unresponsive to Sirius’s frantic attempts to rouse her. She was gone. She was dead.
He was alone in this hellhole.
Sirius jumped up and pulled out his wand, a nasty stinging hex aimed right at his mother's face. She deflected his sloppy and impulsive spellwork easily and countered with a quick spell of her own. A searing pain shot across his chest and extended throughout his entire body; he felt blood immediately dampen the front of his robes. He choked back a gasp, attempting to muffle his grunt of pain, and settled with a deadly glower at his so-called family. Sirius cast a sad glance at his only ray of hope in this darkness, that now lay dead and slowly growing cold upon the floor beside him, before stalking out of his dining room; he was slowed by his father’s voice before he reached the doorway.
“What do you think you are doing, Sirius?” Orion asked, his voice amazingly calm considering what had just transpired.
“Leaving.”
Sirius’s voice was barely audible, but determined all the same. He didn’t even turn to acknowledge his father, or even stop walking for that matter, before taking the stairs two at a time up to his room. He threw as many of his belongings into his still half-packed school trunk as he could—even the things that he hadn’t used in a while as he knew he’d never again set foot in this house. Finally, Sirius paused at the door and gave his poster-lined bedroom one last fleeting glance, lingering bitterly on the one with the bikini clad Muggle girl on a motorcycle that he had tacked up two years ago as both a desperate attempt to redirect his thoughts and to piss off his parents, before lugging his things down the stairs. His family was still down the hall in the dining room. It seemed as if they didn’t understand what he meant by ‘leaving’—or they simply didn’t give a shit. Sirius was betting on the latter. He scowled once more before reaching for the ostentatiously carved door handle, but the floorboards creaked quietly behind him—too quietly to be his parents—and he stopped.
Sirius turned back and caught his brother’s eyes. Regulus was still clutching his napkin, twisting the ends of the dark fabric between his narrow fingers. Regulus was the one person that Sirius could always read like an open book—his emotions written across the glint in his eyes and the curve of his mouth like a well-known nursery rhyme. It was no different now, and Sirius had the insane fantasy that Regulus was about to follow him out the door.
“Come with me?” Sirius asked, his voice low and pained.
Regulus straightened up and, for all intents and purposes, he looked perfectly composed. “I’ll see you at school,” he replied, his voice cracking.
Sirius nodded once, and Regulus looked like he wanted to say more, but he turned back towards the dining room without another word. Sirius yanked open the door, angry for even more reasons now, and he practically threw his trunk over the threshold.
It was pouring.
His trunk landed in a generous puddle at the bottom of the front stoop.
The number of expletives that spewed out of his mouth would make even the most provocative of sailors blush. He stalked down the four stairs he was never allowed to play on as a child and gave his trunk a swift kick, screaming loudly into the night—his hair and clothes already drenched.
A streak of lightning shot across the sky, illuminating the desolate street.
Sirius pulled out his wand and set to work scorching the trees across the way, screaming the incantations until his voice was hoarse—just needing to get rid of this energy that was careening through his veins. When there were no more trees for him to burn, and the rain had turned what would’ve been a row of rather large torches into smoking ruins, he took several deep breaths and steadied himself.
There wasn’t a moment of hesitation on where he would go; the problem was getting there. Potter Manor was miles away, all the way on the west side of England, and Sirius wasn’t of age yet, so he decided not to push his luck with gaining the attention of authorities (if he hadn’t already with his show of destroying the trees) or losing the privilege of having all his body parts by Apparating. He groaned when he looked in the direction of the Leaky Cauldron, the only means of Floo network within a however many mile distance, and left the thought of heading in that direction behind him. He didn’t want to run into any… unwanted individuals while in an injured state, so that meant no interaction with the magical community. And selfishly, he needed a kind, familiar face right now. Wincing, he lifted his trunk and pulled it along. He could at least have a drink while he figured out what to do.
He began the short and familiar trek to the Muggle pub around the next block. He’d been coming here since he figured out how to sneak out of his house undetected, and it was pure chance that this happened to be the first place he stumbled into. Sneaking out used to be easy— like clockwork— but he got cocky and selfish, leaving every night instead of once a week. And now Milly was dead. And it was all his fault.
He set out for the pub anyway.
The barman was an old and withered man with a wispy white beard that could rival only that of Albus Dumbledore. His voice was low and gruff, but his hands gentle and caring—rough and worn with age. When Sirius had first shown up, he was only twelve years old; the man behind the counter had wrapped a bandage around his bleeding arm, stuck a plate of hot food under his chin, and insisted that he eat. He hated to say that there was a small moment of hesitation as his mother’s voice entered his brain, telling him that Muggles are animals, that they’re barbaric and will stop at nothing to kill him and the entirety of wizarding kind. But Sirius had pushed those thoughts away and merely nodded and mumbled a small ‘thank you’ before relishing in the prospect of eating food not made in the wizarding world… he’d never had it before.
