Unbreakable
Got a secret
Can you keep it?
Swear, this one you'll save
Better lock it in your pocket
Takin' this one to the grave
If I show you, then I know you
Won't tell what I said
'Cause two can keep a secret
If one of them is dead
“That went well” Dorcas sighs as she watches the compartment door slam shut behind Marlene. She slumps down on the seat next to Ursa as her friends only laugh at her harder. Evil gremlins the lot of them.
“Don’t you two hate each other?”
“Well, that was before she turned hot!” Dorcas whines
“Plus, she definitely still hates Dorcas” Ursa beams, delighted by this news because she’s a horrible, dreadful friend and Dorcas flips her off
“Piss off, stop laughing at me!” Dorcas slaps her “I’m gonna make her fall in love with me” she decides and Ursa falls onto Regulus’ lap cackling “You’ll see! She’s gonna be the future Mrs Meadows. I’m gonna be Mrs Dorcas Meadows-McKinnon. And you know what? She’s gonna propose to me.”
“Good luck with that”
“She does seem closer to proposing your murder” Regulus points out
“but hey, at least she’s not indifferent about you” Pandora bites down on a laugh and Dorcas glares at her
“She probably thought you were making fun of her new haircut, she’ll stop hating you once she realizes you’re just a genuine dork and Reggie can be the flower girl at your wedding”
“Why am I being dragged into this?”
“Because I’m already going to be the maid of honor, duh, I can’t be the flower girl as well”
“Damn right you are!” Dorcas hi-fives her
“You don’t even know if she likes girls. Plus, aren’t you supposed to hate her?” Regulus reminds her
“Maybe she’s a homophobe” Ursa bites down on a laugh, knowing the lack of truth in that statement but relishing on stirring the pot
“Screw you Blacks. Now just for that, you’re not invited to our Summer wedding” Dorcas crosses her arms in front of her chest
“Speaking of Summer weddings,” Pandora beams and turns to Regulus “when’s yours with James? Should I get my measures taken for my best-man suit?”
“Summer weddings are definitely not my style” Regulus deflects
“Oh, but don’t you love ‘the sun’?” Ursa taunts him and Regulus glares at her
“Shut up. That is the last time I ever tell you anything”
“Wait! James is the guy you were seeing last year?” Dorcas coos
“Yes” Pandora answers at the same time as Ursa barks out a rotund “No.”
“What? Yes, he is.” Pandora frowns from Ursa to Regulus. Ursa casts the muffliato charm while mentally cursing Reggie’s stupidity “Reg spent all of last year crying about how pretty and kind James Potter is” Ursa doesn’t know where to start: trying to fix this problem, bewilderment at the profoundness of her brother’s stupidity or how pathetic James makes him. Just when she thought he’d reached his cringeworthy peak the other morning when he’d unironically and fully-pathetically professed James burned like the sun and he wouldn’t mind being consumed by his heat. Ursa had blinked at him and simply walked away, there comes a point where words cannot encompass just how much she longed for those words to never have been uttered. She wants to do that now, just walk away, but there’s one pressing issue glaring at them
“For reasons I can’t explain I’m gonna need you to pretend it started over the summer” Regulus taps his hands together, his eyes flickering back to Ursa’s blank expression with every nerve.
“What is going on?”
“Is this about your parents?”
“How long have you two known about James?” Ursa cuts off their investigation, she stares off into the hill disappearing into the horizon with a thoughtful expression
“Maybe a month after Easter, something like that”
“Well I knew he was seeing someone since like the beginning of our last school year but I didn’t know it was James until today” Dorcas says, grumpy about being the last to know who it was.
“A full year.” she glares a Regulus and then sighs, turning back to them “Alright, it might be tricky but lets give it a go” Ursa, once again, the only one with a solution. She pulls out her wand and casts the incantation pointed at Pandora
“They’re not gonna say anything.” He grabs her wrist before she can finish “These are our friends. We can trust them.” Pandora isn’t really her friend, just his, but she’s still not looking forwards to the possibility of liquifying her brain if the obliviate charm goes south
“Of course” Pandora nods in agreement
“Besides, who would we tell– fuck!” Dorcas’ hands fly to her head “I owe Barty twenty pounds! My money was on it being a Ravenclaw”
“He’s always known it was James” Regulus tells her and she fumes, she seethes, she’s a cartoon with smoke coming out of her ears and nostrils
“That slimy—I’m gonna whoop his ugly arse!”
