Letter from Sirius Black to Regulus Black
October 30, 1971
Regulus,
Why don’t you just get Kreacher to follow you up to the attic by making him think you’re up to something, then when he walks through the door, run out and lock him in. That should give you at least enough time to get the keys to that big cabinet in father’s study. The cards are on the top shelf. Be careful when you reach in though because the last time I was in that cabinet a Claw of Fortune grabbed at my wrist.
Me and Potter have a fantastic idea for the Halloween feast. Remus told us about this wicked old tradition called Trick-or-Treat where you go around making people give you sweets and if they don’t you prank them. Brilliant, huh? Ana says no one here does that or dresses in fancy dress costume but we’re going to start a new tradition. I’m not telling you what we have planned for the feast but I’ll write you about it in my next letter if it works. Only if Potter doesn’t skive off, he can be a nance sometimes, I don’t know if I trust him yet.
Mum sent me a short letter but she didn’t say anything about your trip to Spain. She’s never taken me anywhere like that. Was it nice?
She reminded me again of my responsibilities to the family and that I’d get my punishment when I get home for holiday. Do you know what she’s got planned? Perhaps she’s calmed down a bit since September tho, but I’m sure she’ll clobber me no matter what.
She did send me some spending money though so I asked Ana to pick up some more ink for me in Hogsmeade today. I like the blue. Ana also bought me (with my money though, the tart) a pack of Exploding Snap cards. They’re wicked fun, you’d love them. I’ll bring them home at holiday so we can play.
Classes are really easy. I dunno if it’s because I’m pureblood that the magic comes so easy for me or if the classes are just that easy. We learned this wicked spell called “Ustulo”. Nick mum’s wand if you can and try it on Grandmother when she’s sleeping and write me back to tell me what happens. Don’t let her see you do it though, she might clobber you.
Ana’s been great but she’s not as much fun here as she is at home because here she is a prefect. She ratted on Potter and me when she caught us peeking over a private wall out on the edge of the school grounds. I could have broken something when I fell off Potter’s shoulders but it was great Peter was there to cushion my fall. Worst part is she caught us before I got a good look.
I heard Bella got detention yesterday. Cissy told me but she didn’t say why. I bet she was caught snogging another boy. She’s such a trollop. I’ll have to take the mickey out of her next time I see her. She’s stopped hexing me in the halls for no reason though, at least for now. I think Ana said something to her.
Has father been home much? He has not written to me once yet. Perhaps he’s very busy. I hope he’s not still angry about the sorting. I explained myself best I could in the letter to him and mother that the headmaster refused to resort me.
Be nice to get a letter from him though.
I have to make this short. Remus is sick and stuck in the infirmary today and Potter, Peter, and I promised we’d sneak him in some sweets past Madam Pomfrey she’s the school nurse.
Write me back,
Sirius
PS “ Did Raven bite you again?
Chapter 5
October 30, 1971
“I don’t see why we have to be in third year to go to Hogsmeade,” James complained.
“It’s rubbish,” Sirius sulked. He was slouching in what he had found in his first two months at school was the most comfortable chair by the fire, his legs stretched out in a “V” in front of him and both arms slung out over the sides of the chair.
It was a blustery, cool October morning and the wind could be heard whistling though the miniscule cracks and crevices of the Gryffindor tower. A few of the female upperclassmen screamed when one of the windows suddenly came unhooked and blew papers all around the room. A fifth year boy ran over to the rescue to shut it.
“Perhaps we could get a petition signed by students to let the younger years go and we could give it to the headmaster?” Peter offered.
“That would take ages, Peter,” James complained.
“And that doesn’t help us today,” Sirius said with a shake of his head.
“And it’s too windy outside for the…you-know-what,” James said.
One more reason Sirius was beginning to like James Potter was the fact that he had inherited a very rare invisibility cloak, which…the boys were beginning to learn, came in very handy for four mischievous first years.
“It wouldn’t keep us hidden with this wind,” Sirius added. “Besides, Peter’s enormous feet need a cloak of their own.”
