The Marauders - Order of the Phoenix Part Three

Quite Imminent

"To check on me?" Sirius laughed in spite of himself, "When you look like that? Darling. Please."

Dorcas looked at him with an eyebrow raised. "Now you listen here, Sirius, I did not just drag all of this --" she waved at her pregnant body "-- all the bleedin' way across London to check on you... LIKE A MUGGLE, MIND YOU... just to have you act flippant, as though you don't even know what I'm here about." She put her hands on the area where her hips used to be, and raised her eyebrows at him.

He couldn't quite put his mental faculties on it, but something about her was really, really, really jangling his whole nervous system. And at some point since he'd seen her last she had changed her scent - a new shampoo? new perfume perhaps? Most people might not even notice the way their therapist smelled, but being a dog at heart, Sirius relied on those things as a comforter. It bothered him quite a lot that Dorcas smelled so different, and on top of the nervous energy coming off him -- blimey, his innards were souping about like they were in a blender.

She was equally the most and least threatening thing that Sirius had ever laid eyes upon.

A flash went through his mind then.

If this was how Dorcas Meadows was pregnant, then what the bleeding hell were they all going to do when it was Lily Potter? Sweet, beautiful, tame ickle Dorcas had turned into a firebreathing dragon with a basketball for a stomach. Lily Potter was already a firebreathing dragon half the time.

Oh Gods, we're all going to die if Lilith ever is in this state, he thought.

"I mean, I'm alright, if that's what you're meaning," he said slowly, still reeling from the realization that their doom was all quite imminent.

Dorcas wagged her finger at him. "Sirius, we've worked far too hard on your well being, and you've been through a LOT this year and I'm honestly - I'm sorry, I've been... well precoccupied, and I feel very guilty for it. I should've been here a dozen times by now, far sooner... I wish you'd please talk to me."

Sirius stared at her with an unreadable expression.

Honestly, the last time he'd talked to her had been December, back when Maryrose's body had turned up at the Ministry looking like Regulus Black and he'd gone in to identify and left with the manic (and correct, by the by) thought that his brother had still been alive. (Oh he really would need to bring that back up sometime, he deserved credit for that which he'd never gotten - being RIGHT and all...) But thing was that he had told Dorcas then that Regulus wasn't gone and she, like everyone else, had thought he was a nutter for it.

Sirius shifted uncomfortably.

If she'd believed him, would he have pushed harder against his brother's stupid choice to hide away alone? Would he have had more time with Regulus if he'd just been given at least a smidgeon of support from just one person back in December? Wasn't it Dorcas's job to support him? And she hadn't. He wasn't sure what to do with that any more than he was sure what to do with the thought that Remus had gone off to America at the moment when he, Sirius, needed him most in the entire world. Sure he'd come back, but that first night back at the flat, alone, laying in an empty bed and battling Archlys had been so dark and horrible... and he'd just needed his Moony and...

Well, thinking about either of these things only hurt, so, like he'd become accustomed to doing, he shoved these thoughts out, buried them deep, deep, deep where he couldn't see them anymore and he drew a deep breath.

"I am talking to you, darling, what do you think this is?" he said with a drawling laugh.

Remus returned then, carrying a bouquet of six licorice wands in varying flavors. "I knew Pete would have one for you. There's an assortment here."