#look they're working on it okay | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

fruitcoops · 1 year

Note

a prompt:

sirius and regulus argument. probably something which has been manifesting for a while, like it starts with short sly comments and then builds up to create tension within the family (cuz i consider them part of the dumais family) so dumo tries to comfort one or both of them in the end? kinda long prompt, it’s just something that i’ve not seen and would like to see how it would work?

Gnaw at the Bone, because I just can't leave these two alone. Character credit goes to @lumosinlove <3

TW** (please be gentle with yourselves!): canon shit childhoods (no graphic abuse), Walburga and Orion's A+ parenting, sibling parentification, panic attack, bad coping mechanisms (skating), and past minor injuries from said coping mechanisms

“Sirius.”

“Reg.”

His stomach twisted. His head throbbed. His mouth tacked over, lips sticky, chapped, too much, not enough. Years of it. Stars in orbit, on a collision course with anything that came too close—their gravity was inescapable and destructive to the nth degree. They ruined everything but each other. That gravity would rub and chafe and grind at their rough surfaces and it made him sick to think about it.

Oh, it made him sick to think about it.

“Sirius.”

“Reg.”

And that was it—a clipped acknowledgment from scowling lips, then resignation. Regulus disappeared down the hall with his pasta. Sirius watched him go, shook his head, and headed in the opposite direction with a white-knuckled grip on his cup.

Alright then.

“Everything okay?” Pascal ventured.

Sirius jumped, his glower lifting for a moment in surprise, as if Pascal hadn’t been sitting there for over an hour. “What?”

Pascal tilted his head toward the empty doorway and set aside the broken toaster. “Everything okay?”

His mouth dipped in a grimace; his brow wrinkled like he was trying to find the weak link in a failing play, but something simmered beneath. “We’ll figure it out,” Sirius finally answered. “We’ll—it’s Reg, you know?”

Pascal didn’t know, actually, but Sirius was gone before he could ask for an elaboration. In fact, the only thing he knew for sure was that Regulus had gone through a period of rapid character development over the past nine months and that Sirius didn’t stop loving him for a single second of it, even through the snappish attitude, even through those horrible interviews that Regulus clearly regretted. They were two sides of the same coin with the unfortunate ability to be as evasive as greased weasels.

Celeste would say he was being nosy. Pascal preferred to think of it as a natural desire to engage with his kids as a loving, supportive parent.

He looked down at the toaster, then back up at the opposing doorways and sighed. It seemed some detective work was in order.

“Remus! How are you, mon ami?”

“I’m…good?” To his credit, Remus recovered quickly and offered a light fist bump in greeting. “What’s up?”

Pascal waved a vague hand. “The usual. House is good? Dog is healthy? Boyfriend is happy?”

Bingo. A shadow flickered over Remus’ face before it smoothed out into his usual neutral friendliness. “Yeah, we’re doing great. We were thinking of repainting the living room soon, so if there’s a day you want to borrow the dog, I’m all ears.”

“Parfait, I’ll let you know. And Regulus?”

There it was again—the tension, the twitch, the passive smile. “I think Sirius is just glad to have him home. It’s really been great getting to know him. He’s a sweet kid.”

He might be, but he’s been getting on your nerves, too. If Pascal knew anything, that would piss Sirius off more than any insult Regulus hurled his way. “I’m so glad to hear it. It’s good for them to be near each other right now.”

He clapped Remus on the shoulder and stood before the younger man could respond. It wasn’t just a one-time problem, then; whatever the seething, festering thing between Sirius and Regulus was, it had seeped into their everyday function. Enough that it had even begun annoying Remus ‘Patient’ Lupin. Pascal might not be able to fix their issue, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t give them a nudge in the right direction.

Sirius was right where he left him, hunched on the bench with a whiteboard in hand, though his pen served more as a drumstick than a writing instrument as Pascal approached. The tip-tapping stopped when he ruffled Sirius’ hair and took the seat next to him. “Defense,” Sirius muttered by way of explanation. “There’s a gap. Tremzy’s a killer when he goes in for a shot, but we need to close his spot when he moves.”

Pascal hummed in agreement and propped his skates up on the boards, letting the battered wood take his weight and ease the ache. “Good eyes.”

“ ‘s what I get paid for.”

“You seem tense, mon fils.”

“Hmm?” Sirius blinked. His eye contact was pristine, but his attention was lightyears away. “Sorry, just thinking. Did you need something?”

Pascal offered a wry smile. “What, you’re too old to let me sit with you?”

The deep crease between Sirius’ brows smoothed out; he smiled softly. He blinked again; this time, a bit of him returned. Not beyond all hope of intervention, then. “Non. Desolé. I’m…I’m in my head today.”

“Nothing to be sorry for.”

A few seconds passed before Sirius nodded. Pascal watched his gaze go distant again and his cheek dimpled as he bit the flesh inside. Guilt. Perhaps frustration. A twisted mystery to solve, if Pascal had not been watching him so closely since he first blessed their threshold. It was Regulus, it was Remus and Regulus—

It was something from a time Sirius had been trying to lock down. Ghosts were hard to trap behind hasty boards, nailed haphazard and half-panicked. Sirius was better, not healed. He was safe, not exorcised. He was so goddamn brave it hurt to watch, but Pascal wasn’t foolish enough to miss the way he spooked. And Regulus was a good kid, but a fucking mess all the same.

(Privately, he questioned the decision to go headlong into university right after escaping 18 years of living hell. That was not his place to challenge and not his problem to solve.)

(But still. University? Really?)

