“…he fell through the ancient doorway and disappeared behind the veil, which fluttered for a moment as though in a high wind and then fell back into place… Sirius must be just behind the curtain…”
-J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Sirius felt himself falling through an endless torrent of mist. It surrounded him in a dense cloak of matter that could be felt but not seen, much like the cloak he and James had used to roam the halls of Hogwarts unseen so many years ago. He could hear Harry’s voice shouting his name, but it was distant, almost as if it was only the shadow of a voice that might have been. Why hadn’t he hit the ground yet? Surely the cold stone floor of the Department of Mysteries had been under his feet only moments before…
Suddenly, Sirius was lying on his back in the middle of a dark, damp alley. He couldn’t recall actually hitting the ground, and he couldn’t recall exactly when the eternal mist had stopped. Like waking up from a dream, or perhaps entering into one, he blinked his eyes slowly a few times and then sat up. The burning migraine pounding in his skull made him want to kill someone. Where the hell was Bellatrix when you needed her?
The sound of footsteps echoed from a few dozen meters away. Sirius instinctively willed himself to change into his dog form, but nothing happened. He tried again, but when he looked down at his feet, they remained fully human and not the least bit canine. Something was seriously wrong here, but he had no time to think about it too much, because he had to get away. He had to get back to the Department of Mysteries and protect Harry. He owed it to Lily and James.
The footsteps were getting closer. Sirius could make out the image of a skinny, unshaven man making his way toward a rubbish bin, as if drunk, and then spewing the contents of his stomach into said bin.
Sirius gripped his wand, which was still in his hand. It seemed to have lost some of its warmth, but it was still a source of comfort to calm his racing heart. Surely this man posed no threat. Maybe, if he had enough of his wits about him, he could tell Sirius where he was.
“Excuse me,” Sirius said to the man, carefully approaching him with his fingers still tightly wrapped around his wand, “I seem to be lost “ could you tell me where this is?”
The man, who had now shrunk to the ground in a drunken stupor, looked up at Sirius with large, sullen eyes. Sirius knew those eyes, though he was quite sure that he did not know this man.
“YerinLondon,” he said, slurring his words together and drooling down his chin as he did so. His eyes went from Sirius’s face to his wand, and then drifted back up to his face again. Sirius quickly stored his wand back in his pocket.
“Where in London?” he asked.
“Er…” the man paused and his face contorted into an expression that was somewhere between confusion and being hit with a Cruciatus Curse. He then leaned forward and puked again, this time on Sirius’s shoes.
Peering into the man’s sunken-in eyes was like staring into deep pools of black writing ink that swirled with a concoction of alcohol and gloomy memories. It was more than just a notion: Sirius was sure that he had seen these eyes before, that he knew these eyes, that at one time they had not appeared so shrouded with sadness. He mentally dove into the past, long before his years in Azkaban, when these same eyes might have peered over his shoulder while he was writing a letter or glared at him as he wolfed down his food at the dinner table. Yes, he knew those eyes all too well.
The man seemed to realize this at exactly the same moment.
“No… no, it’s not you… I must be really, really drunk…” he stumbled over his words, now gazing up at Sirius with genuine fear. He tried to comfort him, but the man staggered backwards, avoiding his touch. “You’ve come back to haunt me!”
“Regulus, brother…”
“GETAWAYFROMME!” he shouted. Sirius frantically looked around to see if anybody had heard his brother’s shouts.
“Calm down, Reg! It’s me!”
“You’re suppose’ tobedead!” Regulus was quivering now, and Sirius took note for the first time that he was not just skinny “ he was practically emaciated.
“Me? You’re the one who died… you joined forces with Voldemort, and you died! I told people that I thought you deserved it!” Sirius shouted angrily, not caring anymore if all of London heard him.
“No!” Now Regulus was cowering behind the rubbish bin like a child. “Youtol’ me you were goin’ to do it, youtoldme! They… theyfound your body in theThames! Youtol’ me you were going to… Ididn’ do anything tostopyou… nowyou’ve come back tohauntme!”
Sirius paused, puzzled. “Told you what?”
“Tha’youwere gointo kill yourself!”
Sirius shook his head. Maybe alcohol wasn’t the only thing altering his brother’s brain at the moment. “I never killed myself. You’re the one who’s dead.” He was speaking almost in a whisper now.
“You… youwerealways depressed, Sirius… you, youhadno friends in school, Imean…”
Frowning, Sirius assessed the situation. Regulus was under the impression that he had committed suicide on account of depression, partially due to the fact that he had no friends in school. This was obviously incorrect, because he had plenty of friends in school. He had Remus, he had Peter, (“bloody traitor,” Sirius said to himself, when he thought about Peter,) and of course, he had James and Lily. Sirius formed his question carefully, simultaneously trying to calm himself down.
“And where, exactly, was this school where I had no friends?”
“Er…” Regulus paused, obviously finding it difficult to think clearly. “St. B-something. Idunno, I didn’ gothere.”
“What about Hogwarts?”
Regulus shook his head. “Don’ know nuffing abou’ Hogwash. Nowstop haunting me. Let me hate myself inpeace.”
With that, Regulus staggered out of the alleyway. As Sirius watched his brother-who-turned-Death-Eater-and-was-supposed-to-be-dead leave, he felt a single tear slip down the side of his face. Regulus had no idea what he was talking about when he asked about Hogwarts, and he didn’t even acknowledge Sirius’s mention of Voldemort. To him, Sirius was dead, just as he had been dead to Sirius. He walked out of the alley and down the street, not really knowing where he was going and not really caring, either. Maybe he had hit his head falling through the archway and was actually lying unconscious in the Hogwarts hospital wing. Maybe this was all a dream.
There was only one thing that Sirius knew for sure, and that was that he had to find Harry and make sure he was safe. Nothing else mattered but his responsibility to his godson.
-
Behind the Curtain by Virgil
Story Notes:
This is a short story that will be coming to you in four separate installments. Oh, and I'm not J.K. Rowling - there's a shocker. These are merely musings that are the result of abusing the phrase “Well maybe…”
Chapter Notes:This is for everybody who never fully accepted that Sirius Black could be killed by drapery.
Chapter Endnotes: Thank you for reading! Please consider leaving a review, because reviews = love and I think we can all agree that we need more love in the world. Chapter Two is already complete and will be submitted once this one is validated, so stay tuned!