Well, my friends are gone and my hair is grey
I ache in the places where I used to play
And I'm crazy for love.
But I'm not coming on.
I'm just paying my rent every day in the Tower of Song.
Sirius sat curled up on the couch, his arms around his legs. He was watching television. It was a bizarre muggle invention - a bit like the cinemas he’d been to in his youth, only smaller… oh no, oh no … that brought back a memory of James. That summer they’d gone to see the same film every day, and met those muggle girls. Had it been summer? Or Christmas? It might have been raining, and someone punched him. James or Remus? Surely Remus; James was never violent, even when Sirius really deserved it.
Sirius shut his eyes to drown out the cold, cruel voices in his head which wanted to drag him back through time, back to the very worst moments. He thought he could taste blood, but when he opened his eyes again, all he saw was the living room, and the silly talking muggle box.
It was his living room. Or it had been, once. It looked different, and Sirius had a hard time working out whether it was different, or he was just remembering wrong. The walls hadn’t been repainted, the fireplace was there. It didn’t stink of cigarette ash anymore, but there was still a burn mark in the carpet under the windowsill - had that been there before? Or had it happened in the years between?
The TV was the worst change; the most noticeable. Sirius had a strong memory of arguing against having one, a long time ago. Noisy, ugly muggle light-boxes. He still thought it was awful, but somehow he couldn’t bring himself to stop watching it. It distracted him. It was a break from thinking; from remembering.
He had spent too much of his life remembering. Turning over events, over mistakes and half understood conversations. Sifting through it all again and again, until everything in his head was shaken loose in tiny fragments, no structure or narrative. He didn't want to sit and think anymore. He wanted to act. He wanted to do. And no one would let him.
He huffed, shifting position, tightening his grip on the arm of the couch. Remus had been invited to a meeting, and Sirius had been told to stay at home with the muggle. It would have been fine if he'd gone as Padfoot, he knew it would have, but no one would listen. They were treating him like a loose cannon, like someone who needed to be contained . As if he hadn't spent a whole year alone, looking out for himself, without any help from anyone.
He wasn't going to be treated like a kid. He wasn't going to let them. Hadn't he earned his place?
But Moony - Remus, he had given Sirius that pained, pleading look, and it shut him up. He hated making Remus uncomfortable, it made him worried he would never get better. He knew he wasn't right in the head, he knew he was going about things all wrong, and that he was not himself. But Sirius had hoped a year would be enough. He was out, now, he was free, everyone who mattered finally knew the truth. It should make a difference. He should be normal again, by now.
Remus wasn't helping, Sirius thought, darkly. How could he get his head straight, when everything was so weird? When Remus, his only friend left, could barely look at him without wincing, could barely speak to him without trailing off, glancing away. And the boyfriend. Sirius wondered how quickly that had happened, how soon the muggle had wormed his way in. Infected Remus with his mundanity; made his Moony quiet and cautious. No better than a muggle himself.
It was like a light in Remus had dimmed. Sirius looked for signs of the old Moony, but there was none of that wicked, mischievous energy, the blistering strength of Remus Lupin when he had an exciting plan.