Sirius made another note on his board. A canine tooth poked out as he worried at his lower lip. Pascal watched him fidget, hands up and over and under and between, and steadied himself with a slow exhale when Sirius began twirling his pen over his knuckles with a dull, rippling noise.

“Regulus is angry with me.”

Pascal made an impassive noise. It was Regulus.

“I think. Probably.” Sirius’ knee bounced for a five-count before going still. “He’s working through a lot. Finals were hard. It took him off-guard. He got snappy at Remus.”

Remus and Regulus. “Oh?”

“Something about changing his sheets. He didn’t like that we went in his room to clean while he was away.”

Something from a time you’ve been trying to lock down. Not mutually exclusive events, but a progression. Sirius was fixed on a far point, no longer tracking the movement of players. His hands had gone quiet.

“I think I—I think they—” Space hung between them like a bear trap. It was horrible to be right. Sirius exhaled hard and shook his head. “C’est pas grave.”

Pascal bit back his disappointment. He knew better than to think it would spill out so easily. He scooted closer on the bench, and when Sirius didn’t flinch, leaned over to bump him with a gentle shoulder. “Don’t let it eat you up, ouais? Regulus is grown. So are you. It will come in time.”

A halfhearted nod was the best he would get, it seemed. Pascal risked a soft squeeze to the back of Sirius’ neck and—there he was. The loosening of his tense shoulders, the careful lean into the contact. “We’ll talk,” Sirius said.

“Take it slow,” Pascal advised, and prayed to any god that Sirius would at least listen to that. Those who shoved their hands in the cage of a feral animal only came away bitten and rabid. For all his growth, Sirius was plenty feral without the influence of Regulus Black ripping him open again.

They watched the drills together in silence for forty-five minutes. When they were done, Sirius’ clipboard held only blank paper.

“Tuney and I were really close. As kids, I mean.”

A light, fluffy cloud passed overhead on the rushing breeze.

“We did everything together. Like, literally everything. Mom used to joke that we should’ve been twins.”

The pain in her voice was one he knew well.

“We started drifting when I hit junior high, I think.” A controlled, even breath followed the gentle sound of a dandelion being picked. A few bits of fluff floated in and out of view. “And then high school came around, and she hated my fucking guts. Shredded all my tights with a fork. Refused to look at me in the lunchroom. Mom and Dad didn’t tell her it was okay, but they didn’t stop her, either. They just kind of sat there and looked sympathetic.”

Quiet fell over them again. A strand of hair billowed over his vision for a half-second. Time for a haircut.

“I still don’t know what I did,” Lily confessed to the afternoon sun. “I still don’t think she’s forgiven me.”

Looking at Regulus now, Sirius thought he might finally understand what she meant.

The corner of Regulus’ mouth was turned down; not more than usual, but enough to be a scowl to anyone who knew where to look. Quietly, he hoped Regulus’ school friends could tell the difference. He deserved to have people like that. Sirius wasn’t sure he had explained that very well before sending him off. Or ever.

“It’s a good book,” he said.

Regulus made a noncommittal noise. He hadn’t turned a page since Sirius paused in the doorway.

Another try. Pull back to the midline, find an open corridor. “One of my favorites.”

“Je sais.”

“Why are you angry with me?”

Once upon a time, he would not have been so bold as to ask. Once upon a time, Regulus would have sunk further into his cocoon. One pale finger traced the edge of the worn paperback. “I’m not angry with you.”

You’re always a little angry with me. “You won’t look at me.”

“God forbid I’m busy.”

“You’re reading.”

“And I’m busy,” Regulus said waspishly. “Go get Remus to take you for a walk, or something.”

Maybe this was where Lily had failed. In one way or another, she and Petunia had missed each other in the middle. He could recall those six terrible, lonely years with too much clarity to let Regulus push him away. Losing him would never be worth an argument won. “I want to spend time with you.”

“Then get your own book.” Regulus muttered something else under his breath that Sirius didn’t care to look into.

He swallowed down a sigh and picked one at random off the shelf, then settled down on the couch opposite Regulus’ armchair. The words could have been in Portuguese, for all they registered in his mind. The edges were soft from many hands. It might have been Remus’, or from the secondhand bookstore in town. God, it could have been one of Sirius’ own favorites for all he knew. He was working on knowing more of those.

The color blue, but a specific shade.

Tater-tot casserole, preferably with meat, acceptable with just cheese.

Books with adventures, books he could run away in.

Poutine with extra gravy.

Henley shirts that stopped at his elbow.

Hoodies—not the zip-fronts—made of heavier fabric. The ones where Remus had fussed with the cuffs.

“What’s your book—”

The sudden snap of cover on page made him wince; an irritated grumble-sigh hung on its coattails as Regulus swept out of the room without a backward glance. Sirius’ stomach turned, and turned, and turned. He always fucked it up. He always tried too hard. He shut his book in silence and set it on the floor, and went to get his skates.

I’m not an infant. Bared teeth and clenched fists. A charge in the air, a snake ready to strike. And you are not my fucking mother.

Remus wrinkled his nose and scrubbed harder at the grout.

Nightmarish, is what it was. The summer had been sun-soaked and semi-charmed with only the awkwardness of getting-to-know-you’s to taint it. But that was Remus’ perfect wheelhouse—polite conversation, buttering up, small talk to ease Regulus into a world that wasn’t actively trying to shred him. It had all worked so well.

He didn’t know what went wrong. Worse, he didn’t know how to fix any of it. Regulus was constantly boiling with silent fury like a kettle about to blow and it was terrible. Every second Sirius and Regulus existed within each others’ eyeline was hell. And they were living together. For twelve more days.

