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Pandora was one of the few people in favor of the idea of spending the two weeks around the winter holidays and New Years in Brazil. She despised the cold and unwelcoming winters in Britain and thought some time away in the warm and sunny Southern hemisphere instead was exactly what she needed, though the company was slightly unexpected. 

They were invited by James Potter to stay at one of his mother’s family properties, being told that it was the “perfect way” for the separate friend groups to bond and get to know each other ever since not only Marlene and Dorcas got their heads out of their ass and made their relationship official, but also Regulus, James, and Lily. 

Separating by group was strictly banned and reinforced by Regulus and Dorcas both, though Pandora was more alright with this compared to Evan or Barty, who had definitely just come along to steal Potter’s booze and get borderline indecent on the beach. 

The previous day was spent arriving and getting settled, James showing everyone to their rooms and letting everyone rest from their long flight. Then they ordered food from one of James’ favorite places and just stayed in, too tired to leave the house, until eventually going to bed early.

Now Pandora was awake before the sunrise to go watch it from the main balcony before her morning stretches and plans to ask James to join him on his morning run so she can learn the best places nearby to walk the next few days. She doesn’t turn on any lights despite it still being dark, but is surprised to see the balcony door already open, a lit cigarette being held by someone she recognizes as she walks in the doorframe. 

“Sirius? Are you alright?”

He jumps slightly at her voice, not looking back but she can see his back and shoulders tensing up.

“I’m fine, Pandora, just couldn’t sleep,” he says, shrugging even though Pandora can hear the tears in his voice. She can tell he’s lying, of course, and his body language is a near perfect mirror image of his younger brother after he had a nightmare.

She hopes Walburga and Orion Black are rotting in their graves.

“Did you know,” Pandora starts, watching Sirius’ ear tilt towards her as she walks closer, “Regulus taught me to do what you used to do to help, when we were at school together and you weren’t there but he still woke up from nightmares.”

“But I always,” Pandora watches him pause, think through it, before turning in surprise, “he taught you the Black lullaby?”

“Oh yes, and imagine my surprise when I heard Remus singing it a few years later,” she chuckles, “I do wonder where he learned it from.”

Sirius just stares at her, the sound of the waves crashing beneath them the only noise around this early in the morning, before he sighs and rests his chin on his knees.

“You must be important to him, then.”

There’s a tone of self-pity in his words, and though Pandora is far from the best person to comfort Sirius when he gets into a mood, she cannot just leave him to stew in his own self-hating thoughts.

“No more than you are,” she tells him, “he does love you, I hope you know.”

He shrugs, but still says, “I know he does, I love him too.”

Pandora nods, satisfied, and stands up with a soft pat to Sirius’ shoulder.

“Would you like some tea or coffee? I always find it best to watch the sunrise with something to drink,” she offers, and he quirks a one sided smile towards her.

“Coffee, please, Pandora,” he hesitates, but eventually says in a quiet voice, “I’m glad y’all agreed to come, even if I know it’s not…exactly everyone's first choice of a group.”

She smiles.

“I’m glad we came too, Sirius.”

James was trying.

He’d done well with Lily’s friends, but Regulus’ friends were a whole different ball game. At least Lily had an in since she knew both Dorcas and Pandora from school and both Evan and Barty were willing to follow them, but James had nothing but Regulus, who was more amused by his boyfriends troubles than sympathetic. 

But if all went to plan then this week would hopefully help that, James just needed to be patient.

“Barty? What are you doing awake?”

He wasn’t expecting to see Barty already up and clutching a cup of coffee in the kitchen at 5 am their second morning in Brazil, however.

“Ever heard of a nightmare, Potter?” Barty’s voice is steady, detached, but it’s more personal than James ever expected him to be, “you’re best friends with the older Black and dating the younger, so I’m sure you’ve seen your fair share of theirs.”

“Oh, you get family nightmares too?” James asks before he can think better of it, but Barty doesn’t immediately try to gut him, so he imagines the question wasn’t taken as horrifically as it came out.  

“Yeah, but don’t worry, I wouldn’t expect Mr. Perfect Parents to understand,” Barty laughs, short and mean, with an eye roll to top it off.

James doesn’t know if it was the laugh or Barty’s dismissal or possibly even the misunderstanding of what James had been accidentally implying, but something happened that causes James to say, “my aunt used to hit me,” before his brain can catch just with his mouth.

Barty just stares at him, the condescending anger gone but replaced by something James can’t read, which is arguably almost worse.

“I, uh, I was partially raised by my aunt for a while? When I was around two to five, I think,” he explains, “my parents were working so much and they were older when they had me to begin with, so my baba’s younger sister offered to help, but she was…well, you know…” James searched around for the right word, “she was strict, I guess, and didn’t like when I wasn’t perfect.”

The silence is nearly suffocating, and James almost apologizes for overstepping and sharing too much when Barty finally breaks it.

“My father hated that I wasn’t perfect too,” Barty whispers in a flat voice, “said I was a terrible excuse of a man and a shittier Crouch.”

“I think you’re a pretty shitty Crouch too, but you make a pretty good Lovegood,” James says, worried it sounds more insulting than reassuring like he means it, but Barty just huffs a laugh and smirks at him.

“Whatever James,” James perks up, it’s the first time Barty has ever called him that, “go enjoy your needless exercise, I’ll be enjoying my vacation relaxing.”

James nods, definitely looking way too eager as he nearly runs into the doorframe in his excitement.

His plan is working!

Sirius is unhappy.