“Not yet” Ursa stops her from storming off in claim for revenge “You can whoop his arse later.”
“Look, I promise not to tell a soul, alright? Now if you’ll excuse me—”
“I won’t” Ursa locks the door
“If my brain goes mushy I won’t forgive you.” Dorcas wails as she yanks on the handle trying to tear it open. It doesn’t budge.
“No. You’re both right about obliviating a whole year being too dangerous.” She says that as a jab, the whole year, she’d known he was lying about how and when he and James got together, this was proof. However, now is not the time for that, they’ll deal with that bit later, she propels on “I just want you to make a vow to never speak of it again”
“Fine. We vow it. Can I go now?”
“Not that sort of vow” Ursa tells her and her eyes round into plates
“An unbreakable vow?! Have you lost your mind?!”
“Not a problem so long as you don’t break it”
“Well of course I won’t break it but I—are you okay with this?!” Dorcas turns to Pandora with a deep frown. Pandora looks at Regulus and back at her. She shrugs “Ugh, fine! But I just want you to know that I hate you so much right now.” She crosses her arms in front of her chest and huffs
“Doesn’t everyone?” Ursa winks at her and links their arms together
Why do you smile
Like you've been told a secret
Now you're tellin' lies
'Cause you have sworn to keep it
But no one keeps a secret
No one keeps a secret
The four boys disembark all in their school uniforms, James keeps rustling his hair waiting for Regulus to disembark just outside the train “When did you get this pathetic?” Sirius stares at him with a mixture of pity and shame
“Probably around the time I sucked your baby brother’s cock for the first time, there was no going back from there”
“Not funny” he snaps at him
“He told me we’d go on the carriage together” James defends himself. He might be acting pathetic right now, but there’s a perfectly reasonable, non-pathetic explanation for it. Alright, if he’s pathetic, he doesn’t really care, all he cares about is that he can be with Regulus and touch him and kiss him and feel him
“I mean… it was kind of funny” Peter chuckles and James flashes him a smile before going back to scanning the faces getting off the train.
“Wormy you traitor! Both of you! Traitors!”
“Come on,” Remus drapes an arm around Sirius and guides him away before he starts declaring his best friends his sworn enemies “we’ll wait for you guys in the carriage”
“You’re the only loyal friend I’ve got left Moony”
“That’s what I am, your friend” he mutters to himself
“Best friend Moony, you’re the best, my favorite person to ever be born” he peers up at him eyes so bright they’re their own stars and Moony sighs a smile
“Only until you make up with James”
“Nah, I like looking at you far more than I like looking at James” Sirius says in earnest. Peter frowns, holding back a laugh at his oblivious friend who believes that’s a totally normal, platonic thing to say to your best mate. His other oblivious friend is too focused on looking for the bloke he likes staring at the most to notice. To be fair, he probably still wouldn’t think anything of it.
“Sure Pads, whatever you say” Remus sighs a smile.
Look into my eyes
Now you're getting sleepy
Are you hypnotized
By secrets that you're keeping?
I know what you're keeping
I know what you're keeping
Charles Macmillan is easy. Stupid. Boring.
Still, he’s muscly enough and walking in front of her, so he will do. Plus, her engagement fitting within her plan on marrying rich recently fell through and Macmillan is a pureblood, they may not be the richest family but she could work the prestige and humble fortune to build herself an empire.
She places her hand on his forearm with an easy smile “Mac, how was your summer?” Ursa flutters her lashes at Charles Macmillan and he’s already bending over backwards, willing to crack his spine, just to please her. She’s glad for the flirting put in through the years she sometimes wanted to brush off “Did you miss me?”
“Every second I spend not looking at your mesmerizing beauty is a second lost” her ears would have much preferred a vicious insult over that. In fact, she’s certain that’s something James might say to Regulus and she once again has to swallow her disgust at those words. James truly sounds like a tooth decaying with how sweet he is, and that tooth is her own twin. Not the time to be second hand embarrassed by her brother’s questionable taste in men.
