胸がはち切れそうで (First Love / Late spring)

“You are not welcome here,” Walburga’s harsh voice stated.

Sirius lifted his head. His eyes were filled with sadness.

“I do not care,” he said, looking directly into Walbura’s cold eyes.

“I was his brother,” his voice was high-pitched and unsteady. He hadn’t intended to show Walburga, the woman he once called his mother, how much he suffered, but he couldn’t
change it if he wanted to.

Walburga craned her head. She looked elegant, elegant the way a snake was. Beautiful but bitter.

“You are not part of this family,” she said, not breaking the contact their eyes had, “You left. You chose to.”

Anger built up in Sirius. “But I was part of his family!” he hissed, “And that’s what all this is about, isn’t it? His family! This is his funeral! I have a right to be here.”

Walburga looked down at him, her face not showing any expression; not sadness, not grief, not pity, not anger. Nothing.

But it had always been like this, hadn’t it? For as long as he could remember.

She sighed. Sirius looked down, his head slightly lowered, his hands in front of his stomach. He felt like a little kid asking for a permit. Just that he wasn’t. Not anymore. He wasn’t a kid, let alone was he asking for something. He was going to attend this funeral, his brother’s
funeral, and not even Walburga could stop him from doing so.

A snowflake fell into Sirius’ vision. It was extremely cold for May. He was even wearing gloves. Regulus would’ve loved it—the weather. He had always been a winter and spring lover.

“Fine,” Walburga said after a while.

Sirius looked up. “Fine?” he asked.

“You’re allowed to stay,” she responded, “But take that ugly head of yours off at least.”

Sirius shook his head. He knew why Walburga didn’t want to see it. It was a self-made beanie with yellow and dark red stripes, looking like the colours of Gryffindor.

“Regulus gave it to me once,” Sirius said, “He crochet it for me, he used to do that a lot, you know.”

He looked up and shook his head again. “Of course you don’t. I bet you don’t even remember his favourite colour, do you?”

Walburga slightly turned her head to the side.

“No, I didn’t think so,” he laughed pathetically.

Sirius looked downwards again. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

“Green,” he said, looking up at Walburga’s face again, “His favourite colour was green. Not that hard, was it?”

Then he pushed past her, walking towards the small church. Walburga, however, stood frozen, her eyes still fixed on the point where Sirius had stood seconds ago. As she raised her gaze, she could see the skyline of Calais on the horizon.

She took a few deep breaths: In and out, in and out. And as she closed her eyes for just a moment, a tear rolled down her cheek.

With lots of energy, Sirius opened the door to his brother’s room. He had only been back home for five minutes, and he’d already had an argument with Orion, but that didn’t matter. He needed to see his brother. He had to tell him about everything: Hogwarts, the teachers, his new friends and especially James Potter.

“Reggie,” Sirius exclaimed and virtually jumped onto the younger boy’s bead, “How’re you? I missed you so much! Why weren’t you at the platform? I have so much to tell you! Hogwarts is amazing, I can’t wait for next year to start. Really, you are going to love it, Reg!”

Regulus stayed silent and watched Sirius as he told him many different things. He didn’t really listen, though. The year without Sirius had been hard, to say the least, and he was just glad to have him back. He couldn’t imagine life without him, his tower of strength.

Regulus continued watching his older brother, who seemed so inconceivably happy. His hands gestured wildly, and a wide smile was painted across his face. He was talking like a waterfall, and even though he had always hated this trait of Sirius, he had admired it too. And now he was more than thankful to have his never-able-to-shut-up-for-more-than-a-few-seconds brother by his side again.

“I’m glad you’re back,” he said quietly, interrupting Sirius’ speech.

The older boy smiled. “I’m glad that I’m with you again. I missed you.”

Sirius embraced his little brother tightly.

“So,” he asked, “What’d you do all the time?”

Regulus frowned. “I’d rather you talked more about what you did.”

“Come on, Reggie,” Sirius whined, “Don’t be like that.”

“Like what?”

“You never talk about yourself and the things you do. You always want the others to talk,” Sirius said.

Regulus shrugged. “I don’t see the problem. I just prefer listening to others than telling things myself.”

Sirius rolled his eyes. “Rubbish!” he said, “You’re a kid! Kid’s love talking! About everything!”
“And how would you know?”