“Shut up, Black!” James hissed, casting an uneasy glance about the room.
“What?”
“Why don’t you just announce it to the common room about my you-know-what?” James whispered this last bit.
“Sod off,” Sirius rolled his eyes.
“We don’t even know how to get to Hogsmeade,” Peter said.
“We would have followed the older students, you tit.” Sirius shrugged. “Just they wouldn’t have known we were following.”
Peter flinched. Sirius loved making the boy twitch. He could tell Peter was still a bit afraid of him. Being a Black had its perks.
James snapped his finger with an idea.
“What about your cousin?” He pointed to Sirius. James had been walking back and forth in front of the fire. “The prefect. The one that’s nice to you, maybe she would pick some up for us?”
“I already asked her and she said no,” Sirius grumbled. “Said she didn’t trust me.”
“Why would she not trust you?” James asked.
Sirius’ crooked grin was all the answer James needed.
“How are we going to get it then? The potion won’t work without it, will it?” Peter asked.
“The book says we need three drops.” Sirius raised his hands in frustration and groaned, “Three bloody drops!”
“Is there a substitute?” Peter suggested.
James shook his head then added, “I can’t believe we couldn’t get it out of the professor’s stockroom. He came in right when we found it. We were so close!”
“Shame,” Sirius sighed heavily and stared into the fire.
“Well,” James matched Sirius’s sigh, “instead of stropping up here we might as well go see if Remus is feeling better. We could share our plans for Treat-or-Tricking.”
“Trick-or-Treating,” Peter corrected.
“What?” James said.
Sirius shook his head; for someone so clever Potter could be truly thick. “C’mon,” he said as he pulled himself out of the comfortable chair and headed towards the portrait hole. James and Peter followed.
~*~*~*~
“Good one, Peter!” James hooted. Sirius stopped on the front steps, bent over and held his sides, which hurt so badly from laughing.
They were headed back to Gryffindor tower by way of the front doors. Saturdays meant free time and with most of the older students in Hogsmeade for the day, the school grounds seemed empty. The boys had spent the early afternoon killing time by the lake attempting to pelt the giant squid with rocks.
Remus decided to try to one-up Peter. He was still looking a little peaky, but he had told the other boys that Madam Pomfrey kept him a bit longer than she should have. He said he’d been feeling better since yesterday. Sirius watched as Remus took a deep breath, swallowed, took another deep breath and swallowed that down then repeated the process again. He cocked his head forward and let out the loudest, deepest, most obscene belch Sirius had ever heard. It echoed off the stone walls of the Front Hall.
“I felt the bloody floor rattle, Lupin!” Sirius shook with laughter.
“Whoo!” James waved his hand in front of his nose, laughing and gasping for breath. “Remus what did Pomfrey feed you for lunch?”
“Erumpent soup?” Peter suggested with a snort.
“Smells more like erumpent dung,” James said.
“Still smells better than his blasted feet,” Sirius added.
Remus was leaning on Peter, laughing too hard to stand on his own.
James started bounding up the stairs and the other boys followed. Sirius, still catching his breath, stayed behind, leaning up against the wall for support as he watched his three mates ascend the staircase.
Mates?
A know-it-all pureblood, a pudgy know-little pureblood, and a bookish Mudblood…were they his friends? They did most everything together anymore. And, although a bit begrudgingly, Sirius had to admit that James was one of the most brilliant people he’d ever met. They were a lot alike. They thought in the same patterns and were both very good in their classes without putting forth much effort. It was like hanging out with a brother the same age, or at least an older Regulus. Much cooler than anyone he’d ever met at any do he’d ever attended with his family. James was a pureblood though, so he could appreciate that. Of course Sirius would like him.
Sirius thought of Regulus. He wondered what he was doing. Surely he wasn’t having as much fun at home as Sirius was at school because Sirius had never had this much fun in his life. School was amazing even though he had to go to classes and all that tosh because it was his three dorm mates that made it so.