If they all survived this, Remus was going to take himself out for a little treat. One that did not involve scrubbing the kitchen grout just to avoid running into either of the ticking time bombs.

Regulus’ hissing colliding with the low, furious timbre of Sirius’ voice was not something Remus wanted to experience again, in this life or the next. Nobody won. Everybody lost in one way or another. Sirius got angry and Regulus got angry and Sirius got defensive and Regulus got mean, flat-out and full-send. Sirius snapped back, Regulus stormed off, and Remus spent the better part of his night assuring Sirius he was not turning into his parents. Rinse, repeat, wish for death.

Commotion kicked up in the living room and went quiet in the same breath—Remus paused to watch Regulus stomp off with a book in one white-knuckled hand and listened carefully for the aftershocks.

The house inhaled with him. The office door closed hard. Sirius’ footsteps were rhythmic as a metronome all the way up the stairs and back down again—Remus bit his tongue when he saw the skates clenched in one hand—and remained that way until the basement door shut him out.

Then, and only then, did Remus let a quiet, “shit” slip through his teeth.

Pull back to the midline. Pull back to the midline. Watch, pull back, find your corridor, strike.

The puck skated past the goal without so much as a whisper of net. Sirius hardly heard it hit the boards.

Remus looked faintly ill when they arrived at practice; Pascal was grateful for the early warning to prepare himself for Sirius’ perma-scowl and overall vibe of ultimate distress. The change in the atmosphere nearly made his ears pop. Leo made a hasty retreat from the locker room after Kasey, looking as if he had taken psychic damage, and several others watched him leave with unbridled longing.

“On-ice in five,” Sirius said. Ordered. Everything about him looked incorrectly articulated. “We’re running drills, then doing dry lands.”

Not a soul dared to try the usual bitching and moaning. All cheerful conversation had met its abrupt end.

Cole lowered his head and slunk out the door like a stray bit of shadow. The rest of them followed suit within a minute or two, save for James, who steered Sirius into the ice room with a firm hand on his back.

Plastic buckles clinked softly in the empty space left. “They’re worse?”

Remus slumped forward and muffled a groan in both hands. “They’re going to fucking kill each other.”

“Any idea what happened?”

Remus spread his hands with a lost expression.

“Did this start when Regulus came home?”

“It’s just been the past three days.” Remus shook his head, leaning his elbows heavily on his knees with his pads half-done. “I can’t—Reg was fine when he got here. He was fine through Christmas. Sirius mentions we changed his sheets before he came home, and now he wants my head on a pike and my boyfriend to explode.”

Pascal picked at the peeling logo of his shorts. Sheets. What was so special about the sheets? “Were they new sheets?”

“Same ones he used all summer. I literally just washed them and put them back.”

“So…he didn’t like that you were in his space?” Remus half-shrugged, clearly frazzled by the mere memory. “You know, Adele hates it when we go into her room. Even to drop laundry off, or help her clean.”

“No, yeah, Jules is the same. That’s what started it.”

“Started…?” Understanding crept up his throat like battery acid. “He didn’t.”

“It was bad,” Remus said weakly.

“How bad?”

The laces of Remus’ skates dragged on the ground while he shuffled in his stall. The lines of his arms were rigid and upset; he scratched at the back of his wrist, curled over like he was trying to shield his middle. “His feet bled again.”

Pascal closed his eyes. He should have pushed harder against the basement rink eight years ago. He shouldn’t have let Sirius leave so soon.

He forgot, sometimes, how very alone Sirius had been.

“I fixed it,” Remus said after a minute. Of course you did. He sniffed, shaking his head like he could hear Pascal’s thoughts. “It wasn’t too bad. Blisters, mostly, some hotspots. Made him keep the bandaids on for practice. I hate—Dumo, I hate this. I hate living in it, I hate seeing them tear each other apart. It’s so quiet.”

“They need to stop,” Pascal agreed. Remus kept looking at him for—a solution, he realized. Terrible hope. Something desperate and fragile, a young man coming to a mentor for help he just…couldn’t give.

He looked away first. Remus’ exhale felt like a knife.

“It’s me, it’s me, it’s me, it’s me—”

“No, no, no,” Remus soothed somewhere in the catastrophe of the world.

Sirius spit, again, and pressed his hands over his eyes, again, and willed the bathroom floor to stop digging into his knees and just swallow him up already. His skin crawled and he wanted to scratch but he couldn’t take his hands away or the room would spin and tip him into nothingness.

Maybe he belonged there. But he had managed to hurt Regulus when he was a country away, so perhaps he wouldn’t even be safe in the ether.

Remus’ hand was cool on the small of his back as he frantically tried to keep his dinner down. He didn’t rub. He didn’t tap. He didn’t so much as twitch. Sirius listed to the side and flashed a hand out to steady himself. The pain of his wrist hitting the cabinet didn’t even register until Remus hissed in sympathy and took his weight in the bend of his arm.

“I am treating him just like they did,” Sirius rasped through the smoke pouring from inside him.

“No.” Remus was begging now. He sounded so tired. He was begging. The room swam in the kaleidoscope of suffering that he really should be used to by now, and Sirius pressed his elbows harder into the toilet seat as his ears began to ring.

You are not my mother.

Sirius gasped in a too-hot breath. It had been directed at Remus, not him. But.

But he was.

It was so sick and twisted and his stomach made sure to tell him that with a real-world example of both those words.

You are not my mother.

She wasn’t, either. Their nannies had come close. Sirius missed them sometimes (often) (aching) (with the hurt of a child).