That had been the extent of their conversation for two whole years; which is to say, there was absolutely no conversation. Sirius would come in and Donald would clean his cuts without question, then feed him and let him stay until the bar closed at around two in the morning. It was only last summer that they had started exchanging short snippets of sentences and only this summer that they began having actual conversations. Sirius let slip small and insignificant factors of his everyday life and if he were actually a Muggle, Donald would’ve simply thought him crazy or from a family of different and weird customs. It was then that a startling fact was revealed, and the reason Donald didn’t send Sirius packing the instant he started talking of curses, house-elves, and Hogwarts.
Donald Forbs was a squib.
That was also why he hadn’t gone to the Muggle authorities when a battered and bloody boy started showing up at his bar every other week. The curses used to near annihilate Sirius’s skin were familiar to the old man, for the same scars still adorn his own wrinkled frame. Donald had simply waited for Sirius to open up to him before he informed him of the ‘small-piece-of-insignificant-information’, as Donald had put it, about himself.
That had made conversation considerably easier because now Sirius could really let go when he ranted and not have to worry about breaking the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy. It wouldn’t do him any good to have his parents and the Ministry of Magic coming down on him.
Sirius rounded the last corner, pushed open the old door to the pub, and was immediately assaulted with the now familiar aroma of fried foods and alcohol. He set his trunk next to the door and met Donald’s stare behind the bar. A somber expression flitted across the old man’s face and there was a knowing glint in his eyes.
“You’ve left for good, eh Sirius?” he questioned, his Scottish accent thick.
“I should’ve left years ago,” Sirius said quietly, “when it first started.”
Donald nodded and motioned for him to take his usual seat in the middle of the bar.
“Think you can give me an actual drink?” Sirius asked wearily, taking his normal seat at the bar. “I’ve had a hell of a night.”
“Just this once,” Donald relented easily, sighing as he placed the pitcher of juice back in its place. “Ya had better not go rattin’ me out to the police.”
“What’s a police?” Sirius asked, trying to be more difficult than usual.
Shaking his head in amusement, and not even bothering to give Sirius an answer, Donald placed a short, wide glass on the counter and filled it a knuckle length with a copper colored substance.
“Closest thing ta Firewhiskey we got, son,” Donald informed quietly.
Sirius downed it in one go and didn’t even grimace as the alcohol slid down his throat. He motioned for Donald to fill it again. With a small chuckle and a raised eyebrow, the man obliged and Sirius took a smaller sip this time, knowing he wasn’t going to get another.
“Where’d ya learn ta drink like that?” Donald asked, placing the bottle back on the shelf.
“I go to Hogwarts, and I grew up in a Pureblood home, Don. We’ve got a huge-arse wine cellar in our basement and young barmaids in Hogsmeade are a lot easier to sweet-talk into a drink than you are.” Sirius smirked. He tipped his glass in Donald’s direction in a sort of salute before taking another sip.
“That would be true.” Donald nodded and softened his voice before he continued. “Ya really shouldn’t drink so much though. It’s a bad habit ta get into at such a young age. Speaking from experience, myself.”
Sirius sighed and looked down into his drink, letting his thoughts wander and his head pound. He swirled the glass around and watched as the amber liquid nearly spilled over the side, but managing to catch it and have it fall back in at the last second. It was actually mesmerizing to watch.
“Do you have a place ta go?” Donald asked. He hadn’t moved from his place behind the bar.
“Yeah,” Sirius mumbled. “I’m just not sure how I’m going to get there.”
“I could call ya a taxi,” Donald suggested. “I don’t know how close it can get ya ta where ya want tu go, but it’s a start.”
“Not bloody likely,” Sirius protested. “There is absolutely no way that you’ll get me to ride in one of those Muggle death traps!”
The two other patrons stared at Sirius after his outburst and looked away quickly as he added, “A motorcycle would be cool though… bet you I could charm it to fly.”
“I bet ya’ ya could, but a taxi sounds like ya best bet a’this point in time…”
“Yeah, yeah, I already know,” Sirius conceded. “How long will it take for this ‘tali’ thing? And it costs money, right? Like Muggle money? Because I don’t have any of that. I have no money on me at all, actually.”
“A taxi, Sirius. And don’t worry, son. I’ll cover the bill for you.”
