The dread mounted in him with each step he took closer to the dorm. He didn’t know why he was so nervous, why he was more tense than when the first pale light breached the trees and the wind whipped in smelling of pine on the eve of transformations.
What he was about to do, what he had been asked to do, felt like more of a betrayal than Sirius sending Snape down the passage in the Whomping Willow to die. It was funny in a sick way that he'd been asked to play the executioner twice now. His own snarling teeth and snapping jaw unleashed on an enemy when he lacked the presence of mind to protest. And now, a year later, Charlene, sending him to the gallows to deliver Sirius his sentence.
He ran over the words she had given him. What was better? Saying them cold and detached, like he didn’t believe in them, like he was just doing what she’d asked him to, what he was supposed to do, what was nice, to make it clear, this isn’t what I want, not even a little bit. Or to try to soften them, inoculate them with his own entreaties and excuses?
And the sickest part was that Sirius liked Charlene. He still remembered when she first came over to sit with them in the Great Hall, and Sirius had welcomed her like one of their own, the same Sirius who could rarely be persuaded to pay any mind to anyone who wasn’t a Marauder for more than five seconds did it anyways, for Remus, because he knew he was already nervous enough about them meeting his girlfriend.
And later, after Remus had pecked her on the cheek–much to his teasing friends’ delight– and James had begun holding a conversation with himself on the merits of a particular Quidditch formation and Peter had disappeared to wherever he disappeared to, Sirius had asked, “Do you think she likes me? Like– not in a weird way. Just– It’s important to me, that I dunno. I get on with the people that are important to you.”
Remus had gushed about her and Sirius had let him; hell Sirius had gushed too once he’d gotten to know her better; Char was muggle-born so she had an even more extensive knowledge of alternative music than they did, and she was extremely generous when it came to lending out records. She was sharp and sweet and the only jam she would ever tolerate was marmalade and she called Remus “Jolly green” short for “Jolly Green giant” and she kept an old bottle of Ogden’s under her bed that she took a generous swig from before every Quidditch match.
The three of them formed a little group of their own, sprawling out near a burst of wildflowers by the greenhouses to smoke spliffs and debate the merits of Buzzcocks vs the Stranglers and practicing silly charms on each other and as content as Remus was with his role in the Marauders, less in the middle of things than Sirius and James who were larger than life itself, it felt nice to be in the center for once, not just to be roped in or included tangentially, but to have conversations that revolved around him and the things he cared about, shared with people who could feel proud of himself for having brought together.
And then yesterday when they were walking around the lake she’d smiled softly at Remus and said, “I mean this in the nicest way possible. I mean– I love Black, I love all your friends, really, but– d’you think you could tell Sirius to back off a little?”
It had caught him so of guard that he’d taken a whole ten seconds to begin formulating an answer.
Because he had thought everything had been fine, was the thing. The last few months, they had been some of the best of his life; Sirius and him finally back to normal again after the Whomping Willow incident and the new rhythm they’d fallen in, weird, and homely and theirs.
It occurred to him that this bothered him more than if it had been Remus she wanted a break from. If it had turned out that it was Sirius she liked after all, he would have been a bit miffed, obviously, but he would’ve been able to wrap his head around it. But this--he couldn’t fathom it, in fact he had half a mind to tell her it was a bit ridiculous that that wasn’t the conclusion she had come to.
That she had a problem with Sirius and that the problem wasn’t loving him too much just seemed so wrong… The thought battered the inside of his brain the entire time she went on speaking.
And she’d raised plenty of sensible points too: that having grown up with three brothers at home, she sort of didn’t feel like spending every day mucking about with boys all the time and that Sirius sort of had a way of dominating interactions and it wasn’t even his fault it was just him being him, natural, like a sunflower bending towards the sun, but she wasn’t dating Sirius, had never wanted to date Sirius…
They’d been walking in the bright yellow sunshine; almost all of the castle was outdoors making the most of the nice weather; it wasn’t even that hot really, but it was easy to pretend that it was, what with exams over and spirits high. But all of a sudden he’d really wished he’d brought his jacket, was conscious that it wasn’t warm enough to have his sleeves rolled up the way they were; that wishful thinking alone wasn’t enough to stave off the chill.
Maybe he’d gotten greedy. Seeing things how he wanted them rather than how they really were, imagining vibrant colors when they’d been muted all along.
Or maybe. Maybe it had all been just as splendid as he’d thought, but it wasn’t to last, because nothing gold can stay, because it had to burn out, because everything did in time, like the spliffs they ashed on the window sill of the dorm, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, not everything in the world could shine as perennial as the stars that it had emerged out of and he’d been foolish not to realize it sooner, because, because, because. He’d lost it before he’d even realized it was something he could lose as gradually as the seasons changing and now he was left feeling inexplicably cold at the very beginning of summer.
He thought about all of that as he stood crammed in the small space at the top of the stairs and struggled to wrest his face into something presentable. Thought about how Sirius’ lips would curve down when he told him. When there was nothing else left to do he opened the door.
“Moony?” Sirius said, perking up from where he’d been sitting on Remus’ bed, seeing right through him because of course he did. “What happened, you look– what happened?”
He was backlit by the light from the still-setting sun coming in through the window, features all gilded. The perfect Mersault-- Sirius hadn't cared for his mother much either-- and he hadn't meant to do anything wrong but that wouldn't absolve him. The lilting accent that came into his voice when he pronounced words in French, their heads bent together, reading each other pages out of The Stranger: "And so I learned that familiar paths traced in the dusk of summer evenings may lead as well to prisons as to innocent, untroubled sleep."
And he knew then he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t hurt Sirius with yet another person thinking he was too much. He just… wouldn’t. It was the one bright spot he refused to see snuffed out. Not now– not yet.
“I’m ending things with Charlene.”