“Because I’m a kid and I love talking,” Sirius said. Again, he gestured his hands wildly, perhaps trying to emphasise his points. Still, Regulus could frankly not figure out in what way this waving around of various body parts made anything just a tiniest bit clearer.

“Not everyone has got to be like you.”

“Come on, Reg,” Sirius sighed, “I just want to know what I missed. I’m curious.”

Regulus rolled over once. He tried to recall what he had done the past year—it wasn’t much. He had crocheted some stuff, he had had to attend multiple boring family gatherings, and he had written some stuff. None of this was new to him, and none of it was to Sirius either.

“I– I don’t know, Sirius,” he said eventually, “Just the usual stuff. Nothing special.”

Sirius moved closer to his brother again. “Well then tell me about the usual stuff,” he said.

He watched his younger brother, who was lying on his back and had his hands covering his face. Sirius had missed him a lot. Whilst Hogwarts and the people there were great, he had been worried sick about his brother the whole year. The thought of leaving him alone with Walburga and Orion for such a long time and exposing him to their anger was incredibly frightening.

But now he was here with him again, and he seemed okay. Everything was alright.

“I guess I learned a bit,” Regulus said, “Practised some stuff.”

A bark of laughter escaped Sirius’ mouth. “You learned?! What? Why?” he asked, amused by that statement, “Reg, I promise you you’ll have to learn enough as soon as you get to Hogwarts. It’ll be torture. Why would you willingly do that to yourself already?”

Regulus took his hands off his face and rolled his eyes at Sirius. “I thought Hogwarts was so amazing, hm?”

“It is,” Sirius said laughingly, “But the learning isn’t! Besides, what’d you learn anyways?”

The younger boy’s face reddened. He shook his head. “It’s embarrassing,” he said, rolling over once again and burying his head in a pillow.

“Hey, I’m sure it isn’t,” Sirius assured him.

Regulus mumbled something Sirius didn’t quite understand, but since it didn’t seem to be his
final answer, he didn’t say anything.

“Japanese,” Regulus’ muffled voice said after a while, “I’ve been learning some Japanese.”

Sirius tilted his head. “But that’s nothing to be embarrassed about! It’s rather impressive!”

Again, Regulus inaudible grumbled something.

“Seriously,” Sirius said, pausing for a moment to make sure Regulus got the joke. And he most certainly did because Sirius had made that joke more often than it was healthy for the development of brains.

After Regulus didn’t react any further than showing Sirius his middle finger, the older boy continued. “It’s almost nerdy. I bet you’ll be in Ravenclaw. You’re way too smart for any other house!”

Sirius still vividly remembered how he had looked forward to the time he and Regulus would be spending in Hogwarts together, but things had come differently—as they always do— and he and Regulus had slowly but steadily grown apart. It wasn’t entirely bad, though. They both just had their own friends and lives now. Sometimes, however, Sirius did catch himself chasing the imaginary could haves and would haves.

It was a late Saturday evening, far past night rest, and Sirius was still wandering around the dark corridors, perhaps even chasing a few of his unattainable dreams.
Hogwarts was peaceful at night.

Walking around, seeing the usually crowded places of the castle empty and quiet, helped Sirius to calm down. In the past days, he had thought about Regulus more than he did anyway.

The Christmas holidays had been hard for both of them. Things have been different this year. Something had changed. Positions of power had arranged new amongst the Black family members, and even though Sirius couldn’t quite grasp how and why, he was sure it meant no good. He had felt it. The atmosphere at the Christmas family gathering had been cold, colder than it used to be. Something dark was coming, he knew for certain. And Regulus knew, too, Sirius had seen it in his careful gaze, he had noticed it in the way the younger boy moved, careful and cautious, not to wake the sleeping dragons.

Sirius sighed. Something was going on with Regulus, and it wasn’t just the alarming undertone of the holidays. There was more.

He felt the sudden urge to see his brother, to talk to him. Just make sure that everything was alright. Because it wasn’t, was it?

Abruptly, Sirius turned around and paced in the direction he had come from. He wouldn’t find Regulus, certainly not. He hopefully was asleep in his dorm, like he was supposed to. But maybe Sirius was able to find him in the night sky. Possibly, this would already be enough.

