Story Notes: There's more! You thought I'd stop after one sucky chapter, but no, I've returned. I actually have most of this done already save for like one chapter exactly in the middle, which creates a bit of a problem, as you can imagine.

Completely Unimportant: E-mailed this second chapter off to my friend and then completely forgot about posting it…so that's how intelligent I've been lately.

Regulus was gone when Sirius woke up the next morning and for a moment, Sirius was thrown into a panic. He threw on his clothes and dashed down the hallway and into the living room, frantic that his brother might have up and left during the night. If he'd gone back to Grimmauld…

But Regulus was only in the kitchen, sulking at a mug of cold water.

"R—Regulus," Sirius said, calming down somewhat. "You're up really early…"

Regulus said nothing; he only frowned briefly at Sirius before pouring the water down the sink and making to leave the kitchen.

"Hold up," Sirius grabbed him as he marched past. "Did you want to have some tea or something? I can show you how to heat that water in the microwave."

"I'm not thirsty anymore," Regulus growled, trying to shake his brother off. Sirius let him go.

"Did you want me to make you anything to eat?" he asked Regulus's retreating back.

"Do what you want."

Sirius grimaced and started about making some breakfast foods. He didn't normally cook anything fancy, but Regulus was used to full course meals three times a day at home, so he figured he'd better start. What were Teenage-Regulus's favorite foods?

Fuck, he didn't know anymore. Come to think of it, there were a lot of things Sirius couldn't say about his brother. What music did he like now? Did he still enjoy mystery novels like he had when he was younger? Andromeda used to read them to him…had the two of them spoken since Andromeda was disowned?

Sirius shook his head. Waffles. Regulus had loved those when he was little. Plain waffles with no syrup but a little bit of cinnamon. He'd always eaten them with his hands.

Did Sirius even own any cinnamon?

Fuck.

The doorbell rang.

"Would you get the door for me, Regulus?" Sirius asked. There was no reply.

"Regulus?" he walked into the living room, only to see his brother was nowhere in sight. "Dammit," he muttered, rolling his eyes and opening the door himself.

Lily tumbled in gracelessly.

"Oh, hi, Lily," Sirius said.

"Hey," she responded cheerfully. "How're things?"

"Fine," Sirius answered. "Did you want to come in and sit down…it's seriously early."

"No," Lily insisted. "I'm just here to get you, remember? To take you to the meeting? James thinks we've got a good chance of being allowed to join…"

Shit, Sirius racked his brain. What was Lily—oh right! Dumbledore's secret organization, the Order of the Phoenix. Many students who had already graduated had joined up, and with the proper amount of begging, Dumbledore had been persuaded to give very minor roles to sixth and seventh year wizards. Nothing at all very dangerous, but it was a good 'getting your foot in the door' sort of gesture. Sirius had been looking forward to it. He and James had been talking of nothing but this first meeting for months, but now he wasn't so sure. What would he do with Regulus?

"Uh, well Lily…" Sirius stumbled over his words. Could he leave Regulus home for a few hours without him running off? He couldn't possibly bring him with, he was way too young.

"Remus, James, and Peter are meeting us there."

"Right, but you see, I kind of actually have, like…well it's—"

"And Frank and Alice are members, too, they're putting a good word in for us with Dumbledore and his brother—"

"Uh…" Sirius glanced nervously behind him, halfway hoping that Regulus would stay out of sight. He really didn't want to go announcing his new situation to the world until he and his brother had worked out a few base rules. He turned back to Lily. "You know I really want to go, but this morning I'm kind of busy with…"

"Regulus?" Lily asked suddenly, craning her neck around Sirius's shoulder and staring at his brother, who had evidently meandered back into the entryway to investigate who had come into the apartment.

Sirius turned around. Regulus was fully dressed now, and scowling immensely.

"Right," Sirius said slowly, closing his eyes in anguish. "My brother is staying with me. I've got custody of him now—"

"Like hell you have!" screeched Regulus indignantly.

"—yeah, we're working on some things…" Sirius turned around swiftly and pushed Regulus by the shoulders back into the hallway. "You're killing me here, Regulus," he muttered through clenched teeth.

"What?" exclaimed Regulus loudly, staring around Sirius and back at Lily, who had poked her head around the corner. "Don't want the fucking mudblood to see me?"

"Regulus!" Sirius growled.

Regulus only sneered and swatted his brother's hands off his shoulders. "Don't touch me," he seethed.

