SHE'S ALL THAT ➭ SIRIUS BLACK ❨2❩ ✔︎

ACT THREE, SCENE FORTY ONE

FONTAINE MANOR

Sage's twenty first birthday was spent in a home full of people who loved and cared about her. Her boyfriend had orchestrated a suprise party, so when she came downstairs to cook dinner, Maia, Remus, Charlotte, Marlene, Rowan, Lily and James, and Peter were all standing in the kitchen. Rowan held a bottle of champagne in her hands.

"Happy fucking birthday!" Rowan, slurring as if she were already tipsy, shouted, popping the cork out of the bottle with a loud bang.

As a true testement to how much Sage Celeste Fontaine had changed in the past four years, she grinned, widely, and fought off the sting of tears in your eyes.

She looked to Sirius, reaching out for him. "You planned this?" She asked, so quietly that he could barely hear her.

He nodded and pushed her gently towards her friends. "'Course I did, love. You deserve it."

☾

The evening went by quickly, and Remus served as the party's photographer, walking around with his muggle camera and snapping photos of his friends and girlfriend's antics.

At one point, while Sage was dancing and singing with Marlene and Charlotte, he came up to them with the camera poised to take a photo.

"Oi, Remus, take one of us, will you?" Marlene asked, smiling happily. "I want to remember tonight for the rest of my life."

Remus was more than willing to comply, and he snapped a few candid photographs of the three girls as they laughed.

☾

Sage was woken up in the middle of the night, Sirius shaking her awake.

"What? What time is it?" She asked, still half asleep.

The look on his face was grim. "I didn't want to have to tell you this right now—I wanted to wait 'til morning, honestly, but I figured you'd want to know now." He said quietly.

She furrowed her eyebrows. "What is it? What happened?"

"Marlene and Charlotte are dead. Murdered in their house an hour ago."

Her heart stopped, and she clutched the bedsheets in shock, trying to ground herself so she didn't go into a full spiral.

Sirius continued speaking, probably explaining in greater detail what had happened to their friends, but she didn't hear him; blood was rushing in her ears, and her heartbeat was pounding, deafening and effectively silencing whatever he'd said.

Her best friend for an entire decade. Sage had seen her only a few hours before, when she'd walked them out and made them promise to come over for lunch sometime within the next few days.

"I can't breathe." She mumbled, hands going to her chest, where she tugged at the neckline of her nightgown. "It's like—it's like all the air's gone out of the room. Sirius, I can't breathe. There's no air." She felt one of his hands on her shoulder, the other going to the back of her head, and she was only slightly aware of him pulling her to his chest.

He held her there as she began to sob, tearless cries that came from deep within her and rattled her slight form.

"Shhh, I know. I know. Let it out."

She balled her hands into fists and pounded them on whatever surface of him she could find, whether it be his arms or legs or chest. She didn't hit him hard enough to hurt him, even though she wanted to; she wanted to hurt him, make him feel everything she was feeling just so she wouldn't be alone in this agonizing pain.

It was a common response to pain and grief, to want to take it from the inside, from within one's mind, and bring it outside, where it was physical and real.

She forced herself to take a deep, grounding breath. She withdrew from Sirius's arms and laid back down, facing away from him.

"I can't do this anymore. I can't keep losing people. First was my brother, then my Nana, and Regulus and now Marlene and Char. Who's next? Lily? Me? You?" She dug her fingernails into her palms. "If someone else dies, I'm going to go mad."

good night !