notsiriusatall

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts​:

Doe’s gaze focuses on some point just off the end of her cigarette as she rolls her reply around in her mouth a few times.

“I miss you too.”

She feels rather than sees Sirius turn full-bodily towards her but doesn’t look at him.

“I never ‘didn’t like” you, Sirius. You can’t go through the things we went through together to-to dismiss them all like that.” She shrugs her shoulders uncomfortably. “There’s some things you never let go. Even if you wanted to. Because at that point, they’re too much a part of you to be separated from. At least in its entirety.”

She turns her head towards him. His eyebrows are set low as he listens, trying to follow along this twisted mindpath that is spilling from Doe’s mouth as soon as she can think it. 

But that doesn’t make it any less true.

“You’re very much a part of me, Sirius.”

“Yeah?”

Sirius looks up at the wrong moment, because the sun pokes out from behind a cloud and lights Doe up in a way that could be misinterpreted as holy. 

God he wants to kiss her. 

Doe gives him a small smile and rolls her eyes, which does nothing to help with the whole desperately wanting to kiss her thing.

“Yes. Did you not hear anything I just said?”

“Apparently I have listening problems. I think one of the doctors told me that, but uh, I wasn’t listening.”

Dorcas scoffs and Sirius feels himself relax-not fully, he’s not stupid enough for that, but just enough. Maybe he can get through this. Maybe...maybe they can actually be friends.

It’ll hurt like hell, but, friends is better than nothing. 

“So, uh...we’re friends?”

Sirius jerks his hand forward towards her, offering a shake. As if their relationship was some sort of business transaction. He cringes visibly at himself but holds his hand steady.

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts​:

Doe stays quiet, looking back at him and letting his words linger in the air between them. James and Lily hadn’t wanted to tell her. Had she been in their shoes, she wouldn’t want to tell her either, but not knowing wasn’t an option. Even they could see that and with heavy reluctance, James answered every one of her questions and for a spiritually-broken twenty-something veteran with a TBI, she thought she reacted rather admirably. If shutting down her emotions and going into a numb state rather than descending into absolute hysterics is admirable.

She finally sticks the cigarette she’d been fumbling with as he spoke between her teeth and lights it, shielding the flame with her other hand against the brisk morning air. After taking a sharp inhale, she coughs, a bit out of practice, and passes the lighter back to him.

“James said you cut yourself,” she says in a tone similar to that used when discussing the weather. “After I left.”

Sirius looks away from her and shuffles his feet, but Doe keeps her gaze steady on him, her eyes drawn to the downturn of his mouth. Back when they were dating and he was in one of his faraway moods, she used to poke at the corner of his mouth until he managed a small smile for her and she feels a deranged urge to do the same now.

The silence stretches between them as she takes another drag of her cigarette and Sirius stares out over the parking lot. Just watching him makes her chest twinge and her heart surge pathetically into her throat before she can stop it.

“You can’t leave like that, Siri. You know that, right? No matter what’s between us, or not or…anything. Just…not like that, okay?”

“Do you have a list of approved methods?”

Sirius chances a glance at her and Dorcas’s look is killer. He scoffs, taking a deep inhale again on his cigarette. 

“I’m kidding-apparently I use humor as a defense mechanism, which still sounds like a load of shit to me...”

Sirius ashes his cigarette and glances at the street below.

“I uh-shit.”

Sirius feels tears start forming behind his eyes for some stupid reason, and he clears his throat twice.

“I regretted it, right after. Which is why...James helped me, and uh, in the place or whatever they made sure I was okay. But I can promise you, as little as that fucking means, that I’m not going to do it again.”

Sirius clears his throat again and speaks to the floorboards of the balcony. 

“So if you know, you’re only giving me the time of day cause you’re worried I igh you know, off myself otherwise-don’t. That’s...that’s not what I want. I don’t want to only have you around cause you feel sorry for me, Doe. That’s almost worse.”

Sirius throws his cigarette on the ground and fishes for another one. 

“So uh, you’re you know, allowed to not like me still. I’m not going to kill myself if you stop talking to me-which uh, you have ever right to do.  I just-”

His voice cracks and Sirius stops talking, letting the silence sit between them. Sirius hates himself for not being strong enough to through a conversation without a fucking breakdown.

“I just miss you a lot.” Sirius finally manages. “And I-I know its my fault. And I’m never going to forgive myself for what I’ve done to you-but uh, that doesn’t make me miss you any less.”

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts​:

Doe cracks a small smile. “A bit.” 

Setting her coffee down and finally sticking the cigarette between her teeth, she lights the tip and passes back the lighter. “You’re wrong about one thing though.”

“What’s that?” Sirius eyes her warily.

She takes a long puff before answering, meeting his gaze with an ease she didn’t know would be possible after the past three weeks, let alone the past 18 months. 

“All the good in you without me…is how you got me in the first place.”

“I thought that was the bike.” Sirius says, smiling broadly at her. The expression feels wrong on his face but he lets it live. 

“Listen-I’ve spent the past three weeks agonizing over this moment and you’re making it too easy. There’s that goodness again. But you really got to know, Doe, I am so sorry.I mean-”

Sirius scratches at his neck and inhales deeply on his cigarette, sighing as he releases the smoke.

“That barely scratches the surface. I could live forever and say sorry every second of every day and that wouldn’t even cover half of it. But you didn’t deserve-” 

Sirius stops, his throat clogging. He presses his lips into a line and looks away, staring intently down at the Boston street below them.

“I uh, I’m sure they told you what I did.” He says softly. “And I-I’m going to say this knowing you won’t believe me but that wasn’t because of you. I promise-if that holds any worth any more.”

Without realizing it, he instinctively flexes the wrist he’d cut. 

“I’m sorry I roped you into all of this and just-” He blows air off of his cheeks again.

“James told me to stop apologizing if I’m not going to do anything to fix it. So I guess just-I’m trying to fix it. What I can at least. And I really appreciate you you, know-”

He looks into her eyes, which is a mistake, because Sirius never wants to look away. 

“Letting me try.”

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts‌:

Her throat feeling weirdly clogged up at the moment, Doe only nods, pushing her hair out of her eyes.

Sirius’s face breaks into her favorite half-smile. She can call it her favorite because she almost lost the chance to call him anything at all anymore. “Okay. Okay. Cool.”

He heads towards the kitchen, pausing to hug Lily, while Dorcas grabs her mug before going after him. She’s not sure if the apartment is actually quiet or she’s just blocked out all the sound that isn’t Sirius speaking in a low voice to Remus or fumbling with the lock on the sliding door out to the balcony. 

He’s here. He’s here. James made it in time. He’s back from rehab. He’s here.

You can’t just stop caring about someone. No matter what sort of hell they put you through. Particularly when they’re the very person who got you through many other sorts of hell. The personal hells they’ve been through and going through don’t cancel each other out.

They sidle out through the door, blocking Grim with their bodies, and Doe quickly slides it shut behind her, sloshing a little of her lukewarm coffee on her hand.

“Shit.” She sucks the back of her hand and swipes it dry on her pants.

“You okay?” Sirius frowns, one hand on the railing, the other lingering in the space between them. There was a time when there would be no lingering; they were all purpose.

“Yeah, just…klutz,” she says with a half-hearted chuckle. Sirius glances between her hand and her face, taking another second before he’s assuaged. She comes up to lean against the railing next to him, her mug held to her chest. They’re both quiet for a minute, looking out over the courtyard behind James and Lily’s building, when Doe catches Sirius’ move for his pocket out of the corner of his eye.

“I-do you mind if I smoke?” he asks with a chagrined smile. She used to give him shit constantly for smoking when they were together, vowing to withhold kisses and break all his cigarettes in half if she found them again. In the same breath, her willpower was never as strong as she claimed when it came to Sirius Black. Plus, she had no problem sharing a joint with him and that couldn’t be doing her lungs any favors either.

She shakes her head. “I actually picked it up a little bit er-during basic training…something to do with my hands that wasn’t, you know. And also apparently they don’t like soldiers getting high so….”

She looks at him with trepidation and Sirius smiles at her again-tentative, careful, knowing how fragile this is. There definitely would’ve been a time where he would’ve given her shit, teased her, maybe even been a little mad.

Instead, when he shakes one of his cigarettes out into his trembling hand, he shakes out a second, holding it out to her. 

“Funnily enough, rehab and the army have the same policies.”

Doe’s fingers touch his for a second and he feels like he’s the one being set on fire, not the cigarette between his teeth. He hands Doe the lighter, but she’s still holding the cigarette, turning it between her fingers.

“You don’t have to smoke it, Doe.”

The inhale settles him, and he leans his head back, looking up as his eyes follow the smoke he breathes out.

“I can’t believe that any of you still want me around.”

Sirius says this so quietly that he’s not sure she even hears him.

“Before I apologize, or at the very least, apologize as much as I can, can I say one more thing that might make you mad?”

He sees her set her jaw as she picks the lighter up from where he’d set it on the railing beside him.

“Shit, that isn’t how I wanted to start this conversation-”

“Say it.”

God, he’d missed the sound of her voice, maybe even more than he’d missed the rest of her. He still knew what each flicker meant, each subtle tone change. He knew all the ways she said his name, what each version meant-and he knew what she was saying without saying but not speaking his name at all. She was serious.

