"it's amazing how much destruction on person can cause."
— E X H A U S T I O N —
SO, HOW DO YOU continue? How do you continue living once you know how soon you're going to die? Once you've been given your expiration date?
Cold and dead, you walk through the place that once was your childhood symbol of life and light feeling absolutely nothing. Your skin turns from tanned and rosey to marble and pure white. This is it. This is what dying is.
Sage Marie Mary-Windsor— dying, marble, and beyond cold.
Maybe it was just that she couldn't feel anything since she told the love of her life that he would have to live most of his life without her, but Sage was empty. Completely, heart-wrenchingly empty. She couldn't remember the last time she felt so hollow, but never had it been this bad.
Her galaxy had turned void, the stars had died and planets gone. The stardust faded, and the supermassive black hole in the center no longer pulsed and pulled.
There was only one star left—
Sirius.
The night Sage returned to the dorms Sirius walked her back, holding her hand and a bag of medicines as well as potions. It hadn't sunk in yet, that their vows would be limited till death took her part from his in just years from their current future. Everything good in his life always became temporary. . . even her.
Sage was sitting next to Lily, the redhead deeply engaged in the lesson Professor McGonagall was giving. The young woman was exhausted, it was her first day back in class after missing almost two weeks of material. The semester had started and Sage didn't touch anything to get them back to where she was before.
Many things felt. . . useless, at this point in time. She was her own graveyard, her mind a cemetery of her plans, her dreams. The ability to decide her future was taken from her before she was even born, now her ability to have one was also gone.
It was a sad state of affairs.
"Sage?" Lily was snapping her fingers in the young woman's face to pull her out of space.
"Sorry- I'm very out of it today, my apologies." Sage looked up from her parchment paper, completely empty besides for her name at the top.
"Are you sure you're okay? You seem quite pale," Lily's face was covered in concern.
Sage felt incredibly guilty that Lily had been the one to take her down, to have to witness her collapsing under her own weight. The redhead had treated her like porcelain since like she could break at any moment. She was almost anticipating it, constantly waiting for the moment Sage's face turns white and she hurtles toward the ground.
"Yes, you don't need to fret, I'm just tired is all."
Lily had doubt in her eyes, but she nodded stiffly and looked back down at her parchment.
———
Sage was sitting on the couch with Sirius and James, her back against the arm and her legs laying on top of their laps. Remus and Peter were sitting next to the fire looking peaceful at their books as they were enraptured in their study. The two boys on the couch were talking quietly to each other as Sage dozed in and out of sleep, trying not to bother her.
"How is your bother?" James looked over at Sirius, his eyes on the flames as the words slipped from his lips.
Sirius shrugged and looked down, his hands playing with the fabric on his Fiancée's dress. "Alive, that's all I really know. Only person he talks to, only person he can really, is Jasper. Sage mails with him quite often but it's "nothing I can know yet". Not exactly thrilling if I do say."
James nodded and looked down at the sleeping girl laying down across his lap. "Lily thinks she's lying- Sage, I mean. About feeling better. Said that she's been working like crazy but not on school, and she's still acting sick. . . I'm worried about her, Padfoot."
"I've noticed it too."
Three Marauders looked over to Remus, the first time he had spoken since opening his books.
"She's always shaking like she's cold, I've never seen her this pale, she can barely eat- Merlin, Sirius! Did she ever actually start feeling better?" The boys' voice was exasperated, desperately trying to be heard by his friend.
The three stared at Remus as Sage stirred slightly in her sleep, rolling over to her side and breathing softly.
"Mate, I've noticed, trust me I have. But, I'm no bloody doctor, I just know they're doing the best they can." Sirius tried to hold a steady voice. It wasn't his truth to tell yet.
"What is wrong with her, Sirius?" Remus's gaze was a bit more intense than he meant, but the full moon was only a couple of days away now. He felt dangerously frustrated.
"I. . . She told me the name of it but I don't remember-"
"Oh, bollocks! You wouldn't just forget such things! You remembered Sage telling you a muggle snack she liked when we were 11! I'm not insolent, you know something is wrong and you aren't telling us what."
Everyone present was taken aback by Remus's tone, the boy who was usually so soft, the gentle soul extruding meters worth of anger. It was jarring, scary, even. The yelling woke Sage up from her inconsistent slumber, and she looked over to see the fuming sight of Remus Lupin. When she looked back to see what had him so riled up, she saw Sirius with his jaw clenched, and his sights fixated on the werewolf.
None of the boys seemed to notice she was awake.
"Moony, mate, there's only so much I can say." Sirius's voice was tight, holding back the words he really wanted to say at this moment.
Remus rolled his eyes and closed the book in hands. "Two years ago, you completely shunned Sage for doing exactly what you are doing now."
She felt her chest start to hurt, like all of her muscles were clenched and screaming for some semblance of release.
Sirius gripped the arm of the couch, trying to have ration and be the calm one. He knew what was going on, he was reminded every time his friends eyes shift, and they glow a faint yellow. Remus appeared feral, ready for the hunt, the only victim safe being Sage.
"Mate, you need to calm down. We don't need to be bringing up resolved issues, do we?"
There was silence, before Remus huffed and grabbed his things, going up to their shared dorm room alone. pls
Sage laid in the silence, discomfort in her soul and tension in her heart. Maybe it was just in the air, the darkness.
The hatred.
"I'm going to talk to him." Peter closed his story and stood, no longer being able to bare the quiet. m
James and Sirius nodded curtly and Peter scurried off. The first one sighed, leaning his head back against the couch.
"Sorry Pads, didn't think that would happen," He said, hoping to defuse something on this side of the candle as well.
"Don't apologize mate, you lot have the right to be concerned. Before she was my fiancée, she was all of our best mate, that doesn't just go away."
James nodded and continued to stare at the ceiling.
What were they all becoming?
What was going to happen to them?
A/N:
hello all:) this is filler, im so sorry, but ive prewritten the next chapter and roughly edited it (so please ignore any errors in the next few chapters they will corrected). this is the only story i'm going to be updating for awhile, im still super busy but this is definitely deserved to you all.
thank you 300,000 reads
<3