He’d definitely have to make it up to Regulus over the winter holidays. There was loads he could teach him already, let alone the wicked things he’d learned of since coming here; Stink Pellets, Screaming Yo-yos, Whizzing Worms, and the coveted Dungbombs (although Sirius had yet to get his hands on some). He and Regulus had never had many toys or games as small children, anything that made noise or had any stench to it at all would not have been allowed in the House of Black. They were left to their own devices and made up play games where they were Werewolves, Pirates, or Vampires and they had been happy enough with that. Both he and Regulus had overactive imaginations, or so their mother had always said.
“Oi, Sirius! You coming?” James called from the first landing.
Sirius smiled up at him but his answer was cut off by a booming voice calling from down the hall.
“Mr. Black!” Sirius turned to see Professor Slughorn waddling towards him. “Mr. Black I’d like to have a word.”
Sirius’s eyes widened and he shook his head at the Professor. “I didn’t do anything!” Sirius said defensively.
Slughorn laughed heavily and his big belly shook. “No, m’boy, no no! You’re not in any trouble, I would just like to have a little chat with you in my office if I could.”
Sirius shot James a grimace as Slughorn wrapped his arm around his shoulders and escorted him in the direction of the his office. They walked the long way down to the dungeons, Slughorn rambling the entire walk down to the musty room, and Sirius had tried to seem interested by nodding. He still wasn’t completely sure he wasn’t in some kind of trouble.
“Have a seat, m’boy!” Slughorn beamed as he plopped down behind his desk.
“I’m not sure why you asked me here, Professor.” Sirius sat gingerly while his eyes roamed the wall of shelves behind Slughorn and instantly located a small, yellow bottle of Puffer-fish Oil. The same bottle he, James, and Peter had tried to nick just hours earlier.
Slughorn grinned at him with a ravishing glint in his eye. Sirius had a fleeting feeling he was a fat, juicy piece of meat and Professor Slughorn had suddenly turned into an extremely famished blood-sucking Bugbear.
Sirius checked the distance from here to the door out of the corner of his eye.
“Mr. Black,” the professor began.
Sirius’s eyes shot back to the professor.
Slughorn sighed as he pivoted back and forth in his chair, his hands in front of his chest, fingertips touching, still surveying him and smiling.
“Sirius, m’boy.”
“Yes, sir?”
“Are you familiar with Ambrosius Flume?” Slughorn asked with a smile.
“Ambrosius what?”
“Flume, m’boy, Flume,” Slughorn chuckled.
“I’m sorry, sir, I don’t know what that is.” And honestly Sirius didn’t care. But he did care about that little yellow bottle…if he could just figure out a way to get the bloody thing.
Slughorn let out a throaty laugh, “It’s a who, m’boy, not a what!”
Sirius grinned sheepishly. “Well, there’s your answer, I don’t know him.”
“Owner of Honeydukes! You do know Honeydukes, don’t you boy?”
“I’ve heard of it, yeah,” Sirius answered roughly. He didn’t appreciate the Professor’s condescending attitude. “It’s a sweets shop, really good chocolate,” Sirius said with a nod.
“He was one of mine in the day.” Slughorn puffed out his chest.
Sirius scrunched his eyebrows in confusion. “One of yours, sir?”
“Slug Club!” Slughorn beamed.
“Slug Club?”
Slughorn leaned forward and rested a chubby elbow on his desk. “Only the brightest and best of Hogwarts, the Slug Club.” He lowered his voice and mock whispered behind his hand, “’Course Dumbledore doesn’t know much about it, it’s my secret little club.”
Sirius’s eyebrows rose and he nodded slowly. He didn’t know what to say to that.
Slughorn leaned back into his chair with a sigh and rested his hands on his lapels. He narrowed his eyes as if inspecting Sirius and added, “You’re a noble and a pureblood. I like those characteristics. And with the surname ‘Black’ you’re someone I’d very much like in my collection.”
“Collection, sir?” Sirius wasn’t some trinket this man could show off to his friends. Sirius was the heir to his family. He didn’t need to be part of a silly club.