Remus was not Regulus’ mother but he had been, in the same scream-worthy way he had been his father, too, and his brother. He couldn’t think too hard about how he had been the only one to cuddle Regulus without crying and fuck, there he went, Sirius the drama queen making the whole damn world about him.

“Okay, okay.” Arms came around him, easing the slicing pain of the sobs that caught him in fishhooks. The back of his hand hit the floor. His knees hurt like a bruise. His face was smushed against Remus’ chest and it really should have been uncomfortable. Remus made a noise of sympathy and gathered all the gross, slimy, bits of a Sirius-puddle into his arms because he was a saint. The patron saint of fucking messes, and Sirius was the messiest sinner of them all.

“I’m so horrible to him,” he sobbed, hitching and sticky. Probably incoherent. He mumbled. She hated it when he mumbled. “I’m so horrible.”

You are not my mother.

“It was me.” He gulped for air. Remus’ dizzying words fell quiet at the interruption. He added another note to his list of penance. “It was me, it was, I tried.”

“What did you try?” Remus’ fingertips brushed away a loose, sweaty lock and the sobs came harder after that, wracking him down to his organs, past the precious cradle of his ribs. A warm palm cupped the back of his head and Sirius heard a strangled noise interrupt his own endless babbling. He didn’t know he could make that sound. With the way his throat and body were angled against the unmovable pillar of Remus, though, it shouldn’t have surprised him.

“I was—I was his mother.” It was so hard to breathe through the gasping. “I didn’t know what I was doing but I was his mother but I won’t be her.”

“Oh, god.” Remus sounded weak for a saint. There went another beautiful thing, ruined in Sirius’ messy clumsy hands. And somehow, in the darkness, in the Blackness, a kiss nestled just near his temple.

He couldn’t help but go still, then limp, as all the fight and fear siphoned from his flooded lungs.

Remus breathed like he was going to speak several times before he did. “There are other ways.” His voice was heartbreak. Sirius closed his burning eyes. “Sirius—baby, you know my mom. You know Effie, and Celeste, and you know Lily.”

Lily. He knew Lily. Her green eyes, so much pain and regret. Don’t be like me, Pads. Her green eyes, the way she looked at Harry, the way they matched. Sirius had his mother’s eyes. Had she ever looked at him like that?

“There are other ways to be someone’s mother. And…” His hands stuttered, then began to move again, scritching the back of Sirius’ head. That feeling usually made him go comatose in their bed. “Regulus was trying to hurt me when he said that. You know that, right?”

I am not an infant. And you are not my fucking mother.

Remus kissed him again. The shell of his ear, this time. “It wasn’t about you. I promise.”

But it was. There on the bathroom floor, it was.

The woman was watching him with infuriating patience. Sometimes—more often than he cared to count—she would even look away to her clipboard or her phone, and that was even worse. Regulus knew how to be ignored. He fucking hated her nonchalant attention.

Either look at me and pay attention or ignore me properly, he thought with enough force that it should have beamed into her brain directly.

Heather chewed at the corner of her lip and checked her texts again.

“Aren’t you supposed to ask questions?” he finally muttered.

She looked up, milk-mild. “Are you ready to answer them?”

You can’t trick me that easily. “Are they worth my time?”

“I certainly think so.” She tilted her head back and forth for a moment. “But it’s not up to me to decide. That’s your choice.”

“So I can just walk out right now?”

“Sure.”

Regulus only let himself pause for a second before regaining his composure. “I’m pretty sure my brother would murder me if I did that.”

“Your brother didn’t set up this appointment.” A smile made her face even kinder, like a storybook bear. “And I’m not allowed to discuss my other patients’ homicidal tendencies. But yes, Mr. Black—”

“Don’t call me that or I’ll puke, I promise.”

“—yes, Regulus, you are welcome to leave whenever you feel like it. I can’t legally force you into therapy and I don’t particularly want to. If you would prefer to sit here quietly, we’ve still got twenty minutes left.”

He bit the inside of his cheek.

“I have a spare crossword,” she offered.

Gifts. Of course. What an awful woman. He plucked absently at the threads of the armrest and slouched into the too-squishy cushions.

Silence reigned supreme for another five minutes and twenty-four seconds before Heather stretched her wrists and smiled at him again. “It’s good to see you, Regulus.”

“You don’t have to say that,” he snorted.

“I know.”

“So don’t.”

“Alright.” She tapped the side of her thumb on her clipboard. “I’m glad you came back. Is that better?”

“Will you stop with the mind games, please?”

Heather’s eyes softened. His skin crawled. “Regulus, I don’t want you to be uncomfortable in my office. I would vastly prefer it if you did something you enjoy with this time, rather than forcing yourself to come and sit there and be miserable. I’ll sit with you if you’d like, but it seems like that’s not helping.”

His lip curled against his will. “So Sirius told you I’m miserable?”

“I haven’t spoken to Sirius lately.”

“You should. He’s a disaster.” Ignore that I’m a screaming teenage trainwreck.

“If he gets in touch with me, I’ll happily make time.”

“He won’t,” Regulus informed her. He wondered if she would stop him. Was there a point where he was no longer allowed to talk about her other patients? He already felt pathetic enough for refusing to use any therapist except the one Sirius had vouched for.

Heather hummed. “Guess that’s for him to know, and for me to find out.”

Push push push push push— “He’s been a mess. He’s doing that implosion thing he does when I’m mean to him. It’s like he thinks everyone in the whole world depends on him to be happy, and the second they’re not, it’s his fault.”

“And have you?”

“Have I what?”

“Been mean to him?”

