[FIC]: Things Left Behind
Title: Things Left Behind
Word count: 1.2k
Summary: Your friends are all dead or gone, and you don’t believe it. After all, the Marauders live and die together, and they wouldn’t leave you behind.
You step through the wards for your flat, feeling the cold fingers of the wards slide over your skin, and you unlock the door. Dust hangs in the weak sunbeam shining through the window in your sitting room as you close the door behind you and begin to unwind the black scarf from your neck.
Black. You’re wearing all black.
Their funeral was that morning, held in the expansive graveyard in Godric’s Hollow. Witches and wizards crowded around the twin caskets, murmuring well-wishes and thanking Lily and James Potter for their sacrifices, for Harry Potter. The Boy Who Lived.
You didn’t cry. You didn’t feel anything: not the cold, not the wind, not the hands that squeezed your shoulders in sympathy for friends lost. Dumbledore gave a passionate and moving eulogy to James and Lily Potter; all the while, you stared through the crowd as though James would jump out and laugh and proclaim it the very greatest prank he’d ever pulled. Just because I’m married and have a son, you lot thought I’d given it all up? It would have been the single greatest Halloween prank the Marauders had ever pulled off. It would have all been at your expense, of course.
You thought we’d left? Marauders forever, mate. We thought we’d made that clear.
Stupid Moony, you think, because you’d finally started to believe them when they said they really would never let you spend a full moon on your own again. The Halloween prank of 1981, landing them in newspapers and in the mouths of every wizard in Britain, would have been a grand joke to play on Remus Lupin in the name of proving to him that he really did worry too much.
No one jumped out of the crowd. They dropped the caskets in their graves, and you stood at the edge until the last shovelful of dirt was poured on top. You stood a little longer after that, and Professor McGonagall touched your arm, invited you to tea.
You left, and you came back home.
You’re still not sure that any of this is real, because it doesn’t make any sense; something about the whole situation is preposterous to the nth degree, but you can’t put your finger on it. The flat is too quiet, too serene, and when you go to the kitchen, you wonder when it was you cleaned up in the past few days.
Sirius had been acting strangely for a long time, and you’d had a terrible row two weeks ago. You lived together, and he was a complete slob; when he’d yelled at you, telling you that he was going to find out where you went every month because there were only two options-you were cheating on him or you were the spy-he’d broken half the dishes in the kitchen. You’d stared, too taken aback by either possibility to say anything.
You’ve been with Sirius Black for four years, loved him and endured him, and he’d accused you. You think that he was particularly incensed by the fact that you didn’t say anything, because he left and he didn’t come back.
You’re not the spy, and you’ve never so much as looked at anyone else since he drunkenly asked if you fancied a shag in sixth year and meant it.
Sirius is the spy. Was the spy. Past-tense is a problem for you right now, because you don’t believe anything of the past week.
It doesn’t make any sense because even though Sirius had been acting so strangely, you never suspected that he was even capable of being the spy. It had to be one of the other Order members, someone who wasn’t a part of the Marauders, because Marauders lived together and died together, and you all would have died for one another.
You knew that James and Lily were going under Fidelius protection, because they had been talking about it for weeks as they gathered necessary supplies for the complex charm. Before you fought, Sirius told you at three in the morning when the room was so dark you couldn’t see him at all that he was afraid. You know this for a fact, because that scared you.
Sirius Black wasn’t afraid of anything, but he was afraid of being Secret Keeper for James and Lily. You’d put your hand on his arm and you hadn’t said anything, because you thought you might ask him if you couldn’t all just run away together until the war was over. No one would have to be Secret Keeper, no one would have to be scared.
Sirius became the Secret Keeper, and now James and Lily are dead because he betrayed them. He didn’t just betray them, though; he betrayed you and he killed Peter, and you’re standing in your flat alone because you had everything you ever wanted ripped out of your hands on Halloween.