Solemnly, Sirius headed up the stairs to the Astronomy tower. The old metal steps chimed loudly beneath him and echoed through the silent castle. For what felt like an entirety, he climbed up the steps of the staircase until he finally reached the top. A fresh, wintry wind blew into his face.

Sirius looked around to make sure he really was alone, but to his surprise, he wasn’t. Opposite him, on the other side of the spiral staircase, stood Regulus. The younger boy was frozen on the spot, staring at Sirius with a tense gaze.

“Reg?” Sirius asked in disbelief

Regulus seemed to have collected himself again, seeing that he quickly was making his way to the stairs.

“No, no. Wait!” Sirius called, “Stay, please.”

Regulus didn’t respond and was about to push past his older brother when Sirius grabbed his arm to hold him back. Regulus flinched at his touch, so he immediately let go. For a fraction of a moment, they just stared at each other until Sirius grabbed his brother’s arm again, this time pulling up his sleeve. Regulus tried to fight him, but Sirius was stronger and faster; he always had been.

Fresh red cuts and dark scars covered Regulus’ forearm. In horror, he watched his older brother inspect his arm.

“Oh, Regulus,” Sirius sighed, looking into his brother’s eyes again, “What have you done?”

Tears shimmered in Regulus’ eyes.

“Let me go,” he said quietly, “Please, just let me go.”

He tried to pull back his arm, but Sirius held him firmly. Unable to say more, Sirius looked at the younger boy concerned.

“Sirius,” Regulus cried, “Let me go.”
Sirius didn’t respond. A million different thoughts were racing through his brain. He had failed completely. He was supposed to protect his younger brother from everything bad. Regulus should’ve felt like he could come to him at any time, talking about everything lying in his soul. But obviously, he didn’t. At this very moment, he even seemed afraid of Sirius.

“I love you,” Sirius said as the first absolutely clear thought that came to his mind, “I love you, Reg, and right now when I’m being honest, I’m very scared.”

He continued to look at Regulus intently. The younger boy opened his mouth but closed it again without saying anything. A first tear rolled down his cheek, more followed. He broke eye contact and looked down at his feet, nervously tapping them on the ground.

“You– You love me?” he asked, his voice unsettled. He raised his head again, looking at Sirius in a shy manner.

“What?” Sirius asked disbelievingly, “Of course I do. Of course I love you, Reg. You’re my brother; I have always and will always love you.”

Again, Regulus tried to pull his arm back, this time more slowly. Sirius didn’t think he was about to run off, so he let him go. Promptly, Regulus hugged him tightly. The older boy needed a moment to process what had happened, but as soon as he understood, he hugged him back and stroked his back gently.

“I promise you, it’s all going to be alright,” he whispered.

Regulus shook his head vehemently. “No,” he sobbed, “No it’s not.”

“I can assure you it will be,” Sirius said, stroking through the young Slytherin’s hair.

Regulus let go of Sirius and looked him in the eyes. Again, he shook his head.

“You don’t understand,” he cried. By now, his whole face was wet with tears.

“Then explain it to me,” Sirius insisted, “Tell me what it is, please, Reg.”

Stressed, Regulus ran his fingers through his hair.

“I’m in love, Sirius,” the younger boy admitted. Nervously, he looked at his brother.

“But that’s great, Reggie,” Sirius said, laughing, “Your first love, that is– that is great! When I was thirteen I had my first girlfriend. I mean, we broke up after just a few weeks but you know, it was great nonetheless–”

“No, no, you don’t understand it. You don’t understand!” Regulus shook his head. “It’s a boy, Sirius, I’m in love with a boy.”

Sirius tilted his head. “Oh, Reggie,” he said, “That’s not a bad thing.”

He stepped forward to hug the younger boy.

“It is!” Regulus cried out, “Maman is going to kill me.”

Sirius gulped. Walburga would indeed not be happy to hear that her second son, too, was gay.

“But Maman doesn’t have to know,” he said, trying to comfort his brother.

His words had the opposite effect he had intended; Regulus only started crying harder. Sirius held him tight and kissed him on the forehead.

“Ça va aller t’inquiète pas,” he whispered, “Ça va aller.”