He takes as deep of breath in as he can and faces her. His back is up against the railing, his arms wide. Open. Defenseless. Ready to fall backwards over the ledge if it’d make her happy. 

“I uh...it’s weird being around you and not being able to kiss you. And I know that’s all on me, that all of this is my fault and I’ve just...kept fucking it up, you know? Cause that’s all I ever do, Doe. But it used to be, when I fucked up, I could always fix it by kissing you. And...well I mean, obviously I still want to kiss you. But you don’t. And I-”

He groans, finally looking away, closing his eyes shut tight and hating himself.

“God I’m so fucking stupid. This is coming out wrong. All I’ve wanted to do since you’ve left is kiss you and tell you I’m sorry. And it feels weird that I can only do half of that now. And I know it’s my own fault, but God.”

Sirius opens his eyes and meets hers.

“I hate this. And I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. And this isn’t just some bullshit step from the program. I’m-”

He sighs.

“Everything good about me was good because of you and I don’t know how to be anything but a mess now. And that’s not your fault, not at all, but that’s why...that’s the tip of why everything happened. The catalyst I guess. Seeing you when you got back just reminded me of how-it was a sucker punch of all the problems I caused. So I guess I thought I’d do you one better and make even more.”

There’s a beat, he ashes his cigarette, still not looking at Doe. This is not at all how this conversation was going to go when he’d brought it up in group last week. As always, Dorcas was uncharted territory.

“Christ, can you tell I was cooped up for three weeks or fucking what?”

Here || 004

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts‌:

For the better part of the month, she barely speaks to anyone in spite of basically taking up permanent residence on James and Lily’s couch. Except Grim, who has taken it upon himself to barely leave her side when she comes over. Like right now, he is lying right on top of her, his nose tucked reassuringly under her chin as she listlessly watches James and Lily set up a brunch spread on the kitchen island.  Today is supposed to be a do-over of their engagement party, with just the wedding party: Remus, a couple of Lily’s teacher friends, and some of James’ classmates. No one mentions Sirius in front of her, and whenever she’s asked James about him after their Saturday visits, his answers are vague variations of “He’s doing a lot better.” But she knows that he brought him his guitar about two weeks in, to which she had heard Lily exclaim in hushed tones when James told her “Really?!” So, that was something apparently. It really didn’t take more than her brief glimpse into Sirius’ apartment to figure that he hasn’t done much with his music in the past eighteen months.

Remus has been over nearly as often as she has, but he doesn’t say much about Sirius either. To be honest, the two of them have never really talked much about Sirius one-on-one to begin with. It’s a bit complicated when you know that one of your closest friends has been harboring a crush on your now ex-boyfriend for possibly longer than he’s been out of the closet. But even with that between them, before her deployment, she and Remus had always been close, but now it feels like they don’t even know how to talk to each other but still are stupidly drawn to each other. He sits with her and Grim on the couch, goes for walks with them, and even gives her rides home when she can bear to part with Grim for a night, but they barely talk. Even when he caught her crying on the couch while James and Lily were out running on errands, he just held out his arm and she ended up sobbing into his chest until she passed out.

It’s because of Remus that there’s a mug of coffee in front of her now. Lily had insisted that she go home last night so she could put on clean clothes for the party this morning, which meant swapping her sweats for a pair of jeans and a navy striped button-down that was getting wrinkled underneath Grim if she could be bothered to care. When she had arrived, she did offer to help, but Lily had brushed her off. However, as soon as Remus came in about a half hour after Doe, Lily immediately recruited him to start the coffee and wipe down the kitchen.

She’s just the ex-military dead weight of the group apparently, she’s thinking dully to herself when there’s a knock on the door. She didn’t think that guests were coming for another hour. Grim, for his part, barely lifts his head from her chest, but they both watch as James crosses the living room from the kitchen to the entry hall and answers the door. There’s the unmistakable sound of two bros doing a manly embrace and Doe is just about to turn her attention back to the kitchen, considering stealing a muffin when he comes into view.

Her breath is already gone but Grim punching his paws into her chest in haste to get off the couch doesn’t exactly help.

“Hi Grimmie!” Sirius gets down to his knees to embrace his dog, burying his face in his neck, but Doe doesn’t miss his fleeting glance in her direction. James stands behind him, arms crossed over his chest and fond half-smile on his face as he watches Grim lick Sirius’ face from chin to temple and Sirius actually laugh. God, how can it be so long since she’s heard him genuinely laugh but at the same time, it’s impossible to think of a time he ever stopped.

She slowly sits up, eyes wide and mouth slightly agape, not entirely sure if she should run to him or run in the opposite direction and lock herself in the bathroom. Her movement draws Sirius’ attention and he stands back up, looking at her uncertainly, smile fading into a bit of a grimace. Seeing him straight on, the apartment around them, James still lingering behind him, Grim circling his legs, Remus and Lily in the kitchen–it all buzzes out into muted white noise.

She barely gets a chance to register that he’s had his hair cut when he opens his mouth.

“Hi, Doe.”

A weird choked noise escapes her throat. Like she’s completely forgotten how to speak, but by some miracle, she does manage to stand and even walk around the coffee table. Sirius actually looks a little afraid.

“Doe–”

It takes exactly two steps until she’s got her arms wrapped around him the tiniest bit too tight just to make sure he’s really here.

@notsiriusatall​

It feels good to be back on his bike again, even if it feels like a death march.

He got home yesterday. James had crashed-supposedly cause he was tired from driving, but Sirius knew it was because he was worried about him. They’d ordered pizza-god, Sirius had missed grease and rented Die Hard. They’d spent the whole night laughing, trying to imitate Bruce Willis and generally being morons. It’d made Sirius less nervous to be back in his old life.

That of course, was completely gone by the time he parks his bike. He lights up a cigarette and takes his time in the parking lot. God, he wants a drink. It’d calm him down, make all of this easier. Sirius sighs and pulls out the stupid chip they’d given him, showing three weeks of sobriety.  He was going to chuck it initially-it felt like such a stupid thing to celebrate, but yet, here it was, in his wallet, keeping him sane.

Fuck. 

James had assured him about 400 times that yes, he wanted Sirius to come. Then Lily had called and he’d gotten choked up hearing her voice for the first time in nearly a month. She’d assured him she’d murder him if he didn’t come and that had relaxed him too.

Still, staring up at the window of the apartment that’s held his best and worst days, it’s not James or Lily he’s worried about.

Every horrible word he’d flung and screamed at Dorcas hits like a punch with each step he makes up the stairs. He’d only meant one of those terrible things, and now, sturdier and sober, the truth isn’t something he can hide from anymore.

He’s helplessly in love with Dorcas, and he’s probably ruined his last chance at having any semblance of a relationship with her.

And now Sirius has to face her.

The one shining light in all of this was Grimm. Sirius missed his dog more than almost anything else. He was half surprised that James hadn’t brought him yesterday, but now he’s pretty sure he was holding the dog hostage to ensure Sirius would come today.

He almost throws up on one of James and Lily’s neighbors welcome mats, but since his stomach is devoid of alcohol, he manages to keep it together. Sirius lets out a breath, grimaces, and raises his fist to knock.

James opens it instantly, and the joy and relief on his best friend’s face almost makes it worth it. 

“Hey Pads.”

“Hey fucker.”

James pulls him into an embrace and Sirius relaxes. He was here and he hadn’t spontaneously combusted. The familiar sound of dog nails on the floor lights his heart up and he lets out a roar of delight as he bends down to hug his dog.

“Hi Grimmie!”

He laughs, feeling lighter than he has in recent memory, his fingers digging into his dog’s thick black fur, and almost feeling like he was home again. 

Then he spots her big blue eyes, and he remembers where home really was.

“Hi Doe.”

Shit. It slips out before he can stop it. His plan had been to let Doe make every first move, but he can’t help it. She’s here-she’s home in more ways than one. Sirius tries to run his hand through his hair but he’d forgotten he’d cut it. He tries to smile, preparing for the worst. Is she gonna hit him? Scream at him? Ignore him completely? Anxiety lurches in his stomach as she walks towards him. He needs to apologize, he needs to try to get it out before she does whatever she does and he loses his chance.

“Doe-”

When she wraps her arms around him, Sirius freezes, the rest of what he was going to say dying on his lips as his brain shorts out. He stiffens, not quite sure if he can hug her back, his arms kind of frozen mid air. Doe’s hug last maybe three seconds, but Sirius feels their whole past rush by with her arms around him. Dorcas is giving him the best gift she possibly can and the last thing he deserves.

A chance. 

It takes another beat before Sirius relaxes into her embrace and hugs her back, the feeling of her in his arms again something he couldn’t have even fathomed a month ago.

Doe swallows hard and pulls away, shoving her hands in her jean pockets. Her eyes are red and Sirius watches her mouth work to get her lip between her teeth.

“Hey.”

“Hey trouble.”

He forgets that he’s not supposed to call her that anymore, but Doe doesn’t seem to care. She lets out a strangled little laugh and glances towards the kitchen. Lily and Remus are doing a terrible job of not gawking at them and Sirius is suddenly hyper aware of James behind him.

“Do you-do you uh, wanna go talk on the balcony?” Sirius asks, his voice is almost dazed, not quite able to process that Dorcas is willingly staying in his vicinity. 