You remove your dress robes, tattered things that they are, and you go to hang them in your wardrobe; your hands are steady, your jaw is set, and you still don’t believe that your friends have done this to you.
They sent Sirius to Azkaban. There was a picture of him on the front page of the Prophet, howling with laughter and being dragged away by Aurors from a ruined street. He doesn’t look like Sirius, but you think that he must be because his name is in the caption. He looks half-mad, and you’ve spent hours with a magnifying glass trying to see the Dark Mark on his forearm. You never see it. Even in this photograph, he’s too clever for anyone to see it.
They never found Peter, nothing more than his little finger. You want to kill Sirius for murdering him, for abusing the unfailing trust and admiration that Peter lavished on him. They don’t let people visit prisoners in Azkaban, and it’s a good thing they don’t, because you would kill Sirius as though you don’t love him above all else in the world.
You open the wardrobe, and your dress robes fall out of your hands onto the floor; you reach out and touch the well-worn sleeve of Sirius’ leather jacket. He must have left it when he rushed out of the flat after your fight.
Sirius never went anywhere without his fucking leather jacket.
You pull it from its poor hiding place-shoved between two too-large sets of robes and just barely clinging to its hanger-and you hold it in your hands. The collar is well-worn and darkened with sweat, very nearly cracking in several places. It reeks of him, of cigarettes and London air and sweat and motor oil, and you wrap it around your shoulders because the world has gone cold.
It’s too small for you, and your wrists are bare when you push them through the sleeves. There’s a half-empty pack of cigarettes in the left pocket, and you feel a scrap of paper wrapped around the package; in a moment of wild, desperate hope, you pull it out and you unfold it.
It’s a receipt for takeaway Thai.
It’s a fucking receipt.
Your knees hit the floor and you clench your fists so hard that your nails break the skin of your palms, and no one jumps out to laugh at you. Your friends are all dead and gone, and they really did leave you alone after all.
You never should have believed them, even if you knew you never deserved them. You were supposed to be the best liar.
It should have been you.
Word count: 1.2k
Summary: Your friends are all dead or gone, and you don’t believe it. After all, the Marauders live and die together, and they wouldn’t leave you behind.
You step through the wards for your flat, feeling the cold fingers of the wards slide over your skin, and you unlock the door. Dust hangs in the weak sunbeam shining through the window in your sitting room as you close the door behind you and begin to unwind the black scarf from your neck.
Black. You’re wearing all black.
Their funeral was that morning, held in the expansive graveyard in Godric’s Hollow. Witches and wizards crowded around the twin caskets, murmuring well-wishes and thanking Lily and James Potter for their sacrifices, for Harry Potter. The Boy Who Lived.
You didn’t cry. You didn’t feel anything: not the cold, not the wind, not the hands that squeezed your shoulders in sympathy for friends lost. Dumbledore gave a passionate and moving eulogy to James and Lily Potter; all the while, you stared through the crowd as though James would jump out and laugh and proclaim it the very greatest prank he’d ever pulled. Just because I’m married and have a son, you lot thought I’d given it all up? It would have been the single greatest Halloween prank the Marauders had ever pulled off. It would have all been at your expense, of course.
You thought we’d left? Marauders forever, mate. We thought we’d made that clear.
Stupid Moony, you think, because you’d finally started to believe them when they said they really would never let you spend a full moon on your own again. The Halloween prank of 1981, landing them in newspapers and in the mouths of every wizard in Britain, would have been a grand joke to play on Remus Lupin in the name of proving to him that he really did worry too much.
No one jumped out of the crowd. They dropped the caskets in their graves, and you stood at the edge until the last shovelful of dirt was poured on top. You stood a little longer after that, and Professor McGonagall touched your arm, invited you to tea.
You left, and you came back home.
You’re still not sure that any of this is real, because it doesn’t make any sense; something about the whole situation is preposterous to the nth degree, but you can’t put your finger on it. The flat is too quiet, too serene, and when you go to the kitchen, you wonder when it was you cleaned up in the past few days.