“You always take my breath away” she breathes at him and at least that part is true, if only it’s because she wants to hurl “such a poet, I bet you go around saying stuff like that to all the girls” she almost wishes he would, his words would be less cringeworthy if they came from flimsy attempts of seduction.
“Only for you” He’s too caught up in staring at her to remember walking so she has to guide him to carry on ahead. Dolt. But an ignoramus wrapped around her finger is still a man with diamonds. This one at least comes bundled up in a good enough package, she likes the blonde bow on top.
Someone definitely forgot to mention to him that poets can still belong to this century, but she’ll play along if she has to “What grants me such privilege?”
“You make my heart sing. Its tune is just for you” Too fucking easy. Disgusting, but easy. She almost wishes he wasn’t, she’d appreciate a tougher challenge, but right now with the school’s entire eyes on her, tediously easy is just what she needs. She tilts her head forward ever so slightly. His eyes instantly trail down to her lip, chasing it. She nibbles on it.
“Will you board the carriage with me?” she rounds her eyes and bats her lashes at him. She’s asking but she already knows the answer
“Anything for you” he steps off the train and swoops her up by her waist with ease, those Quidditch muscles sure do count for something, but she has to resist the urge to bat them away. He sets her down gently and she flashes him a radiant smile. She won’t thank him for putting his meat hands on her body without her consent. He leaves his hand around her waist as they walk. Despite her wants, she doesn’t recoil away from his touch. Instead she folds into it, wraps herself around it.
Still, she knows what to say to keep him on her leash “you sing the loveliest tune” she lowers her voice so no one will hear the horrible words about to leave her mouth, but she masks it with intimacy with just one look “All other music fades away when you sing, I think my ears were made to listen” What she craves is to peel him off her body, boil it and feed it to him. Given her mood today, she might. The blatant stares she can handle—everything she can handle actually, it’s just the part of having to ignore anyone she actually likes that tastes a bit acrid. She’s already spent an entire summer swallowing spoonfuls of sugary sweetness from the Potters. The sour poison from her family she’s used to, she can chug it down with ease. She doesn’t put sugar in her tea, the sweet aftertaste makes her want to vomit. She misses the burn of acid, the taste of sour “Come on” she unwraps herself from him and fades out his touch from her waist to just the tips of her fingers instead, pulling him along and then eases the touch gently into perfect nothingness
Charles Macmillan has consumed far too much sappy romance because he literally takes the robe off his back and lays it on the mud so she won’t have to step on it. She wants to roll her eyes and stump on his overtly romantic sappy heart along with his hand holding the robe. She settles on simply stumping on his robes instead.
“Maybe you can sing along” he whispers back and of course he would say that, but Ursa Black doesn’t do duets, she’s the whole fucking show. She bats her lashes and grins like singing off key beside him would be a treat.
“Ursa!” they both twirl around to see James jogging towards them, Peter follows far behind walking instead “Have you seen Reg?”
“Not since he was with you. I’ll help you look for him. Sorry Mac, I’ll see you at school alright?”
“Alright” he sighs not even trying to shield his disappointment “I’ll see you around boys” he waves at them and walks away
“Where do you think he could be?”
“Would you give it a rest already? We get it. You’re in love. That doesn’t mean you gotta be crawled up his arse all the time. Honestly, you two make me sick. You make me want to dunk myself in kerosene and kiss a flame. I hope he’s hiding from your needy, clingy arse” now that’s breathing again, she needed that
“I thought you said you’d help me look for him” James pouts like a kicked puppy
“I also told your mother she looked great in electric blue and your father that I liked his taste in music. My brothers tell you the shape of their shit as it’s coming out of their bodies, did they really not mention that I'm a stinky little liar?” she quotes that phrase straight from Regulus' mouth and James grimaces. She argued that she wasn’t an excellent liar, her lies didn’t stink in the slightest, they weren’t even perfumed or scented to mask the smell. No, her lies were so good they were as fucking odorless as truths. A tiny smile graced Regulus’ lips, the ever so fleeting, so hard to come by, the ones James cherishes and collects like Quidditch cards. Somehow even more rare, the corner tugged on Ursa’s lip tittered up. Then Sirius sided with Regulus calling Ursa a treacherous cunt and all went tits up. James had to break it apart.
