SHE'S ALL THAT ➭ SIRIUS BLACK ❨2❩ ✔︎

ACT FIVE, SCENE SIX

THE LEAKY CAULDRON

Since the drunken episode that had taken place on her twenty-fourth birthday, Sage Fontaine had remained mostly sober, apart from a glass of wine with Anna-Lee every once in a while, and a toast to Lily, James, Marlene, and Charlotte every 31 October.

Despite this partial sobriety, however, she allowed herself to drink with Tonks and Kingsley at the pub that evening.

"Oh, by the way, Sage," Nymphadora began after sputtering from a shot of firewhisky that had gone down the wrong pipe. "We're having a little costume party on Halloween. Even Moody's going. You in? You can bring whoever you want."

Sage laughed humorlessly. "Yeah, er, I don't do costume parties. Especially not on Halloween." She remarked, taking a sip of her drink.

Nymphadora cocked her head and looked at Sage inquisitively. "Why not? It's your birthday, isn't it?"

Sage's temper flared high and hot for a moment until she remembered that Nymphadora was about nine years old when the worst night of Sage's entire life had taken place. The pink-haired woman surely knew of what had happened that night—at least, the black-and-white history book version of it—but she was far less likely to know why Halloween was a day of mourning and grief for Sage. That fact was not on any Ministry logs or historical records. No one except Sage's closest friends knew how part of her had died that night.

"It's not exactly a day I like celebrating." Sage said simply, keeping her voice flat and even.

She remembered the night she'd first met Nymphadora, when she had shown up on Andromeda Tonks's doorstep with Regulus, half-dead and poisoned beyond belief. Nymphadora had only been five or six at the time, so it wasn't surprising that she didn't remember that she'd met Sage fifteen years before they were formally introduced at work.

It was almost a blessing, though. Outside of her inner circle of people that were essentially family, she didn't want anyone knowing the person she used to be—the dark, angry, traumatized girl. She might not be perfect, but she was proud of the person she had grown up to be. She'd lost everything and everyone, yet she'd come out the other side a better person, parent, lover, and friend.

"You alright, Fontaine?" Kingsley asked, nudging her in the side.

She had been lost in thought without realizing it. She nodded. "Yeah. Fine. Just got a lot on my mind, I guess."

He sighed. "Yeah, I bet you do. It can't be easy, hunting your ex-boyfriend." He said, sounding like he knew far too much.

Sage almost laughed. In the weeks, post-escape, that Sirius had spent in her home, they hadn't once discussed what they were to each other. And while she knew, deep down, that no labels would be able to define what they were, ex-boyfriend didn't seem to fit.