"and i might be okay, but i'm not fine at all"
*
James Potter woke up to the smell of smoke.
Considering the people he shared a room with, he didn't really think much of it. Once in their second year, Peter's bed caught on fire. Every Marauder had learned to ignore the antics of their friends. When Peter spilled powdered sugar on the Invisibility Cloak and a weird white thing seemed to be wandering around at midnight bumping into bedposts, they just went back to sleep. When James decided that he wanted to try and sing opera, Remus just bought the boys earplugs and that was that.
So that night, James just yanked the blanket over his head and closed his eyes again, trying to block out the stench. Then he realized the smoke was not a normal, catch-on-fire-from-a-prank smoke. It smelled like cigarettes.
James poked his head out from under the covers, his eyes flitting around the room worriedly. He actually had to put on his glasses to take count of everyone. Once he slid them on, the world came into focus. Peter lay in the far bed, snoring lightly. Remus has fallen asleep with a book on his face, and Sirius-
Sirius was nowhere to be found. The clock read well past ten at night, and he had completely disappeared. The cloak and the map still sat on the table, so he clearly hadn't snuck out anywhere or with anyone. Briefly he wondered if Sirius was wandering around the castle with Eva, but that seemed unlikely.
James jumped out of bed as quietly as he could and slid on the first pair of shoes he could find before running out of the dormitory and into the common room. To his immense relief, Sirius stood in front of the fire, feeding a paper of some sort into the flames with the precision of a Muggle surgeon.
"You're up again, mate."
Sirius flinched at his friend's voice but quickly covered his surprise with a smile. "I guess."
"What're you doing?" James asked and Sirius shook his head. He didn't want to admit what had him so worked up, not to anyone, even someone he considered his brother. "Come on, you can tell me."
"I'm fine, really. Just couldn't sleep. There's too much on my mind, I guess. I'm going to take a walk, see if that helps. I'll see you later."
"Sirius!" James called, but he left without another word. "Sirius!" Then he realized it was late and everyone else was asleep, and therefore yelling probably wouldn't please anyone.
James sighed and plopped down on the couch. He knew all too well that his friend was a complicated individual, but every time Sirius got into one of these moods, the morale of the entire group took a turn for the worse. Eva always teased James about being the mother of the Marauders, but while he didn't know that, it was completely true. He always made sure that Remus was eating, Peter knew that he was valued, and Sirius felt supported. Because out of all of them, James grew up the most fortunate, and he knew it.
"You okay?" Eva attempted to summersault from behind the couch down next to James and ended up crashing into the coffee table. "Ow."
"Are you?" He pulled her up, chuckling slightly. She rubbed her head and brushed off her bell-bottom jeans, hand-painted with red and gold flowers. In fact, she still smelled like paint, leading him to believe that the project had occurred moments before she came down.
Sometimes he wondered how the girl hadn't ended up in Ravenclaw. Intelligence, creativity, and an open mind - it was all there. And yet, when Professor McGonagall placed the Sorting Hat on her little blonde braids in their first year, the Hat saw her true nature. It sat on her head, debating whether her brains outweighed her bravery, when it realized something. All of her logic and rationale disappeared completely when someone threatened the ones she loved. And it claimed her as a Gryffindor.
"Yeah, I'll shake it off. I'm used to bruises." She winked and nudged him.
"What're you doing up?"
"I left my paintbrush down here somewhere, but I really don't feel like looking for it. Besides, Lils and Marlene are both asleep, so I was bored. It's really hard to paint in the dark."
"Ah, got it." He stared out the window and watched the rain pour down, smattering the glass constantly.
"Seriously, are you okay? You look upset."
"I don't know. I mean, personally I am, but I'm worried about Sirius," he admitted, looking down at his hands. "I know he's been smoking again, so something's bothering him. He just threw something in the fire and left a few minutes ago. I don't really want to go after him, though. He probably needs space."
Her head furrowed as she considered this. "The fire?"
Eva walked over to the fire and crouched down, her green eyes searching. After a moment, James joined her. The flames danced merrily in the fireplace, eating away the edges of a ripped letter. She mentally pieced together a few words, enough to at least know the sender.
