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── Saturday 21st August 1971
REGULUS STOOD BEFORE HIM. His brother didn't care for his reasons. Those familiar eyes held nothing but pure hatred. He'd left. He'd left his baby brother behind, ran off to that stupid school, and Regulus hated him for it. Sirius didn't know what hurt more, the wand - merlin, Walburga's wand - pointed at him, only centimetres away from where his heart beat, and his heart beat like crazy, or those steely eyes - because Sirius knew those eyes, Sirius knew his mother's eyes more than anyone else's.
The eldest son of Walburga and Orion Black was blubbering, his hands pressed against the wall, "Reggie-" he croaked as he collapsed onto the cold, hard ground.
"Don't. You're not my family. You're just disgusting," the younger boy seethed, his bitter chuckle echoing through the eerily quiet room, accompanied by Sirius' painful sobs. "You're not anything to me."
"Regulus, please listen-" The wand that had been by his heart merely seconds earlier had found its way to the eleven year old's neck.
"Shut up." Those eyes - mother's eyes - cut through his soul like a sharpened blade. Sirius knew the word before his brother's mouth formed it, "Supplicium."
He scrambled up, panting heavily, and he realised he was crying. Blacks don't cry. Sirius reminded himself, his eyes refusing to close in case the dream flashed through his mind again.
"Sirius?" a small voice whispered from the door, and a figure approached his bed. Reggie clambered onto it, careful not to make a noise, because Merlin forbid their mother's scoldings if she found them awake so late at night.
Sirius didn't say anything, he stared at his brother for a moment, and then his briefly frozen face broke into a painful expression once more, ugly tears running down his pale cheeks. He felt his brother's arms tighten around him and he hugged back, tighter and tighter, like, if he didn't, his dreaded nightmares would come alive.
Five minutes later, his younger brother had snuggled in beside him, their small hands intertwined even as they lay down.
"Did you have the scary dragon dream again?" Reggie asked, quietly; sleepily, glancing up at him.
"Yeah." he lied, looking into his brother's soft, grey eyes. Those eyes could never turn hard, not towards him - Reggie didn't need to know about the horrid nightmares that said otherwise.
"Mummy said you have to grow up and stop being mean to our family." he replied, with a smile so genuine Sirius couldn't help but simply nod as his brother dozed off. He attempted the same, content with the certainty of his thoughts: They'd always be brothers, no matter what.
