Chapter 7
Minerva McGonagall.
Regulus had never had a reason to speak to her before, it wasn’t hard to see the house in which she favored. Her little lions, for the most part, had always been civil, quick to look for a flaw in his word but nodded her head in approval. She had a connection to his brother and took his brother in, and Sirius looked for someone to fill that hole Regulus accepted the truth.
How he got to the point of sitting in her office was really beyond him, he liked to stay out of the way. Even Slughorn didn’t crave the idiotic man’s approval.
“ Let me be frank Mr. Black--”
“ Regulus is fine” he corrected.
The woman looked seemingly surprised for a moment before nodding her head and correcting herself. “ Regulus then, let me be frank your brother is a sickle away from being shipped off to the nearest boarding school. I have attempted to help but your brother is” She sighed and rubbed her temple. “Stubborn.”
He hadn’t talked to Sirius since that day in the infirmary. Regulus couldn’t even bother to cater to his brother's downfall, he couldn’t help. If anyone was to help him it was James Potter who stupidly sought him out.
“ How does that involve me, I have a busy day and quidditch practice I currently am needed at. Unless there is a reason I am here I would like to return” he said curtly.
He swore he saw a glimmer of a smile before a scowl overtook her face.
“ They need to see that he has a support system at the moment Mr. Potter and Mr. Lupin aren’t eligible due to their past history with the board. They no longer trust Mr.Potter and Mr.Lupin to put the truth before their friend. I won’t waste your time with lies Regulus, your brother is a pain but I wouldn't want him anywhere else. I’d like nothing more to put my head out and get him to stay. At every possible turn, I have tried to do anything but reach out to your parents. You can help your brother expulsion” She folded her hands on the desk and looked at him as if Regulus had the answer.
He shook his head, “ I’m the last person who can help him.”
The woman looked at him with strong disapproval and disappointment, he found it ironic that he was now expected to dig Sirius out of the pit he dug himself. When the only thing that he could do was watch it happen.
~.~
“ Expulsion is not the answer!”
“ Minerva you cannot expect us to entertain this behavior for the sake of a slight soft spot. Entertaining this is such a horrible look at the entire integrity of this school. We expect the best and his behavior is entirely unacceptable.”
“ We are punishing him for a sickness this is unacceptable, our job as professors is to help the students in their best interest. It is not in his to be expelled. I have shown the board everything and still, it isn’t enough.
Sirius barely registered one word filtered through the room of board members and McGonagall. He dazed out from conversation to conversation answering the questions as best he could.
As much as any drunk person could, drunk and high. Sirius wasn’t even sure about the mix of stuff he had ingested in his body since last night. He had to sneak out of the dorms to avoid James who was on a path of salvation in hopes he could help. Remus was mute, hadn’t seen him before his prolonged stay in the infirmary. His company had been Pete who was currently angry at James for eating his stash of sugar quills.
He hadn’t seen Reg either.
“ Sirius” McGongall’s voice called out.
He looked up with a jolt and tried to focus on the two versions of her he was seeing, hallucinating. The swayed movement of both of them made him nauseous and he bit his tongue as a last resort.
The door creaked open. “ Starting a meeting without giving a student proper representation if I recall is quite illegal, I think we learned that from Professor Bins” Sirius heard someone say as the room went quiet.
“ Mr. Black I assure you we have given him the opportunity for representation, but if you would like to reconvene we can do so” another voice replied.
“ Everything that has been said is illegal—off the record due to the lack of representation my brother received. I can stand in but as a witness and source you’d have to be ok with that.”
He felt everyone look around and nod as the room got quieter as more and more people left. A hand on his shoulder felt like a whisper as his eyes closed. He wanted to lay in bed and sleep, he wanted to feel nothing. He felt numb.
A whisper came out in a hushed “ Thank you.”
He cracked his eyes open as he was hit with a startling shock of pain traveling down the entire length of his body. He hissed in pain and leaned forward in a reflex from the pain.
A jinx.
His brother jinxed him.
If anyone knew Regulus like Sirius did they know that Regulus had always been wicked good at jinx’s? Something about him made them extra potent, maybe it was Regulus’s temper. But from the moment Regulus was able to cast those bastard spells Sirius learned to carefully mess with his younger little brother.
His little brother.
His younger brother Regulus.
He closed his eyes and everything sank into the depths of his bones, entrancing his soul in aching despair. Stuck, Sirius was stuck and it felt like dying. Dying was a feeling Sirius felt in his chest and in his head dying was something Sirius begged to escape and begged for.
Black flower detailing on deep green walls, paint peeling at the ceiling, and hands wrapping around his throat. The ice cold wrapped from his feet to his head, never warm and never safe. Like running from the inescapable reality of his entire life.
He knew nothing more than this and somehow yearned for anything but this house. The god-forsaken place he hated more than he hated himself. Sometimes he wished he could wrap a rope around its neck and kill it. Kill everything, kill every memory good or bad because at night none of those mattered.
