They boarded the Knight Bus after breakfast, and were soon zooming around the countryside at breakneck speed. Peter kept getting bored and trying to talk to Sirius, whom he was closest to. Sirius wished he wouldn’t, because he felt as though he were about to be violently sick. He wasn’t sure which was making him feel worse: getting thrown around by the violent movement of the triple-decker bus, or the reason he was on the stupid thing in the first place.
Vega Black had been his favorite aunt. Sirius had looked upon her almost as a mother, since his own mother seemed completely devoid of maternal feelings (for Sirius, at least). When Sirius had run away from home the summer after fifth year, his first instinct had been to go straight to Jocelyn’s, where he knew Aunt Vega would welcome him with open arms. But as it had happened, Jocelyn’s family was on holiday in France, and so he had wound up at James’s instead. Sirius thought back to that day. It was the last time he’d ridden the Knight Bus. He remembered it as though it had been yesterday.
He had been home for merely a week when the storm hit. His mother had been fawning over Regulus, as usual, complementing him on his excellent marks, and generally being sickening.
“And next year, when the letter comes, I think we know who’ll be the new Slytherin Prefect,” she cooed, shooting a nasty look at Sirius.
Something inside Sirius had snapped.
“Yeah, Reg, that’ll be great,” he said loudly. “Give you even more opportunity to curse all those Muggle-borns.”
Regulus had flushed, but his mother’s face turned ugly.
“At least Regulus shows a little loyalty to his bloodline,” she snarled. “That’s more than can be said for you!”
“Yeah, that’s right,” Sirius shouted wildly. “The embarrassing family blood-traitor, that’s me!”
Mrs. Black looked as though she were about to explode.
“You have been the bane of my existence since you were born, boy!” she growled. “All we’ve had with you is problems! Problems with you at school, problems with your beliefs, problems with “!”
But exactly what other problems his mother had with him, Sirius didn’t wait around to find out.
“You know what?” he interrupted her loudly. “I’m going to fix all those problems for you. I’m leaving!”
“You can’t do that!” his mother shrieked in alarm.
Sirius had smiled coolly, acting much braver than he felt.
“I think I’ll try anyway,” he told her placidly. In five minutes time he’d had his things packed and was heading out the front door. The last glimpse he’d gotten of his mother was of her cursing his name off the tapestry of the family tree.
Once out on the streets he’d turned right, intending to walk the few blocks to Jocelyn’s. But then he’d remembered with a jolt that she was on holiday in France, and would not return for another six weeks. And that was how he’d ended up stumbling out of the Knight Bus onto James’s front porch. James had answered the door, taken one look at Sirius, standing there with all of his worldly belongings, and then his face had broken into a grin.
“Family troubles, Padfoot?”
Sirius had lived with the Potters ever since. As he was thrown against Peter for the hundredth time, Sirius reflected how much better that last trip had been. He’d been riding to freedom then. Now he was riding to death. As horrible as this ride was, Sirius wasn’t sure he wanted it to end. He didn’t think he could bear what was waiting for him at the end of it.
Alphard Black had been in his mid-fifties when he married Vega McKinnon, a very pretty witch in her early thirties. He had aged very well. A man thirty years younger might have looked older and been in worse physical condition. When Sirius greeted him after climbing off the Knight Bus however, he looked every bit his seventy-one years. His hair, which three months earlier had been a distinguished salt-and-pepper (lighter on salt), was now almost completely white; his once finely chiseled face seemed to suddenly consist of nothing but saggy wrinkles, and there was a definite stoop in his shoulders that Sirius had never noticed before.
“Well, young Sirius,” he said, his voice coming out in a thin, raspy quaver that was so unlike his former, commanding tone. “Good to see you.”
Sirius, not knowing if he ought to look happy or sad about this meeting, and unsure if he was supposed to say something like, “So kind of you to let us stay,” or something comforting, compromised by looking extremely sick and nodding slightly as his uncle grasped his shoulder.
Jocelyn was the last to come off the bus, and Sirius saw at once that she and her father needed privacy. He therefore herded James, Remus, Peter, and Lily up into the house, leaving Jocelyn and her father out in the garden to grieve together in peace.
“This is dead depressing,” Lily moaned, flopping onto one of the squashy sofas in the sitting room. “I’ve never felt worse in my whole life.”
“Yeah, and that Knight Bus didn’t exactly help things,” groaned James, flopping onto the other one, his face looking rather green.
“Isn’t it time for tea yet?” questioned Peter, examining the small clock on the mantel, which at the moment had its only hand pointing rather unhelpfully, in Sirius’s opinion, to the words You’re Late. “I’m starving.”
He, James, Lily, and Remus all looked expectantly at Sirius, as though waiting for him to do something.
“Er “ right,” he said awkwardly. “I’ll go see what I can find.”
He wandered boredly across the hall, pulled open the kitchen door “ and froze, horrified by the sight that met his eyes.
The room was in ruins. The two windows in front of the sink had been shattered; a cold wind was blowing through them, whipping at the shredded remains of the curtains. Smashed cups and cracked plates littered the floor. Cupboard doors had been ripped off, or were hanging from one hinge in splinters. Worst of all were the fiery letters that seemed to be written on everything: WARNING! UNDER MINISTRY SURVEILLANCE. DO NOT TOUCH! It was all too much for Sirius. Fighting the impulse to scream, he backed slowly out of the kitchen. Then he turned and ran, past Lily and the Marauders, (“Where are you going?” “Did you get that tea?”); past Jocelyn and her father, sitting together on a garden bench; past the group of Muggles walking down Jocelyn’s street; past a row of shops a few blocks over; past a lone Muggle waiting at a bus stop. He ran until his legs refused to run any longer, and when he finally stopped, he did not know where he was.