“Just a figure of speech, m’boy. But all the Blacks that have been in my club have been in Slytherin. I’m not prejudice,” Slughorn added quickly, shaking a pudgy palm at Sirius, “Gryffindors are welcome too! There are a few Ravenclaws this year as well.”
Slughorn stopped and stared at him. Sirius stared back.
“Well?” Slughorn asked.
“Well what?” Sirius asked back.
“What d’you say, boy? Are you going to join?”
“I don’t know.” Sirius shrugged, “I’m not big on clubs.”
Slughorn’s jaw dropped. For a moment he was shocked into silence.
“You’re a first year, boy! I don’t usually snag first years. You’re an exception. You’re a Black, Sorted into Gryffindor, that’s never happened before! We’ll see some interesting things coming from you I’m sure. I just have to have you!”
“Have to have me, sir?”
Slughorn looked around fumbling for more to say. He wasn’t usually snubbed like this. All the students wanted to part of his club. He was literally speechless.
Sirius glanced up above Slughorn to the Puffer-fish Oil then back down to Slughorn and something occurred to him. First of all, Slughorn was head of Slytherin House and it sounded as though this club was for the elite of the school. If Sirius joined this “Slug Club” perhaps that would make up for the fact that Sirius wasn’t Sorted into Slytherin, perhaps that was something his father could be proud of him for? Second, he needed that bloody little yellow bottle.
“Slug Club, huh?” Sirius narrowed one eye.
“Yeah, boy, give it a try,” Slughorn said with a prodding smile.
“Sure,” Sirius said resolutely. “But…” Sirius licked his lips, “…perhaps there’s a little something you could do for me first.”
Sirius smiled his most charming smile and it’s was Professor Slughorn’s eyebrows that shot up this time.
~*~*~*~
“You bloody well did not!” James shouted from his bed.
“I did.” Sirius was grinning from ear to ear. His eyes sparkled with an insane amount of self-appreciation.
Eat that, Potter.
“What the hell.” James ran one hand through his mussed up hair and ogled at the bottle in the other.
“How did you get it?” Remus asked in surprise, hurrying towards James’s bed from his own.
“Doesn’t matter now,” Sirius smirked.
“You nicked the whole bottle?” Peter asked, amazed.
Sirius smiled proudly then swiped the bottle from James’s hand.
“Pick up your chin, Potter, we have work to do,” he said and started towards their bathroom.
The three boys scurried in after him.
~*~*~*~
Sirius lay on his stomach on his bed with all the curtains shut around him. It was late and the other boys were asleep. He and James were usually the last to do so and James had just turned in for the night.
Sirius himself couldn’t sleep.
Halloween 1971 was going to be one for the history books. He scratched his nose, bit his bottom lip, and scribbled more notes onto the parchment he and James had been working on.
One: Swelling Solution.
Merlin anoint James Potter with some sort of hair product to tame that atrocious rat’s nest he calls hair for his superb potion making skills.
Two: Time Release Spell.
Merlin bless Remus Lupin with piles and loads of musty old books, which he loves for some odd reason, for his ability to accidentally run across obscure spells.
Three: Decoy.
Merlin help Peter Pettigrew keep his brilliant ability to gab endlessly to teachers about nothing enabling him to avert attention away from where it is not wanted.
Result: To be determined…
Sirius grinned wickedly down at the parchment before rolling it up and tucking it safely in his side table drawer.
~*~*~*~
October 31, 1971
The Great Hall was adorned with the usual floating candles, the tables were laden with huge platters of delicious amounts of food, and scattered all around the room at each table sat great, massive, carved pumpkins.
Sirius counted; there must have been nearly a hundred of them.
The Halloween Feast was definitely a big to-do at Hogwarts. Crepe paper in orange, yellow, black; ghoulish masks along with the Jack-o-lanterns lined the tables in decoration for the feast. The headmaster was sitting, chatting animatedly to Professor McGonagall as most of the other teachers filed in to the room, socializing as they did so.
