KNOCKTURN ALLEY
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[People who need a reason to be alive follow that moon...]
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There's a street in their world that follows the moon.
Knockturn Alley.
It's small, dingy, dark, dismal, but at the end of the street, the moon is visible. Like a giant crystal ball, it glistens enticingly in the black sky, and people walk towards it, their heads bowed solemnly, not talking or looking up, just like soulless, damned spirits. Their robes billowing behind them, their footsteps slow but determined, pulling themselves towards the moon through the eternal hollow distance that lies in between.
Knockturn Alley.
Not the magnificent Diagon Alley, no. The place where young wizards are escorted to in the beginning of their lives in their world, where they buy their books and cauldrons and wands and their lives, no. Diagon Alley doesn't follow the moon; it ends in foggy gray smoke, something dreadfully treacherous, or maybe nothing. People walk around happily, freely, oblivious, in Diagon Alley. Joyful faces, content smiles, hope, and happiness mark the contours of that street. Ironic, yes, considering how Knockturn Alley is known as the 'black' street out of the two.
People are too taken up with the charming things that Diagon Alley provides that no one has time to look towards that void at the end of the street. (No, they just have a reason to be alive).
But maybe, Diagon Alley also follows the moon. Only that the moon is invisible. That street goes on forever, never ending, never stopping; only when it reaches the edge of the earth does it stop (no, it doesn't stop there either; it follows the invisible moon).
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"What's this about, Sirius?" Lucius hissed.
The cream kept expanding, rising centimetres above the rim of the cup. It looked alive, infinitely alive, and she wondered if she didn't press the cup to her lips already, it would come out and bite her. Or drown her. Or wrap itself around her. She looked at Sirius and raised an eyebrow, knowing full length that Lucius' question wouldn't get him an answer. Sirius was never a straightforward person. Never mind the fact that Lucius wasn't really one of his favourite people.
"I like this place better than that Leaky Cauldron." Sirius took a huge gulp of his drink, looking around the place. She didn't agree with him, Leaky Cauldron was warmer. More clean. And at least the cream there didn't keep on expanding. "Why is that?"
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lucius look at her sharply with his pale, stormy, horrible eyes, probably thinking she was trying to distract Sirius from whatever he intended to talk about. She didn't care. He would always remain at the corner of her eyes, she thought, in her peripheral vision. Something, someone, she really didn't care about. If luck was with her, he would be completely out of her vision.
"Because Tom – is that his name? – doesn't have hair."
She nodded understandingly. Seemed like a good enough reason. Tom the Barman's head reminded her eerily of the moon. Once again, that git Lucius scowled and kicked her in the shin under the table. She kicked him back, only ten times more forcefully than he had, not bothering to look at him. He needed less attention than he got; otherwise he wouldn't be able to deflate his Jupiter-sized head.
"Yes."
The place was almost empty, yet she could hear whispers, scraping, snores, and all kind of noises she'd been hearing through her entire life. Every dreadful secret she'd heard in the past, every soft and rare word of endearment, her sisters' whispers, her aunt's screaming, Hogwarts Express' horn, Frederica Snotmann's snores as she slept through the History of Magic class, spells, Herbology teacher's lectures... everything, combined together into a twisted melody, moulded together with one another, to haunt her, taunt her, disturb her. Tonight. She didn't understand. The cup, though, was still placed on the table before her, and she didn't touch it, fearing that her previous notion of its capability to drown her might actually be true.
The unsettling melody continued to play.
"Story time," Sirius declared suddenly, stopping her ears from bursting. "Once upon a time, her name was Narcissa." Her head jerked up, and once his pale, stormy, not horrible eyes locked onto hers, she knew what it was about. Poor him. Poor Sirius. "Yes, it was. I used to fancy her, a lot. A lot." Not in front of her, you fool. Don't do it. "Her delicacy used to make me smile. I never smile, mind you. I laugh." At this, Lucius stiffened visibly, and she snickered maliciously. "Initially, I waved it off as something fickle, something really weak, like a stupid teenage hormones thing. But I just... I just couldn't push it all away, the attraction, the damn attraction." Shaking his head dejectedly, he swatted away a fly. He was doing it all wrong, the poor dog. "And I realized, while playing quidditch with James, that I was in love. Imagine me being in love. Not right. Not at all right. Goes against propriety. Goes completely, wholly, against propriety" —Since when did Sirius care about propriety, she thought— "But her... she was just so, so... goddamn! Yet none of this changed the fact that she was family." For the first time since the start of his story he looked up, his eyes fixed directly, bravely, gravely, coldly on Narcissa's face. Narcissa had gone alarmingly pale, and had it not been for her already pale as ice complexion, her sister would've thought she might faint. "Yes, she was family. Pure-blood, Black, my – how do I put it – should-be, or would-be," he snickered at the blonde. "Yes. Bloody yes. My father wanted me to fit in with the Blacks, follow the tradition, marry a pure-blood. And when he found out that I was interested in someone both pure-blood and a Black, I became his favourite son, for the first time. He bought me a new broomstick, the old fool. It didn't last long though, his affection, didn't last long at all."