“I can’t breathe, Sirius, I can’t breathe!” Regulus said, crying. He grabbed his brother’s arm and held onto it as if his life would depend on it.

“Reggie, Reg, I’m here. I’m here with you, everything is going to be alright, okay?” Sirius said softly, lowering himself and Regulus onto the floor. “I just need you to calm down, please. I promise you, everything is going to be alright. I promise, do you hear me?”

Regulus’ nails dug deep into Sirius’ skin. Sirius searched his whole mind for something to distract Regulus with, for something to calm him down.

“Hey,” he said after some time, “Are you still learning Japanese?”

At first, Regulus was irritated by the sudden change of subjects, but then he nodded slowly.

“For how long have you been learning it now?” Sirius continued to ask.

Regulus shrugged.

“Oh, come one, I bet you still know.”

“I– I don’t know,” the younger brother said between two sobs, “Four years, maybe… More or less...”

“And?” Sirius asked.

“What do you mean? And?”

“Are you good?”

Regulus shook his head. “Not really,” he admitted and even laughed softly.

“In first year I became friends with this Hufflepuff girl from my herbology class. She’s Japanese. She and her mum lived in Japan until she was like five and then they moved to Cambridge. There her mum met her new step dad, some French guy who was just on holidays here. But well then they fell in love and married and he fastly moved in with them,” Regulus explained, “And to get to my point; this Hufflepuff girl didn’t speak French obviously. I mean, why would she? And she didn’t start learning it because that language sucks frankly. But yeah then we met and we made this deal that she teaches me Japanese when I in return teach her French.”

Hearing that story, Sirius smiled at his brother, who eventually had stopped crying.

“Are you still friends?”

Regulus shook his head. “No,” he said sadly, “After the Christmas holidays last year she came to me and told me that she didn’t want to meet me any longer since I’m a Black and our family has done a lot of bad stuff.”

Sirius sighed. “I’m sorry, Reg.”

The younger boy sniffled. “I don’t want to be a Black anymore, it makes me feel mean. I don’t want to be associated with all the things our parents and relatives do.”

“I know, Reg, I know,” Sirius said, stroking Regulus’ back, “But you know what? It won’t be like this forever. We’re going to grow older and one day we’ll be old enough to leave all of this behind; this house, this family, everything. And then we can start our own lives, our own family. It’ll take some more time till we get to that point, but it’ll be worth it. Then we can be us… And no one, Regulus, no one and especially not Maman and Papa, is ever going to hurt you because you like a boy, okay? I promise you, I will protect you from them and anyone else because no matter what anyone might say to you, it is okay, okay? You’re not weird or broken or wrong. You’re just as you’re supposed to be. I love you, Reg.”

“Je t’aime aussi, mon frère.”

It wasn’t the first time that things had come differently than hoped. Fastly, Regulus and Sirius lost touch again. Sirius had done his best to keep close to Regulus after that night on the Astronomy tower. But Regulus had avoided his brother where he could, refusing his help. Only occasionally, the two talked to each other, and even when they did, Regulus didn’t respond to Sirius’ questions referring to his self-harming.

It wasn’t until shortly before the summer holidays that Sirius realised he had to talk to his brother. If he didn’t do it now, he perhaps never would. So, on the last Wednesday of the school year, three days until the train would leave Hogwarts, he grabbed the Marauder’s Map off James’ nightstand and started looking for his brother. It didn’t take long to find him.
At times, he was predictable. Moreover, Sirius snatched the invisibility cloak, already stuffed into James’ case, and then made his way to the library.

When he reached it, he pulled over the cloak and sneaked to the corner where he had seen his brother’s name before. Through the maze of bookshelves, he walked until he saw him. Alone, he sat on a windowsill bent over some book.

For several minutes, Sirius stood there silently, watching over his brother. His posture was terrible—Walburga would lynch him if she saw it— causing his dark curls to fall onto his face, hiding his eyes. After a closer look, Sirius saw that Regulus wasn’t actually reading but writing in what seemed to be a diary or journal of some kind.

Although it was a hot day, the Slytherin was wearing long robes. Sirius could foresee why. He sighed. Regulus was so engrossed in his thoughts and writing he didn’t notice.
Sirius decided to take the cloak off. He folded it and put it into his bag. Then he leaned against the closest shelf and waited a few more moments until he demonstratively cleared his throat.