“Oh, yeah, I’ve been terrible.” Regulus frowned slightly and sat up. “You know I’m not a nice person, don’t you? You should know that before we start anything.”

Heather seemed interested, but not confused. Infuriating. “Okay.”

“Sirius is the nice one.”

“Okay.” She nodded for a moment. “Why is Sirius nice, but you’re not?”

“You’re not—” He bit his tongue. Being mean to Heather was not what he came here to do. Wasting his time with someone who didn’t understand was not the point of this. “Sirius would have been much happier as a suburban family’s well-loved dog. He’s good like that.”

“Okay.”

“I was ignored for three-quarters of my childhood and have half a dozen complexes and attachment issues because of it. I am not a nice person at all, and so I take it out on Sirius because—I don’t know, I think it’s supposed to feel good, since he had everything and then he left me.” She was still looking at him. Mild and kind. Was everyone in Gryffindor obtuse enough to think he was kidding? “Heather, I am telling you that I’m petty and mean and use my older brother as an emotional punching bag because our parents fucked us up. There is nothing you can say to help me.”

“Supposed to feel good?”

Regulus blinked. “Pardon?”

“You said it was ‘supposed to feel good’ when you’re mean to your brother.” Heather rested her head on her hand. He wasn’t sure when she had put her clipboard aside. “Does it feel good?”

“Oh my god, no,” Regulus laughed hoarsely. “No, it feels like I’m the worst person alive. Why does that change anything?”

I just wanted them to like me.

It hadn’t even been about love, in the end. He had given up on that. Forget about pride—that was a lost cause. But he had yearned to be liked, to have a smile turned on him like the ones he only remembered in blurry dreams between sleep and wakefulness. Their father had light crow’s feet by his eyes. They were probably deeper by now. Their love was never going to happen but it really would have been enough to simply be liked. Regulus had been bright enough to stop hanging on to them far sooner; oh, yes, he had always been the smart one.

Heather had seemed sad when he said that. Sirius hated making her sad.

Pascal thought he knew where the precipice was. He thought they had more time to reel that celestial disaster back from the brink before they tipped over it, clawing at each other for grip and for hurt. Looking back, he felt like an utter fool for thinking he could have stopped them.

“You fucking liar!”

“I wouldn’t lie to you!”

“Yes you would, you always do that!”

“I—” Sirius’ mouth snapped closed; his jaw ticked with tension. “I wouldn’t—”

“You do,” Regulus insisted angrily. “Our whole childhood, and now this. I won’t fall for it anymore.”

“I told you, I didn’t go through your things—”

“Stop it.”

“It was just changing the goddamn sheets—”

“Stop it.”

“God forbid I want you to sleep on something clean!” Sirius shouted back.

Regulus flushed red, bright against his dark hair. “Don’t yell at me!”

“Are you—you started yelling first, you pain in the ass!”

“Oh, I’m just a pain in the ass now?”

Sirius threw his hands in the air with a furious noise and folded them at his nape, shaking his head. His stomach hurt and trembled. His throat was tight, and every swallow had to fight its way around an iron fist. The inside of his cheek was raw and tender from his teeth. “You’re fucking delusional.”

Remus straightened fast. “Woah—”

“I’m delusional?” Regulus laughed humorlessly, hysterically, all dry bonfire wit. “I’m delusional? I’m not the one that tried to start a brand-new family when the old one failed!”

The insides of his ribs were scorched black. “Don’t bring Remus into this—”

“I’m talking about him!” Regulus’ arm shot out. One pale, skeletal finger hovered in midair, an executioner’s axe. A hairline tremor shivered over his skin; his eyes gleamed.

Dumo had both hands on Sirius’ broken toaster, and both eyes locked on Regulus’ hand in shock.

“You had it all planned out, didn’t you?” Regulus’ face contorted. “From the second they called your name on the television. You were going to billet and you were going to go to him and fuck the rest of us, is that it?”

Sirius couldn’t feel his hands. I still don’t know what I did. I still don’t think she’s forgiven me. “Regulus, no.”

But Regulus just nodded, tears welling up despite the guillotine edge of his voice. “You did. And thank fuck for that, because then Logan came along and a brand-new brother just dropped himself in your lap without any effort at all. Your perfect parents, your perfect brother, your perfect, perfect life. How convenient.”

He shook his head. “No. No, it’s not like that.”

But.

But it was. A little bit, it was. Dumo wasn’t his choice but he was Sirius’ escape. And Logan…Logan had been so alone, so afraid, so young, hiding under his baseball caps like Regulus used to hide under his toques. Sirius had caught too many sidelong glances of dark curls and bitten back the wrong name those first few months.

Regulus could smell it on him. Could read Sirius’ guilt like a child’s book. His eye twitched. “I told you not to lie.”

“I didn’t mean to,” Sirius said hoarsely.

“I don’t care.”

“It was not my intent—”

“Fuck your intent.”

Lightning spit up inside him and he choked it down, tasting iron as it went. “Will you let me speak? Or are you going to stand there and yell until you feel better?”

Regulus’ face turned blotchy with rage. “Don’t patronize me.”

“Then stop acting like a child,” he snapped back.

“You sound like—”

“Do not.”

Something burnt coated his tongue as the lightning licked off it in a whipcrack and sparked between them. Regulus looked away, fists balled tight against his sides.

Sirius let the burning out on a controlled breath. “Do not bring them into this,” he continued carefully, even as a scream built under his lungs, kicking its feet and howling. “Do not bring her into this. I am telling you right now that you will not like how it goes for you.”

Regulus’ mouth twisted, petulant and bitter. “You’re really going to threaten me? Now?”