He could smell the dust and the debris and the reeking scent of wine. He could hear the screams and the sounds of skin hitting bone. He could see the broken glass shredded wooden from oak chairs, carved by a carpenter in Dragon Alley. The drowsy noise of drugs, the silence after chaos.
The one moment Sirius could breathe before choking.
A slap, blood dripping down his face. His stomach sank and his heart pounded from his throat to his stomach. Wishing something would save them, praying, begging. Sirius was pathetic begging to any ghost listen.
His brother was safe asleep in his room.
Sirius stood in front of the stairs, taking hits, taking words that carved chinks out of him.
Pathetic, stupid, nothing.
Somehow sinus was the disease they carved out and the salvation of a cure.
The heir, the embarrassment.
He toed the line never to win, never to succeed. But survive.
His brother's soft face, was untouched by worry and terror while he slept. Sirius watched him, listening for every creak of wood every whisper of noise in the house. Every loud tone, crack of a hand, thud as a head hit the wall. The sound of another chair smashed against the wall, pounding fists on the table.
Virus wanted to die more than anything, but every time he was closed he begged for life.
A life he never lived, a life shackled to fear.
He hated her as much as he hated breathing but he was her, Sirius was every version of her before it went mad. Before the pain turned into vengeance and anger.
“ Sirius” his name cracked through the air loud and afraid.
McGonagall on his right and Regulus on his left step back from him, with a straight posture and an unfazed look void of emotion. His professor squeezed his arm unrelenting until he met her gaze and her grip weakened.
He felt the drugs in his veins and looked at his professor fighting for his innocence.
Sirius loved this he loved the thrill and the fear and deep down he knew it was because he knew nothing else. Not a life of peace not what James taught him. Sirius grew up in hell and he was damned if he ever thought he’d be anywhere else.
He was just like them.
He was fighting against fate, a fight he’d never win.
Sirius wasn’t good or moral or kind, he was vengeful and angry and impulsive. And he was just like them he was no better.
“ I’ll take the suspension,” he said cooly biting the bitter taste in his mouth and the urge to run.
McGonagall’s eyes shot up and her head shook. “ NO! I absolutely won’t allow that, I have gone through everything to make a place for you here. You are a student at Hogwarts you are the bane of my teaching career but you are brilliant. You are not your mistake.”
“ I’m not getting out of this. I almost killed someone, I’ve nearly put Remus in danger with the ministry and I’ve made problems for everyone. You have a council outside the door, my brot-Regulus should be in class. I should be at—I can go back for however long they say. I’m not fighting this.”
Regulus stared at him with a blank expression that threw Sirius off guard, surely his brother felt stronger than nothing at him going back home. He’d expected disbelief, anger perhaps, but not nothing. This wasn’t something Sirius saw coming.
While his brother looked unaffected his professor looked as if she had given up.
“ You won’t fight for this will you Sirius,” she asked.
He shook his head, “ No.”
“ Well, I guess that that’s then, I will have the council come back and they will serve you with a suspension. Along with some probation guidelines. This will look like an act of acceptance so in some ways, this may help you. For there is a life after Hogwarts if I might remind the both of you” she sighed.
He looked at his brother who looked at the floor.
Seemed like he wasn’t the only one who had given up on himself.
The sad sops on the council trickled into the office once again filling it with soft stuck-up murmuring. Talking about the expectations that the institution held, he bit his tongue to snap back on the fact that the institution was built on a lot that was half in love with each other and half fatal enemies. And that they had instilled the hard house loyalty, but he was tired. And whatever was in his system was beginning to wear off.
This was a waste, beyond a multitude of things this was one of the most useless things and efforts on his behalf for anything he may have done ever. He was a screwup, there wasn’t even a year where he could stay out of detention. His mind might have been halfway brilliant due to excellent tutors but he wasn’t worth it.
He was halfway the reason the fourth-floor stairs didn’t work, he’d given everyone in the school food poisoning due to an incorrect amount of milkweed powder in the last batch of untested potions for pranks.
He was immature and childish, there wasn’t a joke he wouldn’t laugh at, a situation he wouldn’t push off. Sirius was a combination of neglect and abuse and he clung to the small joys like a child.
He was broken, unmistakable.
He could no longer hide under humor and jokes in hopes that it would distract from the clear cracks on his body, scars. All bloody and unhealed because maybe Sirius was able to hide from his reality. But now his reality was smacking himself in the face.
Moments of peace in whatever drug he was snorting, whatever drink he was guzzling down.
The council buzzed for a span of time that Sirius couldn’t even begin to quantify, he went from staring at his hands to the floor to his brother who wore a blanker expression than himself. A feat that he couldn’t imagine possible if he wasn’t looking unwaywardly at Regulus.
There was a small noise of agreement before he felt someone guiding him outside the room, his feet moving without his mind even thinking anything of it. He was tired, and he wanted to lay in his dorm bed. A small moment of silence before going back to that burning house of hell.