"It's from his parents. See, their names are right there." They don't even sign as 'Mum' and 'Dad'. Everything about his family seemed cold to her. A blonde curl fell from her ponytail into her face, so she tucked it behind her ear and glanced at James, whose face displayed a worry similar to hers. "What do you think it said?"
"Dunno. Knowing them, nothing good," he said darkly. When he first met Sirius, his parents didn't even want him to be friends with a Black. He knew the family, knew the twisted ideals they cherished, knew the shell of a home Sirius hated more than anything.
"I'm worried about him."
"Yeah, me too."
Eva laid her head on James' shoulder. With any other girl, this would bother him, especially with his tying to appear attractive to Lily, but he held a special place in his heart for her, the girl who played keeper and read feminist books and wore flowers in her hair and looked after her friends just as protectively as he did.
"You smell like smoke." Her nose wrinkled, but she didn't move. He was too comforting.
He chuckled. "You should tell Padfoot to lay off the cigs, then."
"I try not to hold them against him, even though they're disgusting little packs of cancer," she muttered, causing him to grin.
Never shy about her beliefs, he thought to himself. Yet another thing he liked about her. Eva Taylor always strived to be unapologetically herself. And if that meant wearing flower power clothes, refusing to use quills when she had those weird featherless ones the Muggles had, and getting into duels she knew she had no chance of winning simply to protect someone weaker than her, than so be it.
"His birthday's coming up, you know," she said through a yawn. "We should do something special for him. Maybe it'll cheer him up."
"The boys and I have been talking about a party. Do you know where the Room of Requirement is?" She nodded. "We could use it. Nothing big. Just us, maybe Evans and Marlene. Some food and games, maybe you and Evans could bring one of those Muggle movies you like."
"That's a great idea." She began to think about which movies the Marauders would like the most. "We could sneak food from the kitchens. No one can catch us there if we don't want to be caught, right?"
He nodded. "So we'll have it on the night of his birthday, then. That's, let's see..." He counted off on his fingers. "Eighteen days away."
"I don't know what to get him," she confessed. "What do you get a wizard for their seventeenth birthday? I honestly have no idea how this works. I mean, Marlene turned seventeen over the summer, but I sent her a lot of candy and a cute jacket I found in Italy. That doesn't really work in this situation."
James grinned to himself at her concern. He knew that Sirius couldn't keep his eyes off of her, but he also had a sneaking suspicion that the feelings were reciprocated. "Well, tradition usually says that a wizard gets a watch, but that's a parent thing. Don't tell, but my mum bought him one."
"Really?"
"Yeah, I think she loves him more than she loves me," he joked. "He's going to love anything you get him, Blondie. I wouldn't get freaked out over it."
"Thanks, James."
"Anytime."
She dozed off on his shoulder and he didn't bother to wake her up. She looked too cozy. He just readjusted so that they were both laying on the couch and fell asleep himself.
*
Sirius barely made it out of the common room and to the closest boy's bathroom before he broke down. Gripping the porcelain sinks tightly, he gasped, letting the hot tears spill down his cheeks. Because even at school, where he supposedly could be himself around people who understood him, he never could escape where he came from. Never.
The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black hung around him like a dark, angry storm cloud, constantly raining down upon him. Bits and pieces of the letter floated back into his memory, the letter he so badly wanted to erase from his mind.
You need to stop associating with filth and start acting like the man you are supposed to be.
Don't you have any pride?
Your brother has recently informed us of his decision to join the Dark Lord, and it makes us truly wonder about you.
Each day, you disgrace us and your family name.
If you're still hanging about those blood traitors and Mudbloods, you're more imbecilic than we imagined.
When will you grow up and start doing what's right?
The world felt like it was crashing down on him, suffocating him slowly and painfully, stabbing him where it hurt most.
"Why?" he muttered to everyone and no one. "Why? Why me? What did I do?" There was nothing to throw, but he so desperately needed to throw something, to hear it clatter and smash against the floor into a million tiny pieces. Instead, he sunk down to the cold tile, his back against the wall, head in his hands, and began to sob. Not loudly. He learned early on in life how to quiet his tears. Weakness was never tolerated in the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.