Meanwhile, the four Gryffindor first year boys sat huddled at one end of their house table, unbeknownst to most, at a safe distance.
“Are you sure you got all of them?” Sirius whispered. He and James were sitting; backs to the wall, so they could have a view of the entire Great Hall.
“Yes!” James hissed at him, “we got them all. Stop fidgeting!” He pushed his hand onto Sirius’s leg to force it to stop shaking.
Sirius scanned the room as it filled with students. But they were taking too long; everyone was taking their time to reach their seats, giggling and horsing around, in no rush and a generally festive mood.
“They need to bloody hurry up,” Sirius said through clenched teeth.
“Would you sit still?” Remus whispered breathlessly from across the table, “You’re making me crazy.”
Remus’s eyes were big as saucers with the air of someone generally terrified about life and he looked as though he was about to lose his lunch. Peter was chewing on his fingernails, turning his head every few seconds to look behind him and gawk at the room. James sat next to Sirius, a bundle of nervous energy himself. He kept literally bobbing up and down in his seat, pushing his glasses up his nose and running his hand through his hair.
“I’m going to go mental if they don’t just sit down!” Sirius threatened.
“You’re already mental,” James added. “And you’re going to blow it if you do anything. Just shut up!”
“Peter, stop looking about! It makes you look suspicious!” Sirius hissed.
Peter flinched and grabbed his goblet to take a drink, simply for something to do.
“Shut up!” James thumped Sirius on the arm.
“Ow! Wanker!”
“We should have never done this,” Remus said as he shook and bowed his head down at his empty plate in front of him.
“Stop being such a tosser. It’s going to work brilliantly!”
“Sirius, Slughorn’s going to know who did this. He’s not thick!” Remus said.
“He shouldn’t have bloody well given me the potion then!” Sirius responded.
“He’s going to know it was you.” Remus added, borderline frantic, “and subsequently us!”
“Calm down,” Sirius shrugged before a wicked grin crossed his face, he nearly cackled with excitement. “Oh it will be so bloody worth detention though if we get Bella.” He turned to James, “As long as Potter got all of them.”
“I got them all, you git! I already told you!”
Bustling older students, hyped up from a busy day out, chatted endlessly about Hogsmeade. Younger years, lucky enough to be acquainted with older students returning from Hogsmeade, were frenzied from and abundance of sweets brought back. The overall feel of the Great Hall that evening was one of over-excitement - or possibly - a feeling that something could explode at any moment.
Little did most of the student body know that that indeed was about to happen.
The first one to go was sitting in the middle of the poor Hufflepuff table. Some unsuspecting second year caught the blunt of most of it. The next one to go, just seconds later, was at the Slytherin table.
Sirius’s body tensed involuntarily and he let out a small squeak of excitement.
Two more went off at the Ravenclaw table at the same time.
Boom! Boom!
Everywhere popping and booming and explosions, one after another, as the Time Release Spell went into action. Bits of pumpkin, once carved into Halloween Jack-o-lanterns, sprayed from each table as they blew up and all over startled students. The Swelling Potion was a success as chunks of the massive orange gourds and glops of the mushy flesh insides flew in the air as if in a display of messy fireworks.
Where there were once happy and contented students, ready to feast on a holiday meal, were now a roomful of screaming and frantic students.
Sirius positively shook in laughter when he caught sight of his cousin, Bellatrix, covered from head to toe in sopping pumpkin pulp, screeching like a banshee as she stormed out of the Great Hall, pushing and shoving those around her as she sped out. James too was doubled over in delight. They gave each other a look of satisfaction in a job well done. Their first combined prank, and what a fantastic prank it was, pulled off to perfection.
Until they felt a warm, chubby hand resting on their shoulders. Sirius turned slowly and looked up onto the face of Professor Slughorn.