“I can’t let you do that. I don’t want you to think that–”
“I don’t,” Donald interrupted. “I don’t think anything. I can cover the taxi, I just want you to get to your destination safely.”
Sirius nodded and was unable to respond—his generosity, although common from Donald, was still alien for Sirius to experience.
“I’ll call it right now, Sirius,” Donald informed. “It usually takes around fifteen minutes for the cars tu get here, and then however long it’ll take for ya ta get where yer going.” The man gave a noncommittal shrug. “Do ya want some food? I’ve got a little left over from the evenin’ rush.”
“That would be great, thank you.”
Donald bustled into the back room and emerged from the kitchen five minutes later with a plate full of chicken and a small helping of green beans. Even though he’d just eaten, Sirius picked up a fork immediately, needing to do something with his hands. So, he ate in silence and the reality of his situation finally sunk in when his adrenaline reluctantly subsided.
The burning of the trees seemed to only be a temporary fix.
He left.
He wasn’t going back. Ever.
Sirius swallowed thickly and his fork clattered to the countertop as he growled a low, “Fuck.” Sirius swiveled the chair around and stumbled up, catching himself on the bar and letting out a ragged breath. He started pacing in front of the bar, pulling at his hair, breathing rapidly, and mumbling under his breath. Donald, taking notice, threw his rag on the bar and hastily made his way around it—wobbling on his bad hip and holding his beard down so it couldn’t fly up in his face.
“Sirius, Sirius calm down. It’s al’ight,” Donald soothed.
Sirius laughed darkly.
“No it’s not! I’msixteen years old, and I just left my family! I’ll be disowned, Donald! I have no money. I’m underage. I’m aBlack.” He paused. “I am Sirius Black and I’m part of one of the most prominent wizarding families ever and I LEFT! I threw it all away!”
His thoughts were running a million miles a minute and he couldn’t seem to focus on just one.
“She killed Milly, Donald!” Sirius cried, his voice breaking. “My mother killed the only creature that cared about me in that fucked-up house… right in front of me. She didn’t even think twice about it because Milly was a house-elf—less than, and unimportant. She stuttered when she talked, Milly did—she couldn’t help it, my parents traumatized her and she was terrified of them. I would’ve given her clothes if I could’ve, but only my father could do that. But then again, even if I could I don’t think I would’ve, I’m too much of a selfish person for that.”
“Ya are not a selfish person, Sirius,” Donald stressed, trying desperately to keep up with Sirius’s rapid-fire thoughts. “Ya wouldn’t ‘ave survived in that ‘ouse if it wasn’t for ‘er. She allowed ya ta ‘ave a temporary escape from it all, and I’m almost positive, even if I’ve never met ‘er, that she would ‘ave never left ya there on yer own. You are no selfish a’ person Sirius Black.”
“No, but I am. I only thought of myself when I left. I kept a house-elf around purely for my own intentions and-and I left my brother there all alone. Merlin! My brother, I have to go back—I’ll drag him out by his ear if I have to! I can’t–”
“Sirius, stop.”
“I don’t want him to end up like me, Don,” Sirius whispered miserably—his voice dropping several levels in volume.
“Now why would ya go and say somethin’ like that?” Donald asked. “He’d be a lucky bugger if he was ‘alf the man yer gonna be. Yer too ‘ard on yerself, son.”
“But I’m so fucked-up Donald,” Sirius whispered, his throat becoming tight. “And I’m scarred, so scarred… both literally and figuratively speaking. I’m lucky I escaped there with half of my sanity, let alone my life. Home life should not be that hard; home life should be loving, and carefree, and you shouldn’t have to spend every waking moment fearing for your life.” Sirius absently applied pressure to his chest wound and let out a barely audible groan of pain.
“What’s wrong with yer chest?” Donald asked, zeroing in on the motion.
“N-nothing. It’s just a scratch, honestly. Nothing I haven’t had before.”
“Sirius Black!” Donald’s voice was stern and left no room for argument. He hated when Don’s voice got like that. Wordlessly, Sirius undid his dress robes and slowly and meticulously pulled his bloodstained black button-up open, revealing his bleeding chest to Donald. The cold air stung quite a bit. There was a deep gash that ran from one collarbone to just below the opposite pectoral muscle, yet it didn’t appear deep enough to be fatal to any organs. Blood was everywhere, giving his chest a dark red sheen and turning his newly inked, black tattoos a sickly color.
“Good Lord, my boy!” A bar patron gasped.
“We need to call you an ambulance!” the other man added.
“Donald, don’t call anyone. Mrs. P can fix me up, and Muggle methods probably wouldn’t work on this anyway. It’s from a curse, not a knife,” Sirius said, ignoring the two other men present.