“If you’re up for it. And um...you know. Feel like you can be safe with me. I’d get it if you didn’t.”

His eyes search her face, matching features by memory. He’s struck by an incredibly stupid urge to cry-but fuck, it’s good to see her.

Here || 004

[notsiriusatall]

Forget What I Said, It's Not What I Meant

He’s not sure what time it is when he wakes up, but the throbbing in his head and wrist remind Sirius of what’s going on before he even opens his eyes. 

“Doe?”

Sirius pushes the blanket off of his head and sits up as best he can. Every part of him aches, the pain of the past thirty six hours finally fully hitting him. He sucks in a breath and touches his ribs gingerly-at least one of them has to be broken.

“Fraid not, bro.”

Sirius turns towards the sound of James’ voice. Why do people keep cleaning his kitchen? Well he knows why, but he doesn’t really see the point in cleaning up a mess that doesn’t have an end in sight. Though he should probably abandon that style of thinking if he wants any chance of cleaning up the mess of himself. James is making pancakes, Sirius watches as he throws one at Grim who has abandoned his post at Sirius’s side in an effort to receive snacks. Sirius swallows, his throat raw from dehydration and the yelling he vaguely remembers doing last night. 

“James. I’m so sor-”

“I’m not taking any more apologies from you, Siri.” James says, his voice light and easy. “I’m not mad. You scared the shit out of me, but I’m not mad. But you don’t get to say sorry anymore unless you do something to fix it, okay?” 

Sirius nods, his throat scratchy and feeling as raw as the rest of him. 

“Okay.”

He sits in silence for a few moments, his heartbeat in his head as the hangover he’d pushed back finally settles in with full force.  Sirius pokes at his wrist, James must have bandaged it in his sleep, and sucks in a breath when his touch causes more red to seep into the white of the bandage. Sirius closes his eyes as the weight of everything crashes around him, eerily calm now that he’s on the other side of it, but the blood on his wrist won’t let him forget how close to the end he had been. 

This has to be rock bottom, right? There’s no way he could go any lower, right?

“Did you mean it?” James asks, coming around the couch and handing him a plate of pancakes. Sirius has a strange urge to cry when he looks at the smiley face James has painted with syrup.

“...mean what?”

He doesn’t know if he’s actually able to discuss all of this with James, but he guesses he doesn’t have much of a choice. How do you tell the person who has saved your life countless times that you can’t picture a future where you’re happy? Where you’re anything but a burden to the people you care about? 

James stuffs his mouth full of pancakes as Sirius stares at the syrup as it slides off the top of the stack. 

“Siri. You need to eat something.”

“Fine.” 

He takes a half hearted bite as James speaks.

“Did you mean it when you said you wanted help?” 

The hope in his best friend’s voice about kills him. Sirius fights through the shame and looks up, meeting James’s eyes.

“Yeah-” 

His voice cracks and shame wins out, his head falling back down to his plate. Grim noses his way between his knees, his snout just touching the plate, asking without asking. The couch shifts as James sits next to him.

“Good. Because-god, Sirius. Finding you like that-”

“I know.” His voice is too high. He feels sick but he cuts off another bite of pancake to make it up to James.

“You don’t, dude. It was...I can’t lose you, okay? Especially not like that.” 

Sirius breathes in and wills himself to sink into the leather of the couch. He closes his eyes as he threads his fingers in his hair, the giant knot he hasn’t bothered to brush out catching in his fingers.

“I-I don’t want to-I don’t want that either, but if I-when I’m sober it’s okay almost. But I can’t..I have to drink, James. I don’t think I can stop on my own”

He’s never admitted that out loud before. A small weight leaves the space between his shoulder blades.

“Okay.”

Sirius opens his eyes just in time to see James nod twice.

“I know a place-”

“I’m not going to the hospital.”

He says this with more authority in his voice than he deserves to have, but Sirius doesn’t care. Between a life time of his mother’s grooming and what had happened to Reg, if he never steps foot inside of a hospital again it’ll be too soon.

“Jesus fucking christ, will you let me finish?” James actually sounds pissed...well not pissed just frustrated. Sirius shuts up and looks at him expectantly. James sighs.

“There’s a place my professor works at sometimes, it’s inpatient-but its not hospital. It’s kind of got a...dentist office vibe.”

Sirius laughs and even though it sounds wrong, James smiling back at him makes it worth it.

“They’re not gonna like...I don’t know, do medical shit on me?” He asks, anxiety building in his chest. God, he wants a drink.

“I mean they might fix up your wrist a little better than me, but uh, we can tell them about your aversion.”

Sirius nods, not entirely liking how appealing it’s beginning to sound.

“They’ll uh, well they’ll work with you to get you sober. And you’d have to talk to a therapist.”

Sirius frowns, any hope he had slipping away.

“You mean I’ll sit there while a therapist talks at me.”

James sighs.

“Siri-”

“I’ll go, but only to dry out. Not for any of that other shit.”

James opens his mouth to argue, but then closes it.

“Fine. But you’re staying for a month.”

Sirius laughs, incredulous.

“A month? I thought like, maybe a long weekend.”

James gets up, not looking at him as he walks towards the kitchen.

“Then you’re not fucking going, if you’re not going to take it seriously.”

“I take everything Siriusouly.”

Sirius watches as James stiffens at the sink. He puts his plate down and turns, his hands bracing himself on the island as he speaks, his anger barely contained, his knuckles whitening.

“Right, now’s the time for jokes, after I sped over here, almost crashed my fucking car because you sounded like you were fucking dying on the phone. Because my first instinct when Doe called Lily and asked for a ride and mentioned you was that you were going to try to die. That’s really fucking funny, Sirius. It’s all just a big fucking joke, right? Me panicking trying to figure out how the fuck I’m supposed to get through everything left in my life without you if you die, Lily in fucking hysterics when I called her a bit ago and Dorcas-”

“Don’t.” Sirius says, anger taking over even the shame. “Don’t bring her into this.”

“You brought her into this, dude. And she’s already in it whether you like it or not. We fucking care about you. We’re fucking terrified, Sirius. And not just for you...I’m scared of you. I have no idea what you’re going to do next, I have no idea who you are and I thought maybe I could stick it out long enough to see if my best friend would come back but if you’re just going to sit there and think you can solve your problems with a long weekend of minorly giving a shit then I don’t think you’re ever going to come back. And I don’t think you’re ever going to beat this. You need to wake the fuck up, Sirius. You have a choice to make-you can stay down at the bottom or you can fucking try.”

James searches his face as his words sink in. Sirius knows he’s right. But, more importantly, Sirius wants him to be right. This has to be a turning point-he didn’t push that glass deeper for a reason. There was something in him that wanted to live, needed to live, and it was time. Sirius puts his barely touched pancakes on the coffee table and stands. James’s gaze doesn’t leave him, challenging him and begging him at the same time.

“...what happens to Grim?”

James smiles at him sadly.

“He can come stay with us.”

Sirius nods, looking down. 

“Will you tell her I’m sorry?”

Sirius doesn’t need to clarify who ‘her’ is.

“You’ll tell her yourself.”

“In a month.”

“In a month.”

Sirius nods. 

“What do I-how do you even pack for rehab?”

~

Sirius hates most of the people here, but that was the case no matter where he went. It was a bougie place-to be expected given James’s connections, but Jesus. Its hard to find empathy in your fellow addicts when they’re all vapid pieces of low-fat cornbread. Still, he has to admit he feels better than he has in months. The first few days were hell with alcohol withdrawls-and a wake up call. He’d never considered himself an alcoholic, not really. Not any more than anyone else he knew who was in their early twenties. Of course he had been kidding himself, and there was strange comfort in the label, though he’ll never admit it. 

He’s on his way back from his one on one therapy right now. His therapist is a pretty redhead with gappy teeth named Samantha, and he was annoyingly patient. She’d given him a notebook after he’d spent their whole first session in silence, and spent the next silent one offering Sirius suggestions as what to write. She’d mentioned the word letter and it was all over. Not that writing letters to Doe had ever been over in the first place. Sirius had talked at the third session, he asked her how he could not want to die all the time. They’d talked a little more and more and now he almost trusted her, two weeks in. Not enough to tell her anything significant, but still.She’d picked up on that.

“There’s something you aren’t telling me.”

“You got that right.”

“This is only as effective as you let it be, Sirius.”

“That sounds like a cop out.”

She’d laughed at that, and for a second, Sirius let himself imagine that it was Doe’s laughter, that he was somewhere, anywhere, with her. That he hadn’t been messed up and broken from the very start, that he could be someone she deserves. 

Cause even though Sirius is still hopelessly in love with her, he’s going to try his best to not stand in her way. Not poison her more than he already has. He almost told Samantha about that. Almost. But telling her about Dorcas lead him down a nasty path of his past, one that they’d also almost uncovered when Samantha had suggested an antidepressant and Sirius had gone borderline ballistic.

“If we just try-”

“If you try to give me a pill I’m walking out that fucking door and never coming back.”

She’d told him next session that she’d met with the substance counselor and determined together that getting Sirius on something else wasn’t the best step, but he was pretty sure she was lying. She’d decided not to give it to him to appease him-and even though Sirius could see through it, it didn’t mean it didn’t work.