“I don’t threaten, Regulus. I win.”

“Because everything is a competition,” he sneered.

“Because you know better than to start that fight.” Sirius caught his gaze and held it with clenched, snarling teeth. Regulus knew better. Always the smart one, always levelheaded. Regulus, the wordsmith, and Sirius, blowing up the ground he stood on as long as he didn’t come out on the bottom. Locked jaw or locked antlers, dragging them both over the canyon edge before any thought of retreat. He had shouted himself voiceless before bending to their father. A simple locked door couldn’t block the endless screaming matches from Regulus’ memory.

“This isn’t a tantrum,” Regulus said at last.

The slavering dog in Sirius’ head sat back and eased its hold. He jerked his chin. “Then get to the point.”

“You left.”

“I was always going to leave.”

Regulus flinched, but to his credit, kept going. “You replaced us. Me.”

“Logan was never you.” Logan, young and scared, but not Regulus. Never Regulus. It had only ever taken a moment for Sirius to right himself, and less than that to be buried alive in guilt.

Regulus stared at the kitchen table. His nailbeds were white where he clutched the back of a chair. They’d have to get more iron into him while he was home; Sirius didn’t trust the university food. “You never came back.”

“For holidays—”

“You never came back,” Regulus repeated, louder. He blinked fast a few times, inhaling sharply. “You were never there for more than a day or two. You’d go dead the second we sat down together. You never—you never came back.”

“Regulus, that house was going to kill me.”

It came out too soft for the weight of it in the room. Regulus closed his eyes and leaned forward, stretching his arms with an unsteady exhale. Sirius kept his focus despite the building sting in his eyes but he could feel Dumo’s gaze on his neck, could hear Remus’ short inhale. There was no coming back from this. Ever onward, clawing his way out of the depths.

“One way or another, it was,” he continued quietly. “So, no. I didn’t go back. I won’t.”

The blur of Regulus tilted his face toward the ceiling with another shaky breath, still blinking fruitlessly as drops of mirrored light slipped down his cheeks. “Then how—?” He broke off and cleared his throat hard enough to make Sirius wince. “How could you leave me there?”

“I didn’t want to.”

It meant nothing; they both knew that. It still felt right to get it out there.

“I thought you’d come back,” Regulus said. “I thought you’d try. Once—once you had your first paycheck, or something.”

It hurt so much more to hear old, broken hope than anger. “They knew where I lived.”

“Then we’d move.” We. A child’s daydream. They made me hate you, but I never did. A phone number memorized for six and a half years. “We’d go somewhere else.” Regulus ran his sleeve under his nose and shook his head. “I was so alone. I don’t—” He looked up and immediately, his lip curled in disgust. “Oh, god, don’t look at me like that.”

“Reg—”

“Like a fucking puppy, merde.” He yanked his sleeves down over his hands and scrubbed viciously at his face, lingering over his eyes a second longer before letting them dangle at his sides again. He sniffled, then did a double-take when he saw Remus and Dumo on the other side of the room. “Why are you still here?”

“Um.” Remus glanced over at Sirius, but he had nothing to offer. “It…felt wrong to leave.”

Regulus rolled his eyes, though the effect was dampened by his red cheeks and slight pout. “You are all so codependent.”

“Don’t be mean,” Sirius chided instinctively.

“Don’t tell me what to do.” Regulus gave him a quick up-and-down look. “We’re both ugly criers. Shit. Yell at me again.”

“…no?”

“Just do it, it’ll make me feel better.”

“I’m not going to yell at you.”

“Don’t make me insult you more. My throat hurts.”

“Do you want a hug?”

“No.” They stood in silence for another fifteen seconds. Wool socks scuffed on the floor. Regulus gnawed at the inside of his lip, then stepped around the side of the table an inch. “If it’ll make you feel better.”

He was over six feet tall, now. His hockey muscle had yet to fade. He felt—

Small. He felt safe. A shudder ran down his aching back. It had been so long since he felt safe.

“Desolé.” Sirius’ voice vibrated in the burrow of his chest and Regulus pressed his face to it as hard as he could. “Desolé, mon etoile.”

Tears snuck up on him in bursts; he pushed closer, closer, tucking his arms between them and shuffling forward until he could stand on the front of Sirius’ stupid slippers and let the cold floor fall away. He was tired of drowning, but it was hard to remember how to let the water out.

Sirius sniffed above him. The kiss to the top of his head was more of a hard bump than anything else. His arms were tight and warm around Regulus’ back, one palm cupping the back of his head. “I never forgot you.”

“Je sais,” Regulus croaked back.

“I never forgot you.”

Don’t, don’t, don’t. He coughed to clear the brackish muck from his lungs. He wasn’t pretty like this, and he knew it. But neither was Sirius, so maybe that was okay. Just this once. He could be held like a child, just this once. It was a long time before they spoke again.

“I don’t want to see Heather anymore.” He breathed in Sirius’ laundry soap and the same deodorant they had both been wearing for years. The rushing flood in his head had become a stream, had become a trickle. His heartbeat pulsed behind his eye. “I want—I want to see someone else.”

Sirius’ shoulders relaxed enough that he could feel each muscle release. “Good.”

“I still haven’t told my friends about—the everything.” He felt Sirius nod and gathered two fistfuls of his hoodie. “I want to stay at school.”

“D’accord.”

“What if they find out?” He held on tighter, pressed his face to Sirius’ calm heart. “What happens when they find out how horrible I am?”

Sirius huffed. “You’re not horrible.”

“I am.” That was the deal. He was the villain so Sirius could be the hero. He was the junkyard. Spare parts to be hosed off and trotted out when they needed him.

