Pensieve - Wolfstar Fanfiction

29

"Sit down."
Orion commanded. Sirius took his chair and sat down, fingertips freezing and trembling of fear.
"What in Merlin's name happened to your face, boy?"
Arcturus' voice was even more creaky that Walburga's, old and shaky. Mean.
"I-It's nothing, Sir."
Sirius stuttered, feeling even the last of his blood leaving the area around his face. Orion started to cut up his turkey piece, glaring at his eldest with a look that warned him for opening his mouth too much.
"Fighter, eh?"
The old man laughed dryly, seemingly not believing even his own theory. Arcturus wasn't deaf, he knew about the gay thing. He was disgusted by it. And deep down he also knew, those bruises were his son's doing.
Sirius staid silent. Orion's eyes burned at his skin. Walburga seemed uneasy. Regulus silently reached for his wineglass of water.

They ate in silence. Sirius felt like throwing up on every bite, his head was aching as he stared at his plate silently.
Just like every year, but worse.
Regulus hadn't had any time, or more so any chance to tell his brother about his thoughts on the gay thing.
He wanted to say that he accepted it, because he really did. There was nothing Sirius could do to make Regulus hate him. Nothing he could be that'd change how Regulus admired him.

Orion and Arcturus had started to talk about some ministry buisness, as Walburga called for Kreacher to pick up the dirty dishes. She was soon off to the kitchen to get the dessert, one that wasn't really even that good in Sirius' opinion. And now the two brothers were alone in the cold dining room with their short tempered and sociopathic father and cold hearted grandfather.
Sirius' breathing was shallow. He wanted to leave, go back to his bedroom and lock the door.
He wanted do leave the house, London too, even the country.
To disappear. Fade away from the entire world.
But first, before doing all that, he needed to do some things. He wanted to kiss Remus, tell him that he loved him because that was the truth. The only truth that ever mattered.
He wanted to apologise Regulus, about every mean brotherly thing he ever did, though he was certain that Regulus needed no apology. That was just life, really. That was what having a brother was like, a constant pain in the ass.
He wanted to spit on his father's face, but certainly that was the only thing on his list of things he couldn't do.
And he wanted to let his mother know how absolute shit job she had done raising him.

As the dinner was finally over, after about two hours of sitting still and trying not to vomit, after listening to his father talk about dark arts and how mudbloods should be wiped off from the population entirely, and about how the Dark Lord was rising in power and how there'd soon be a war, he was back in the safety of his now dark room.
The walls felt like they were closing in on him, as he laid down on the bed.

There was a brown shoe box on top of his wardobe. The yellow light of the streetlamp outside of his window painted a stripe over it. Sirius stared at it blankly.
Two weeks. Then he'd be back at Hogwarts. Only he didn't know if he could live those two weeks under the roof of 12 Grimmauld Place. He didn't know if he could take all that pain.
The shoe box was covered in dust. Inside of it must have been a pair of neat leather shoes that had been too small for him since he was nine. Something like that, certainly.
His eyes didn't move at all, as he stared at it from his bed. He was breathing the cold air slowly, it filled his lungs, tasted weird on his tongue. Like dust and mold. Almost like death.
That box would be the answer, he thought for some reason.

Then he got up, in the dark room he hated so much. He walked to the dark wooden cabinet and reached to the box. It wasn't heavy, he dumped the shoes that were inside of it on the floor and sat back down on the bed.
Cold fingers tracing the cardboard surface.
Then he took a piece of parchment from the drawer of his bedside table, and a bottle of ink.
This would be the apology. This would be his entire life. Everything, in one sad brown box.