He’s so lost in his thoughts that he bumps into something. When he pulls himself out of his head, he registers the piano bench. Sirius glances around him-it was their hour and a half of free time between therapies and dinner. A few of the other residents-as the staff insisted they be called-were scattered on the various couches in the rec room. Some watching a movie, some reading-no one would notice, right? His fingers itch with an urge he hadn’t felt in forever. Cautiously, he slides onto the bench, moving the cover off the keys. He hits middle C. It’s terribly out of tune. He glances around and no one has looked up from their own business. Something like joy threatens to creep into his chest as he starts to play-singing along before he can stop himself.

Wise men say

Only fools rush in

But I can’t help

Falling In Love with you.

He keeps glancing at Dorcas next to him on the bench in his apartment, butterflies everywhere inside of him. He hasn’t told her before, not in so many words. Not that this was you know, words, but he hopes she’ll be able to read between the lines. He turns his attention back to the keys, his face hot for some reason as he finishes the notes. He hand covers him as he hits the last keys and he breaks out into a big grin as he faces her.

“So, what do you think?”

She’s beaming back at him, her eyes full of his answer before she even speaks.

“You’ve been practicing.”

He nods, his voice falling to a whisper, feeling like the entire world existed for just the two of them.

“Every day.”

“Siri?”

“Yeah?”

“I love you too.”

He hits a wrong note and pulls himself out of his memories. He stops and shakes himself.

“You’re really good.”

Sirius about jumps out of his skin. He turns and sees one of the Mindys smiling at him, her too thin hands draped over the top of the standing piano.

“Oh-thanks. Just you know, something to do.”

She smiles at him in a way that’s uncomfortably familiar. “I could give you something to do.”

Sirius laughs awkwardly and slides off of the bench in the opposite direction of her. She is pretty, in a Boston Barbie type of way. He was pretty sure she was in for a coke habit, or maybe she sniffed incessantly for some other reason. There was a point, aka three weeks ago, where he would’ve thrown caution to the wind and gone with the Mindy to the very romantic broom closet he knew people hooked up in, but instead, Sirius shakes his head.

“I’m uh, good. Thanks.”

She glares at him and walks back to her group on the sofas. Maybe this was progress. 

Sirius looks at the piano, wondering if that was progress too. Tomorrow was Saturday, when they got visitors, and he knew James would be coming, like always. Last time he’d brought Lily and Grim-but the dog wasn't allowed in and since Sirius didn’t think he could handle seeing Lily, they’d both waited in the car. For a stupid fleeting moment, Sirius wonders if James would bring Doe, but he pushes the thought out of his mind as he makes his way to the phone, calling collect. He holds his breath but releases it when James answers.

“Couldn’t wait one more day, sweetheart?”

Sirius laughs, the eagerness in James’ voice it’s own reward. He had a suspicion his best friend might know who he was again, and regardless of what else happens when Sirius gets out of here, he’s going to try to keep it that way.

“You know it, no bespectacled black gentlemen are in here with me, it’s unbearable.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s racist.”

Sirius laughs again but swallows hard as he gears up to ask.

“Could you uh, do me a favor?”

“Is it saving your ass and bullying you into getting your life together? Cause I’m still working on that one.”

“Uh, no. I mean, well, yeah. But um...can you swing by my place and bring me my guitar tomorrow?”

. 

[notsiriusatall]

What if I'm Someone I Don't Want Around?

He laughs at the door as it slams, any emotion or scrap of warmth dying inside of him as soon as it had surged forward.

“Don’t know what I expected.” 

Sirius glances at Grim who has now crossed to the door and is pawing at it. They’ll find him in time. He’s got food.

The fraction of a reason he had left has just slammed the door in his face. Sirius doesn’t really see a point in carrying on any longer. 

He should’ve bought a gun, like he’d planned before. But Sirius had chickened out, like always. He wasn’t strong enough to do this, he wasn’t strong enough to finally bring the people who still care about him for some stupid fucking reason some peace.

That changes today. 

He looks at the vodka bottle in his hands, excepting to feel something, anything. Nothing comes beyond the numbness, no fear, no regret, no fleeting memories of Doe, no shame for the way her face had looked, no guilt for having the last time she saw him be this time….a little guilt. Maybe he shouldn’t…

Sirius shakes his head and unscrews the bottle. He takes big, gulping drinks, as much as he can stand at once, choking slightly as the burn slides down his throat. The bottle is gone and he doesn’t even feel drunk, so he opens the freezer and gets to work on a second, downing half of it before he feels the familiar feeling of drunkenness spreading from his brain all the way down to his toes.

Numb. This shouldn’t even hurt.

He takes the empty bottle and knocks it against the kitchen island, barely registering Grim’s noise of concern as the bottom half of it shatters.

The broken jagged edges of the bottle catch the overhead light and sparkle, and Sirius feels himself swallow hard. He takes a deep breath and is surprised his hands are shaking as he raises the sharp end of the bottle to his right wrist.

It’s not going to hurt. It’s just going to be like falling asleep except he doesn’t have to wake back up. It’s going to be over soon, even if it hurts. 

Soon he’ll finally feel nothing. Soon he’ll finally be nothing.

They’ll be safe. It’ll be worth it.

He drags the glass across the delicate skin of his wrist, horizontal first, a test. The red of his own blood is shocking and Sirius takes a breath in, waiting for the pain, the sting of his skin tearing-but nothing comes.

Is he dead already? Is this how it ends? He laughs despite himself. Of course even the ending of his own life wouldn’t go according to plan. He digs the glass in deeper, feeling something close to satisfaction as he makes himself bleed. Sirius isn’t shaking anymore. He knows what he’s doing is right.

That is, until a wet nose pushes against the elbow of his uninjured arm.

Sirius’s eyes find Grimm, who barks softly, and pain shoots through his arm as his vision blurs out. In an instant, he’s realized what he’s done. In an instant, he realizes he’s made a mistake. 

He wants to live. He’s not entirely sure why, and he doesn’t even know if he needs a reason, just that the want to keep breathing is there and stronger than it’s been in months. 

“Grimm-”

Sirius catches himself on the kitchen counter, breathing hard from his nose as the glass bottle falls out of his hand and shatters beneath his feet. He’s able to right himself and vaguely registers his dog barking louder and louder behind him, pressing his body against Sirius’s and whining softly when his good arm absentmindedly touches soft black fur. 

“Help.”

Sirius isn’t sure who he’s speaking too, but saying it out loud seems to motivate his body to cling harder to the counter. He pushes himself down towards the sink and grabs the dish towel Doe had laid out.

Doe. Fuck. If he survives this, she’s going to be even more pissed at him, if that’s possible. And if he dies….

Sirius doesn’t want to die. He wants to be able to tell her loves her again. He wants to mean it even more. 

Sirius wants to hear her say it back. 

He gasps as more pain shoots up his arm when he pushes the dish towel to the open wound. The light blue fabric is quickly muddied by the color of his blood and instinctively, Sirius knows this isn’t enough. There’s only one person who might be speaking to him who can fix this.

Thankfully the phone is right next to the couch on an end table, and as Sirius makes his way towards it, able to stand a little straighter due to the surge of adrenaline, it rings.

It's always been like this between the two of them, ever since they’d made their first blood oath in 6th grade. They’ll think hard about the other and within minutes there will be a phone call, or a random pop in, or they’ll pass each other on the street. James said it was coincidence, self fulfilling prophecy, a bunch of other smart science-y stuff, but Sirius knows better.

Its a magic that the two of them share, something they’ll never fully be able to explain but at the same time, each understand. 

“James-?”

Sirius’s voice doesn’t sound right, even to him. It’s too hoarse, raw. Someone else’s. He hears James hear it too when his best friend breathes in sharply. 

“Siri-are you-what’s wrong?”

“I did-I did something really stupid.” Sirius hears his voice crack and he’s crying before he can stop himself.

“Please come.”

“I’m coming. What’d you do?” 

“I...I’m bleeding, James.”

The phone line crackles, Sirius thinks vaguely that James must be covering the receiver.  

“Okay, okay. Can you-do you have something you can stop the blood with?”

“I-” The room tilts and Sirius sinks to the floor, the digital handset clutched in his grasp-his lifeline.

“I don’t wanna die.”

He whispers like it’s a big secret, cause it honestly is. Saying it old loud makes Sirius’s will to live that much more real, it makes the blood he’s losing all the more dire.

“You’re not gonna die, Sirius. You’re not dying, understand?” James is doing a poor job at hiding his panic and Sirius just nods against the phone.

“I’m coming right now. I’m on my cell, okay? I’m staying with you.”

“I really messed up.” 

“You didn’t, bro. We can fix it. I can patch you right up.”

Sirius shakes his head.

“James, I messed up.” 

He doesn’t just mean hurting himself. He doesn’t even just mean any of the things he’s done in the past twenty four hours. He’s messed up and he has been for months and months-and he doesn’t even know how to fix it. 

“Hey-hey, hey, stay with me, Sirius. You’re okay. You didn’t mess up.” 

“Would you be better without me?”

He hates himself for how childish his voice sounds, how stilted and tired his speech is, for the panic laced even in James’ breath.

“God, Sirius. No. Of course not. Quite the opposite.”