Sirius had been acting strangely for a long time, and you’d had a terrible row two weeks ago. You lived together, and he was a complete slob; when he’d yelled at you, telling you that he was going to find out where you went every month because there were only two options-you were cheating on him or you were the spy-he’d broken half the dishes in the kitchen. You’d stared, too taken aback by either possibility to say anything.
You’ve been with Sirius Black for four years, loved him and endured him, and he’d accused you. You think that he was particularly incensed by the fact that you didn’t say anything, because he left and he didn’t come back.
You’re not the spy, and you’ve never so much as looked at anyone else since he drunkenly asked if you fancied a shag in sixth year and meant it.
Sirius is the spy. Was the spy. Past-tense is a problem for you right now, because you don’t believe anything of the past week.
It doesn’t make any sense because even though Sirius had been acting so strangely, you never suspected that he was even capable of being the spy. It had to be one of the other Order members, someone who wasn’t a part of the Marauders, because Marauders lived together and died together, and you all would have died for one another.
You knew that James and Lily were going under Fidelius protection, because they had been talking about it for weeks as they gathered necessary supplies for the complex charm. Before you fought, Sirius told you at three in the morning when the room was so dark you couldn’t see him at all that he was afraid. You know this for a fact, because that scared you.
Sirius Black wasn’t afraid of anything, but he was afraid of being Secret Keeper for James and Lily. You’d put your hand on his arm and you hadn’t said anything, because you thought you might ask him if you couldn’t all just run away together until the war was over. No one would have to be Secret Keeper, no one would have to be scared.
Sirius became the Secret Keeper, and now James and Lily are dead because he betrayed them. He didn’t just betray them, though; he betrayed you and he killed Peter, and you’re standing in your flat alone because you had everything you ever wanted ripped out of your hands on Halloween.
You remove your dress robes, tattered things that they are, and you go to hang them in your wardrobe; your hands are steady, your jaw is set, and you still don’t believe that your friends have done this to you.
They sent Sirius to Azkaban. There was a picture of him on the front page of the Prophet, howling with laughter and being dragged away by Aurors from a ruined street. He doesn’t look like Sirius, but you think that he must be because his name is in the caption. He looks half-mad, and you’ve spent hours with a magnifying glass trying to see the Dark Mark on his forearm. You never see it. Even in this photograph, he’s too clever for anyone to see it.
They never found Peter, nothing more than his little finger. You want to kill Sirius for murdering him, for abusing the unfailing trust and admiration that Peter lavished on him. They don’t let people visit prisoners in Azkaban, and it’s a good thing they don’t, because you would kill Sirius as though you don’t love him above all else in the world.
You open the wardrobe, and your dress robes fall out of your hands onto the floor; you reach out and touch the well-worn sleeve of Sirius’ leather jacket. He must have left it when he rushed out of the flat after your fight.
Sirius never went anywhere without his fucking leather jacket.
You pull it from its poor hiding place-shoved between two too-large sets of robes and just barely clinging to its hanger-and you hold it in your hands. The collar is well-worn and darkened with sweat, very nearly cracking in several places. It reeks of him, of cigarettes and London air and sweat and motor oil, and you wrap it around your shoulders because the world has gone cold.
It’s too small for you, and your wrists are bare when you push them through the sleeves. There’s a half-empty pack of cigarettes in the left pocket, and you feel a scrap of paper wrapped around the package; in a moment of wild, desperate hope, you pull it out and you unfold it.
It’s a receipt for takeaway Thai.
It’s a fucking receipt.
Your knees hit the floor and you clench your fists so hard that your nails break the skin of your palms, and no one jumps out to laugh at you. Your friends are all dead and gone, and they really did leave you alone after all.
You never should have believed them, even if you knew you never deserved them. You were supposed to be the best liar.
It should have been you.