A/N: Written for round 4 of the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition! Not necessarily my best work, but I did what I could with the time that I had. Enjoy, and as always PLEASE REVIEW! Thanks!
Title: Remember
Team: Tutshill Tornadoes
Position: Captain
Prompt/Character: Walburga Black
Sirius Black hadn't been to 12 Grimmauld Place in years. He'd run away at sixteen and never looked back, but now, with a war seeming more and more imminent and the Order needing a place to keep headquarters, he was back, walking the halls of his horrific childhood.
He'd forgotten about much of Grimmauld Place. Part of him had wanted it to be different, happier, when he returned, but it wasn't. The halls were still dark and foreboding, that blasted house elf Kreacher was still a pain-in-the-arse, and his mother's voice, though she was long deceased, was still just as shrill and obnoxious as it had been during her lifetime.
Everyone in the house despised the painting of the ever-so-lovely Walburga Black, mother of Sirius and Regulus Black, and nearly every member of the Order had tried to remove the permanent sticking charm that held it to the wall, but nobody had tried as hard as Sirius.
Just the sound of her voice made him cringe. It made him want to run away from home all over again, no matter how many ministry officials were still looking for him. Each and every time he heard her complaints about the occupants of the house, he wanted to incinerate the portrait until her shrieking ceased for good, but the charms placed on it were undeniably good, and though he had tried, the painting remained stuck to the wall, where it would be forevermore.
There was a loud clatter downstairs, and the voice of Tonks saying, "Sorry!" Sirius braced himself for what would inevitably follow.
"Mudbloods, blood-traitors, and filth! Befouling the home of my fathers! Contaminating the noble house of Black with the stench of wizardry gone bad! Filling the hallowed halls of Grimmauld Place with the sounds of fools and those unworthy! How DARE they cross the threshold! How DARE they-!"
Sirius breathed a sigh of relief when he heard the curtains being shut and silence throughout the house. It was one thing to listen to his mother insult him, because he'd admittedly done things that he knew his mother would hate simply to gain disapproval, but the poor souls in the house now- Hermione, the Weasleys- they were simply the unfortunate people Walburga considered to be filth.
There was another loud bang downstairs, causing the shrieking to begin again, and Sirius couldn't help but think of the last time he spoke to his mother while she was alive, the day he ran away...
A young, sixteen-year old Sirius Black stood in his room, smiling and nodding in satisfaction at the posters that coated the walls. His mother hated nothing more than seeing anything to do with muggles in the house, and he'd decorated the entire room with posters of muggle things.
There were posters of strange contraptions the muggles called "motorcycles," bikes that would ride by themselves at speeds to match that of a car, accompanied by photos of muggle girls wearing rather revealing things that they called "bikinis."
Needless to say, Sirius rather enjoyed the appearance of these muggle girls. What could be better, after all, than seeing a girl standing in hardly more than undergarments? It simply didn't happen in the wizarding world.
"Sirius? What exactly are you doing?" asked Regulus. Sirius spun around and glared at his brother.
"Well if you must know, I'm decorating my room, thank you very much."
Regulus held up his hands in surrender. "Alright, alright! I was just asking!"
He glanced around the room and rolled his eyes. "Our mother is going to kill you if she sees this," he said matter-of-factly.
Sirius grinned. "And that, my dear brother, is why I did it in the first place. Good day!"
And with that, Sirius slammed the bedroom door in his brother's face.
Right on cue, Walburga's voice echoed thought the house. "Sirius, you stupid boy! What have I said about slamming doors in the house?"
Sirius allowed himself a grin as he listened to his mother's angry stomps up the stairs, which lasted for quite a while given that his bedroom was on the last landing.
The door flung open and the angry face of his mother appeared. She was very red and looked absolutely furious. "Slamming doors will not be tolerated in this house! Do you understand-"
She stopped suddenly and stared around the room, mouth agape, while Sirius just smiled smugly. "Something wrong, mother?" he asked, feigning confusion.
Walburga stepped into the room, staring at the posters and photos on the walls in disgust. "What," she began venomously, "are these?"
"Oh!" Sirius exclaimed cheerfully. "You mean these posters? Well, this one is something muggles call a motorcycle. They use them to ride around, like a car. And these are pictures of muggle girls. Gorgeous, eh?" he finished, wiggling his eyebrows.
Walburga's face was a priceless image of fury, beet-red with beads of sweat developing on her brow. She looked about ready to explode on her son, which is exactly what happened next.
"Sirius Orion Black I have TRIED and TRIED to teach you the noble ways of the Black family, but you simply will not listen to me! Do you have ANY idea what you grandfather, or your great grandfather, or your great great grandfather-"
"I get it mother," Sirius said, rolling his eyes.
"Quiet!" she snapped. "Do you have any idea what they would think if they ever saw these... These... These DISGUSTING images plastered all over the walls of the noble house of Black! Why, they would be furious! They wouldn't be able to stand the sight of you! You ought to be disowned from the family!"
Sirius rolled his eyes again. "Why? Because I have a few pictures of muggle girls on my wall? That's a bit ridiculous, even for you mother."
"Not just for this incident! For all the others! Publicly insulting the Black family, befriending blood-traitors like that Potter boy, ridiculing the noble house of Slytherin, dating MULTIPLE half-bloods and mudbloods, defying me, your mother... You ought to be disowned for all of it!"
"Do it then!" Sirius finally said, fed up with the way he was treated at home. "Do it! I dare you."
Walburga seemed taken aback for quite a while as she tried to process what her son was saying. "I beg your pardon?" she asked.
"I said do it," Sirius replied simply. "Disown me, I don't care."
"There is time to change, Sirius!" said his mother. "You can redeem yourself! Marry a pure-blood girl and your wrongs will be forgiven! Accept the house of Black as your heritage and you needn't be disowned!"
Sirius shook his head. "Nah," he said, sounding just as casual as always. "I'd rather not."
He made for his dresser and started pulling clothes and personal belongings out of it, throwing them hastily into his trunk.
"What are you doing?" asked Walburga, sounding very exasperated.
"I'm leaving, mother," said Sirius. "I'm leaving."
"And where exactly will you go, may I ask?" she said in a bored manner. Sirius could have sworn he saw her examining her nails out of the corner of his eye.
"The Potters' place," he replied cheerfully, the thought of seeing his best friend already cheering him up. "I love it there, and plus, they're more like family than you great band of buffoons."
"How DARE you-"
"Oh yes, mother, I dare!" Sirius bellowed, slamming his trunk shut. "I'm sick of the way things are in this place. It's dark, and depressing, and everyone here hates anyone who isn't a so-called pureblood. It's pathetic, and I'm done living here. So disown me, mother. I don't want to be a part of this family anyways."
With that, Sirius pushed past his mother and walked down the stairs, out the door, and to the bus stop, where he got on to take the long ride to the Potters' house.
That was the last time he'd ever spoken to his mother while she was still alive. Of course, he and her portrait still got into arguments at least twice a day, but it wasn't quite the same.
Every once in a while, Sirius would wonder what life would have been like if he'd adhered to the way his mother wanted him to live. He probably never would've been friends with James, or Remus, and he never would have been in the Order, and Harry wouldn't have known him... In short, his life would be completely different.
But Sirius Black loved his life, so whenever he heard the voice of Walburga Black echoing through the halls of Grimmauld Place, he very silently thanked her for being the obnoxious, small-minded person that she was, because without her, he wouldn't be the person he was today.
And if he was certain of anything at all in this crazy world, he was infinitely grateful for who he was.
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