He hears James get into his car and start the engine. 

“I’ve got a towel.”

“A towel?”

“For my wrist. Where I’m…”

Sirius can’t finish his sentence, shame sobering him. For fifteen straight seconds, all he hears on the other end is the sound of James driving.

“You slit your wrists?”

“....just one.”

“I’m taking you to the hospital.”

Panic shoots through him and another surge of adrenaline spikes up.

“You can’t. Please, James. You can’t. I can’t go- they’ll-”

“Hurt you? Sirius.”

James’s voice is tender towards him when it should be angry. Gentleness he doesn’t deserve. Fleetingly Sirius realizes just then that if he makes it through this, he’ll never be able to repay James.

“I can’t-” His voice breaks off into a sob and he feels his breath start to get short. All the things his mother drilled into him for years seep into his brain. Hospitals are only there to take you away from me. 

They just wanna hurt you.

They won’t believe you. No one will believe you. 

Anything they do to you will hurt more than what I do.

If you loved me, it wouldn’t hurt. 

Why can’t you just be good?

You don’t need anyone but me. You won’t need anyone but me. Remember that. 

If you’re hurt it’s your own fault.

It’s your fault.

It’s your fault.

It’s always going to be your fault.

“Sirius! Sirius!” 

He squeezes his eyes shut hard, trying to stay present, trying not to fall backwards, trying not lose himself more than he already has. He presses down on the cut on his arm and cries out in pain, but the sound of himself brings him back. He feels something wet on his elbow again, and when he looks over, Grim is right next to him. Sirius lets out another sob and clutches onto the dog with his good arm, the phone cradled between his shoulder and ear. 

“Sirius!”

James is screaming his name into the phone, almost hysterical. 

“James-no hospital.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.”

“I’m sorry-”

“No, it’s okay. You just scared me, man. It’s okay. I’ll try to make it so you don’t have to go, okay?”

“Okay. Are you here?”

“I am so close, buddy. I am so close.”

Sirius hears the sound of a horn blaring as James accelerates. Grimm whines beside him and Sirius start to pet him.

“Was that Grimmy?” 

“Uh-huh.”

“He keeping you company?” 

Sirius can hear the fear in James’ voice still, but he can tell he’s trying to calm down for his benefit. 

“Yeah. James?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m really scared.”

Sirius can’t ever remember saying that out loud. Not to James, not to anyone. He’s thought it more times than he can count, increasingly so since everything fell apart eighteen months ago. But he’s never let himself think about it for more than a second. He didn’t dwell, and he definitely didn’t say it out loud. Sirius had learned very early in life that showing weakness, being afraid, doing anything other than laying there and taking it was a good way to get hurt. But here he was, more hurt than he ever could’ve imagined, and beyond the point of pretending otherwise.

“Me too, Siri. But it’s gonna be okay. You’re gonna be okay. You have to be okay.”

Grimm nudges his arm, gets him to keep petting him, keeps him tethered to the life he’d been so determined to leave. James keeps reassuring him in his ear, and Sirius keeps repeating okay every minute or so, not sure of what’s being said, only registering soft black fur beneath his fingers. Soon, Sirius hears a car screech to a stop outside.

“I’m coming up, Siri. I’m here. Is the door unlocked?”

“...yeah.”

He can feel his pulse in the cut now, but he doesn’t think it’s bleeding as much. Sirius shifts so he’s sitting up more against the wall, clutching Grimm with both arms now, suddenly terrified about what’s going to happen when James walks in.

Normally, Grimm greets visitors at the door, but he doesn’t move, letting out a short warning bark when the knob starts to turn.

“S’okay, boy.” Sirius mumbles, shifting more, realizing as he’s trying he doesn’t have the strength to get up. He closes his eyes and rests his head against the wall, opening them again when he feels a hand cup his face.

“Hey.”

When he looks into James’ dark eyes, filled with concern, Sirius loses what he has left. He releases Grimm and throws himself at his best friend, holding onto James with strength he didn’t know he had. He relaxes as he’s held, sobs stealing his breath as James rubs circles on his back. He’d found him in rough shape a handful of times before, but it’s never been like this.

Sirius hopes it’s never like this again. 

“Let me see your arm.”

It’s only when James speaks that Sirius realizes he’s been crying too. He pulls away, his hand on his uninjured arm still gripping James’ bicep. James gently pulls the towel away and breaths a sigh of relief. 

“Alright, Pads. You didn’t get deep.”

Sirius’s eyes work double time and search James’ expression. 

“What-what does that mean?”

James’ offers him a watery smile.

“You’re gonna be just fine. No hospital.”

Sirius breaks down again, relief flooding him as James readjusts them so Sirius can lean against James properly, his arm around his shoulders keeping Sirius on Earth. Grimm puts his head in his lap.

“I’m not gonna die?”

“You’re not gonna die. Not on my watch.”

They sit there for what could be forever, Sirius quietly crying into James’s chest/armpit, letting years of pain out on the floor of his living room. When he’s done, James lets the silence surround them, reaching over to scratch Grimm behind the ears as Sirius’s breath turns back to normal.

“I have to ask you, Siri.” 

Sirius nods against him, not moving his head up to look at him even though he should.

“I know.”

“How much did you have to drink.”

He lets three heavy seconds pass before he has the guts to answer.

“One and a half.”

“Drinks?”

“Fifths.” 

James sucks in a breath. Sirius wants to cry again, realizing how consistently he’s been letting James down. He pulls away, lifting his head up even though it feels far too heavy.

“I...James. I need help.” His voice cracks but he pushes through.“Please.”

James nods twice, standing and pulling Sirius up with him.

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay, I’ll get you help. Let me bandage you up first.”

He drops Sirius off on the couch and disappears into the bathroom. Grim jumps up beside him and whines again. Sirius reaches for him but he touches something else soft first. The blanket Doe had slept with. Without thinking, without caring, he wraps it around himself, wrapped even around his head. He breathes her in, tears streaming down his face again.

He has to see her again. He has to tell her he’s sorry. 

And he will.

He’s asleep before James even finds the first aid kit,he’s completely exhausted. His sleep is mercifully dreamless and for the first time he can remember, Sirius is looking forward to waking up.

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts‌:

“I don’t believe that’s any of your fucking business, is it?” 

Doe hates herself for the way her voice wobbles on her words and she hates him even more for the mean glee in his eyes when she speaks. But she still doesn’t give in. He can break her down into fucking bone splinters if he so chose but she’d never stop fighting him. Against him, for him…what difference did it really make anymore?

“If you really believe that,” she says, breath hitching in her throat, hands falling to find Grim now standing at her side. “then I don’t why I’m here right now. I don’t know why you ever let me into your life five years ago. I don’t why I ever trusted you. I don’t know why you ever kissed me. I don’t know why…” she breaks off with a soft deranged laugh and presses her the heels of her palms hard to her eyes. “I don’t know anything anymore.”

She lets her hands fall back to her side, and with sticking her chin up to contradict the quivering of her lower lip as she stares into the pits of what used to hold her future.

“I’m pulling out of the wedding. I’m not doing this with you and I’m certainly not doing this to James and Lily because apparently we can’t even be in the same fucking room together anymore so…yeah, we’re really fucking done now. If you truly believe I’m so awful, that nothing we had was ever real, then I see no use in even pretending anymore that we can even try to fix this.”

“No need, sweetheart. James hasn’t talked to me in days-”

That wasn’t entirely true. James had came by two days after their fight, demanding to be let in, to talk to him but had left after the fifth time Sirius had shouted through the door to go fuck himself.

“And they always take your side anyhow.” Sirius scrunches his face as he takes a swig from the vodka bottle. “I’ll fuck off forever like you’ve all always wanted.”

He cheers her with the bottle before doing another shot, the familiar numbness creeping into his brain. Maybe he’ll wake up in an hour and it’ll be a dream, his kitchen will still be a mess and Dorcas will be at her home where she belongs. Away from him. Safe. 

Sirius meets her glower with a smirk that he hopes hides his sadness.

“Thought you were leaving.”

“I am.”

“Good.” 

Doe turns to the door and something seizes inside of him. Memories flood him before he can stop them, the last time Dorcas had left him, all the times she’d walked out that door with the promise to return the next day, the times they’d pressed each other up against that door, the doorknob digging into his back...

But this time felt finite. More so than the last time, the worst time-something in Sirius’s soul told him this was really it. If she walked through those doors, he  was never going to see her again.

So he might as well tell her the truth, while he was still alive.

“You wanna know why I came to see you last night?”

Doe’s back stiffens and she turns to look at him, her face full of rage and something that hurts too much for Sirius to properly place.

“No. I don’t care.”

Sirius laughs.

“Yes you do.”

Dorcas doesn’t respond, just looking at him expectantly, looking more tired than he’s ever seen her. Sirius takes in her face, each feature folding into his memory so he can keep a little piece of her forever-as short as forever might be for him.

“I had to come see you, Dorcas. And I-” 

He lets out a breath, tucking his bottom lip under his teeth as emotion he thought he’d completely lost swells inside his chest. His eyes find hers and he gives himself a fraction of second to get lost in them, to hold the intensity of their blue in his heart, not knowing if he’ll ever look into them again.

“I’m still in love with you. I never stopped. And I needed to tell you. That’s all.”  

