To Have A Home

Chapter 10

The weeks dragged by. Sirius did not feel like himself. The brief cheerfulness that had filled him up inside immediately after returning to school soon dissipated. Sirius felt nothing but shame, sadness, anger, and above all else, numbness. He hated the numbness more than anything else. He would pick fights with people, force himself to think about sad things to cry in the middle of the night, or dig his nails into his skin just to try to shake himself out of his trance.
James, Remus, and Peter tried to combat Sirius's moodiness and constant gloom with as many jokes and pranks as possible, but to no avail.
One particular evening in early February, just before night fell, Sirius was walking blindly through the castle hallways, barely even aware of what he was doing or where he was going, when he crashed into none other than Snape.
"Watch where you're going, Black," Snape said sourly.
"Oh shove it Snivelly. You do not want to push me."
"Please... you're tough enough when it's four-on-one, but when it's just the two of us you're not so tough after all."
"Yeah? Well how about you poke the knot on the Whomping Willow tonight and head on in there if you want to prove you're so tough?" Sirius snapped before realizing his mistake and hurriedly heading to find his friends.
What had he done? He had just risked Lupin's biggest secret... something that his friend had trusted him to protect carefully. Sirius felt disgusted with himself.
When Sirius made it up to the Gryffindor common room, he found James and Peter but no Remus.
"Where's Moony?"
"His furry little problem is starting a little earlier tonight... we were just waiting for you to head down," James replied.
"Oh Merlin... I don't know how to say this... I told Snape to head to the Whomping Willow and how to get in... I didn't mean to I swear I just... I don't know what came over me."
"What the hell, Sirius? Oh god... I've got to stop him," Sirius began to follow James out the portrait. "No. You stay here. I don't know if we can trust you anymore. Pete, come with me."
Sirius sunk down to his knees on the now-deserted common room floor and began to sob. He very well could have just lost the only good thing left in his miserable life: his best friends.
The next morning felt almost as painful as the Cruciatus Curse had for Sirius. Lupin felt betrayed and hurt, James angry, and Peter disappointed. None of them would talk to or even acknowledge Sirius, despite his many attempts to apologize. "I deserve this," Sirius kept telling himself. "I did something terrible." Sirius walked dully and silently through his classes, and the only conversations he had were brief and meaningless.
The same pattern continued for several weeks afterward, and Sirius began to spiral first into deep despair which was then absorbed by the cloud of numbness already threatening to overtake him. This feeling was not helped by a letter from home saying:

Sirius-
After much consideration, we have decided that you should come home for the Easter holiday. Although we have heard that you've been making progress at school, we want to make sure your lesson has been learned.
Signed, Mother and Father

With this letter came a brief note from McGonagall reminding Sirius that he was not required to leave for breaks and that if the letter had any material that was concerning, he should alert her at once. But what was the point of fighting this? Sirius's one hope had been that if things ever got too bad, he could go to James's. But now... it was better to just comply with his parents.