This year has been one shitty thing after another. It started with Remus getting put in the hospital after a particularly bad flare, then Sirius got sent on a three week work trip with only a single day's notice and to make matters even worse one of his and Remus’ pet dogs ended up dying during that period. His uncle died, which would normally be a good thing, but for some reason he and Regulus were invited to the funeral and were convinced to attend where they proceeded to be endlessly berated without the ability to escape. There was an issue with his and Remus’ wedding venue next year that required endless days worth of meetings with their wedding planner and dozens of other people and the possibility of having to reschedule their entire wedding. There were almost monthly problems with his job that he had to take care of by himself every time and to top it all off they were denied the ability to adopt the puppy they’d been looking at for weeks.

Then James offered to take them to Brazil for the winter holidays and Sirius thought this was finally his time.

Except instead of a Marauders vacation, it turns out everyone is invited.

Remus convinced him to play nice for James’ benefit, reminding him how important it is to him that he gets along with Regulus’ friends, but it did not mean Sirius had to be happy about it.

Case in point, he’s having a terrible time sleeping, something he is fully blaming on Barty Crouch Jr in particular even though there is no connection there, and went downstairs at three am to grab a drink of water to replace the one he gulped down after waking up a few minutes ago. The first floor is dark, but Sirius knows the layout of the house well enough for it to not affect him, however the sight of someone sitting on the couch is nearly enough to make his heart feel like it’s stopped until he realizes it’s just Lily.

“Red? What are you doing down here?” He asks quietly, and Lily startles a bit, turning as she tries to discreetly wipe away her tears and offer him a tight smile.

“Oh, hey Sirius, did you need something?”

He raises an eyebrow, walking closer and sitting right next to her, letting Lily lean against him.

“Nice job avoiding my question, but I’m not going to let it go that easily, so what’s going on?” Sirius asks, feeling Lily sigh against him.

“Just couldn’t sleep,” she plays with one of the loose threads of her shirt, “nightmares, you know, didn’t want to bother Reg or James so I figured I’d come down here for a bit.”

“What about?” 

For a while Sirius thinks Lily isn’t going to answer, and he’s willing to drop it if she’s not ready to talk about it, but then she tucks her legs over his.

“I…I had a miscarriage two months ago,” Lily whispers, curling up further against him, “Regulus and James don’t know, I didn’t…I didn’t even get the chance to tell them I was pregnant. I had only known for about three weeks and was waiting until we were out of the danger zone to say anything since I didn’t want to get their hopes up.”

“Oh Red, I’m so sorry,” he knows from James' constant oversharing that the three of them have been trying to get pregnant for months, “anything I can do to help?”

She shakes her head, “no, thank you, it was just…it hurt, and was scary.”

He hums in acknowledgement, reaching his hand up to scratch her head like he knows she likes.

“You should tell Reggie and Prongs, Lils,” he tells her, “they deserve to know and you shouldn’t have to deal with this alone, am I the only one who knows?”

“Yeah, and you’re right, I know, but I…I don’t want them to be disappointed.”

Sirius snorts, squeezing her in reassurance as he tells her, “in you? Babes, you’re amazing, only an idiot could be disappointed in my future sister-in-law.”

She laughs a bit, and Sirius can tell she rolls her eyes by the slight head movement she always does.

“Okay, I’ll…I’ll tell them tonight,” she adjusts to hug him, “thanks Sirius, you’re a good friend and I’m glad you’re going to be my brother-in-law one day.”

He smiles, job bubbling up inside his chest.

Alright, maybe the trip isn’t all that bad.

Dorcas, for the most part, did enjoy Marlene’s friends. 

She knew Mary, Lily, and Remus from school, and though she wasn’t in their group during those first couple of years since Dorcas was more often with Regulus and Pandora, they had always been friendly with each other. Then she started dating Marlene and met her childhood best friends, Peter and James, who welcomed her with open arms and easy smiles. Sirius was a bit more difficult to win over, but after a conversation about international Quidditch teams one night during what she’s pretty sure was Lily’s birthday dinner, Dorcas won him over too.

She’s invited to parties and dinners and everyone looks happy to see her when she comes, but Dorcas knows she’s not really in the group. Dorcas is very much still “Marlene’s girlfriend” to most of them, though it’s not something she can be too mad about since Marlene is still “Dorcas’ girlfriend” to her own friends, but the main point is that despite being friendly and hanging out with most of them for multiple years, Dorcas doesn’t really personally know any of them too well.

Still, she was enjoying the trip a lot.

She had originally been a bit on the fence about James’ idea when Marlene first mentioned it, but now that she is here Dorcas is glad that she agreed. The area is beautiful, the food is delicious, the water is perfect, and even the company is pretty good. She’s gotten a bit closer to Peter, Lily, and Mary and Marlene has for the first time spoken more than three polite words to her own friends, including often joining Pandora and James on their working run/walk on the beach. 

Including this morning, where the three of them just returned from their run. Normally Dorcas would just go back to sleep after Marlene left, but this morning she couldn’t for some reason so she decided to come downstairs early instead. There’s a couple people awake already, she heard them walking around upstairs, but so far she and the morning runners are the only ones who have come downstairs.

Marlene went back to their room to take a shower and Pandora is meditating on the balcony, so it’s just her and James. 

