Meet my melancholy blues

Sirius

14th June 1980

“It's empty!”

“No, it's not, just look deeper for fucks sake.”

“Oi careful, you almost dropped me!”

“I did not you prat!”

“Could the both of you just shut it, you´re givin´ me a headache!” Lily stormed in, with a hand placed on her left hip, and her red hair sticking in all directions. When she saw them, the wrinkles in her forehead flattened and instead, she began laughing.

Sirius needed his white wig that he knew he had stored up at the Potter's loft a couple of years ago. He was sure it was in the box he had labelled: “funsies for poncies” but now Potter claimed it was empty?

“What´chu doin' up there on Sirius´ shoulders Potter?” Lily asked in disbelief.

James immediately moved his head out of the loft when he heard his Lily´s voice. “We´re just looking for Padfoot´s wig, you know the white mental one,” he explained calmly, as if that explanation was not clear enough James had to add, “You know the one that makes Sirius look like the muggle prime minister.”

“Oh fuck off or ill drop you for real this time,” Sirius threatened as he flinched slightly to scare James.

Lily let out a small laugh, “Yeah yeah I know that wig, but what I am surprised about is how you know who the muggle prime minister is?” she looked impressed.

James smiled proudly, “Of course, I know, it's that woman your father despises right?” he looked at Lily for validation which she nodded agreeably to.

“But the real question is why in the hell are the pair of ya, both twenty-year-old wizards jumping on each other's shoulders to get this small box?” she was now leaning against the door frame looking almost amused.

“It's a brother's bonding activity alright?” Sirius tried, while nearly dropping James by accident for the third time, luckily he was too busy talking to Lily to notice.

“Yeah, strengthens our bond ya´know, it's also nice to learn doing things the muggle way ya know, in case magic disappears or somethink,” the curly-haired boy spoke which only earned an eye roll from the redhead.

“Cause that's very likely to happen..” a blonde boy walked in as he held some newly ironed shirts in his hands.

“Pete?! Since when are you here?” Sirius looked genuinely surprised at his blonde friend.

The blonde chuckled, “If you´d take your massive head out of your arse for just a sec, you´d notice that James stole something of mine as well,” Peter joked back, showing off his favourite pair of shirts.

“Oi– I didnt steal Sirius´ wig, he merely left it here,” James protested but enthusiastically enough to almost fall over, and Lily decided it was enough.

“Alright set him down now Sirius, I'd like my boyfriend to remain intact by the end of this summer, yeah?” She looked at him sternly through her emerald eyes, and Sirius understood the appeal of the redhead when she did that exact look.

“You love me really?” James leaned on her when he was put back down.

“Do I?” she questioned but the blush on her cheeks suggested otherwise.

Sirius rolled his eyes, “Keep it in your pants for one-minute lovebirds, I want to question loverboy number two over here,” Sirius pointed directly at Peter.

“Hm?” Pete looked up at Sirius curiously.

“Your vacation with this mysterious girl of yours?” James quirked a brow up at the blond who seemed to grow redder by the second.

“Fuck off it's not like that–” Peter blurted out, almost a bit embarrassingly.

Sirius threw an arm around his friend's shoulder while moaning dramatically. “You´re leaving us for two months in La Espana, oh my heart can't take it!”

James chuckled as he did the same to Pete but on his other side. “And for a girl you ´haven´t even told us the name of too, are you really that ashamed of us!”

Sirius heard a small I would have been from Lily at his side and sent her a fierce stare, that was meant to be intimidating but that never worked on her. Sirius had tried for his entire seventh year to hate the girl that stole his bestfriend but it was impossible too, she was too Lily to hate. 

“how´d you know it's a girl?” Peter looked at them with a flash of devilishness in his eyes.

“You don't bat for both sides silly,” Sirius interrupted very sure of that.

“And how would you know that?” the blonde skimmed at him unquestionably.

“Call it my incredible gaydar, im never wrong, or maybe I was that one time– but that hardly counts…” Sirius noticed he was rambling so he looked back at Pete.

