Repairwork
Oct. 25th, 2006 06:34 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
toujours-sirius.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
hh_mirror((Like Cox's apology pony to Lily, backdated to a couple of days after Potions class and the strip-poker aftermath))
It had been a good few years since Sirius had spent the night in the Shrieking Shack. He had taken up a sort of sporadic residence there during the year he had been living in the Forbidden Forest and hunting Peter. Most of the time, he had slept in the Forest, but on some of the colder, wetter nights, he had taken up refuge in the Shrieking Shack, typically with Crookshanks's help. Contrary tofanon popular belief, on the other hand, Sirius hadn't spent nights in there with Remus before or after the full moon when they were teenagers. First of all, there was nothing romantic or sexual about that place, and second, although deranged slasher fangirls might think otherwise, Remus was not at all horny before or after his transformation. Nothing says sex like horrible pain due to the rearrangement of one's entire bone structure, right? WRONG.
But the Shack was nothing if not secluded, and as such, it was the perfect place for contemplation, solitude, and champion-scale liver pickling. In other words, after the mess that Potions class and strip poker had turned into, Sirius went there to think and drink - mostly the latter.
What the hell had happened with himself, Cox, and Lily? The only clear, resounding fact was that he had somehow managed to anger the both of them. Truth be told, he was pretty angry at himself as well. Whatever Cox and Lily had going was none of his business, and it shouldn't have been bothering him. He hated overprotectiveness and jealousy, and yet he had been feeling both in, well, spades from the moment Cox and Lily had kissed and made up, and for no good reason as far as he could tell.
Was it the James thing? Sirius wasn't really sure. Part of him still held onto the hope that one day he'd go into the Sorting Room and there would be James, his James. And when that happened, he knew how crushed James would be to find out Lily had moved on.
But he also knew that Lily had to move on, that she couldn't sit and wait around for something that might never happen. If she did that, months would turn into years, and years would turn into decades, and what if James never did come? Sirius didn't like thinking about that possibility, but he knew it was there.
If it was the James thing, however, it wasn't entirely the James thing. Something else had gone on there, something that had caused Sirius to feel this horrible, unstoppable wave of jealousy when he saw Lily and Cox being affectionate with each other. It was Sirius's job to console Lily and to make her happy. It was what he had promised James he would do, and it was what he wanted to do, because he loved and cared about Lily.
That still didn't explain the funny way he had felt when she had looked at him, but too much thinking made his head hurt, and he very quickly made short use of the Firewhisky bottle he had brought with him into the Shrieking Shack. After about three quarters of it had gone into his system and about half of that had come back out in a nice pile in the corner, everything was blurry and moving and he passed out on the bed, not aware enough to get under the covers.
He woke sometime in the late morning the next day with a wretched headache and a nasty taste in his mouth. The room smelled of drunk, and after using the loo, he crawled back into the bed, too hungover to attempt getting up for good. The sheets were dusty, but a quick spell cleared most of it off, and he slept again until evening, when he got up, Scourgified the mess he had made in the corner, and dragged himself back to the castle to clean up and get a bite to eat.
The next morning, after the alcohol had all passed through his system and he had got lots of rest, he felt his mind was clearer, and he sat down to write two owls, hoping to repair the bigger mess. He still wasn't sure what had gone on and why it had turned into such a wreck, but at this point the only thing he wanted was for it all to be smoothed over. He could deal with his own problems later, once he worked out what the hell they were in the first place.
Owl to Lily, heavily warded to play the Numa Numa song at ridiculously loud levels to any unintended readers:
Evans,
Are you okay? Still angry? Feeling groovy? Up for a round of poker?
JUST KIDDING.
Anyway, I just wanted to check on you and to apologise for whatever it that made you so angry. I promise I didn't stare at your melons. They're very nice, but I didn't stare.
- Sirius
Owl to Cox, heavily warded to play Daler Mehndi's 'Tunak Tunak Tun' at ridiculously loud levels to any unintended readers:
Perrilicious Perry,
Are we cool now?
- Sirius
It had been a good few years since Sirius had spent the night in the Shrieking Shack. He had taken up a sort of sporadic residence there during the year he had been living in the Forbidden Forest and hunting Peter. Most of the time, he had slept in the Forest, but on some of the colder, wetter nights, he had taken up refuge in the Shrieking Shack, typically with Crookshanks's help. Contrary to
But the Shack was nothing if not secluded, and as such, it was the perfect place for contemplation, solitude, and champion-scale liver pickling. In other words, after the mess that Potions class and strip poker had turned into, Sirius went there to think and drink - mostly the latter.
What the hell had happened with himself, Cox, and Lily? The only clear, resounding fact was that he had somehow managed to anger the both of them. Truth be told, he was pretty angry at himself as well. Whatever Cox and Lily had going was none of his business, and it shouldn't have been bothering him. He hated overprotectiveness and jealousy, and yet he had been feeling both in, well, spades from the moment Cox and Lily had kissed and made up, and for no good reason as far as he could tell.