James is making breakfast for the house while Dorcas drinks a fruit smoothie, stomach growling from watching him cook and the frankly unreally delicious smells. Since most of this week has been exploring his mom’s Brazilian heritage, James decided to incorporate his father’s Punjabi heritage this morning by making aloo puri. Dorcas has never had it before and James promised her first plate since she’s the only one “helping” him, though in reality she’s just sitting here and occasionally telling him it smells good.

When first looking at him, James looks normal.

He’s smiling, laughing and joking with her, and if Dorcas hadn’t spent so many years with Regulus “emotionally repressed” Black and Pandora “optimistic nihilism” Lovegood then she likely would have never picked up that something was wrong. However, she is best friends with a bunch of people who barely acknowledge their own emotions, so she notices quickly that his smiles are dimmer, his laughs sound tighter, and he’s not dancing as he cooks like he has every other time she’s watched him in the kitchen.

“What’s wrong?”

Not “are you okay?” because she’s not going to even give him a chance to deny it.

James pauses, turning towards her from the stove with a slightly masked pained look and minor panic in his eyes.

“I’m fine, Dorcas, don’t worry, I just didn’t sleep great last night,” James tries to brush her off, smiling in a way that doesn’t reach his eyes, but Dorcas just rolls her eyes.

“That excuse might work on your idiots, but remember I’m best friends with Barty, Evan, Pandora, and Regulus, so bullshit like that doesn’t work on me,” she tells him, “I’m an expert on picking up when people are lying about their wellbeing.”

James just stares at her before chuckling slightly and turning back around.

“Regulus has told me those exact words before,” he shakes his head a bit with an amused laugh, “I just had a nightmare, I get them often but occasionally they are a bit more jarring than normal and last night just happened to be particularly rough.”

“Want to talk about it?” 

“Nah, thanks for the offer, it means a lot, but I’d really rather not…if for any reason it doesn’t get better I’ll talk to one of my boys, Lils, or Reg,” he turns around again, “not that I don’t value you, of course,” he reassures, sounding panicked, “they just already know and-”

“It’s fine, James,” she tells him, “you don’t need to justify your emotions and wants to me, I get it.”

James hesitates, but nods and turns to the stove again.

“Thanks, Dorcas, you’re a good friend…I’m glad you agreed to come on this trip, it wouldn’t have been the same without you.”

James doesn’t turn around to see her smile, but Dorcas hopes she can feel it.

She’s glad she came on the trip too.

Lily knew she was likely the only person genuinely enjoying the trip and everyone here. 

Not that people weren’t having fun, they were, or there had been any major issues, there shockingly hadn’t been, but more like…well, Lily knew she was already friends with most of the people who are here.

She’d been long term friends with Mary, Marlene, Dorcas, and Remus from their school years, was best friends and even dated Pandora as teenagers, became close friends with Peter and Sirius since being introduced to them by Marlene, was currently dating Regulus and James, and has even become close with Barty in an academic rivals type of way since they had been in the same program until he dropped out.

The only person Lily doesn’t really know well is Evan.

Sure, she knows Evan enough between dating his sister at one point and being friends with his partner, but she wouldn’t really consider them friends by any means.

Friendly, yes, but friends was…stretching it.

Which is why she should definitely not be the person helping him right now.

Everyone was separated at the moment after spending most of the morning exploring the area with James tour guiding. They’d had a lovely lunch at a rodízio-style restaurant where they’d definitely all eaten far too much, most of them returning back to the house to sleep off the large meal with a nap. Now it’s been a few hours and most of the house is awake, though quite a few have left to go do something until dinner.

The only ones still here are Evan, Remus, and Marlene, who are all still asleep, and Regulus, who is up in their room doing some work on his laptop. 

Instead of going to nap in their room, Barty and Evan had decided to collapse on the couch, meaning Lily was able to see the exact moment Evan started twitching in his sleep from her spot in one of the rocking chairs. It started with Evan’s eyebrows narrowing and a quiet almost whine that was the first thing that alerted Lily that something was wrong, then she looked over at him in time to see him curling into a ball with one of his hands moving to cover his mouth.

He’s obviously in the middle of a nightmare, and Lily almost gets up to go get Regulus since she has no idea when Barty or Pandora plan on returning, but is stopped by a startled gasp and Evan shooting up. He looks around in a half-asleep panic, eyes fogged over and looking only half present as he mumbles incoherently in what Lily is pretty sure is a mixture of Arabic and French.

“Hey, Evan you’re okay,” she tells him, trying to remember what she normally does for Regulus, “you’re safe, you’re in Brazil right now, at James’ house…we’re on vacation with everyone, you’re safe and everything is okay.”

“Où est Pandora?” He gasps out, and though Lily only knows minimal French she can guess what he’s asking going off of the name.

“Pandora went with Barty to buy some more stuff for dinner, he didn’t think we had enough chicken for the pasta tonight,” she says, “they’re safe, Pandora is okay and she’ll be back soon.”

Evan breathes heavily and for a moment Lily thinks he doesn’t believe her, but then he nods and collapses back onto the couch, closing his eyes and falling back asleep. She watches him for a few more minutes, ready to soothe him if he wakes up again, but Evan stays calmly asleep until Barty and Pandora return from the store.

Lily whispers to the two of them what happened, and both thank her for helping him before Barty wakes Evan up to help with dinner prep.

At first Lily is pretty sure Evan doesn’t even remember that it happened, but halfway through dinner they make eye contact and Evan gives her a single nod before continuing his conversation with Dorcas.

She thinks it’s a good first step to them becoming true friends.