“ You may return to your dormitory Sirius, I expect to have a word with you before the weekends and you head home. Regulus would you please walk your brother to his dorm and make sure he ends up in the Gryffindor dormitory.” McGonagall sternly instructed. He watched his brother just briefly nod.
He followed behind his brother not finding any words to say. Anything he would say or wanted to say was either a lie or futile. Regulus was less forgiving than he was, Regulus was burned one too many times. By that house, their parents, even himself, and he knew that nothing could make up for the betrayal that Regulus felt he endured.
His younger brother had been gentle, sensitive even: something Sirius wasn’t sure he had entirely lost. But instead morphed into something new, something twisted and dark. His sensitivity had been buried and a deep pitted anger had brewed from the first day Sirius had left him.
Where Sirius had found sanctuary, Regulus had barely found reprieve.
He never blamed his brother, he had been hurt, devastated perhaps. But he knew what had been done, irreparable damage. He wasn’t even sure there was room for forgiveness between them.
The corridors were empty and cold and the sound of their footsteps echoed across the stone walls. His brother kept a steady pass never looking back only following the trudging sound of his footsteps. Past portrait he didn’t look up to greet the occasional ghost that knew better than to even come up to his brother.
Every ounce of pain he felt, he knew he deserved. Sirius hadn’t been an angel, hadn’t had the best intentions, and had never pushed himself to be anything other than a walking joke. He had charisma and charm, a pretty face, and unsolvable DNA.
His brother stopped in his tracks right in front of him and Sirius stopped staring at his brother's back in confusion. He didn’t care to touch Regulus or even ask what was wrong. Instead, a gargled version of his brother's name managed to come out. “ Reggie?”
He wanted to reach out and touch his shoulder but he pulled his hand away.
“ You’re a fucking idiot” his brother spat turning on his heel, his face red and traces of tears dried on his face. The dark hair curled around his face from the perspiration, and Regulus’s hair curled when it was cut straight, although, in this last year, all traces of those curls had disappeared. If Sirius were to guess he’d say a nice hair charm. “ You want to remove yourself from our name fine. You want to proudly wear red and gold and be brazenly stupid fine! You want to remove yourself from this family—from me, FINE! But I thought you wouldn't be dumb enough to do this. You think you’ll come home from a suspension and they’ll pat you on the back and ask if you’re ok. NO you know deep down what they’ll do. Sirius! THEY’RE GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU” his brother screamed his brother's face the same color he hated. A vein in his forehead pulsing as his brother's fists rattled at his side clearly fighting the urge to deck him in the jaw.
He was tired, too tired to fight and scream and yell. He barely managed to keep himself up straight through the conversation which was one-sided still. He took a deep breath, “ I’m not an idiot Reg, I understand what is going to happen. But what should I do, you seem to have all the answers then help your older brother out because I am very aware I don't have the answers.”
“ If you know why don't you fucking care” He spat. “ If you know how they’ll react why aren’t you fighting? Why did I sit in that room and hear you say nothing to defend yourself, to do anything other than sink yourself into this hole.”
He looked down shoving his hands in the pockets of his robes. “ What was I going to argue, they smelled it on me, they tested me for everything. I can dispute the facts Reg—” he said before Regulus’s jagged words cut him off.
“ STOP!— stop calling me that. You don't get to pretend you care after all this time. You chose your friends over me years ago. I’ve gotten over that, what I don't get over is your actions and how they fall back on me. You don't think they’ll punish me for your failings. Because no matter what I do I am still not you. Despite your constant failures and disappointments and betrayals, our mother still looks at me trying to find YOU.”
“You’re the heir they want me to be—Reg—Regulus it's always been you.”
Regulus’s scoff rattled against his head as Regulus seethed at him. “ You’re an idiot if you believe the words shooting out of your mouth, it’s either the muggle drugs or your brain melting for the fire whiskey. I may be in the house they desire, the classes they approve of, I might wear the look of the Black heir, but don’t think for a moment if you had half a desire I wouldn't be left on the side. They look at me and still seek you out” Regulus took a step closer glaring at him with eyes that looked dull and lifeless.
“ I hope you know what you’ve gotten us into when we go home Sirius, because the blood—ours both—it’ll be on your hands.”
Sirius didn’t know if it was because he was high or if he missed something but he swore Regulus said we. The only one who was going home was him.
“ I’m the one going home, not you, I’ll take whatever they throw at me.”
Regulus smiled so cruelly that it almost looked genuine. “ Didn’t hear her did you brother, she did you a favor and managed to get the council to agree to let you serve your suspension over break. So WE brother are going home.” Regulus stormed away leaving him alone in the middle of the corridor.
His mind spiraled.
They were going home.
They were both going to get punished.
Because of him, always because of him.
He failed again.
He was a failure.
NO.
NO.
NO.
He needed to protect his brother, if anyone left alive it was Regulus.
Always his little brother.
He didn’t have another conscious thought as he fell to the floor the cold stone greeting his head warmly.