“Regulus, you’re nineteen.”

He frowned. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“Everyone’s horrible at nineteen.”

“What if I’m…” He wracked his brain for something smart. It blew a raspberry at him and fucked off back to sleep. “…extra horrible?”

Sirius sighed, scratching lightly behind his ears. Regulus felt his eyelids droop against his will. “If you turn out to be extra horrible by—I don’t know, 21, we’ll talk.”

“What if they fucked us both up too bad?”

He winced—Sirius’ steady motions stuttered briefly. He hadn’t meant to let that one slither out from its careful cage. That was a thought for sleepless nights in a cold hotel bed and watching the sun rise in a strange city through dry, tired eyes. When his hands were blistered and bleeding, he’d wonder whether that Black blood could ever really be gone from him.

Sirius’ head was a gentle pressure on his own. “Then it’s us against the world, isn’t it?”

Gryffindor airport was quiet at 7 in the morning. Dumo stifled a yawn in the back of his hand as he passed the rolling suitcase to a boy that was far too awake for the early hour, in his opinion. Youths.

“You have everything?” Sirius checked. “You’ll be safe?”

“I’m literally fine.” Regulus arched a brow. “And less than four hours away, if you speed.”

“You’ll call when you land.”

“I’ll text.”

Sirius wrinkled his nose. “If you don’t, I’m filing a missing person report.”

Regulus turned to Remus. “Can you keep him on a leash? Or just sedate him?”

“You think I haven’t tried?” Remus laughed.

Sirius fixed them both with a weak scowl. “Will you just get on the plane?”

“I thought you wanted me to stay.”

“I want you—” Sirius took Regulus by the shoulders and turned him around with a firm grip. “—to have fun and live life and not die. The bar is on the ground. Do not dig under it.”

“Killjoy.”

“Pest.” Sirius kissed the top of his head. “Fly safe. Text.”

“Wait until I’m on the place before you start crying. I don’t want your gross emotions all over me.”

“Well, we can’t disturb your delicate sensibilities.”

“Sirius?”

“Reg.”

Regulus paused, laden with his duffel and rolling bag, and kicked the toe of Sirius’ sneaker lightly. “Love you.”

Sirius’ smile was close-lipped and small and brighter than the rising sun outside the massive bay windows. He kicked him back, even more gently. “Get on your plane.”

#sirius black #regulus black #pascal dumais #remus lupin #sweater weather #vaincre #lumosinlove #my fic #fanfic #coops #hurt/ comfort #angst with a happy ending #black brothers #parentification #panic attack #sibling problems #therapy #look they're working on it okay

184 notes · View notes

starry-bi-sky · 4 months

Text

Clone^2 Damian

If you really think about, Damian's situation in the clone^2 au is... kinda tragic? Especially in the early months of his arrival. Like,,, think about it. Damian has always known he was a clone of Damian Wayne, that he was a copy of the blood son. There was nothing 'original' about him, not even his name (of which at least Danny has that). He was just... a replacement. A disposable one, to boot.

And he knew that, to an extent, by the time he was six years old. he might not have been actively acknowledging it -- he's six years old -- but deep down he knew. And like, he's six years old. Every small child craves the love and affection of an adult, especially their parents, and even though he knew he was clone, I imagine he still considered - and still does consider, somewhat - Talia and Bruce as his mother and father. And I really doubt he was... getting it?

Now, I know Talia loves Damian, her son. At least in some interpretations she does, and in this au she does. But... a clone of her son? I'm not so certain if she would have the same affection for baby Dames as she would for Damian. I don't think she would treat him badly, but I don't think Talia would treat him warmly either. Kinda just, distant. Colder than she would have been with OG Damian.

And, I know I've mentioned Damian's arrival from Danny's point of view, and its kind of comical kind of insane from his perspective -- a little boy clone of Damian Wayne falls through a portal and immediately attacks him. That sounds like a bad joke.

But, if you think of this from Damian's point of view? It's like he just got dropped into a scary movie. Like, think about it. You're six years old, and suddenly a portal, as green and as swirling as your grandfather's pools, opens up beneath your feet and sucks you through.

After an intense bout of vertigo, you end up in a massive, urban city -- completely different from the rural mountain palace that you lived in for the last six years of your life, and in this city, you don't know any of the language. You don't know what anyone is saying, you can't read any of the signs - you are completely stranded, away from home.

And then, to make things worse, you're facing a figure with a terrifying mask and eyes as burning green as the portal you fell through. Of course Damian's first instinct, six years old, is to attack. He's terrified.

And this figure, he's not a good fighter, but he's fast, and he dodges you quickly. He grabs your sword with his hands, and tries to restrain you, saying something in a language you don't know. Naturally, Damian is just scared. He's six! He'd just be learning how to read if he was normal child going to school.

This figure halfway through the fight yanks off his mask -- he realizes you're scared -- and looking at you now, is a youthful version of your father. This is a clone of your dad, someone you have never met but, six years old, still wants to. Damian gets defensive. This is an imposter.

But this imposter eventually gets you home with him - and he's using his little box, his phone, to communicate with you through a mechanical voice speaking in arabic. and it's frustrating. The boy, the imposter, can say whatever to you just fine, but trying to talk back is a hassle and a half. He's six, he doesn't have that much patience.

He wants to go home.

And so he keeps trying to run away. He keeps trying to find out of this hellish concrete jungle, and he keeps getting lost. It's loud, and busy, and there are people talking to you and you don't understand them, and there are rules and signs you don't understand - Damian tries to cross the street and nearly gets hit by a car. He doesn't know how the road signs work, he was never taught. They didn't get to that.