“I can wrap it up for ya if ya’d like, or at least clean it up a little? I’ve still got all the supplies in the back.”
At Sirius’s nod, Donald disappeared and then reappeared just as quickly, the usual gauze and wrappings clutched in his hand. He ran a finger down the outskirts of the laceration and Sirius hissed quietly. As always, Donald was humming off-tune as he worked. It was slow going, but the mannerisms were practiced and the wrappings snug. A horn sounded twice from outside the bar, but Donald didn’t increase his pace, focusing only on Sirius’s wound. It wasn’t two minutes later, though, that Sirius was gingerly pulling his shirt back around his shoulders and shrugging his dress robes on as well.
“Thank you for everything Donald, really.”
Sirius held out his hand, but Donald stepped forward and hugged him firmly, albeit gently so as not to further agitate his chest. Sirius embraced the man right back and stifled a surprised sniffle and a not-so-surprising grunt of pain. Donald eventually pulled out of the embrace, but continued to grip Sirius’s shoulders tightly.
“Come and visit me,” Donald said. “I don’t want ya ta forget the old man down the street, al’ight?”
Sirius could only nod, not trusting his voice at the moment. Donald dropped his arms and allowed Sirius to drain the rest of his drink and head towards the door. He gave the bar a longer glance than he spared his own house before nodding to Donald, lugging his trunk out the door, and then heaving the thing into the back of the taxicab.
.:..:.
The ride to the village near Potter Manor was long and the walk from the village to the actual house was even longer. When he finally saw the silhouette of the huge manor, he was pale from the cut on his front and clutching an unfamiliar stitch in his side.
The gates opened on their own accord, recognizing his friendly aura as an allotted guest; he trudged up the entranceway and took a deep breath before knocking on the door.
Mid knock, the door opened and revealed his pajama clad best friend, James Potter. Sirius leaned against the doorframe and tried not to show how terrible he actually felt. James had on his usual pair of red and gold plaid pajama bottoms and a simple black t-shirt. His black hair was as unruly as ever and his hazel eyes were pinched in concern behind his square glasses. Sirius opened and closed his mouth, gaping like a fish, trying to find the words to tell his best friend that he had left. That he had nowhere to go.
“I-I um…” Sirius trailed off.
“You left,” James supplied.
Sirius nodded, happy that his friend was so well attuned to him.
“Well, come in then. Leave your trunk by the door and head to the living room. I’ll get Mum and Dad.” James left Sirius stunned on the threshold. It took him a while to pull together the strength to walk into the house and head down the hall, for the ache in his chest was getting almost unbearable. No longer was it a dull burn, but a non-stop throbbing ‘bring-you-to-your-knees’ type of pain. So, he sunk to the floor when he reached the living room, and buried his head between his knees, forming a ball and curling into himself as best he could to try and minimize his pain.
“What are you doing on the floor?” James asked.
“Your furniture’s too nice to stain, and even with a Scourgify, blood stains never really go away,” he mumbled.
“Where are you bleeding?” Euphemia Potter asked seriously, coming out of nowhere. Sirius looked up into the kind face of James’s mother. Mia was a no nonsense type of woman that Sirius absolutely adored. Currently, she was adorned in a dark purple dressing gown and black house-slippers. Her red hair was streaked with grey and prominent laughter lines crinkled her eyes. At the moment, though, those eyes were pinched with concern. Fleamont Potter was standing next to her, his calloused brown hand on his wife’s shoulder. Monty looked exactly as Sirius remembered: grey hair cropped to his skull, glasses dangling from the collar of his shirt, and a blanket wrapped around his shoulders. The only thing that was different was his expression; usually, it was relaxed, a twinkle in his eye that his son inherited, but now it was only worry that marred his features.
“Chest,” Sirius eventually ground out.
“Well, let me see it,” James’s mother ordered. “Take your robe off and lay on your back on the sofa.”
As Sirius got up and attempted to undo his shirt like he did for Donald, he realized something else. He sighed and said, “I-I can’t… um, it hurts to lift my arms to unbutton it, ma’am.”
Mia’s lips turned down into a frown and she hesitantly walked the few remaining feet that separated them. She quickly made due with his dress robe, pulled off his already untied tie, and then slowly started to undo the buttons of his shirt. He hissed a quick breath of air out between his teeth when she grazed the top of the wound as she slid the shirt slowly from his shoulders. Mia began to unwind the bloodied gauze and her expression grew tighter and tighter as she saw what was revealed. When she shifted to place the wrappings on the table, James gasped.