Surprised, Regulus looked up. His eyes widened as he caught sight of his brother. At once, he jumped off the windowsill and started packing his things.

“Hey, hey, hey,” Sirius said, “Not that again. I need to talk to you.”

“Not my problem,” Regulus grumbled.

“Yes, your problem,” Sirius said.

As Regulus walked past him, he caught him with one arm.

“You’re behaving like a toddler,” the older boy said, “Just listen to me for a few minutes. Five
minutes of your oh-so-precious time, that’s all I want.”

Regulus rolled his eyes.

“Fine,” he said, raising his arm as a sign of surrender.

“Thank you,” Sirius said and let go of his brother.

Regulus went back a few steps and leaned his back against the wall.

Sirius sighed. Regulus was still so young, and it was so unfair.

“I’m not coming home this summer,” he said, looking at Regulus intensely, “I’m going to James’ place.”

It was anything but fair to leave his brother behind in this house he couldn’t call home, but he had no choice. He’d die in these walls if he didn’t escape now. He’d have been gone long ago if it wasn’t for Regulus. It was hard to leave him behind, almost impossible.

Regulus didn’t answer Sirius and just stared at him in pure horror.

“You can come with me if you want to,” Sirius suggested, but he understood the younger boy well enough to know he’d refuse this offer.

For countless nights, he had been lying in his bed sleepless because he couldn’t seem to find an answer to this inextricable problem.

Regulus still didn’t say anything. He just tilted his head slightly to the side. For Sirius, that was enough to understand. He had expected it, technically even known it, but to have it confirmed was worse than expected.

“Alright,” he said, his mouth suddenly extremely dry, “Alright… Just, please know that I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry, but I have to go. Though, please remember that this doesn’t mean that I–”

“Don’t,” Regulus cut him off, “Please, don’t.”

“What?” Sirius asked, confused.

“Please don’t tell me that you love me,” Regulus said, his voice shaking a little, “Please don’t tell me that it’s all going to be okay.”

Sirius looked at his brother for a moment, thinking about what to say next, but before he was able to think of something, anything, Regulus had walked past him at a fast pace. For a few moments, he just stared at the spot Regulus had been standing a few seconds ago. Upset, he ran his hand through his hair.

“Alright,” he said after a while, wiping a tear out of the corner of his eye.

“Fuck.”

It was the first time since he had run away from Grimmauld Place that Sirius saw his brother alone. It had been a long time. Over a year had passed, but he had hardly seen Regulus. Only in the great hall during meal time and seldom in the corridors. But he was always with his friends, so Sirius never had the chance to talk to him. However, that wasn’t really important since he didn’t want to talk to him that much anyway. There was just nothing to talk about. They both certainly had made mistakes, but they both also had made choices. Sirius had made his and Regulus his.

It felt weird standing in front of his younger brother after all that time. He didn’t look that young anymore, not at all. It was hard to believe he was only fifteen. The shimmer in his eyes was long gone, and dark eye bags marked his face.

“Hello Sirius,” the Slytherin greeted.

“Regulus,” Sirius nodded, “What do you want?”

Earlier that evening, he had gotten a letter from his brother in an unusual scribbled handwriting. And whilst a small part of him still hoped that Regulus would finally accept the offer and come with Sirius to the Potters, the greater part of him was aware that this dream was a bottomless pit.

“I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry,” Regulus said, “For everything. And that I regret many things I did in the past; I wish I could change them, but I can’t, so I just want you to know that I love you.”

Concerned, Sirius looked at him. He didn’t know how to react. This was far from what he had expected to be confronted with.

“Reg, are you– are you alright? Is everything okay?” Sirius asked, “Do you need help or are you in any kind of trouble?”

“胸がはち切れそうで,” Regulus said, his face emotionless.

Over the years, Sirius had gotten used to the sound of this language, and he very well was able to recognise it. However, that didn’t mean he understood a single word of what Regulus had said.

So he just said the first thing that came to his mind, “I love you, remember.”

“How could I ever forget?”

The younger boy turned around and left the library without looking back, and Sirius helplessly watched him go.

That would’ve been the last time the two brothers saw each other.