And he gets lost. And it gets dark, and Damian is brave, but he is six, and this is the worst stress he's been under in all his six years of life. He wants, desperately more than anything, to go home. Why wouldn't he? The only stable... semi-stable environment he was in just got ripped out from under his feet, literally! He wants his mother.

And it's not happening.

But there's something good to be said, at least. The imposter that looks like his father always comes and finds him, no matter what. He could have left that morning, and he will find Damian at midnight, frazzled and worried, and carrying an extra jacket with him because it is cold in Amity Park and Damian is six years old.

And sometimes Damian attacks him - he's scared and stressed and he doesn't want to be here. And every time he catches the sword. Even though Damian can see it cut into his hand and pearls of blood well up and stains his fingers. Even though Damian can see him wince in pain and bite his lip, he still catches it.

But with that little box, he coaxes Damian to come back with him. It's cold, it's dark, Amity Park is unsafe at night. They can figure something out tomorrow, please. And every time, he agrees, reluctantly. And the imposter takes the extra jacket he brought with -- a flannel, a hoodie, a jacket -- and he wraps it around him. It's warm, Damian's clothes are not that thick, and even though he thinks he might hate this imposter, he still sticks close to his legs as he leads him down the street.

And sometimes the imposter carries him, because Damian's shoes are not that thick, and he cuts his foot on broken glass while they're walking home. The imposter sits in the bathroom with him and carefully cleans the cut out, and makes sure it doesn't get infected.

There's hope you know, he still has it. His mother will be looking for him. She'll be worried. He's important to them. Damian may not be the original, but he is still a blood son. He is still her son. She will come find him. This nightmare will end soon. He can go home.

And then weeks pass, and nothing. Then months, and nothing. His family is not coming for him, and it hurts. Hurts more than anything. And yet while that happens, the boy he's attacked, and hurt, teaches himself arabic in order to speak to him. He takes Damian out of the house one afternoon and buys him new clothes, or tries to. And then he keeps buying him new clothes. He gives him blankets and gives up his bed to him until they can get him one himself, and steadily he teaches Damian english.

This boy is kind. Kinder than Damian's ever experienced, and he doesn't know what to do with it. He's devastated by the fact that he is not as important to his family as his family is to him. What do you do when you're six years old and you learn something like that? When a random stranger who looks like your father is kinder to you, and cares more about you than your family did?

And then Damian tells him he's a clone. He's Damian Wayne's clone, and he tells him his purpose - that their grandfather made him to kill him. And the boy, the imposter, Damian thinks he probably already knows that he's a clone. But he doesn't say that. He just nods, and asks him if he wants to tell his original about him.

Damian says no. He doesn't want to. He's tired of living in the shadow of his original. He wants to keep this to himself. This is his. For once, all of this is his.

And to his surprise, the imposter doesn't try and convince him otherwise. He just nods, and says okay. And when Damian asks why, the imposter - his brother - looks at him and says.

"I don't care about Damian Wayne. I care about you." And in Damian's gobsmacked silence, his brother continues. He tells him that if Damian doesn't want to tell his original that he exists, then they don't need to. They don't need to worry about the LoA going after him, because clearly if his 'grandfather' needs to make a clone of Damian in order to take him out, then whatever it was that Damian Wayne was doing to keep himself safe, was working.

"Wayne already has people in his corner, he's got Gotham's army of vigilantes to keep himself safe." his brother says with his eyes as blue as moonlight. "You, however. Do not." And he continues, and says that if Damian Wayne has the same training as Damian does, then he will be fine. He doesn't need to be aware of his clone. Because if DW doesn't know about Damian, then the LoA doesn't either.

And here's the thing. Damian would not have survived in the LoA for long. Not as a clone. No matter what, he was going to die no matter what he did, and sooner rather than later. The sword of Damocles was always hanging above his head in the League of Assassins.

That portal, and meeting Danny, saved his life. There's no way around it. And to an extent Damian knows this even at six years old. He may not be aware that he would've died, but he knows that meeting Danny was the best thing to happen to him.

It's no wonder after that, that Damian is as clingy to Danny as he is. Danny is the first person he's met to offer him unconditional love, with no strings attached, only pure affection.

#dpxdc #dp x dc #dp x dc crossover #dpdc #dpxdc crossover #clone^2 #like god can you imagine how scared he must've been? how afraid? he just wants his mom - only to realize he doesnt even matter to her #dpxdc au #danny fenton is not the ghost king #this poor kid man. no wonder he latched onto danny the moment he gave up on the league like a leech. he's a six year old kid man and #it doesnt matter how smart he is or how mature he acts. he still is six years old. he still needs that validation and affection from adults #or from people older than him. and his emotional needs were just not being met in the league.#cue the song “two” from sleeping at last - some of their songs are very clone^2 honestly.#'sweetheart you look a little tired. when did you last eat? come in and make yourself right at home. stay as long as you need.'#'tell me is something wrong? if something's wrong you can count on me'#'its okay if you can't find the words. let me take your coat and this weight off of your shoulders'#'like a force to be reckoned with. am i the ocean or a gentle kiss. i will love you with every single thing i have'#'like a tidal wave i'll make a mess. or calm waters if that serves you best'#'i will love you without any strings attached'#like just. just *imagine* being in damian's shoes during all of this. he's *six* you guys. i've worked with six year olds and they're #pretty independent but they're still six. they get excited when they see their parents and they get upset when an adult is angry with them.#they're still developing their motor skills. they're still developing everything else!

336 notes · View notes