Lily Evans had never been in a wizard house before. Jocelyn was always promising to invite her during the summer holidays, but these plans were always being delayed due to Alphard and Vega’s fondness for holidaying abroad.
“Sorry Lils, next summer, I promise!” were always Jocelyn’s parting words as her parents ushered her from King’s Cross station.
Not that Lily hadn’t received other invitations to wizarding households; James Potter owled her invitations to his house at least once a week. But even with Petunia making everyone miserable, Lily didn’t think she’d ever be that desperate.
“Is that a letter from one of your school friends, dear?” her mother would ask over Petunia’s screeches that owls were “unsanitary”, and should not be allowed to swoop into houses, dropping letters on people’s heads during breakfast.
“No,” Lily would answer flatly, and that would be the end of it until the owl returned a week later.
So this was the first time Lily had ever been in a wizarding home, but she found she could not enjoy the experience properly. She had never felt more awkward in her life. She didn’t blame Sirius for running out; she had been fighting the instinct to bolt from the moment she’d stepped through the doorway. All the same, she wished he hadn’t, because she would have felt a lot more comfortable if he had been there.
“Anyone want to play chess?” Peter suggested tentatively. He had evidently given up on the idea of tea.
Lily opened her mouth to accept when she caught the expressions on James and Remus’s faces. They were both looking coldly at Peter, as though they didn’t think this was the moment for chess. Lily quickly shut her mouth again, just as her stomach gave a low rumble. She wanted to go see if she could find something to eat, but had gotten the impression from Sirius that there was something horrible in the kitchen, and therefore was not sure she actually wanted to go into it. She was beginning to suspect that that might have been where Vega was when she’d been attacked. Lily had finally decided to go lie down in her room, when she realized she didn’t know where her room was.
“You’ll be staying in the room next to Jocelyn’s. Up the stairs, second door on your left,” James directed her when she asked.
And so Lily found herself in a very neat, lavender bedroom, lying boredly on the comfortable bed. She had never been so depressed in her life.
The funeral was held the next day. Lily had never been to anything more depressing. Wizarding families from all over the country came to give their (in Lily’s opinion, useless) condolences. Even Professor Dumbledore had come. Lily met the families of several of her schoolmates she knew by sight, but had never spoken to. The McKinnons had all come, of course. Lily spotted Alice McKinnon, a round-faced, very pleasant Gryffindor sixth-year prefect, with her boyfriend, a seventh-year Ravenclaw prefect, Frank Longbottom. Lily recognized Fabian Prewett, who had been Head Boy the year before. Sirius pointed out Fabian’s sister, Molly, who was there with her husband, Arthur Weasley, and their two small sons, Bill and Charlie. Sirius also introduced her to his cousin Andromeda, her husband, Ted Tonks, and daughter, Nymphadora.
Jocelyn didn’t introduce her to anyone, but Lily wasn’t offended. Jocelyn hadn’t spoken to any of them since they had boarded the Knight Bus the day before. She sat throughout the entire service staring straight ahead, her expression blank. Her father sat beside her, hunched over in his chair, his face in his hands. Lily couldn’t recall ever seeing anything sadder. As the service ended and Alphard Black hobbled to his feet, Lily reflected that he looked ready to collapse. Which is perhaps why it should not have been such a great shock to her when, a moment later, he did so.
Sirius sat miserably in the waiting room of St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. People surrounded him, but none of them were speaking to him. There had been an instant uproar when Alphard had collapsed. Jocelyn had screamed, several people had gasped, and Alice McKinnon had burst into tears. Then there had been a few minutes of general pandemonium as everybody began suggesting what to do at the same time. Andromeda Tonks and Molly Weasley got into a very nasty argument over whether or not he ought to be moved, and were only silenced when Dumbledore had made several loud firecrackers shoot out the end of his wand (which Andromeda muttered was very bad for Alphard in his current condition). Sirius wasn’t sure what had happened after that, because Dumbledore had forced all of the younger witches and wizards out of the room. And so he, the other Marauders, Jocelyn, Lily, Frank, Alice, and Fabian sat together in a miserable silence until they were called for and sent to St. Mungo’s half-an-hour later.
Sirius was now seated next to Jocelyn in a hard-backed chair, hearing, but not actually listening to the buzz of half a dozen conversations (Lily, the other Marauders, Alice, Frank, and Fabian had all gone off in search of tea). Andromeda and Molly were still arguing in low hisses, while Arthur was excitedly questioning Ted (whom he’d discovered was Muggle-born) about escalators. Dumbledore was conversing in low tones with two of the Healers. At long last he nodded once, and came over to Sirius and Jocelyn, looking very serious.
“If I may have a word, Mr. Black,” he said quietly to Sirius. Sirius nodded, and followed Dumbledore over to a corner. A few minutes later he returned to Jocelyn, his stomach churning.
“What was that about?” she questioned, speaking to him for the first time in nearly two days.
Sirius bit his lip.
“Your father.”
“What did he say?” she asked eagerly. “Do they know what’s wrong with him?”
Sirius nodded mutely, staring at her.
“Well,” she demanded, “what is it?”
Sirius didn’t want to tell her. He looked straight into her eyes, bracing himself for what he had to do. Finally he took a deep, shuddering breath.
“Jocelyn,” he said quietly, “he’s dying.”
A/N: I told you (or did I?) it was going to get depressing! But don’t worry, it’ll get better soon (although I’m not making any promises! ;))… Anyway, I’m going on vaca, so I won’t be able to update until next Saturday (August 13) at earliest! (no internet where I'm going :( ) In the meantime, keep up the excellent work you’ve all been doing by continuing to review! Peace out my homies! ~ Trinsy