“Wait are you?” Sirius asked very a bit unsure now.

“God no, men are terrible!” Peter laughed, and James nodded agreeably.

“You little tease,” Sirius winked at him.

“I´d love to stay around and help you lot with Sirius´ little wig problem, but I have to stop by my aunt since she figured I'm here, woman´s like a hawk, sees bloody everything, ”

“Sure Pete,” they waved him off.

“I think Effie has your wig, Sirius, she might have borrowed it during our last girls' night.” Lily snickered as if she was remembering precious memories, that they were too unfortunate to miss.

James tilted his head a tad, as he had an unaware expression on his face. “Im not even going to question that.”

Sirius realised, “Wait mum has it? If you knew the whole time, why did you let us search like fools?” he looked in disbelief.

“Eh, it was entertaining wasnt it?”

“you´re such a mean girl Evans.”

Lily laughed clapping her hands together, like an evil caricature. “Call it revenge for that pack of fag´s I know you nicked from me last week,” she smirked cruelly.

Sirius had to let out a laugh. “How´d you figure it was me?”

“Please, we´ve always´ got to hold on tight to our packs when you´re around you, little thief,” she squinted her eyes at him.

It was true, he really did do that, and even though it was a terrible terrible habit to have, he liked how they knew these things about him. The last person to know that was, it was—

“Are my eyes betraying me or am I seeing Jagan, Gayan and the most beautiful of flowers in my hall?” The grey-haired woman immediately dropped her bag to the floor.

Her warm smile immediately spread over her entire face when seeing the three of them there, she took her time to hug them all warmly.

Sirius didnt realise what a good hug was till he got one from a Potter, few things were better than that.

“Amma, we were just talking about you,” James smiled while helping his mother unload the bag when they walked to the kitchen.

“Oh yes? I took the trip to the small market the muggles set up here every Saturday, you really should come with me once Lilian, it is so adorable there, they put up muggle vegetables there yes, very small but not bad at all–” she told them all about it, and Sirius couldn't help but sit down and hear Effy talk for hours.

Sirius loved Effie, he had ever since he had the pleasure of spending his first Christmas with the Potters in Liverpool. He had never seen something like that before, and when he realised that life could be so much better than what he had experienced by the age of thirteen, he never wanted to leave. But since that wasnt his family he had to leave then and return three years later, but when he was sixteen and unwanted Sirius didnt have to leave the Potters ever again.

“— I did not think I would like me here, not after we left Liverpool, but it is proper cosy here, much smaller yes but a very charming place, and I am so much closer to my two sons, and my Jagans love,” Effie had tendencies to talk a lot, but Sirius did not mind at all. No, quite the opposite, he loved how much she could talk, it made him happy that she never went empty for ways to fill the silence in the room.

The Potters had moved from Liverpool to Ipswich a year ago, Fleamont said it was because of Job opportunities, that was the most hilarious excuse merely because Monty owned his own business.

Sirius suspected that it was because they loathed how far they lived from James, and him, who were settled in London.

“So sweet of you to finally visit me, son, you never think of your old woman now that you are in London,” Effie complained to James, as he looked baffled.

“What? But what about Sirius?" James protested, he sounded a bit like a child.

Effie said with her soft voice. "My sweet son visits me all the time, always helping me out," Effie sent him a warm look over the counter.

She and Monty called Sirius their son, and he called them mum and dad, even though he loved them the way one would love their parents. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't force himself to believe it, to make himself think they really were his parents. Because they weren´t. Euphemia and Fleamont had done so much for him. So fucking much. They had treated him like a son, and not once had they treated him with a bit of bitterness.

No matter how much he deserved they didnt. And though it was something Sirius' mind would never really understand, he didnt understand why.

Cause Sirius parents hated him, they did not like him a bit, and even though he hated him equally he couldn't get himself to forget that they were the ones he came from. Mostly because every time he looked in the mirror he saw it.

And the hardest thing to erase is one's own reflection. And he saw his reflection too much back four years ago, so much he struggled to find a bit of himself in that reflection.