Falling || 003

[notsiriusatall]

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts‌:

“Oh, for Christ’s sake.”

“You’re right,” she says as she disentangles herself from the blanket and Grimm. “I am the one being dramatic here. I absolutely should have guessed that me getting in the cab with you being pissed off your rocker would lead to you telling me how you get off on me turning into a fucking stranger before your very eyes. Or you calling yourself ‘my biggest regret’ and didn’t I spend my entire time in Afghanistan wishing I’d never met you?” Getting to her feet, she crosses from the living room to stand toe to toe with him in the kitchen, jaw clenched off the vague stench of vomit and B.O. After last night, she wasn’t interested in tiptoeing around him anymore. He was gonna call her dramatic? After what he put her through last night? Fuck. Him.

“Or my personal favorite, you telling me that hitting you would make me feel better. That one real took the fucking cake. That’s what gets me off.”

“But you’re so right,” she says with a click of her tongue, now on her feet and staring him right in the eye as she pulls her hair up. “I should have seen that coming. Fucking glutton for punishment that I am.”

“Glad you see it from my side.”

He chuckles cause Sirius can practically see the fire coming out of her eyes. Luckily he feels like being burned.

“So...did I get you off? Was it good for you, baby?”

All the times he’s called her that. All the times he’s meant it, all the wonderful things he’s said and done and meant and felt for her shatter with the sarcasm on his voice and the way her face falls, how for a second hurt breaks through the anger and disgust. Hurt caused by him. Sirius thought he’d reached max capacity for hating himself, but Doe, as always, was taking him to new places. Hate for himself surges through him as he watches her in pain and as he hears himself break the only promise he’d ever really meant.

“That’s all you wanted, wasnt it? To get off with me? And not just last night either, huh?” He smacks his lips together loudly and raises his eyebrows at her.

“That’s all anyone ever wants from me anyhow. Stupid that I’d think otherwise, huh? It’s all I’m ever good for...”

He turns around and grabs a bottle of vodka out of the freezer.

“You fuck anyone since me?”

He’s not playing anymore. He never really was. He can pretend like he’s pushing her away and being horrible for some big grander noble scheme, he knows deep down that this is just who he is.

Horrible. Rotten. Only good at ruining things.

He’d already proven that to Dorcas. Might as well do it again. He unscrews the vodka bottle and sniffs it before taking a swig, his eyes never leaving Doe’s and waiting to be burnt alive. Maybe it’ll make him feel some other kind of pain.

Falling || 003

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts‌:

“You’re kidding, right?” Doe grimaces and brings her hand up to massage the knot out of the back of her neck.

One look at his pained face tells her that no, Sirius was most definitely not kidding and he usually never was. But back then, blackouts were ridden out with both of them staying in bed, gradually piecing together fragments of the night before between naps and vomiting.

“Sirius no!” she laughs, shoving at his shoulders as he swoops in like he’s going to kiss her. “You stink!”

“I thought you liked them nasty, Meadowes,” he grins at her and flops onto his side with a groan.

“Mmm,” she smiles, twisting around so she’s facing him, and cards her fingers through his hair framing his face, “I like ‘em greasy. I like ‘em clammy. I even like ‘em gross and disgusting…but I do not want you kissing me with your nasty puke breath.”

All of that was lost now. Even at their worst while they were still dating, he never was so outright vicious to her, drunk or not. Never so aimed to hurt…

“You came to my dad’s house last night,” she sighs, dropping her hand to pet Grimm still curled around her. “And you wouldn’t leave when I got you a cab, then threatened to keep screaming unless I got in the cab with you so…I got in the cab.”

She stares blankly at him, watching him go noticeably pale.

“Oh, and you fell out of the tree by my window so that has to hurt like a bitch right now.”

Originally posted by share-the-damn-bed

Bits of what she says come back to him as Doe talks, and shame rises up deep within him. It’s funny almost-in a way that wasn’t funny at all-he thought he was beyond feeling anything, but then Dorcas shows back up just to prove him wrong.

“I’m obviously fucking not kidding, but thanks for assuming I’m lying just to trick you. That’s...” 

He feels his face twitch into a frown, but Sirius forces himself to keep his expression neutral.

“I promised I never was going to lie to you, remember? I mean, I broke everything fucking else I promised you, so I get it, but come on, Meadowes.”

He takes a giant swig of Gatorade. God his neck hurts. He remembers falling now that she said it, the way the air had left his lungs, the few milliseconds where he thought maybe he’d finally ended it, that maybe he’d finally stop letting everyone down because he wouldn’t be around anymore. That they’d all be free to move on and finally be happy with out him. But then he got up. He tells himself that not sharing this with Doe doesn’t count as a lie, even though he knows that’s anything but the truth.

He can’t tell her. If she knows how bad Sirius is, she’ll leave forever. Or worse, pity him. He can’t put this on her, not along with everything else. Sirius won’t be the reason she drowns twice.

He knows that’s all he’ll do. That if she stays with him-God, Sirius wishes he was strong enough to actually let her go. That he wasn’t so selfish to hold onto her, even in this small way. Unable to be good enough to walk away.

Sirius can’t do it. But he can push Doe that way. He can help her save herself-throw her a lifeline she doesn’t know she needs. He just hope he knows Dorcas well enough still to know what buttons to push.

“Give me some fucking credit. Besides-”

As he speaks, he pulls open what would be a silverware drawer for a normal person and pulls out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. He puts one in his mouth and lights it up, inhaling audibly to piss her off.

“You knew what you were getting into if you got in that cab; you didn’t have to come here with me. Don’t be fucking dramatic.”

Falling || 003

[notsiriusatall]

Falling || 003

Before he opens his eyes, the pain registers. What’s surprising is that the pain in his shoulders is somehow stronger than the pain in his head. Sirius takes a deep breath, waiting for the usual wave of nausea to hit him, but as he opens his eyes, he vaguely remembers throwing up before.

 But that’s about it. He knows he went for a walk, and apparently he banged his nose up some more because he can feel his pulse in it as he slowly pulls himself out of bed. His sheets are sweat soaked, like they always were when he dreamed about his mother. Flashback dreams like that, with the details and pain as real as they had been the first time, were getting more common when he was drunk, but Sirius doesn’t care. He tells himself remembering that, being put through it all again was no less than what he deserved for what he’s done. For all the lives and peace and goodness he blew up because that’s all he’s good at doing. His past was punishing him for his present, and Sirius couldn’t see it as anything other than fair.

He pads into the living room and stops dead, his blood running cold when he sees her unmistakable form curled up beside Grimm on the couch. The body he’d spent the best days of his life memorizing tucked under a blanket he didn’t even know he owned, breathing harder in sleep than he’d remembered.

“Doe?”

She groans sleepily and Sirius looks down and realizes he’d whipped his shirt off in his sleep. Panic shoots through him when he remembers his tattoo and something deep within him is telling him she shouldn’t see him half naked-that it might send the wrong message. Thankfully the hallway between his bedroom and living room was lined with discarded laundry, so he shrugs into a dirty grey sweatshirt and clears his throat, stepping fully into the living room. Grimm lifts his head at him and breathes out his nose hard, his tail thumping against the couch, but he makes no move to leave Dorcas’s side.

“Traitor.” Sirius mumbles, making his way to the kitchen but he stops short. There were several bags of trash lined up neatly beside the can, his sink was empty and the army of takeout containers no longer covered the counter. Shame he didn’t know he still possessed clouds his cheeks as Sirius grabs three water bottles and a Gatorade out of the fridge. He was already at the bottom, but Dorcas being here, cleaning up his messes that she didn’t even have a part in, was like putting rocks in his pockets. He cracks the Gatorade open and watches Doe stir as much as he can with the back of the couch in the way. The effort of opening the drink sends pain shooting through his shoulder and down his arm. Dorcas sits up on the other side of the couch, Sirius sees her just in time to bite back his cry of pain.

What the hell had happened? Why the hell was she here? 

And why did she still look so pretty when she was pissed off?

“What uh...”  he laughs, trying to be casual, realizing this is the first time he’s seen her sober. This was far from what he’d pictured their second chance at a reunion being, hoping even though he knew better that maybe he could be...well not better, but not quite this bad the next time they saw each other. Sirius should know himself better than that. He must of massively fucked up if Doe was here, he flashes her a smile, hoping to at the very least put a pause on the massive fuck-ups.

“What are you doing here?”

@pvtmeadowespvtparts​

[notsiriusatall]

Samuel Larsen in a deleted scene of After (2019)

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts‌:

She’s at his side without a thought, placing a careful hand on the small of his back while reaching around to place her other hand on the side of the sink to protect his head. Like you would do with a baby. A baby spewing vomit and blood into a kitchen sink miraculously filled with only a few dishes, but really how many dishes does the baby need to use when he’s surviving on alcohol and takeout?

Sirius mutters something indecipherable but most assuredly something incisive and Doe shushes him and starts rubbing circles into his back.

“All right, all right, just…get it all out…yeah, there you go.” 

He moans and pushes his head into her hand. “Doe-”

“Sirius,” she shakes her head even though he can’t see her but doesn’t pull her hand away from his sweaty forehead. “Just…relax–let’s–are you done?”

She gets her answer by way of a renewed wave of puking.

