Back at Hogwarts
It’s September 1st 1976, Regulus just arrived at Kings Cross. The place is crowded, hundreds of students that are excited or rather not excited to go back to school. Surely depends on the family they came from. Regulus knows it to well. Hogwarts is not his favourite place to be but being at home is far worse. Actually he is very glad to step back into the Hogwartsexpress, the holidays have been horrible. Worse than any holiday before. Since Sirius left, and he was alone, he felt like his parents watched him very step he took. He has been treated bad before but never as bad as in the past weeks. It felt like they blamed him for Sirius leaving. He got the torture for it.
But Regulus couldn’t think of that right now. The place was crowded, he had to concentrate not to loose his Luggage or run over little students that looked like they just lost their whole family cause they surely never said goodbye to their parents for that long. And obviously, since the wizarding world kind of has a war going on at the moment, there was no guarantee that they will see their families again, if you’re very honest at least.
He made it to the train without running over kids or loosing his stuff. In the train he went looking for his friends. He saw Barty at the train station already but he couldn’t get to him in the rush.
“Regulus hellooo“ his voice said happily as he entered the cabin. Pandora was already there as well.
“Hello Barty, Hello Pandora“ he smiles. He is glad to see them again.
“Have you seen Evan already“ Regulus asks, sitting down on the bench opposite of Barty.
Barty‘s eyes flash to Regulus‘ as he mentions the name. He shakes his head smiling a little. Regulus wondered what has been going on between them since the past school year. He has though about them being in love but then he thought he‘s just thinking to much about what his friends do and think about each other because them liking each other would be wrong, wouldn’t it? A boy liking a boy? He never heard that that’s possible. No one ever told him something like that was possible. Boy and girls belonged together, that‘s what his mother always told him. But his mother also taught him that halfblood and muggleborn people are bad people and not worth his time so that was surely not true. So maybe, after all, boys could love each other too.
Regulus thought about that for just a second but when he got back to reality and looked to the side, he saw Evan staring at him, waiting for him to say hello back.
“Oh, Evan, hello.” he says confused.
Evan just smiled and sat down. The four friends that began chatting about their holidays, leaving the dark parts out though cause they surely excised for all of them. Regulus rather stayed silent tho. He commented on the experiences the others made but kept his mouth shut on his holidays. They were all ok with it, he knew that. Surly he loved his friends but when it came to the Black Family and what he experienced at home he sometimes wished they wouldn’t be so ignorant on it. Yes, maybe he was the problem for not speaking up on it but on the other hand why did they never just ask him what happens during his holidays? When they all first became friends they all asked what he does at home during holidays but as Regulus never shared anything, or when he had to, only the basic family stuff like meetings, they just stopped forcing an answer one day. And yes, even if it was his fault, he sometimes kind of wished they would just ask again. But ok maybe if they would he would still not be honest, the conditions to tell the truth about his family would surly not be right in the Hogwarts Express.
The rest of the train ride went by well but as they were just a few minutes away from arriving at Hogmead his thought wandered to something, someone, he had tried to keep out of his head the whole time. His brother. He didn’t know if he was ok, he could be dead and Regulus would not know it. He didn’t know if Sirius ever thought of him. He wanted to cry, really, but he was somehow able to suck up the tears that builded. Barty, who sits in from of him, noticed his absence tho. He must’ve also seen his glassy eyes. He gave Regulus an asking look, meaning to ask him if he was ok. Regulus lowered his head but kept his eyes on Barty, he shook his head silently. He could go on like this for the rest of his life. He not once told anyone how he felt since Sirius left in Winter and somehow no one questioned it. Everyone was ok with him being silent about it. He felt like no one actually cared about him anymore.
***
Arriving at Hogsmeade station and getting out of the train was horrible again. Regulus always hated the trouble created at train stations. The first and second years are the worst, he thinks. The first years are way to excited to go to Hogwarts and then they also have to get on those stupid boats and get super nervous and jump around and the second years are also so excited or some rather not excited because they have to go by carriage for the fist time.
At some point Regulus and the others made it to the carriage. They were with some other students from their year. They all chatted a bit but they weren’t best of friends, actually they never really talked to them before, so the conversation couldn’t really get anywhere. Regulus was glad about that because if they would all start talking it would’ve been just a matter of time until someone asked him about his family. Or worse, they would most likely even ask him about Sirius because that was something everyone has heart of. The oldest Black son leaving the black family to live with the potters, that’s a story that spread very fast.
He hasn’t seen his brother yet. He hasn’t even seen any of his friends yet. No potter, no lupin and no Pettigrew. He did see Mary though and he thought he had already seen Marlene as well but no sight of his brother. It did kind of worry him but he told himself it were just to many people everywhere, they were most likely at the different end of the train and later at the train station. I will surely see them at dinner, probably making a fool of themselves on their first day back already, he told himself.
“Reg, where there, get up”, Pandora then said to him, offering him a hand to help him get up.
He looked up.
“Oh, didn’t even realise. Sorry. Was to caught up in my thoughts” Regulus smiled at her, taking her hand to get up.
“That’s fine, just come on, wanna get inside, I‘m hungry and don’t wanna be last to arrive in the great hall.”
They all hurried inside. Of cause they weren’t the last ones, the 7th year was always last because they were the last ones to get the carriages.
After they found a seat at the Slytherin table Regulus finally hat the time to proceed everything and look around. His eyes glanced over to Gryffindor table first, he searched for familiar faces and after just a few seconds he found them. His brother and his brothers friends. Tears rushed to Regulus‘ eyes immediately. He couldn’t tell why but he was glad to see his brother, glad to see him laughing with his friends. But there was also something else. A bit of anger climbed up to his chest, how is he so happy? why did he leave me alone?, he thought in silence.
If was hard for him to shake of the tears now and he felt like he needed to vomit right on the floor but he somehow managed to keep himself together. He turned his eyes to the front of the hall instead where everything was set up for the first graders to get assigned to their house.
The first graders were right in front of the stairs already, waiting for their turn and right as the first name was said out loud Regulus‘ eyes were caught something, or someone, else that seemed to try to keep the first graders in place. It was his brothers friend James Potter. The boy that, on one hand, stole him his brother but on the other hand also saved his brothers life.
Regulus could tell he wore his glasses, the glasses he wore since he first saw him. His hair was messy as the years before but regulus thought he could tell it got a bit shorter. Maybe his mom cuttend them during the holidays, he thought. His robe was red, of cause, but compared to the normal ones he had an extra pin on it. His perfect pin. Him being a perfect fits perfect Regulus hat to admit because was in fact perfect. He looked perfect and besides his annoying, attention-seeking behaviour his personality seemed to be perfect as well. People liked do describe him as the sun.
He stared forward the whole time but not a second went by where he really concentrated on the ceremony. He thought about everything but the ceremony, if he was honest. Mostly he thought about the boy with the glasses. But the only reason for that was that he stole Sirius from him and the fact that he stood there, at the front of the great hall.