"Good for you," she mumbled, feeling strangely satisfied, yet terribly out of place. She wondered if the cream really had drowned her without her noticing.
He turned to her abruptly. "No, no, Andromeda, don't interrupt. Do not interrupt," he said firmly, taking a swig out of his cup, half of it pouring down the corner of his mouth. "So what if she made me smile? So what if she took my breath away? She was still the one I was supposed to be with, according to my bloody pure-blooded parents. The one I was supposed to be with." He laughed gruffly, and pointed his index finger in her face. "But hey! I'm Sirius Black; I can't ever not go against propriety. And besides, I would never do anything that my parents want. Especially not my parents. I would do anything, absolutely anything, seriously anything, to show them that they have no influence whatsoever on my life. To show them that they do not, did not, will not succeed, in any way. They couldn't make me be in Slytherin. They can't make me marry her. Or anything else for that matter. See, that's right. My parents have no influence whatsoever on my... life!" He was sobbing by then.
Good old Sirius.
It was then that she realized how much exactly he loved her sister, and wanted her. But he let his pride get in the way, the dog, and his determination to refuse anything his parents wanted him to do. It was a fickle reason to break the engagement, yet it seemed to be complexly significant. His pride had always been a big part of him, and when he had let it get in the way so many times before, this really couldn't go smoothly.
Nevertheless, she got the feeling that he was hiding the actual reason.
She wished Sirius could see her in their house, in their room. How her sister whispered evil things in Bellatrix's ear, how her chilly laugh echoed around the house horribly, how she looked at everyone, mother, father, her, even Bellatrix with her blue eyes full of unexplained malice. Just one glimpse of the real her could make him unlove her. Couldn't it?
Her sister dropped her head in her hand, her white hair luminous in the dim light of the pub, his ring glistening on her finger, glaring him straightly in the eye.
"That's right; don't look at me, you bitch. You rotten bitch," he said.
Love was clear in his voice, pouring out of his mouth, his eyes, him, in such a painful manner that if her sister looked up, she'd melt. It really didn't go with the context of the sentence. In that moment she envied her sister more than she ever had, not because of her hair, or her cataclysmic eyes, but because of the man sitting in front of her. She'd have him forever, even when he'd be determined to hate her, even when he'd believe he hated her, even when she'd marry some pure-blooded beast and keep her bloodline pure. And she'd never see. What a lucky bitch, she thought.
She watched the hem of Lucius' robe disappear silently behind the door of the pub with a smirk on her face.
She didn't know how her sister felt about the whole thing. Her sister didn't even have a heart, for goodness' sake. (She did have a heart, it was just made of stone). She didn't care. (No, she truly felt for her sister). Her sister was horrible, really horrible. But him? He was... something else. He was a... legend; her hero. She didn't know what he saw in her bloody sister. She didn't want to know, she didn't need anything else to be worried about.
The cream could come out and drown her. She really didn't need to be worrying about their forbidden romance.
"Well, I still think black is a good hair colour on you." She stood up and looked at him for the last time. He was smiling; she thought (knew) he understood (knew). He was the only one who could understand her. The cup was still on the table, untouched, the cream was still wobbling creepily
, more frothy than ever, and she still believed that it was alive and could come out and drown her. The unsettling melody was still playing, but somehow over time, it had dimmed out. Now it was just a small noise in the background melted almost into nothingness, overcome by the hideous music of reality.
Life was spiteful. (Love was spiteful).
She touched his cold hand, turned around, ran out of the pub into the dark night, and she followed the moon.
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[People who give up their love for someone who loves them follow that way...]
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There's a brick in the wall behind the Leaky Cauldron that opens a way to the stars.
As he watched her walk out of the pub with her green robes billowing wildly behind her, he wished he'd given her a reason to be alive. He got up from his chair, threw Narcissa a last glance, and followed her out. It was raining; raining wildly, openly, freely, and he cursed the rain. His eyes followed her tall figure and he watched blankly as she blended into the crowd that followed the moon, watched her become like a soulless spirit, watched her bow her head forever.
He watched her follow the moon.
Casting his pale, stormy, not horrible eyes down, he made his decision. He'd been a fool, an undeniable fool.
He raised his insensitive eyes upward as raindrops poured down heavily against his face. The stars above blinked at him, so innocently, that he smiled. And suddenly, as he watched the sky through the crystal raindrops, the stars burst noiselessly into images of her, Tom the Barman, James, Remus, Lily and a green-eyed James look-alike, and they smiled down at him.
Narcissa was nowhere to be seen, amazingly.
He turned around abruptly; and he ran and ran and ran through the hollow distance, towards the wall that'd take him to the stars.
It was then that he realized it was her who'd made him smile, just a few minutes ago, when all he'd wanted to do was cry.
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A/N: Review? ;)