Marlene knew a hefty amount of Remus’ life history from their years being roommates in school. It was hard not too when you saw him changing every day and his extensive collection of scars were on display or you woke up to him screaming awake from a nightmare, begging a man no longer here to stop. Granted, in his defense it was probably jarring to be asked as bluntly as she had what happened to him, but Marlene has never been known for her tact in social relationships. Especially not eleven year old Marlene who grew up with three sisters and was childhood best friends with Peter and James. 

Anyways, the point is that even if she had never been his best friend like Lily, Marlene knew about Remus’ monsters.

Surprisingly, the two of them were alone in the house this afternoon. Remus was resting due to having a particularly bad pain day and not wanting to deal with his forearm crutches on the beach with all the sand and Marlene had gotten a bad sunburn on her back yesterday so she was made to stay home so as to not make it worse. Originally Sirius was going to stay with Remus, but Remus finally convinced him to leave to hang out with Regulus after Marlene promised that she’d help if Remus needed anything.

‘Help’ ended up primarily being occasionally pointing at him in threat to stay put on the couch, getting him tea or crackers so he could take his meds, and grabbing his heating pad from his and Sirius’ room after his back pain got particularly bad. The two of them have mostly spent the day in front of the tv watching random documentaries, only moving when the rest of the group brought them lunch around 12:30, and now they’re in the middle of a documentary about the world's tallest mountains.

Remus fell asleep not long after lunch and Marlene has been in and out of sleep for about an hour, occasionally opening her eyes to glance over at the man on the other couch. It’s during one of these glances that she sees that he is no longer relaxed and instead his entire body is completely stiff and unmoving. 

Marlene knows this is the first sign that he’s having a nightmare. First comes the stiffness and the shallow breathing that has had Marlene convinced he was dead more than once. Next, sometimes after only a minute and occasionally closer to five, Remus will flinch once, whimper in fear, and go completely limp. A few times she’s seen him begin to fight and thrash violently instead, but nearly every time she woke up to that first whimper during their years in school lead to Remus going completely limp. He’s limp but never quiet, always letting out painful sounding noises until eventually he’d gasp awake in a panic.

This time Remus is only stiff for about two minutes before making that fucking whimper sound and going limp, similar to a prey animal who knows there’s no point. 

Marlene feels wide awake now, no longer tired and she debates what to do. She doesn’t want to just leave him to go through the nightmare, but it’s sometimes iffy to wake him up directly, so instead she does the next best thing. 

“He’s not here,” she says, trying to keep her voice at its normal speaking level, “he’s not here Remus, you’re safe, it’s just a dream now…it’s not happening anymore.”

It’s what Lily always did, just talking in her normal voice until it dragged Remus back to reality.

“It’s alright, Remus, there’s no one here but us, it’s just Marlene, remember? Marlene Mckinnon, it’s just me and you, he’s not here…I wouldn’t let him get you again, I promise.”

Remus doesn’t gasp awake, but he does inhale sharply before his eyes snap open. For a moment his gaze is foggy, not completely in the present, but he looks at her for a second before glancing around the room to see where they are and his eyes slowly clear.

“I’ll get you some tea,” she says just to break the silence, give him something else to focus on. 

He looks back at her, shaking his head slightly and voice wavering as he says, “don’t worry about it, it’s okay, really, I don’t want to be a both-”

Nope, no self-hatred is happening on her watch.

“Shut up, I’m already going to make some for myself so it would be stupid not to get you any.”

Remus knows it’s a lie, he knows that Marlene has always fucking hated tea, but he just sighs and nods with a slight smile.

“Thanks, Marls.”

She waves him off on her way to the kitchen, keeping an eye on him as he switches the documentary to a hour long YouTube video of cute animals instead. 

Marlene doesn’t need to be his best friend to still care about him, and if that means suffering through a single mug of tea, then she can do that no problem.

Regulus would be the first to admit that Pandora was his best friend. 

Even though it’s been many years since it was just them against the rest of their school, in the years before the two of them met the upper years like Dorcas and Lily and before Pandora thought to introduce him to her brother at the other school, Regulus still to this day believed that she was his best friend. 

They live much more separate lives now, no longer two children in a boarding school just trying to survive their family, but instead functional and dare he say happy adults living lives they never thought they’d be allowed to have. Their lives may be more separate but Regulus still knows Pandora like the back of his hand, much like she does about him.

Which is why when James returns and tells him one morning during breakfast that Pandora didn’t join him and Marlene for their morning run and work out that Regulus knows something is wrong.

Pandora is an early riser, has been as long as Regulus has known her, and she is up with the sun every morning to stretch, pray, and often go on a run. Evan may have not enjoyed the morning prayer, having always been much more in love with sleep than his twin, but Pandora had always told him that Fajr was her favorite prayer because it put her in the best headspace for the day.

Except, of course, on days like this.

Regulus just thanks James for letting him know, kissing him gently as he passes to walk to Pandora’s room for this trip. The lights are off, her prayer rug still on the floor instead of neatly folded like normal when not being used, and there’s an unmoving lump on the bed.

“Memory or prophecy?” He asks, and the lump lets out a hum, one single brown eye peeking out from the blanket mound.

“Prophecy.”

Of course, Pandora doesn’t actually experience real prophecies, not to their knowledge at least, but the two of them have been categorizing her nightmares in this way since they were eleven so now it is just second nature. Despite it being more joke than serious, it’s a disturbingly good description of the types of nightmares she has since it is always one or the other. Most people Regulus knows, himself included, will have nightmares that don’t make sense or may be less straightforward. They’ll feature people he doesn’t know or things that could never actually happen, but not for Pandora.