“Holy shit, mate! What in the bloody hell did you do?” James breathed.
“My mum’s a right nasty bitch, Prongs,” Sirius said, stretching out as best he could, as instructed, on the couch while Mia immediately went to work on his chest. She first Scourgified off the blood and sanitized the gash, not wanting to make anything worse by creating the possibility for an infection. At one point, Sirius registered that Monty left and came back with an embroidered potions bag. The pain lessened with each stroke of Mia’s wand, and she worked for over half an hour before performing one last spell. Sirius could feel his wound closing and he let out a sigh of relief when she cast a cooling charm over his inflamed flesh.
“Here, Sirius, drink this. It’s a blood-replenishing potion, and it’ll relieve the light-headedness and the lethargy you feel in your limbs,” she instructed him.
“Thank you, ma’am,” Sirius said. He downed the foul smelling liquid in one go and curled his face into the soft upholstery of the couch, inhaling its welcoming scent.
This place had always smelled more like home than his own house did.
“No more of that ‘ma’am’ business, Sirius. You’ve never bothered with such formalities before and it makes me feel quite old,” Mia scolded halfheartedly, lovingly pushing a couple strands of Sirius’s hair out of his face.
Sirius looked up at her, propping his head up on his hand and turning to give her a full view of his chest. He forced a cheeky grin.
“Yes ma’am.”
She playfully shoved his hair back into his face, and he laughed quietly as he collapsed back down onto the sofa.
“I know that you know your way around by now, but James can show you to the spare rooms and you can pick one,” Monty said, standing by James with a hand on his son’s shoulder.
“Pick one, sir?” Sirius asked. He stood up and gathered his dress robes in his arms.
“Well, yeah. You live here now, right? Don’t tell us you’re thinking about going back?” James asked.
“Of course I’m bloody well not going back. You think I’ve got a death wish?” Sirius asked. “I just don’t want to intrude on you lot too much. You’ve got summer plans and-and you're going to Paris and your-um-your beach house… in Majorca! I can’t—no, I won’t intrude on your family time,” Sirius finished. “It’s not your fault my family’s a load of shit.”
“You’re bloody mad, mate!” James laughed, “We were going to take you with us anyway. There was no way I was going to leave you with your fucking–”
“Language,” Mia and Monty chided in unison. Even though there was no heat behind their scolding, James paid them a quick grimacing glance and backtracked.
“With your fudgenutting demented family for a whole summer. We were going to come and get you tomorrow after breakfast!” James finished, his choice of words letting a real smile grace Sirius’s face for the first time that night.
Sirius looked between James’s parents for confirmation. They merely smiled and Sirius started to laugh.
“Did I tell you they were talking about marrying me off to Rosaline Avery?” Sirius chuckled.
“No way?” James smiled. “You should’ve taken it, mate. She’s one fit bird.”
“Fit or not, she’s a Pureblood, Prongs,” Sirius said. “And a stuck-up one at that.” He led the way out of the living room and headed to the stairs.
“You’re a Pureblood, Padfoot,” James reminded.
“Exactly. I’m either not getting married at all or I’ll find someone my parents would vehemently disapprove of—maybe a cute Muggleborn like you–” James scoffed, “–but I’m betting on the former… I’m not really a marriage type of bloke.”
“Right now you’re not, but that might change, Padfoot.”
“No it won’t, mate,” Sirius chuckled.
“Not even with McKinnon? You’ve had a crush on her for years,” James smirked.
“I do not fancy McKinnon, James.”
“Funny Sirius, I don’t really fancy Evans, either.”
Sirius scowled, not understanding how his dismissal of this argument was never taken at face value. He knew how to stop it entirely, of course, but it wasn’t the time yet. He wasn’t ready to tell James… especially after how his family reacted to finding out. He knew, of course, that James wouldn’t treat him any differently, but that innate fear of rejection was still illogically harbored in his chest.
“Sod off, Prongs. Mind if I find a room tomorrow?” Sirius asked. “I don’t fancy gallivanting around your manor to find the best room at the mo’.” His voice was uncharacteristically small, and he couldn’t bring himself to look his best friend in the eye. He sort of hated himself for it, but James just threw his arm around Sirius’s tense shoulders and smiled.
“Sure thing mate,” James said, dropping his arm and walking into his bedroom. Sirius visibly relaxed and let out the quiet breath he’d been keeping trapped in his chest. James paused and turned back to face Sirius, running a hand through his hair as he shook his head.
“What?” Sirius asked.
“Nice tattoos, mate.” James chuckled.
Sirius let yet another smile grace his lips before following his friend into the bedroom.