Bugger
~*~*~*~
Completely exhausted and smelling of dragon manure, Sirius trudged up the staircase to the dorm. He, James, and Peter had finished clearing Hagrid’s garden, which was punishment for the pumpkin fiasco. James and Peter had stopped by the pitch to watch Quidditch practice but Sirius, not used to physical labor or smelling of rotten vegetables and animal feces, wanted nothing more than to wash up and go to bed.
When he entered the dorm, Remus was the only occupant. He was sitting on his pillow; legs outstretched in front of him, with something flat and square sitting in his lap. He looked up when Sirius entered.
“Hullo,” Remus greeted him with a small smile.
Sirius raised an eyebrow at him and crossed the room to Remus’s bed. He fell back in a boneless heap of unwashed, smelly boy at Remus’s feet.
“Oi!” Remus shouted playfully, “get your filthy self off my clean bed!”
Sirius smirked and comically wiggled his filthy self all over Remus’s bed.
Still lying on his back, he stopped his squirming and pointed a grimy, stained finger up at Remus.
“I don’t understand how you got out of detention. You’re at fault as much as the rest of us. You found that bloody spell in one of your musty old books.”
“I just told you about that spell,” Remus answered shyly. “I didn’t expect you to actually use it.”
Sirius wiggled more and Remus laughed as he playfully tossed the flat, square object onto Sirius’s stomach.
“You’re mental,” Remus snickered.
Sirius reached blindly for the item and held it up over his head for inspection. He opened it and looked at the pictures inside. Four longhaired men looked back at him. They didn’t move; they just looked blankly back at him. It wasn’t a book. There was a stack of similar items sitting neatly on Remus’s bedside table.
“What’s this?” Sirius asked.
Remus looked up and rolled his eyes, “Don’t be daft.”
Sirius lay on his back, holding up the item and examining it. It looked like some sort of thin, square book with no pages or maybe a wall hanging of some sort. He didn’t know anyone who would hang this sort of item on the wall though; certainly no one in his family. And why would Remus have an entire stack of them?
Sirius slyly peered over at Remus. He was a bit taken aback when he noticed Remus was watching him.
“You really don’t know what that is?” Remus asked gently.
Sirius shyly shook his head. He was not used to not knowing things.
“It’s a record.”
“A what?” Sirius asked.
“A record. An album.”
“What does it do?” Sirius asked.
Remus smiled. “It plays music.” He took the album from Sirius and pulled the record from its sleeve. “This is the Beatles’ White Album.”
“It’s black though,” Sirius stated the obvious.
Remus chortled, “I know it’s black, all records are black. This record is called the White Album.”
“Why?” Sirius asked.
“Because that’s what the musicians’ named it.”
Sirius pulled a face. “Why would they deliberately call a black album white? That makes no sense.” He rolled his eyes and mumbled something under his breath that Remus thought sounded a lot like, “Muggles.”
“A lot of the Beatles records make no sense,” Remus added with a shrug.
“How do you get the music out of it?”
“You have to play them on a victrola. It spins the record around really fast and a needle vibrates and it sounds like music through a large cone or speaker of sorts.”
“Do you have a victrola?”
“Yeah.”
Remus slid down to the floor and pulled a large box out from under his bed. He reached under again and drew out a large funnel shaped object?.
“That thing will play the record?”
“Yeah, just wait.”
As Remus lugged the box onto his bedside table, Sirius sat up and craned his neck to watch him assemble the music player. Once ready, Remus took the record from Sirius and placed it on the turntable. He dropped the needle onto the record and started turning the crank.
Sirius listened for a moment then pulled a face.
“Who’s Bungalow Bill?”
Remus snickered, “No one. It’s just a song. Here, here’s another.”
Sirius listened, trying hard to understand what was coming out of the music machine.
“Ob-la-what? What are they saying?” Sirius scrunched his face.
“Ob-la-di-ob-la-da.”
“Why are they saying that?”
Remus snorted and shrugged, “I don’t know.”
Sirius pulled a face, “Beetles, huh? I don’t think I like your buggy Muggle music.”
“There’s others,” Remus nodded towards his stack of records. “My mum gave them to me. They were hers.”
“They’re from your mother?”