“But you don’t have to lie anymore” he peers down at her with his heart on his sleeve and nothing but earnest inside of it. She furrows her brows and narrows her eyes on him. Oh, he can’t be that thick, that doesn’t even dignify a response. He has to have been dropped on his head as a child and then smacked against a wall for good measure, only that would explain it. Or perhaps a spell gone wrong vanished a part of his brain.
“Peter, lets go, you can sketch me on the carriage while this moron mopes around waiting for Reggie. Honestly, and I thought Sirius was meant to be the dog” she scatters off before James can get his thick brain to work.
“I’m not sketching you” Peter says as he falls into step with her, leaving James behind. She wants to roll her eyes, does this boy think he’s fooling anyone? Isn’t he supposed to be the smart one? Alright, that’s Lupin, but someone as good at chess as Peter is should have some functioning Gehirnzellen. She side steps past a carriage and he frowns at her “can you see the thestrals?”
“Unfortunately I haven’t seen anyone die yet. Why won’t you sketch me?” she stares at him with seemingly genuine confusion drawn on her face, and knowing he’s way too used to being called the dumb, ugly friend she adds “Are you afraid my beauty won’t fit within the confounds of a page?” she peers up at him through her long lashes and his cheeks instantly turn pink. His mind may be good at playing games, but his body certainly isn’t. His body is just as easy as any other fool’s. That’s what they all are, boys, girls and in between, they’re all fools.
“How are you Blacks all so fucking cocky?” he spits bitterly, his mind is clearly mad at his body. Interesting. Maybe he’s not as dumb as they thought. Still he’s an even bigger fool for believing he could ever resist her charm. It’s useless to try, but Gryffindors aren’t known to stop fighting just because they know they’ll lose. They’re not smart enough to regroup and think of a plan to change the outcome either. Slytherins are far more clever. As soon as they see something they want, they adjust accordingly, and Ursa always gets what she wants.
“Wouldn’t you be if you looked like us?” She sides steps past a carriage and makes her way to the carriage with two blokes chilling in a carriage five feet apart cause they’re not gay. Peter grumbles at the ground, he’s felt envy of his best friends’ good looks enough times to know she’s right “Or maybe if you’d just put some effort into your appearance. If I were you I’d be a thousand times hotter” she suggests and he sways in the direction she’s leading him to
“Did you just call me hot?”
“I called you unfortunately not hot” She grants him the perception of privacy by staring straight ahead instead of having to face her head on, being seen isn’t something he’s used to and she needs to ease into it or the crystal she’s hovering on will shatter and she’ll have to build the structure from the ground up. It might be more fun that way though. She’s tempted to take a hammer and crumble everything down to the fucking ground and light it on fire just for the thrill of building it from the ground up“I said you have potential to be hot, but you don’t exploit it. That’s even worse than being butt-arse ugly”
“I see you’re in a particularly crappy mood today”
“Aw, you noticed” she swoons with an overtly sweet smile “Unfortunately the day is still young and I still have plenty of shitty conversations in the horizon”
“You don’t have to ride with Sirius if he’ll just piss you off” he notes as they head straight towards him, he’s laughing way too hard at whatever Remus said.
“Oh, I didn’t mean him, I don’t mind him, it’s fun to mess with him.” Could it be that his brilliance at chess translates to nothing in life? Can he really predict check-mate twenty moves ahead but not pick up the shitty conversations she means aren’t the same as her entire summer? “Though you know what might cheer me up?”
“Am I supposed to care?”
“Given that for the next twenty minutes you’re about to be trapped in a carriage with me and my very obnoxious brother I’d go with yes”
“So if I pretend to care you won’t rile him up?” When did the bar get so low that this actually sounds like a good enough deal for him?