“Yup. Okay. Just…we’re gonna finish here and then we’re gonna get you into bed, all right? Just…all right.”

It’s all on instinct, she’ll reason later, that she still ran to him after possibly one of the worst nights of her life with who used to be her favorite person in the world. Just because, that she rakes her fingers real gentle through his hair, trying not to react too much to the straight bile swirled with blood like red food dye making its sluggish way down the drain. It’s their history more than how she feels about him now, both elements of herself that are completely separate now.

This person isn’t her Sirius, but at the same time, she left her Sirius sixteen months ago. Or rather was forcefully ripped away from him and the pain was too much, the thought that she’d nearly thrown her whole life away for him.

Maybe this is the closest they’ll get to anything resembling their old normal. When they’d basically take turns vomiting in the toilet and clean each other up, sometimes just lying on the bathroom floor because it felt good on their flushed skin. Too warm to hold onto each other but doing it anyway…

The sound of his deep shuddering breaths raise her from her thoughts and she adds more pressure to the circles in his back.

“What about now, Siri?” The nickname slips from her tongue before she can even think of taking it back, but all Sirius does is close his eyes, still pressed against her hand in the sink, making her heart ache in all the wrong ways.

“Drown me.” He mutters, his stomach lurching again but not quite as violently as before.

The familiar wrinkle appears between Doe’s eyebrows.

“What?”

Before he can come up with a lie, Sirius starts throwing up again. It’s almost worth it to feel her hand on his back, the coolness of her hand on the back of his neck as she steadies him. Doe’s touch is like coming home-he wonders if there will ever be another person who can touch him and for it to instantly be okay. Selfishly he hopes not, that way he has a viable reason to never move on from her.

Of course, that’s assuming he’s around for a significant amount of time after this.

Sirius would stick around forever if it meant he’d always feel her hand on his back, but, like everything else in his life that had held the possibility of goodness, Sirius had ruined that.

“I said, ‘sorry’.” He manages, too drunk to even know what he’s sorry for beyond the fact that he was throwing up. His mind was blurry. He knew it was strange Dorcas was there, that something had happened, but he couldn’t remember why it was strange. It was something that had happened dozens of times before-he’d get too drunk and apologize, usually by making her breakfast while he was hungover and going down on her in the shower the next day. She’d teased him once that she was pretty sure he sometimes got too drunk just to make it up to her after, and he’d been too embarrassed to tell her she was right.

It was different now though. Something was off, maybe he’d hit his head too many times. He knew he couldn’t kiss her, which was unfortunate cause that was about all he wanted to do. But she’d said not to, and if Sirius was good at anything, it was knowing that no meant no.

“Can we go to bed?”  He asks, sounding like a child. He pushes his hot cheek into her now wet hand. He smiles to himself as she gently washes some of the vomit out of his hair with the spray house, excited and ready to fall asleep in her arms, like always.

Except they hadn’t done that in a while. Sirius knew it was his fault why but the drunkeness had all but consumed him now. He didn’t even feel like a person.

“Please...” 

Her hand still fits perfectly in his as she pulls him to his room. 

Doe says something to him about leaving him in his clothes as he falls onto his bed, removing his shoes for him. She knew better-even like this, even on the edge of his will to live, she knew how important it was for Sirius to keep control of himself like that. 

“Ok.” He says, not knowing what she says. He gropes blindly for her hand as she pulls a blanket over him, but he can’t find her. He can’t keep his eyes open. He hears rustling as she moves something around his room, he’d learn in the morning that it was his trash can. 

Time blurs as the lights turn off and Doe starts to walk away. Suddenly, it’s two years ago, and Sirius’s biggest problem is the family dinner he faces that weekend.

“Don’t I get a kiss?” He slurs, his bottom lip sticking out.

He hears Dorcas suck in a breath and he frowns, knowing somewhere subconsciously that he’s not supposed to ask for that but not knowing anything else.

“.....no.”

“S’okay.”

Sirius tosses and turns, whipping his t-shirt off in the darkness of the room. He’s already too hot and when Doe joins him in a minute he’ll roast. Vodka always made him sweaty. He settles back into the covers, still sensing her presence in the doorway. She always took such good care of him.

“Night, babe.”

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts‌:

Doe looks up at him from where she’s crouched in front of Grimm clipping on his leash.

“If you think hitting you would make me feel better, I guess you were right.” She stands up and heads back toward the door, Grimm at her heels. “You never really knew me at all.”

She slams the door behind them but not fast enough to block out Sirius’ harsh laughter.

“C’mon, Snuffles,” she murmurs, stuffing her hands in her hoodie pocket and cracking a small smile when he cocks her head at her. “I missed you too.”

The two of them head back down the stairs to the front lawn where Snuffles does his business and shuffles along with his nose in the flowerbeds, Doe following behind him. A dark BMW pulls into the parking lot and a young man and women–probably in their mid-twenties–come spilling out hand in hand, giggling and stumbling up the walkway to Sirius’ building. Right at the foot of the stairs, the woman sticks her hands in the man’s coat pockets and tugs him real close, spending seconds where just their noses brush before their lips come together in series of short giggly kisses. It’s so achingly familiar and Doe doesn’t realize that she’s been staring until they go up the stairs out of sight.

They stay out until Doe can’t stand the cold anymore, and even Grimm has stopped moving around so much and just stands with his side pressed to her leg.

“I don’t know what to do,” she tells the dog, pulling one hand out to scratch behind his ears while her other hand keeps hold on the leash from inside her pocket. “He’s–Christ, Grimmie.”

It’d be so much easier if she could just hate him. If she didn’t have all these memories, the letters that she keeps folded in a notebook now that she’s retired the uniform. She could hate him for tonight. For climbing up to her window, upsetting her father, blackmailing her into a cab, hurling abuse after abuse at her, but she can’t properly make herself hate him.

But the pain between them, in him, even in her, it’s toxic.

Sirius is still in the kitchen when they re-enter the apartment, still slugging from the bottle of rum over by the sink.

“Don’t you think you’ve had enough?” she asks as forcefully nonchalant as possible, yanking out her scrunchie and raking her fingers back through her hair. Grimm almost follows her in the kitchen but seems to reconsider and decide to head towards the living room. She considers following him but even like this, even drunk out of his mind and mean and horrid and nearly unrecognizable, Sirius still holds her glued to the spot. 

“If you think this is enough, you never really knew me at all.” He says easily, mimicking her sentiment from earlier than had stung harder than anything he poured down his throat. The coconut of the parrot bay is oppressive as he lifts the bottle towards her sarcastically, toasting her, before slugging back two more shots. 

“It’ll be enough when I stop feeling like-” He catches himself, clearing his throat and swaying in his spot as he quickly looks away from her. His vision blurs and he stumbles back into the sink, laughing  even as a sharp pain flairs in his tailbone. He falls forward and catches himself on the other side of the counter, hoisting himself up unsteadily and gripping the counter beneath him to stay steady.

“It’ll be enough when I stop feeling.” He amends, half wishing she’d call him out so he can get his purpose for all of this out in the open. All Doe gives him is a raised eyebrow.

“How’s that going?”

Sirius laughs, gesturing his arms out wide to the squalor around him.

“Fucking swell, Dorcas.” 

When he moves his arms out from under him, he falls again, hitting his barely healed nose on the counter and making himself bleed again. He grumbles as he stands back up, clumsily grabbing a fistful of paper towels and grinning maliciously at Doe from behind them.

“You never even asked why I came to see you.”

His stomach bubbles as he says the sentence, he tastes coconut and bile. 

“I’m pretty sure I did.”

“I don’t think so. I mean, I told you I...I need to know you hate me, but the stupid part is that I-”

The bile and the coconut come up before he can stop it, bending almost fully over the sink and making it just in time, throwing up so violently he hits his head on the side of the sink.

[notsiriusatall]

He hates his heart for the way it perks up at the sound of joy in her voice. Sirius didn’t know he was capable of hating himself more, but it deepens just then as blood rushes down his arm and the love of his life looks the way she’s supposed to, finally. But definitely not because of him. He’s hit with a stupid urge to cry and he wants to beat his own head against cement until he can’t get up anymore.

“I dont give a shit what you do.”

His voice comes out cracked and wrong, and he doesn’t look at either of them as surveys the apartment that’s almost as neglected as himself. It’s trashed with piles of garbage and laundry scattered everywhere on the floor. He’d told the maid to stop coming after she walked in on him hammered at 10 am one Tuesday. His kitchen is littered with empty liquor bottles, forks, and take out containers. The class schedule that he hasn’t even looked at hangs from one pathetic magnet on the fridge thanks to Lily. The white carpet and surfaces are coated in thick black dog fur. The apartment had been made for someone old enough to be a minimalist, with wide open spaces, white walls and clean simple lines. Sirius had hated that when he’d moved in, forgoing the work of painting and covering the starkness of the walls with every poster for every band he could find. He’d ripped them down two days after Doe had left for basic training without saying goodbye. His guitar lay unused in the corner closest to the tv that was pretty much only ever on pay per view porn. Magazines and pizza boxes and styrofoam cups were stacked on top of the instrument he at one point hadn’t let anyone else touch. He hadn’t played since she left. He could barley listen to music, every song he liked, regardless of what it’d been about, he’d liked because of Doe.