“Yeah,” Remus answered, his cheeks reddening.
“She gave all those to you?”
“Yeah,” Remus said. “She’s a music teacher in a Muggle school. She loves all kinds of music. These are just a few from her collection.”
“Wow.” Sirius couldn’t believe someone would have that many records in their home. But he also couldn’t remember ever hearing music played in Grimmauld Place. He had heard music before at his aunt and uncle’s at holidays, but mostly from a magicked piano. And, no one ever really listened to it.
“That’s cool,” he added with an impressed nod.
Remus smiled, “Yeah, it is cool. My mum thought if I brought them it might help me make friends.” His ears turned pink as soon as he realized what he’d said.
There was an awkward silence.
“Why wouldn’t you be able to make friends on your own? Because she’s a Muggle?” Sirius asked without much thought.
“No,” Remus answered indignately, busying himself with the records.
Sirius raised his eyebrows in surprise. His first thought was he wondered if his own mother ever thought about that sort of thing. The second thing to immediately pop into his had was; probably not. Remus was the only wizard in his dorm that had a Muggle parent and there was something definitely different about Remus because of it; but Sirius couldn’t put his finger on it…and that was maddening.
There was another long, awkward silence.
“Remus?” Sirius played with the corner of the bed covers. He was not sure if he should push further but his curiosity was getting the better of him.
“What?” Remus answered, purposely still distracted.
“What’s it like…” Sirius chewed on his bottom lip thinking of the right words. “I guess, what’s it like living with a Muggle?”
Remus’s turned, brows furrowed. He didn’t necessarily look angry at the question but somewhat perplexed.
“I don’t know what you mean,” Remus finally answered.
“Well, your mum, she’s a Muggle. What was it like growing up with her?”
Remus shrugged after some thought.
“I don’t think I know how to answer that, Sirius. She’s my mum. I don’t know what it’s like not to grow up with a Muggle.”
“Well, I mean, did she ever clobber you, or did you ever have to perform weird rituals or something?” Sirius’s eyes grew big as he asked, “Did she ever kill anyone?”
“What?” Remus exclaimed, “Of course my mother never killed anyone!”
Remus was looking at Sirius as if he’d sprouted four more heads.
“Is she sick all the time?”
“No,” Remus shook his head, “Why would she be?”
Sirius could feel his face start to flush. He chewed on his thumbnail, fidgeting, scrunching his eyes up in thought.
“Do you suppose she’s a squib then?” Sirius asked.
“She’s not,” Remus shook his head. “She didn’t know anything about magic until she met my dad.”
“Are you sure?” Sirius pressed, leaning forward on the bed.
“Of course! Why are you asking me this?” Remus finally asked.
Sirius looked straight at Remus and answered as if reciting from a textbook.
“Muggles are vile and they would kill you just as easily as look at you. A wizard should never trust them because they are evil creatures that will hurt you and infect you with their diseases so you die a slow, painful death.”
Remus’s mouth literally fell open and his eyebrows shot up beneath his fringe.
“My mum’s never hurt anyone…ever,” Remus said in a small, hollow voice. “She loves children and teaching and she was the most popular girl in her school when dad met her. She makes great pie,” he added, as though this last talent would demolish any thoughts Sirius could have that his mother was a raving murderer.
“Does she ever go into fits?’ Sirius continued, “Does she foam at the mouth? Or maybe she just…”
“No and no!’ Remus shook out of his stupor with a snort of laughter at the absurdity of this conversation.
Still snickering, Remus pulled from his bedside drawer a framed photograph and handed it to Sirius. Sirius looked down and saw a man with glasses and golden brown hair that was blowing wildly in the wind. He was on a beach. The sun was bright overhead and the waves were crashing onto the sand behind him. Sitting propped up on this man’s shoulders was a young boy of around four; it was Remus, he was grinning and waving frantically at the photographer.