“No, of course I will. But he won’t be able to rile me up so I won’t knock Lupin off the carriage”
“What did poor Remus ever do to you?” he sighs
“Sirius would hate that a thousand times more than if it were himself”
“Yeah alright, that’s true.” He stuffs his hands into his pockets “Though to be honest, I think he likes fighting with you too, not that he’d ever admit that” the corner of her mouth titters up, maybe he’s not entirely daft and that front is just one of his pawns “last year when he didn’t have you to fight with he was utterly unbearable—not that I’d ever admit to saying that— but he picked fights with us all of the time. He may have made James and I cry a couple of times” she smirks at the shine of the threads he just wove into a web. He might just not be such a waste of space after all.
“Then I might just not fight with him” she doesn’t miss the shimmer in his eyes as she says this, just what he wanted. Oh, this could be fun “maybe I can even be nice instead, right?”
“Right”
“Will you help me? Being mean to him is like wired into my dna. It comes from my mother’s side” he nods and she smiles “Oh, I know something we could do that we’ll both love!” she bites down on his hook and yanks him along without subtly “Siri!” she skips ahead “Peter just agreed to let us give him a makeover!” she beams up at him and Peter pales
“I should’ve seen that one coming” he sighs and climbs onto the carriage “Look, fine, you can do it, but at least wait until we’re at school”
“Is it because you wanna draw me?” she speaks sweetly to him leaning against the carriage.
“Actually, you should do it, it might shut her up” Sirius chimes and she rolls her eyes at him
“Ah,” she smiles when she spots Regulus with his head down making his way towards them “finally a brother I don’t hate the sight of” she rounds the carriage and wraps her arms around him “Chin up darling” Ursa bops his chin with a smile and he glares at her.
“Everyone’s staring at me”
“Of course they are. You look almost as good as I do” She slips her arms around his neck on a loose embrace and tucks his curl behind his ear. They do that silent communication twins do and Sirius quickly shuts it down.
“We should get going” He hops off the carriage and snatches his little brother’s wrist like a prissy little dog peeing on his favorite tree. Regulus shakes him off and glares.
“You go. I’ll go with her” he tells him and Sirius scowls. Remus laughs but when Sirius turns to him it’s only a cough. Peter wishes he had popcorn, he’s suddenly glad Ursa ignored his not-fighting scheme
“Don’t be jealous big brother, otherwise Amycus and Alecto will think I was right” she bops his nose and he swats her hand away harsher than usual
“James is waiting for you” Sirius grinds his teeth at Regulus
“Crap. Yeah, I forgot I told him to meet with me”
“A second of your day went by without you thinking of James?” she gasps. He glowers at her and she chuckles
“I saw Barty earlier, he wanted to see you” he tells her, watching her expression carefully but she gives nothing away
“Yeah, he found me”
“Evan too.” He says and the conversation changes to a language the other three don’t speak.
“Should the three of us go find James? Those two clearly don’t want any of us as part of their conversation” Peter sees Sirius clench his fists, Remus gives him one of his disapproving looks while he shrugs
“Regulus, get in the carriage” Sirius growls at him, his brother raises a brow at him unimpressed. Ursa bites down on a laugh. Regulus turns his back on Sirius and faces her instead.
“Reggie, why don’t we ride with them instead?” she asks with a bubblegum smirk
“It only fits five people and we gotta wait for James” Sirius snaps at her. That’s not even remotely true.
“We can fix that” Her smirk tugs further up.
She makes Sirius regret every word he’s ever spoke. She ends up on Remus’ lap, her hands loosely linked behind his neck. Sirius can’t help it. He throws a tantrum and she ends up perched on Peter’s lap instead, he’s a surprisingly comfortable seat. She combs her fingers through his hair absentmindedly as she faces Regulus beside them. She and Regulus ramble on in a language Sirius doesn’t understand. They laugh and talk to each other like they’re a secret society or something, their own little secret club none of the others are invited to. They don’t even glance his way. It’s like their older brother isn’t even there. It’s like he doesn’t exist to them. Again. It’s like last year all over again. They’ve got each other and Sirius doesn’t have either of them.
So, he sulks.
Why when we do our darkest deeds
Do we tell?
They burn in our brains
Become a living hell
'Cause everybody tells
Everyone tells