No, Pandora’s nightmares are always either direct, or near direct, play by play of her past or terrifying possible futures of her or the people she knows.

Memory or prophecy.

“Who was it this time?”

“You,” she says, singular visible eye closing tightly, “drowning, again.”

Ah, yes, the recurrent drowning prophecy nightmare.

She’s been having it since they were thirteen after learning about Regulus' near-death experience when he was six. At one point she had even the nightmare for five nights in a row and panicked so strongly that it was going to actually happen that she sent herself into a near hysterical level of anxiety and paranoia, but it’s the first time in a year or two that Regulus has heard of Pandora having the nightmare it again.

Regulus crawls into the bed, joining the blanket mound despite the near unbearable level of heat underneath it, tucking Pandora’s head under his chin and rubbing her back.

“I am alive, I did not drown,” he tells her, feeling his chosen sister curling tighter around him, “it did not happen, it will not happen, I am still here with you.”

He repeats these words a few times for her, knowing sometimes Pandora just needs the reminder after she wakes up and is still half stuck in sleep, just letting her breathe through it and listen to him, ear over his heart to hear it beat.

“Would it be alright if you did not swim today?” She asks after a few moments of silence, her body slowly losing the tension strung throughout it.

Regulus hums, “yeah, I can do that. We haven’t gone to the city much, so maybe we can take Dorcas and the idiots with us and do that today.”

“Could Sirius join us?” Pandora asks, and Regulus raises an eyebrow, lips quirking up into a slight smile.

“Odd request, any reason?”

“They were reaching for you,” Pandora’s voice drifts, Regulus looks down to see her eyes fogging ever so slightly, “they did not make it in time.”

Regulus tightens his hold, letting Pandora return slowly to reality instead of drifting away as he keeps her grounded through his hold and she grounds herself by blinking repeatedly.

“Sure, I’ll invite him, do you want to get up to eat a bit before we go?” 

Pandora hums.

“Yes, but let us lay here awhile longer,” her hold on him tightens as well, “I was not in time to save you either.”

Regulus does not answer, but neither moves for a while as the sun slowly rises more into the sky and the rest of the house wakes with it.

Yeah, Pandora will always be his best friend.

Peter has come a long way since his childhood and adolescence. He knows that a few years ago he would have been terrified at the mere idea of this type of trip. The idea of being so far away from home, staying in not just a completely new country but a whole separate continent, and going with a handful of people Peter was less than comfortable around would have sent him into a panic. However, nowadays he was beyond stoked after James first told him and the boys about his plan, and he can recognize how far he’s come from the anxiety riddled adolescence he had once been.

Course, it helps that Peter has been friends for years with most of the people here.

He’s known James and Marlene since their childhood, met Sirius through school when he was eleven, and became friends with Remus, Lily, and Mary as teenagers after Marlene introduced them. Though he knows less about the other group, he’s always been friendly with the five of them. Peter has spent hours talking plants and rocks with Pandora and has become good friends with Regulus since he started dating James and Lily. Though he knows less about Evan, Barty, and Dorcas, Peter has always enjoyed any time he did spend around them.

Despite how his friend group has expanded, Marlene has always held a special place in his heart. She was his first friend, their older sisters being friends since before they were born and the two of them practically being raised together, and a constant presence in his life. He knew Marlene better than anyone else, which is how she knew something was wrong despite her still laughing and chatting like nothing was different.

“What’s going on?” He asks after following her inside from the balcony where everyone else is partying and having a good time, most of them either drinking or smoking weed. Peter himself is a little stoned, but not enough for it to be a problem as he assesses Marlene, who turns with a raised eyebrow.

“What do you mean, Pete?” She responds, artfully dodging the question, but too bad for her since Peter is a master of all things deflection with Marlene.

“Don’t deflect, Marls, you’re off today, so what’s going on?” She just shrugs, turning to walk towards the kitchen, but Peter continues. “Fight with Dorcas? Did James say something to you? Has someone been giving you trouble? Did something happen at home? Is your family okay-?”

“Pete, I’m fine, it was…” she sighs, rolling her eyes but Peter can see her normal snark isn’t in it, “I just had a nightmare last night and it…it just threw me off, nothing to worry about.”

He pauses, eyebrows scrunched together as he looks her up and down.

“A nightmare?”

“Yeah,” he watches her defenses rise, “a nightmare, you do know what that is right? I had a bad dream, okay? I’m allowed to have them, aren’t I? Last night just sucked, Peter, so don’t look so fucking confused and shit, sometimes nightmares just happen.”

“Marlene, don’t be a bitch,” it’s rude, but when Marlene’s defenses start to rise she needs a shock and reminders that she’s safe, that the world isn’t attacking her and she doesn’t need to be ready to fight everything, “I was just shocked since I haven’t seen you so thrown off by a nightmare before, nothing more and nothing less, so I’m just worried about you and wanted to make sure there wasn’t anything I could do to help.”

She glares but Peter can see the heat slowly drain away until she just sighs, leaning against the island. Marlene frowns, rubbing her collarbone absentmindedly as she does a breathing exercise and Peter lets her defense come down, waiting for her to speak first.

“I’m sorry, I know you’re just worried so I shouldn’t have gotten defensive, I just…ugh,” she throws her head back with a groan, “I don’t get nightmares often, especially not bad ones like this, so I don’t know what to do and it makes me feel powerless since I know it wasn’t real but I can still-” 

Marlene cuts herself off, looking away from him with a fight in her eyes as she internally argues with herself on whether to admit to this vulnerability or not.