Next to these two stood a pretty woman whose long, light brown hair kept blowing across her face. She wore a light yellow sundress that tied at her shoulders and she kept tucking strands of wind blown hair behind her ear. She had a warm smile and her shoulders were tinted pink from the summer sun. She was a picture of health. She waved shyly up at him. She looked very nice, if pictures could tell a story. Her eyes were bright with laughter and her smile was warm and inviting…much different from the formal pictures of his mother, solid, steady, and stern.
Sirius had a sudden unexplainable burst of envy towards Remus which quickly turned to embarrassment.
He must look stupid really. There was no way on Merlin’s earth that this woman could ever hurt another soul. What did Remus think of him for saying such foolish things? But this was what he had been taught, this was all he knew. Mrs. Lupin was an enigma and the first thing to ever allow Sirius to question himself.
“That’s my mum,” Remus pointed out the obvious.
Felling unbearably self-conscious and clumsy, Sirius smiled in spite of himself, not sure of what else to do or say. He handed the photograph back to Remus and slid down off his bed.
“I should wash up.”
Remus nodded, turning the photograph around in his hand and glancing down at it as Sirius crossed the room.
“Remus.” Sirius stopped in the doorway of the boy’s bath and turned around.
“Yeah?”
“I wish I never called you a Mudblood our first day.”
Remus smiled shyly and shrugged. “It’s alright.”
“Yeah, well…I didn’t know it was a bad thing.”
Remus gave him an incredulous look. “You didn’t think it was bad to call someone something with the word “Mud” in it?”
“Well,” Sirius stammered, “I knew it was bad because Mudbloods are filthy…well, I mean, I thought they were. I mean I think they are. Well, that’s not true I guess.” He shook his head. “I knew it was bad but I didn’t think it was a…”
Glancing up and seeing Remus’s confused reaction, Sirius cursed his inability to explain coherently.
“Bugger!”
“That’s not a very good apology.” Remus tried to hide his smile. “If that is in fact what you are doing.”
Sirius lifted one corner of his mouth in a half-hearted grin. “It’s just, that’s what I thought you were called. I didn’t know the term ‘Muggleborn’.”
Remus shook his head to repeat that there were no hard feelings.
Sirius looked down at the floor debating to say the next thing on his mind or not.
“Lupin, one last thing?”
“Yeah?” Remus looked up.
“Your mum,” Sirius said as he looked up with a shy smile, “she seems real nice.”
Remus smiled broadly. “She is.”
Sirius returned the smile but he turned and left for the bath with the gut-twisting feeling that no matter how easy classes were for him, there was so much he didn’t know about the world outside of Grimmauld Place.
Letter to Sirius Black from Regulus Black
November 3rd, 1971
Sirius,
That spell is wicked! I tried it on Grandmother Irma when she fell asleep after tea and it blasted off her eyebrows! She looks funny now. It worked for me first time and she did not know it was me! Do you think I’m really powerful like you? Maybe spells will come easy for me too. It is because we are pureblood I bet.
Ms. Babcock promised not to tattle on me since she has to help me write these letters and sees what I write. She said as long as I don’t try it on her she will keep my secret because the more I write the more practice I get.
Mother says you got in trouble. She got a letter from Hogwarts. What did you do? Is it because of the Halloween Feast? Are you going to tell me about it? You said you would.
I found a way to get past the elf heads on the wall. I took the poker from the fire in father’s study and jammed it in their eyes. I’m not so afraid of them now that they can’t watch me walk by. I don’t think mother has noticed them yet.
There’s no one to play with here. So mother told Ms. Babcock to give me more lessons to keep me occupied. Mother is having me relearn all the family history. I tried to tell her I already knew it but she just said something about, one can never be too careful. I don’t know what she meant.
Father brought back this food from India and it is wicked! It is called curry and is super hot. It has got all sorts of bits in it and I really like it. I drank four whole glasses of water with dinner last night. I think my tongue is burnt tho. The boxes it came in are bright colors and they sparkle different shades depending on how hot the food is. I ate the orange box but only father tried the red. He seemed sorry he had.
Write soon I’m bored,
Regulus Arcturus Black