Brothers always argue, over trivial things really. Yet those few lucky times, brothers will fight over a girl.
Regulus and Sirius Black were brothers. Up until Hogwarts they did everything together. They played wizards and werewolves and pranked their elder cousins. But something that was obvious about the two was their main differences. Sirius was the rebel and Regulus was the observer. In this Regulus was smarter and less impulsive while Sirius' impulse led to good and bad changes.
Then I came along. I thought mysteriously as I turned the muggle coffee pot on. I was making hot chocolate and it brought me back into my reverie.
Regulus, even though he appeared more cautious also had a rebel side. Often he would knock on my window in the girl's dorms at Hogwarts on his broom. We'd fly sometimes and other times he'd take me down to the kitchens, where we'd have hot chocolate courtesy of the house elves.
Sirius however hated having to wait for the hot chocolate to cool and often burned his tongue. This resulted in him never drinking it. He was so childish and I loved that about him.
While one Black brother was mysterious, the other was open with everything.
I liked Regulus because I never knew what to think about him. He kept me thinking and wondering. He was always a challenge, even though I knew him inside and out.
Sirius was very expressive. He would tell you what he thought and how he felt about something. It was just how he was. Ever since we were little he enjoyed calling me Babydoll, because he'd seen a muggle man saying it to a woman on the street outside his house once. Sirius had assumed it was because she was beautiful and the man loved her.
As I sat on the couch and drank my hot chocolate I thought more about my school days.
Regulus had done terrible things. He had joined the Dark Lord. I guess that led to me not speaking to him. He was stupid and regretful. We wrote each other but never spoke in person. It tore me apart. Though we had some secrecy. Everyone thought we hated each other. We became enemies to the public's eyes.
Our secret letters at night gave me an adrenaline rush every time I would receive a letter from his dark black owl. The adrenaline coursed through me as I would sneak a reply to him. I lost many hours of sleep doing this.
Sirius became my tag along a month after Regulus and I had publicly unfriended each other. His friend (and mine too) James Potter had finally gotten Lily Evans to go out with him. He needed a new buddy.
Sometime in the last two months of school, Regulus and I stopped writing. I can't remember why or when exactly but it had broken me a bit. Then school finished. I was a free witch. No more school, no more teachers, no more homework and no more Regulus.
I went to America. I figured maybe I could get a teaching degree at a wizarding college over there. I did and when I was twenty I returned to Britain. My old friends were shocked and happy to see me. I hadn't told anyone where I had gone and there was no communication allowed at college.
I got a job with Dumbledore at Hogwarts. I was to teach History of Magic for a few years while Binns took a break. He had some ghostly needs to attend to.
When I saw Snape I discretely asked him about everyone. I learned that Regulus had died and Sirius had escaped Azkaban two years ago. Then his name got cleared a year after his escape. Peter Pettigrew had really been at wrong. James and Lily had had a son called Harry and they were dead also. I vaguely remember making a joke about going away and everybody dies. I don't think it was that funny, even at the time.
I had not expected it when Sirius Black walked through my doors one day. I had been teaching Harry's class, his friends Hermione and Ron next to him. Lucius Malfoy's kid was across the room from them with his cronies.
I'd told them I would tell the kids stories of their parents. I knew most of the kid's parents in school. I had been very sociable.
However when Sirius walked in he froze as he saw me. He'd whispered my name and hugged me right in front of the class. I'd pushed him into my office and told him we'd talk later.
So we talked. And talked and talked and talked and soon we were back to being best friends.
I washed my empty cup and put it away. Then I wearily climbed the steps of my apartment.
The next morning I was awoken looking at the same face I woke up to every morning for the past four years.
"Morning Babydoll."
I'd always loved Regulus Black. But Sirius looked so much like him.
