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It’s maybe five or six in the morning when Sirius makes it back to the dorm. His movements subconscious and unclear as he elbowed the bathroom door open and stumbled in. Grunting over the sink, he lay his head on the mirror and ignored the way blood splashed into the area below him in inconsistent drips. It wasn’t a serious injury just a simple nosebleed from running head first into a wall on his way to warn Prongs. Could he call him that anymore? Would James get angry?
His head spun as his legs collapsed under him and sent him flying to the floor, bashing his head on the counter as he fell. Groaning, he grabbed the nearest towel and rubbed its scratchy fabric on his damaged skin in an attempt to clear the mess of tears, snot and blood. If somebody was going to yell at him for his actions he didn’t want sympathy because of how horrifying he likely looked. Though maybe nobody would bother with him. Simply shun him from their life with no explanation or closure. Maybe that would be easier than facing the people he had clung to for years as if the world would end at their separation.
He didn’t deserve closure and knowing of how his life would continue.
Sirius’s head hurt and face stung as he fixed his hair and attempted to look somewhat presentable. He couldn’t make it obvious something had gone on or people would start asking questions and that would just draw more attention to the situation and cause all sorts of issues (e.g. everyone figuring out Remus is a werewolf and chasing him away with pitchforks or some shit.)
Peter looks up at him as he exits the bathroom but shifts further behind his beds curtain when their eyes briefly meet. Neither of them say anything, simply choosing ignorance and avoidance over confrontation.
A noise registers in the room at some point in the night that Sirius determines is Peter being rushed out by a panicked James. His heart aches as his hands grip his hair tightly and tug, pulling out black strands and curls that tumble onto the bed.
He can’t sleep that ‘night.’ His lungs feel like they are overloading and jumping every time he tries to close his eyes. There’s multiple points in the darkness that Sirius could swear he sees his mother’s silhouette standing in the corner. She looks freakishly like him in a way with styled hair and manicured hands that she spends hours on obsessively. It catches him by suprised and he’s sure he’s broken out of all similarities his mother passed down but cosmetic ones had never even passed through his head.
Covering his eyes and holding back tears he hears the door open and footsteps he could recognise anytime start approaching his bed. Yet they are rough and vicious instead of calculated and slightly off timing from a limp that hasn’t been sorted correctly. A stick thumps beside the footsteps showing he must really be doing bad as he always refuses to use the old thing.
The curtains are ripped back and Sirius is met with eyes beyond anger and eyebrows scrunched in a way that makes his stomach curl. A look only directed his way a handful of times and never so seriously. Never filled with such anger and hatred. Never such betrayal.
There’s a battle in those mesmerizing hazel eyes with pupils darting and so much consideration. Remus’s mouth opens a few times yet he just breathes heavily and closes it again as if lost for words but desperate to speak something.
It must have been a few minutes from how sore his eyes hurt from being scared to close them incase he misses something. Remorse, anger, forgiveness. Anything. A solid emotion instead of all these conflicted ones.
“Why?”
Remus speaks breathlessly as if he’s been rambling for hours instead of pondering what to say. His posture sags and his eyes squint as something Sirius identifies as a wave of pain washes over him. He shouldn’t be out of the hospital ward this early after a full moon so he must of snuck away. There’s a large bandage across his torso and a bloodied cloth in his hand that was originally placed over the new slash that is diagonal across his face from his eyebrow to jaw. A painful thing that looked to have been bleeding for hours on end without forgiveness to the poor boy.
Sirius knows he should respond. Should plead for forgiveness and explain his actions but his mind comes blank because why did he do it? There was no real reason except pure selfishness. Snape had cornered him demanding answers on what their little secret was and then he had decided it was all these horrible things about Sirius and he just.. snapped?
Changed the subject over without any regard to Moonys safety. Not considering how little care he was displaying. How he was betraying his person, his lover, his lifeline. All just to protect his fragile ego and frail self worth. Destroying his friends with a simple wave of the hand only to save himself from the embarrassment of some childish rumors that would have blown over in a week’s time when everyone moved on to the next gossip.
But this wasn’t something that would just get lost in the rumor mill. This was priceless and fragile trust that he had crushed underneath his blood covered shoes.
“You should be in the hospital wing.” Sirius whispered back. It wasn’t even close to a response. Nothing like the explanation the look in Remus’s eyes had pleaded for so plainly. An easy request Sirius could fulfill if he had actually thought through his actions. if he had taken a moment and thought for once like Remus always reminded him to. If he wasn’t so like his mother. Always looking out for himself was in his blood. In his DNA and wrote across his ribs with a dagger at seven after his mother struck him for the first time without her hand.
Remus recoiled as if burned at the words. Practically baring his teeth with how he stood over Sirius with pure fury.
“You really think you’re in the position to advise me on how to fucking live?! You didn’t seem to care about my well-being when you tried to kill Snape and abandon the blood on my hands.” The boy spat back and clenched his shaking, scarred fists in a way that made memories of people Sirius begs to forget flash through his mind.
He always heard it was said that love turns people soft but he has never been more brutal.