am i real?
when regulus woke again he was laying on the couch he had just stood from.
it only took him a second before he noticed the pounding headache.
despite the thudding in his head, he pushed himself up, looking around the room.
obviously a fair amount of time had passed since he was last aware, because a now clean and healed remus lupin was lounging with his brother on the couch across from him.
they make eye contact and remus nudges sirius and gestures in his direction.
“oh reg, you’re awake! i’ll go get effie” his brother says as soon as he sees him.
“n-no wait” regulus burst out, rubbing at his eyes fiercely, in an attempt to make anything more clear.
“what’s ?- um what happend?” he finishes, his voice slightly cracking from sleep
sirius pauses in his steps and turns to kneel beside him
“you passed out. took a dive straight into the floor, however you wanna say it.” sirius laughed
regulus sent him a dry look at that. but he knew his brother often used humour to hide his worry so he didn’t mention it.
“yes you child i figured that out” he mocked with a straight face,
“i just mean, lupins obviously been fixed over there and james is gone and mrs potters gone too”
sirius’ face dropped as if he was scared to tell him the answer.
“sirius. what. happend.” regulus was scared now.
his mind spiraling on what could have happened while he had stupidly passed out.
“reg don’t worry ok everyone is fine now.”
that certainly didn’t make him feel any better.
“when you dropped like a log in all the chaos… james kinda freaked out.” he finished sheepishly
regulus’ heart stuttered “freaked out, HOW?”
“we don’t know reg, monty got home just after you dropped and took him upstairs to his room because he wouldn’t stop screaming and hitting his head” sirius whispered out softly, as if he was scared of regulus’ reaction.
“how long ago was this?” he questioned, mind reeling.
sirius grimanced
“a couple hours ago” he answered softly.
regulus didn’t know what to do with that. james, his loving boyfriend, was struggling and he was too busy being a baby and having a fucked up nap.
he blew out a sigh, and made his next mistake, making eye contact with sirius he huffs out,
“merlin it feels like mother has cursed us today”
slapping a hand over his mouth as he saw sirius’ eyes darken.
“fuck,” he reached a hand towards his brother
“that was a stupid joke forget i said that, mother didn’t curse us, fuck, forget i said anything” he rushed out, rn
it was stupid. he knew not to speak of mother cursing things around sirius. it was one of the few things that he let get to him.
sirius looked at him blankly before shaking his head slightly
“don’t worry about it reg i’m fine”
regulus didn’t know whether to believe him.
but at this time all he could really think about was james.
“still im sorry, listen, im gonna go find james.. see if he’s feeling better”
“yeah reg as long as you’re not feeling dizzy” sirius answered airily
regulus gave him a smile before standing, taking a minute to make sure he wasn’t going to drop like a board, and making his way up the stairs to see his james.
(pov change!! (remus))
“love?” remus called towards his boyfriend, as soon as his brother made it up the stairs
sirius just turned and carefully took a seat next to him. which quite frankly scared him a bit, considering his boyfriend was a bit like a koala and clingy pretty much all the time, not like he minded though.
“pads love, im sorry he said that, are you doing alright?”
he knew regulus didn’t mean to mention it, his brain was probably moving to fast to even think, but he knew they were just setting eachother off today and this could very well mean sirius was about to loose it.
sirius turned his head towards him, blinking slowly
“i feel funky”
to anybody else witnessing this, they would probably find it a bit if a funny exclamation, or they may assume he was feeling ill or anxious, but remus knew exactly what he meant.
since the night sirius and regulus ran alway, when he would get triggered he’d have these dissociative episodes.
sometimes he would simply sit and stare through you until somone was able to bring him back, or sometimes he would be alert, most people would assume the times he was alert weren’t as bad but these kind of episodes were more destructive.
after a particularly bad episode, sirius had admitted he often felt ‘funky’ as he would say, before the full episode sets in. kinda of like a warning sign.
now when he would express he felt ‘funky’ remus knew they didn’t have long before the episode would fully set in. he would often try his best to prevent it but they both knew when it started there was not much to stop it.
“ok pads it’s ok, can you look at me?” remus tried to remain calm, knowing him getting worked up wouldn’t help anyone.
sirius lifted his head to look remus in the eyes
“good love, can you tell me exactly what’s going on in that head of yours?” remus took the smaller boys hands into his, squeezing them in pulses trying to ground him as much as possible.
sirius blinked slowly, glancing around the room before his eyes landed back on his boyfriend.
“are you real?”
remus’ heart picked up, he knew this was gonna be a bad one
“yes honey, yes i am real, we are in potter manor, this is all real. i am real, and you are very real.” he managed, looking his foggy eyes boyfriend.
“no no i don’t think it is,”
“it is love i promise, here feel my hands, this is real ok” their hands squeezed together.
“ remus,” the animagus said shakily
“i think i might be dreaming. oh merlin that means i never made it out of that house, regulus oh merlin nono no” sirius was starting to get frantic.
he stood up, pulling his hands away before pacing the length of the room
“ it’s not real it’s not real it’s not real it’s not real it’s not real” he whispered to himself
over
and over
and over.
remus started to panic at this point, needing to go get his meds to try to calm him down, but he knew he couldn’t leave him by himself.
remus stood, making his way over to stand infront of sirius.