“Need me to do anything?” He asks once it’s clear the argument isn’t going to solve itself, and Marlene shrugs.

“Think me, you, and James could watch a movie tonight? Just the three of us?” Her voice is strained, and Peter guesses whatever the nightmare was must have included the two of them if she’s asking to recreate a childhood memory like that.

“Course, I’ll go tell him now, you wanna come with?”

“Nah, I’m gonna use the bathroom and then…” she trails off, so Peter jumps in.

“You’ll go to my room and I’ll be up there soon with James so we can watch a movie?” He suggests, and she nods, eyes clear but still a bit lost as she just nods, hands clenching together.

“Yeah, yeah I…yeah, that’s what I’ll do,” Marlene breathes a relieved sigh, “thanks, Pete.”

It’s quiet, barely audible, but Peter still hears it and offers her a half smile as he turns to go get James and let Dorcas know her girlfriend’s new plans for the night.

“Yeah, love you too, Marls.”

Mary didn’t really know where she fit in this group.

Sure, her best friends were in it, but most of the other people here were tied by either early childhood connections or romantic relationships and Mary didn’t have either one. She had short moments where she dated Sirius and Lily as teenagers and has known the girls and Remus since they were eleven, but that doesn’t hold nearly as much weight as the length some of the others have known each other.

Still, she didn’t really feel bad about this fact. After all, Mary was raised to make herself fit no matter what anyone told her, and by God she would do so even if others didn’t like her for it. Though, she will admit, that sometimes the outsider feeling was particularly present.

Case in point: the Black brothers.

Though she once dated Sirius, his family troubles and trauma was kept away from their relationship. She knew the basics and had hung out with him enough to know that a lot of his childhood stuck around with him in particularly negative ways, but Mary didn’t know the real details about him or Regulus in regard to their particular traumas. 

Given that Mary rarely hung out with Regulus to begin with and Sirius often leaned on Remus and the other Marauders for help, this fact was one that rarely affected her life. Sure, she was aware of it, but it didn’t really ever come up. However, she’s currently wishing she had a bit more information to work off of now that it is affecting her life.

You see, Mary has always been a little uncomfortable around Regulus.

Even when they were in school together, before Regulus was outwardly Regulus and Mary just knew him as the youngest child in the rich and terrifying Black family, Mary had feared him a little bit. Not enough to call it fear, not like she’d been afraid of some of the other people she knew, but enough that she’d avoid him even when he began spending more time with Lily.

The discomfort has faded slightly as they’ve gotten older, but some of it definitely still lingers.

Still, Mary is…she’s not heartless enough to just ignore him right now.

Regulus has been off since yesterday morning.

He’s a bit more distant, eyes a bit fogged over. The man has never been talkative as long as Mary has known him, but even this silence feels a bit too much for Regulus. He avoided the beach like the plague and wore long sleeves with pants instead of the more appropriate for the temperature clothing he’d been wearing before. Regulus stuck to Lily’s side without fail the entire day and she saw multiple times where he would disappear for a while with either her, James, Sirius, or occasionally one of his friends.

This morning he’s looking a bit better, chewing on his toast at the island while watching James and Peter cook the rest of the group's breakfast. Despite looking better, Regulus still doesn’t look great, and Mary decides her plan from yesterday is still good to go and she hopes it helps him a little bit…or at least lets him know that he’s got more people who are here for him if he wants it.

Mary finishes her plate of food and smoothie, standing up and walking past Regulus. She discreetly places a bracelet she made next to Regulus’ plate when he’s not looking down in favor of quietly answering something Peter had asked him. He says nothing so Mary figures she’s good, continuing her way to the sink to place her dishes in it before leaving to the living room.

Regulus never mentions it, but she can see the bracelet on his wrist and watches him play with it multiple times throughout the day. The short glance and smile he gives her later that evening tells her that he knew it was from her and that he appreciates it.

Mary decides it’s time to completely get over that childhood discomfort of Regulus.

Evan was one of the last people in the house, as everyone else had left for the beach about thirty minutes ago. He was still nursing a hangover from the night before, easily the person with the weakest alcohol tolerance out of his friends since he only very recently started drinking in small increments, and didn’t feel like being in the sun yet, so he told everyone to go on ahead and promised he’d take care of lunch today to convince Barty in particular to leave.

It was just past ten and he knew everyone was going to be returning at noon, but he was still procrastinating before cooking by drinking his coffee, a type of coffee he will mourn never drinking again after leaving because it’s so good, and eating the pão de queijo that James and Pandora picked up after their morning run.

He was mentally cataloging all of the ingredients he needs for his lunch plans, tabbouleh and arayes since they’re one of Barty’s favorite dishes for Evan to make, when he hears footsteps coming down the stairs.

“Pettigrew?” He calls out as loud as he dares, knowing the other man is probably nursing a similar hangover, and gets a quiet hum in response right as Pettigrew walks through the doorframe and into view.

Of everyone in the other group, Evan probably knows the least about Pettigrew.

He obviously knows about Potter and Evans from Regulus and Mckinnon from Dorcas. He also knows about the older Black from Regulus and both Macdonald and Lupin from Pandora during her school years, but Pettigrew is a mystery to him.

Still, he can’t help but feel bad when Evan sees that the blond is wiping tears from his cheeks.

