Miss Moony would like to say that she doesn't own Harry Potter and that she had no help with this story from Miss Wormtail, Miss Padfoot or Miss Prongs.
Warnings for abuse and neglect.
------- I solemnly swear that I'm up to no good -------
Slime
Padfoot remembers a thousand silent I-Love-Yous that his mother never wanted to hear. He remembers the icy distance she imposes on him: For being Different, for being a Traitor, for being Wrong. He remembers the foreignness of seeing all the children in the park being picked up by their parents, hugged and kissed, and then pulled into Side-Along Apparition.
Padfoot remembers years spent dancing with his cousins, being screamed at when he stepped on their daintily clad toes. He remembers long hours of unwanted lessons on family history, and dipping their hair into ink wells. He remembers the blandness of the Grimmauld Place airing cupboard, imprinted in his mind from even longer hours spent locked inside it, strapped to a backboard and scratching out apologies in his own blood.
Padfoot remembers a hundred nights spent being woken by his little brother crawling into his bed. He remembers the tears of despair, the shared dreams and secrets, hopes and fears, and he weeps. Weeps for the absence of this forgotten brotherhood.
Padfoot escapes through his open window three days after his sixteenth birthday, wiping his eyes dry, because they are all slime, and he is better off without them.