“sirius, listen to me. you are real. this is not a dream. you are very real. come on love!, look at me you are real. it’s all real.” remus spoke firmly to him, but he could tell he wasn’t getting through to him. he weighed his options as sirius resumed his pacing.
that was until the yelling started,
“NO NO NO NO NO I DONT WANT TO WAKE UP I DONT WANT TO GO BACK PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE NOTHING IS REAL NOTHING IS REAL NOTHING IS REAL NOTHING IS REAL. PLEASE I DONT LIKE THIS JUST LET ME BE SAFE I DONT WANT TO GO BACK THERE. OH GOD ILL NEVER BE ABLE TO GET THERE IF I CANT WAKE UP” sirius was frantic at this point.
screaming and pacing while pulling on his hair, nothing remus was doing could help this.
the noise had meant the rest of the household had come back down stairs. now all frozen in place staring at the distressed black.
“can somebody please grab his meds for me please” remus called out, having to yell slightly over sirius’ ongoing frantic babbling.
monty raced off towards the kitchen at his words, as the others began trying to get him to stop his pacing,
james wrapping an arm around him as he pulled him towards the couch, regulus trying to get him to look at him, and effie talking to remus trying to understand what’s happend.
“sirius. it’s reg. look at me and see that i’m here, cmon sirius i’m right here” regulus held sirius’ face in his hands forcing him to look into his eyes, meanwhile james sat behind sirius holding him in place, arms looped through his so they were restrained from his constant hair pulling.
the first few times this happend they were hesitant to restrain him, fearing it would make him worse, but after the first particularly bad one, they had no choice but to restrain him. and luckily, they found he didn’t fight it too much, even calming slightly at the grounding touch.
remus seemed to of finished talking to effie as he came and knelt beside regulus
“reg can we swap? i think i know what will work” regulus switched immediately, just wanting his brother to feel better.
remus took his boyfriends face back in his hands, just as regulus had done,
“sirius i need you to listen to me ok”
sirius quieted his voice, and remus took that as an indication he was listening
“if this was a dream, you wouldn’t have ten fingers yeah? we’ve talked about this before, huh pads?” he askes,
sirius stops yelling and starts to just mumble quietly
“yeah you with me love? can you use your words and tell me you understand me?” remus questioned softly
sirius jerked his head in a nod and gasped out a quick yet garbled,
“ye-yeah fingers”
everyone in the room un tensed slightly in relief that remus was getting through to him
at that moment mr potter came rushing in the room with a potion in his hand, handing it over to remus before quickly explaining that he mixed his muggle meds with a calming draught (something that they had done often).
“pads could you drink this for me before we count our fingers? it will make you feel better i promise?”
remus tried.
he wasn’t sure whether he would go for it if he still thought he was dreaming.
but, sirius simply opened his mouth slightly, nodding, as an invitation to pour the potion in his mouth.
remus did so and praised his boyfriend when he was done.
“james can you let go of his arms for us please? maybe keep a hold on his shoulders but we’re gonna count his fingers together, right pads?”
sirius nodded and flexed his hands once james let his hands go and resumed his grip on his shoulders, rubbing in small, calming circles.
“ok, can you count your fingers for me?”
sirius nodded and looked at his hands again for a moment
“can you count them out loud? just so i can count with you?”
sirius nodded again, before wiggling his pinky finger and croaking out the first number
“one”
remus smiled and continued counting with him.
two
three
four
five
“thats it, keep going love”
six
seven
eight
nine
ten.
“see love ten fingers? that means you are not dreaming, you are real” remus finished.
sirius nodded slowly, seemingly mulling over what was happening, before he slowly looked around the room again.
“ this is real, isn’t it?” he whispered
“yes sweetheart it’s real” effie spoke to him, for the first time since she entered the room
sirius nodded his head slowly, wiping his face harshly and blowing out a sigh
“gosh i’m so sorry, i just properly screamed the house down for no reason. and while you guys were trying to calm down i’m sorry” he announced sheepishly
“hey no pads never apologise for this, you can’t help it we know that.”
james said from his position still behind sirius.
“i’m sorry for setting you off” regulus whispered ashamed, from next to remus
sirius just closed his eyes and shook his head, leaning back into james and squeezing remus’ hands
“don’t apologise reg, you didn’t mean too. and everyone’s been setting everyone off today so it was going to happen eventually” he smiled softly at his brother, trying to reassure him.
“well,” mr potter started
“im proper exhausted right now, and that means i reckon you lot are probably dead on your feet” they all chuckled a little at that.
“how about we call it a night huh? it’s getting late anyways” he continued
a murmur of accent spread through the room, james helping sirius up, before remus wrapped an arm around him, keeping him steady.
james moving to take regulus’ hand and following the other two back up the stairs.
“ i wish we could make things easier for them” mr potter spoke once it was just him and his wife in the room.
“we can’t do anything but be there for them, dear.” euphemia spoke, rubbing a hand up her husbands arm.
“they’re good kids, mia”
“i know, none of them deserve it” she answered.
the stood in silence for a moment, before mrs potter spoke up,
“you go check on our kids, and i’m gonna go pay lyall lupin a visit”
her husband chuckled at that,
“give him hell for me”