The rest of the apartment, with two exceptions, was equally as horrific. One of the exceptions being the place where Grimm ate-Sirius tried to at least keep his life in order. He’d tried to give him to James and Lily but they refused-which ultimately was great for Sirius but bad for Grimm. Sometimes it was the thought of the giant dog with the soul of a baby bunny finding him lifeless that kept him alive. But Grimm deserved better. They all did. And better was anything but Sirius.

He stumbles to his freezer to root around for some more vodka, instead finding some parrot bay rum and deciding that was good enough. He doesn’t even bother with a glass, swigging from the bottle and making eye contact with Doe in the doorway as he lowers it back down. He grins at her, the disgust in her gaze only egging him on.

“I’m sorry I’m being a terrible host. Would you like a drink?”

She doesn’t say anything as she gingerly crosses the trash filled floor to get Grimm’s leash from the hook. Doe’s face changes when the door lets out a bark of delight and starts wiggling.

When Sirius hears her laugh, he does another shot.

“Good to know you still have some love left for one of us.” He slurs at her. He feels sick and he’s not sure if it’s because he’s vaguely aware of what he’s doing or if it’s because of the rum mixed with vodka.

“You can hit me you know. You should. Bet it’d make you feel better.”

notsiriusatall‌:

“Couldn’t resist, huh?”

Sirius knew Doe wouldn’t leave. She’d always needed that last word, just like him. It’s why when they fought they ripped each other to shreds.

But now, Sirius was only tatters. He’s not even sure if there’s anything left to rip.

“Get up.” She says, her voice forceful. Sirius is pretty sure he sees hate in her gaze, finally, when Doe looks down at him.

“You just couldn’t resist.” He mumbles, getting shakily to his feet and stumbling past Doe to concur the rest of the stairs.

“You love seeing me like this, don’t you? Shows you that…..” He frowns deeply and stares at her with drunken thoughtfulness. “Shows you that karma works, huh? I know I deserve this, probably worse-who knows.”

He makes it to the top of the stairs before he trips again, hitting the cement hard on his way down and scraping up his right side. He laughs at himself and then watches Doe as she approaches. He props himself unsteadily up on his elbows and looks up at her, trying and failing to get his eyes to really focus on Doe’s face.

“This has gotta be so satisfying for you, huh? Isn’t it nice of me? Showing you exactly what you haven’t been missing?

“Hey.”

Sirius and Doe had been sitting at his kitchen island doing homework. Or rather, Doe had been staring at the same page in her calculus textbook for the past twenty minutes and Sirius staring at her, his foot nudged against hers on the leg of her stool, the wrinkle in his forehead betraying his thoughts. In the hour before that had been spent on the couch with her face buried in his chest.

“What?” She pulls her wavy hair over one shoulder as she turns to him.

The corner of his mouth lifts into that sweet half-smile that makes her fall for him all over again even when he makes her so mad sometimes. He gets off his stool and takes her hand. “C’mon.”

She groans, leaning into him as he stands behind her and wraps his arms around her, tucking his chin on her shoulder, all without letting go of her hand. “Baby, I got a calculus test on Friday, and I’m nowhere near ready-hmm.”

He presses a kiss to the side of her neck, rendering her completely useless. “Humor me.”

“Okay.”

He leads her by the hand down the hall through his bedroom to his bathroom. The bathroom she shares back home with Miriam is always cluttered with everything from hair ties to Bath & Body Works sprays dating back at least five years, but Sirius’ bathroom as well as his guest bathroom is always clean and just nice to be in. The Dolce & Gabbana perfume he’d bought her last weekend sits on the white marble counter next to his shaving cream. She’d refused to take it home, knowing that Miriam would steal it the first chance she got. There was a weird comfort in their domesticity at Sirius’ apartment that she didn’t feel at home. Her perfume next to his shaving cream–a little glimpse of the future she wanted with him, a stupid little fantasy to have at seventeen but something she couldn’t shake. Plus, she likes the idea of having her fancy perfume here while her sister dabs the last dregs of the coveted Cherry Blossom spray behind her ears.

She frowns when he turns on the shower and holds his hand under the spray to find the right temperature. “Is this your way of telling me I need a shower?”

He rolls his eyes and releases her hand to take off his shirt. “No,” he says in that soft careful way of his as soon as his face is back in view, his hair a little mussed up from the shirt. “This is my way of telling you that you’re allowed.”

He doesn’t need to say anymore for her to know what he means. “Sirius,” she shakes her head, “I’m fine. It’s been ten years and–”

She ducks her head, her voice cracking when he slides his hands down her arms to her hips, the sob that’s been clogging her throat all day finally threatening to break through. “It’s been ten years.” 

“Yeah,” he says softly into her hair, his hands moving around to hold her, his fingertips grazing the small of her back under her t-shirt.

“I miss her so much,” she murmurs into his chest.

“I know, baby.”

She lets out a strangled laugh. “But why the shower?”

She can hear the smile in his voice when he kisses the top of her head. “Because I know you like it.”

She looks up into his cool grey eyes and feels nothing but warmth in them. Safe in how well he knows her and how she can be anything she needs to be with him. Perfect. “I love you.”

It’s hard to reconcile the man now leering at her from the ground with the boy from her past, but she supposes that’s her own fault. Which makes it his fault too.

“Gimme your keys.” She holds her hand out to him but thankfully the sound of nails clinking on the floor on the other side of the door draws her attention and marginally lightens her mood.

“Gimme me your keys,” he mimics back at her but miraculously decides to fish out his keys and hands them to her without further comment.

The moment that follows her unlocking the door and pushing it open is the only moment that has any potential of making bearing Sirius worth it. Immediately, she is greeted with a cold nose nudged to her nose and two massive paws on her shoulders.

“Oh my god, it’s a big boy!” she cries, grinning as Grimm starts licking her face chin to forehead right there in the doorway. “A big, beautiful boy! Oh my god, Snuffles!”

He pants happily right in her face and she plants a giant kiss right on his snout, pointedly ignoring Sirius as he edges around them grumbling to himself. “Does a big puppy need to go outside? Huh? Are you a big puppy?”

He woofs in response and drops back on all fours to push his face against her hand. Scratching behind his ears, Doe cranes her neck towards the kitchen where she hears Sirius banging around in the kitchen. 

“Uh, Sirius? Is that okay…if I take Grimm out for a minute?”

[notsiriusatall]

pvtmeadowespvtparts‌:

She sits for a solid minute, watching him out of the door he had left open behind him as he curls up on the stair landing.

“Jesus fuck, get up, you conniving shitstain,” she mutters under her breath.

“Um ma’am?”

“Just wait a second.” She scoots along the seat, not intending to actually leave the cab but more or less hope the motion is enough to disrupt the energy enough to miraculously compel Sirius to his feet.

What would happen if she just left and he just spent the night on the landing a few flights down from his cushy apartment? People have had worse. Hell, she’s had worse. Come morning, he’ll blink open his eyes and manage those remaining flights and crawl into his queen-sized bed with the designer bedsheets. It isn’t that cold. Not like he would die or–

“Fucking dammit.” She clambers out of the cab and turns around to face the driver, who she has the decency to feel a bit sorry for but then again, this is Boston. The people across the street from her dad have this amount of drama in their lives before fucking breakfast, based on the shouting she can hear from the bathroom.

“Uh thanks, I think I’ll get off here too.”

The man frowns at her under his Red Sox cap. “You sure? He’s-”

Doe scoffs. “Life is shit, innit? What else are you gonna do?”

He nods slowly but the expression on his face shows anything but understanding. Confusion is more the term. Maybe he thinks she shouldn’t care either. Because she’s doesn’t. She can’t. “Right, well…be safe then.”

“Yep.” She slams the door behind her and trudges up the walkway.

“Sirius!” she calls as she stomps up the stairs to his reclining form. “I don’t wanna touch you but you need to get up.”

He groans in response and turns his face into the pavement, bringing his arms up as if to shield himself. Now that she’s back outside, the wet cold cutting through her hoodie, perhaps not leaving him to sleep here was a good call.

Not that she cares or anything. Common human decency. Supposedly.

“You can’t sleep here,” she tries again. “You have a bed in two floors. You can make it.”

“Couldn’t resist, huh?”

Sirius knew Doe wouldn’t leave. She’d always needed that last word, just like him. It’s why when they fought they ripped each other to shreds.

But now, Sirius was only tatters. He’s not even sure if there’s anything left to rip.

“Get up.” She says, her voice forceful. Sirius is pretty sure he sees hate in her gaze, finally, when Doe looks down at him.

“You just couldn’t resist.” He mumbles, getting shakily to his feet and stumbling past Doe to concur the rest of the stairs.

“You love seeing me like this, don’t you? Shows you that.....” He frowns deeply and stares at her with drunken thoughtfulness. “Shows you that karma works, huh? I know I deserve this, probably worse-who knows.”

He makes it to the top of the stairs before he trips again, hitting the cement hard on his way down and scraping up his right side. He laughs at himself and then watches Doe as she approaches. He props himself unsteadily up on his elbows and looks up at her, trying and failing to get his eyes to really focus on Doe’s face.

“This has gotta be so satisfying for you, huh? Isn’t it nice of me? Showing you exactly what you haven’t been missing?