Eventually, he staggered into enough of a standing position to see himself in the mirror. This was not Sirius Black, heartbreaker, prankster, dark and attractive rebel with a decent cause.
No, the boy staring back at him had bloodshot, crazed eyes. Desperation hung in the scarlet Gryffindor scarf that pleaded to place him anywhere but Slytherin. This was the part of himself that he hated most of all, the part that lost control and just exploded with emotion. The part that cried and smoked and felt human.
He fixed his deranged look with a simple charm and began walking to a place he rarely frequented for several reasons. It's not like he didn't know how to get there, and besides, after a quick glance at the map, he noticed that he wouldn't even have to get in.
Outside of the doors to the Slytherin common room stood Regulus Black, returning after a late-night study session at the library, but the sight of his older brother made him hesitate, unsure of how their encounter would go. Shadows surrounded the brothers as they both stopped in their tracks.
"Sirius," he said, not offering any other greeting.
"Reg," Sirius whispered hoarsely. He put a hand against the wall to hold himself up. "What... did... you... do?"
Regulus met Sirius's wide eyes with a glare. "What I needed to. What I wanted to."
"You're crazy. I can help you, I swear. Don't do this, please, Mum and Dad don't know what they're talking about. I'm sorry they forced you into this, but-"
"Forced?" Regulus looked at him sharply. "You think they forced me to do it?"
Sirius stayed silent. He didn't think that, but he hoped it.
"This was my choice, Siri. My choice, not theirs, not yours."
"What were you trying to do? Be the perfect son?"
"Someone had to be."
The brothers stared at each other, contempt in their expressions.
"You know, I could see it with the others. Snivellus, Lucius, especially Bella. I knew it was only a matter of time. But I never thought you'd join up with him, Reg."
"You thought wrong, then. Obviously. Just like you're wrong about everything else."
"They're very proud, aren't they? Mum and Dad, I mean," Sirius spat, anger overtaking him.
He caught a glimpse of the tattoo on his younger brother's arm, and something broke inside of him. Regulus, who he always took the beatings for, who he always let stay with him when their parents were fighting, who he always loved even though he hated the rest of his blood relatives, was a Death Eater.
"They are," Regulus replied smoothly. "You wouldn't know what that feels like, though."
"I don't care who you're buddied up with now, I'll hex you if you talk to me like that!"
"Running around with your blood traitor friends and your Mudblood girlfriend, no wonder they like me better at this point. You're not even putting up a fight, Sirius."
"You shut your mouth!" Sirius snarled, his wand inches from his brother's face. "They're better company than your new death club. They support me and accept me for who I am, unlike anyone you know, so leave it or I'll make you wish Voldemort himself was here to save you."
"Don't disgrace his name by saying it, you traitor."
"I'll do what I want. Lord Voldemort doesn't scare me. You're just hiding behind him, just like you used to hide behind me. And I was always the one who got hit, Regulus. It's only a matter of time."
Regulus smirked maliciously at this. "I'd watch your back. You never know who's standing behind it with a knife."
Still grinning, he disappeared into the Slytherin common room without another word, leaving Sirius to deal with his anger and heartbreak alone.
He decided to return to Gryffindor Tower and find someone, anyone, to talk to before he landed himself another detention. Maybe James would be waiting up for him, or he could find Remus or Eva. But when he gave the Fat Lady the password and entered, his already bad night reached a new level of the word bad.
James and Eva laid on the couch, his arms around her, her head there on his chest, both sound asleep. His chin rested on the top of her head, his glasses askew, and there was this little smile on her face, like she was having a comforting dream.
I'd watch your back. You never know who's standing behind it with a knife.
He hated that he heard his brother's words, but as he stared at the two people he loved most of all blissfully asleep in each others' arms, an overwhelming sense of betrayal filled him.
Stone-faced, Sirius slipped back into the dormitory and got into bed without saying a word. At around midnight, Remus heard muffled sobs through a half-awake state and sat on the bed next to Sirius for the rest of the night, never speaking as his friend cried.