“Sorry,” he sniffles, his sleeves doing little to clear the tears when more replace them soon after, “I didn’t realize anyone was still here, I just need some painkillers, so I’ll be out of your way soon.”

Evan’s not the best at comforting people, that’s always been more of Pandora and Regulus’ thing, but he’s not a terrible person either so he barely thinks before telling Pettigrew, “you’re fine, there’s extra coffee and breakfast if you want to sit with me, I was just about to start cooking…you can taste test?”

It’s a weak offer, and even Evan can hear how unsure he sounds, but Pettigrew just stares at him in confusion before glancing behind him for a moment then back to Evan like he was talking to someone behind Pettigrew instead of Pettigrew himself.

“If you’re sure it’s not a bother then-”

“It’s not.”

They stare at each other for a few painful seconds until Pettigrew finally moves towards the cabinet holding the medication and starts making himself coffee.

It’s awkward, but Pettigrew looks like he feels a bit more comfortable with the uneasy air than Evan does, sitting himself down in one of the empty barstools and serving himself from the bowl of food.

“You were crying,” Evan says, not thinking, and he cringes a bit when he looks over at Pettigrew and sees him with a pão de queijo halfway to his mouth, eyes looking sideways at him. Pettigrew closes his mouth, setting the bread down with a slightly raised eyebrow as he turns towards Evan.

“I was.”

“Why?”

It’s not his business, not really, this should be something Pettigrew’s friends deal with and not him, but Pettigrew just chuckles a bit.

“Nightmare, I don’t get them often but occasionally they just hit really hard, you know?” Evan nods, oh boy does he know, “and alcohol tends to make it worse so I don’t drink too often anymore, but I figured it would be fine since it’s been months since it last happened, ‘course, it turned out that was a mistake.”

“Oh.”

Pettigrew snorts a bit, expression looking somewhere between amused and pitying.

“Also, you know you’re allowed to call me Peter, right? We’re adults now and some of our best friends are dating, so I like to think we’ve moved past the whole schoolhouse rivalry thing,” he shrugs, finally eating the bit of bread he wasn’t able to finish earlier, “you don’t have to, but I wanted you to know that you can.”

It’s weird to think about it like that, having grown up being taught that only your closest friends should be called by their first names to maintain emotional distance, but Evan thinks he’s right.

“Okay…Peter.”

Peter grins at him, “good, now you promised me taste testing privileges and I fully intend to brag about it to everyone else, so you better get cooking, Evan.”

Barty was willing to try the whole “mixing friend groups” for Regulus and Dorcas’ sake, but he drew the line at actually enjoying any of these people’s presences. 

Sure, it wasn’t nearly as bad as he thought it would be, and Barty’s found that most of the people here are halfway decent, but that doesn’t mean he actually liked any of them.

Nope, absolutely not.

Except…

“Here.”

Barty tosses the particularly pretty seashell he found over towards Macdonald, the little shell hitting her in the chest as she lifts her sunglasses in surprise. She blinks in confusion, looking in between the shell and Barty before her face morphs into suspicion.

“What are you doing, Crouch?”

He rolls his eyes.

“You’ve been collecting them the last few days and making jewelry, sue me for wanting to offer you another thing to fiddle with, but if you don’t fucking want it I can take it back.”

He holds out his hand to take it back, but Macdonald just picks it up and tightens her grip on it, glaring up at him.

“No, fuck you, you threw it at me so it’s mine now.”

Barty just shrugs and walks off, not looking back until he’s sitting back on his towel with his headphones in.

Look, he’ll never admit it out loud, but he’d been worried about her all morning. Barty’s known Macdonald for a small handful of years now and has never seen her look anything less than perfectly well done and put together, so watching her come downstairs last of everyone when she’s normally one of the first while looking the messiest he’s ever seen her and as if she’d been crying threw him off.

Normally he wouldn’t give her a second glance, figuring one of her actual friends would take care of it, but he kept watching her brush them off when any of them asked. For most of them she just smiled something dull and fake and told them she was fine and not to worry, but for Black he heard her tell him that she’d had a nightmare about “Mulciber” and that’s when Barty got the idea since he knew exactly what event she had dreamt about.

Course, he couldn’t just directly do something, he had a reputation to maintain after all, but Barty remembered that she’d spent most of their beach time collecting seashells and making jewelry each evening and went on a mission.

It wasn’t weird for him to not get in the water, Barty wasn’t the biggest fan of the ocean and much preferred pools or hot tubs, but he did see his friends giving him odd looks when they noticed him walking up and down the beach looking at the sand instead of tanning like he had been the last few days.

Still, no matter their opinion, his little gift makes Macdonald look a little lighter and less stuck in her memories as Barty watches her make his seashell and a few others into a necklace until it’s time to return to the house for Dorcas to start her night for dinner.

And if he genuinely smiles at her for the first time when she gives him the necklace she made that afternoon later that night with a quiet “thanks Barty,” then that’s just for him and Mary to know.

Remus was pleasantly surprised by how well this trip went.

He normally tends to believe James’ well meaning, if occasionally delusionally optimistic, plans to fix the rough air between the two main friend groups were doomed to fail. Remus knows everyone will play nice, Regulus will make sure of it with his group if only so James doesn’t get sad and Lily has the rest of them under threat of death if any of them so much as glare at the others, but he personally believed that after this trip everyone will still be as separated as before.

Except, well…

He’s wrong, or, at least, it looks like he’s going to be wrong.

By the time the trip is coming to an end, Remus is watching people who before either couldn’t stand to be near or hadn’t spoken more than two sentences to each other prior to this hangout like they’ve been friends for years. 