Was it the James thing? Sirius wasn't really sure. Part of him still held onto the hope that one day he'd go into the Sorting Room and there would be James, his James. And when that happened, he knew how crushed James would be to find out Lily had moved on.
But he also knew that Lily had to move on, that she couldn't sit and wait around for something that might never happen. If she did that, months would turn into years, and years would turn into decades, and what if James never did come? Sirius didn't like thinking about that possibility, but he knew it was there.
If it was the James thing, however, it wasn't entirely the James thing. Something else had gone on there, something that had caused Sirius to feel this horrible, unstoppable wave of jealousy when he saw Lily and Cox being affectionate with each other. It was Sirius's job to console Lily and to make her happy. It was what he had promised James he would do, and it was what he wanted to do, because he loved and cared about Lily.
That still didn't explain the funny way he had felt when she had looked at him, but too much thinking made his head hurt, and he very quickly made short use of the Firewhisky bottle he had brought with him into the Shrieking Shack. After about three quarters of it had gone into his system and about half of that had come back out in a nice pile in the corner, everything was blurry and moving and he passed out on the bed, not aware enough to get under the covers.
He woke sometime in the late morning the next day with a wretched headache and a nasty taste in his mouth. The room smelled of drunk, and after using the loo, he crawled back into the bed, too hungover to attempt getting up for good. The sheets were dusty, but a quick spell cleared most of it off, and he slept again until evening, when he got up, Scourgified the mess he had made in the corner, and dragged himself back to the castle to clean up and get a bite to eat.
The next morning, after the alcohol had all passed through his system and he had got lots of rest, he felt his mind was clearer, and he sat down to write two owls, hoping to repair the bigger mess. He still wasn't sure what had gone on and why it had turned into such a wreck, but at this point the only thing he wanted was for it all to be smoothed over. He could deal with his own problems later, once he worked out what the hell they were in the first place.
Owl to Lily, heavily warded to play the Numa Numa song at ridiculously loud levels to any unintended readers:
Evans,
Are you okay? Still angry? Feeling groovy? Up for a round of poker?
JUST KIDDING.
Anyway, I just wanted to check on you and to apologise for whatever it that made you so angry. I promise I didn't stare at your melons. They're very nice, but I didn't stare.
- Sirius
Owl to Cox, heavily warded to play Daler Mehndi's 'Tunak Tunak Tun' at ridiculously loud levels to any unintended readers:
Are we cool now?
- Sirius
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Date: 2006-11-16 04:22 am (UTC)Sirius had been on the verge of assuring Lily just how far away from her his bollocks would indeed stay when she had to go and remind him of certain incidents that had taken place long ago after too much alcohol had been imbibed and too few clothes had been worn (http://community.livejournal.com/hogwarts_hocus/676074.html?thread=32925674#t32925674).
"Never going to let me live that one down, are you?" he muttered instead, feeling warmth radiating across his entire face from his cheeks to his ears. What made things even worse was the realisation that, to Lily, the incident had happened only five or six years before, so it was probably still fairly fresh in her mind. Brilliant. For some reason, she was the one person who had managed to turn the situation from hilarious to embarrassing. Oh, it was still rather funny, but the thought of Lily catching him like that - Sirius could barely bring himself to imagine it without wanting to go find James's Invisibility Cloak and throw it over his head. After all, it was Lily.
As Lily settled against him, Sirius had to fight a completely different urge, however. Maybe it was his usual longing for physical contact, something that had no doubt been intensified by his decade and a half of solitude and loneliness, or maybe it was just Lily's light, clean scent, but with her leaning on him like that, it was all he could do not to wrap his arms around her and pull her even closer. But while he expected James would be glad to know Sirius was taking good care of his wife in his absence, he didn't think James would appreciate the sight of his best friend holding his wife that closely...breathing in the fragrance of her hair...maybe touching his lips gently to her neck...several times...even if Sirius's intentions were completely noble and platonic...which Sirius was starting to doubt himself. And those were suspicions Sirius was not cool with. Anyway, they made no sense - it was Lily.
Concluding that it was the smell of her shampoo that was causing this effect, Sirius took one last heady whiff and then forced himself to keep talking, to explain his feelings about her and about James, one hand resting very lightly on her shoulder and the other draped across the back of the chair.
It was weird hearing Lily's interpretation of Sirius as he had been in his teenage years. Only a few short months before, he would have given anything to return to those days, anything to have James back, to go marauding on full-moon nights, to play pranks and laugh and...and forget about how everything had changed, how everyone's hopes and wishes were destroyed after one fateful decision and three flashes of green light.
But now, after having had his dream come true, Sirius realised it hadn't been everything he had wanted after all. Even if James had been the right James, his James, it wouldn't have been perfect. A decade and a half of life just couldn't be tossed aside and forgotten. Sirius had been trying to do that at times, and it had nearly cost him the one person in the world (http://community.livejournal.com/hogwarts_hocus/595056.html?thread=28505456#t28505456) who meant the most to him (http://community.livejournal.com/hogwarts_hocus/873563.html?thread=44003931#t44003931): Harry. There was no going back; there was only moving forward.
((Continued...))