Sirius had been lost, and maybe on the verge of breaking, when the Potters took him in.

Despite everything that had happened. Despite the fact that it was his fault that James had gotten hurt on that one day in June 1976, they let him in. And they refused to let him go.

“Gayan, my dear, when will you bring someone home to me?”

Sirius had zoned out thinking about the past but came back to his senses at the sound of his name.

Or the chosen name, Effie and Monty had begun calling him. It meant music and the sky in Sanskrit. Sirius had been in bliss when they first used it on him.

Gayan was someone else, he was chosen. Even if Walburga had chosen Sirius for him, he did not hate it. How could he?

It was him.

The way James was James but also Jagan to them.

It was Gayan and Jagan, “like twins” people liked to say.

And who could oppose that?

“Mum, you know when the time is right I will,” Sirius said while smiling sweetly at the elder lady.

But he knew the time would never be right.

What none of them knew was that the time had been right before, once, it had been, it had been so close to perfect.

Sirius never told them about him and Remus. As far as they were the only Sirius and Remus that had been two friends, where one betrayed the other.

But it ran much deeper than that.

Sirius had been stupid at the time, he had always refused to admit it, but Sirius had been in infatuated with him. And they had been lovers.

Every single moment of every day they spent together, entwined in each other. And if they were separated his mind would always run to him.

When Sirius did what he did, Remus was taken away from them.

And they never heard from him again.

Sirius was out now, he was very gay, and very proud, the important people in his life knew that about him, even if four years had gone. Sirius couldn't find it in him to tell them what he and Remus had really been, cause he did not want to take Remus' voice from him again, steal his choice.

Never.

“You know my friend Anne has a son,” Effie began smirking. “I think he is a little bit bent–” James burst out in laughter. “What is it not what you kids call it? He is also a very cute boy.”

“Bloody hell mum,” Sirius's face felt hot and red when Effie began talking like that, he hadnt really gotten used to it yet, not even after three years of being out. “I´ve got game alright?”

“And with “got game”, you mean that you´re a sl–” Sirius jumped the brown-haired boy when he realised what he was going to say.

“Shut up you twat!” he tried to tackle him to the floor but as per usual he underestimated James´ strength and somehow they both ended up on the kitchen floor.

“If this was a couple of years ago I'd try to tear you apart, but now im just happy to see my boys on my kitchen floor,” Euphemia mused.

In the end, James won, and Sirius had to admit defeat.

When Sirius was back up he realised Effie was cooking, he saw the prawns on the kitchen counter and smelt the mustard seeds, Prawn Kuzhambu.

Fuck, Sirius really wished he hadnt promised Marlene.

“Oh, and Mum Sirius needs his wig,” James said exactly what Sirius was thinking about, sometimes he wondered if their brains were connected.

The grey-haired woman looked up from the vegetables she was cutting, with a confused look. “Wig?” she repeated.

“Effie, you know the white one, the one you wore last month during our little escapade,” Lily joined, and h

“Yes, I know this one, such a beautiful wig. it was in the “funsies for poncies” box of yours Gayan, I borrowed it. You need it I assume?” she tilted her head slightly looking at him.

“Glad you liked it,” he smiled genuinely, and he meant it. Sirius hated when people took what was his ironically enough. But he did not mind when Effie did, or James, not even if Monty would. He sort of liked it when any of the Potters felt comfortable enough to do that, made it feel a bit family-like. “And yes I need it for tonight, it´s a show thing I've planned with Marlene,” he explained.

“Does this mean you´re not staying for the night?” Effie looked baffled.

Sirius hated to disappoint. “`M sorry mum, I promised Marls I´d be there,” she nodded smilingly as she understood the importance of a promise. “Actually I should go leave soon if I want time to get ready.”

“C´mon Pads, stay for dinner, Mum´s making your favourite,” James said while he peel the prawns.
He really should go.

Sirius had to do his make-up as well.

And the train to London lasts for almost two hours.

London was waiting.

“Ah fuck it, I´ll get ready on the train,” Sirius said while he rolled up his sleeves, ready to peel some prawns.