Peter has been in Barty and Evan’s orbit for days, the three making a terrifying trio that has Remus refusing to ask questions because he doesn’t want to know. Barty and Regulus are wearing jewelry obviously made by Mary and Pandora is joining James and Marlene on their morning workouts. Even Sirius, who was the most vocal about his negative thoughts about the trip and their new company, joined Regulus and his friends for a few hours in the city just the six of them and everyone returned smiling and uninjured. 

By the time it’s ending, Remus feels like he may be the only one who hasn’t actually made any headway into mending the gap between the groups. 

Sure, he’s good friends with Regulus despite the rough beginning of Remus being a poor scholarship kid in a rich private boarding school and Regulus being raised to believe…the way he did. Even after the even rougher patch after Remus and Sirius first started dating and Regulus decided he hated Remus for it, the two of them eventually figured it out and Remus doesn’t hesitate to call Regulus his friend anymore.

It’s the other four he’s less familiar with.

He knows Pandora from school, of course, but he’s never been close with her. There were a couple group hangouts where he mainly hung out with Lily or Regulus and a few times they were in the same club at school, but that is pretty much the extent of their relationship. The woman has always been kind to him, and would often be someone who reached out to include him when he was stuck against the wall, but Remus has always considered Pandora more of a “friend of friends” than he would an actual friend. 

Barty is more of a terrifying mystery than anything else. Him and Remus have probably only ever exchanged a handful of words, most of them being tense and short and with both of them wanting it to be over as soon as possible due to both of them knowing their father's rocky history with each other. Crouch Sr might as well have been a forbidden word in Remus’ household, being one of the few men he can confidently say his father truly hated, and Remus imagined the sentiment was similar in Barty’s household with the added threat of violence that Remus didn’t experience.

It was better for them to stay away from each other.

Evan is slightly different despite his relationship with Barty telling Remus it’s better to keep away. Both him and Remus are kind of the awkward people of their group, the introverts surrounded mostly by extroverts, so anytime there were group events the two of them tended to drift together once everyone else got too drunk and excitable to notice the quieter men of their groups were hanging out by the wall. They didn’t really talk during this time, and, again, Remus would struggle to call them actual friends in a sentiment he’s sure Evan would agree with, but Evan has become something of a comfort during those times.

But Dorcas…Dorcas was arguably the person he knew the least about.

Despite spending the most time with her out of the five of them on account of her dating Marlene and having gone to school together for seven years, Remus knows very little about her.

She’s always been kind to him, they’ve never had any issues, but Remus just…he just doesn’t know her like he feels like he should after all this and at this point he’s too anxious about it to try and actually interact with her more.

It’s a vicious cycle, and the world has always been cruel to him.

“Mind if I sit out here with you?” Dorcas asks from behind him, and Remus only startles a little before spinning around to see the woman standing in the doorway of the balcony. She’s got a pair of black pajama pants with little orange cats on him and an open jersey over her white tank top that Remus suspects is Marlene’s since the team on it is one she’s been rooting for since he met her. There’s a mug in her hand that she raises in question at the too long silence, and Remus shakes his head to clear the shock.

“Yeah, yeah of course no problem you can join yeah of course I-I don’t mind,” he manages to get out, internally cringing at his own rambles, but Dorcas doesn’t seem to mind as she nods in thanks before walking over and sitting in the chair next to him. 

Her eyes look tired as she stares off at the ocean view, occasionally sipping from the drink in her hands. 

“Is it an okay pain day?” She suddenly asks, nodding towards his cane instead of the forearm crutches he had the last two days, and he inhales sharply before answering.

“Yeah it, uh, it’s alright so far, mostly just my shoulders right now so Sirius has instructed me to take it easy and try to stick to the cane instead of crutches since they can sometimes make the shoulder pain worse…I’m being put on mandatory hot tub time later since the, uh, the hot water helps,” he explains, and Dorcas just smiles softly.

“Good, I’m glad it helps.”

The silence returns, Remus occasionally sneaking glances at her while she stares straight forwards, until eventually he blurts out, “are you alright?”

Dorcas just turns, raising her eyebrow in question, so Remus continues.

“It’s just…you seem kind of tired, and normally you spend breakfast with Marlene or your friends inside so I’m just…I’m just a little confused why you’re…”

“Out here with you?” He nods, and Dorcas shrugs, taking another sip of her drink. “I had a rough night's sleep, my father called last night and let’s just say it’s never a great day when he calls, and though Marls and my friends are great when stuff like this happens, I don’t really want anger at the moment…they all hate my family, after all.”

He nods in understanding, even if he doesn’t know the fine details of her family issues Remus does know enough to know that a call is never good.

“And besides, we are friends, Remus, you do know that, yes?” She asks, even though the look in her eyes says it’s not really a question.

It may be phrased like one, but he knows that this is Dorcas telling Remus they are friends, no questions asked.

“I…yes, I do.”

It’s a lie and by the little smirk Remus knows that Dorcas knows it is, but she doesn’t try to fight him on it.

“You’re a good man, Remus, thank you for letting me sit out here with you,” she nods towards the house, “you should join Reg, Pans, B, Evan, and I for our game of Here to Slay later. Pandora brought it with her, and I think you’ll be good at it. Plus, I could use a buddy to team with me against Evan and Barty and Regulus and Pandora, they always duo up against me.”

“I…okay,” he agrees, and she smiles.

“Wonderful.”