July 31, 1977SIRIUS
One of those girls wore a short denim skirt and a tight t-shirt. The other wore a light summer dress blowing in the warm summer breeze.
The red convertible they had driven to the gas station sparkled in the rays of the setting sun. Like a big toy. Its owners hung around the fast-food window, gnawing on striped lemonade straws and giggling at the boy sitting on a big bike near the pump.
At first Sirius pretended not to notice them, but occasionally he glanced at the girls from under his hair, which was falling over his face, and a small smile formed on his lips. He sat on the side of his iron beast of prey while it enjoyed a watering hole, tapping his foot to the beat of the song that was coming from the window, and playing with his keys.
"I broke a thousand hearts
Before I met you
I'll break a thousand more, baby
Before I am through
I wanna be your pretty baby
Yours and yours alone
I'm here to tell you, honey
That I'm bad to the bone"
Sirius took a bite of his hot sandwich and lifted his head, automatically brushing his long, dark hair out of his face.
The stillness at the window shattered.
The blonde looked back at him nervously as her friend whispered in her ear.
Sirius winked at her.
Jackpot.
She blushed.
A rosy-cheeked, embarrassed blonde in a mini.
Just what he needed.
Single and long-legged adventurers on the open road. What more could you ask for when you're a seventeen-year-old wind?
"That I'm bad to the bone
B-b-b-b-b-b-bad, B-b-b-b-b-bad,
B-b-b-b-b-b-bad, bad to the bone"
He looked back at the pump to see if the tank was full.
The warm summer dusk had settled outside. The heat of the day was slowly evaporating from the hot ground, mixing with the sweet scents of the field herbs.
The gas station was crowded that evening. All the space was taken up by trucks and trailers. Their drivers - tall, elephantine drivers in stained denim overalls and shirts - crowded around the noisy window, spreading a mixture of curses and laughter. Their voices, the smell of cheap food and wild herbs from the field, and the hot rubber of the wheels had a soothing effect on Sirius. He loved it. The noise. The smell of gasoline. This was what freedom smelled and sounded like.
Sirius crumpled up the sandwich bag and threw it in the bin. The girls were whispering and jostling, obviously deciding who would go out, but Sirius had already lost interest in them.
Because he suddenly remembered.
Today would be a whole year since he had ran away from home.
A whole bloody year.
And in all that time, his mother had never tried to contact him. Not once had she asked about him.
As if he was dead.
Although to her he probably was.
It wasn't that Sirius missed her too much, or his distant, silent father, or his idiot younger brother, who had been terrified of him like a leper for a whole year at Hogwarts...
But despite the bitterness that permeated his memories of home, he still missed it.
It was as if he had left himself, a little boy, behind in this terrible but still, damn it, home, and now he felt guilty and very sorry that he couldn't go back for him.