Sirius glanced shyly back at Lily, only to see she had tactfully disappeared. With a sigh, he snatched ahold of Regulus by the hair and dragged him into his bedroom.

"In," he tossed him through the doorway.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"I'm going out…somewhere," Sirius said. "You're staying here. And I mean here. In this room."

"Sirius!"

"Quiet, Regulus. Just…quiet." Sirius made to close the door, but Regulus grabbed the other handle before he could.

"Are you locking me in this room?" he demanded incredulously. For a minute, they played an angry game of tug-of-war with the bedroom door.

"Uh…Yes," Sirius yanked hard and the door snapped shut. He heard Regulus cry out and gently thump to the floor. "Serves you right," he muttered through the door before locking it with his wand.

"Give me my wand, Sirius!" Regulus's voice sounded surprisingly loud considering there were two inches of wall blocking his words.

"No," Sirius said simply. "Now stop yelling, or I'll put up a silence barrier before I leave as well."

Sirius walked calmly back to the entryway, ignoring Regulus's furious pounding on the bedroom door. He grabbed his jacket from the hall closet.

"I'm ready to go, Lily," he said. Lily walked around from the living room, holding up a short wand made of a deep, reddish wood.

"Is this your brother's?" she asked curiously.

"Oh, yeah. He left it on the coffee table last night; he uh, slept in there for a while. I'll take it."

Sirius put the wand in his pocket and Lily opened the door for him.

"Sirius!" Regulus screamed. "You bastard, at least tell me where you're going!"

"Your brother has…well he really has some impressive lungs," Lily said awkwardly.

"Yeah, just…yeah," Sirius kicked the door shut. Immediately there was silence from inside the apartment. He grabbed Lily's hand and the two of them apparated away together to Aberforth Dumbledore's house to meet with the Order.

ﯕⱤﯕⱤﯕⱤ

Regulus seethed for a very long time, and he systematically dismantled Sirius's bedroom in the process. He kicked small dents into the walls, tore down pictures and smashed every item sitting atop his brother's desk. With a sort of detached fury, he tore the pages from Sirius's books and broke his lamp. Sirius's owl, eyed him intently from his perch in the corner while he sent his brother's quills and ink sailing towards the wall. Only when he yanked the curtains down from their rod did he pause.

The window…Regulus stared wistfully out it. Sirius had only locked the door, and they were on the first floor; he could easily climb out.

Did he want to?

No. Actually, he didn't. After all, where would he go, home? He couldn't return to that place so soon and without his wand, he'd look foolish (at least this was the reason he told himself). It was still nice to look outside, though. His bedroom at Grimmauld had overlooked the property's dead garden. This view was much nicer. He could see the trees lining the streets, people walking, stores, dogs, children…

Regulus was startled out of his daydreaming when the curtain rod, loosened from the wall when he'd torn down the drapes, clattered down to the ground, narrowly missing his face.

Regulus observed it in its new position on the floor for a while before slowly turning to take in the rest of the room. It was trashed. Maybe Sirius would kick him out for it, Regulus thought, send him back home. He nodded to himself. Sirius would surely get rid of him the instant he realized this situation was going to take effort, and that his little brother was too much to deal with. Regulus was positive that when Sirius got home, he would throw him his bag and send him walking back to Grimmauld.

Only Regulus wouldn't return there. Where he would go, he wasn't sure, maybe to a friend's house. After all, Sirius had run away to go play house with his new brother, James. Why shouldn't Regulus do the same?

Sirius's bird hooted dolefully behind him.

Perhaps this would be a good time to get in touch with some of his classmates. Antonin, Severus, his cousin Rabastan…Regulus hunted through Sirius's desk for some paper and a pen before sitting down to start some letters, the room behind him in ruins.

ﯕⱤﯕⱤﯕⱤ

Sirius hadn't been expecting much, but even so, he was disappointed in the amount of information withheld from him at the meeting. After barely two hours of pointless arguing over possible political actions, Sirius and his friends had been kicked out. It stung a little to know that the rest of the Order were probably talking some serious strategy at this point.

"Well it could have gone worse," said Lily, walking close beside James with her hands deep in her jacket pockets. She had her hood up over her head to block out the light drizzle that had started up.

"…how?" asked James incredulously.

"We could have been treated like twelve year olds, mocked silently, and then thrown out into the rain when it came time to actually discuss Voldemort."

"Lily," said Remus. "That's exactly what happened."

"Oh…well fuck."

"Okay," James admitted. "So we don't get to help plan any sorts of cool espionage missions, we were still there, weren't we? I mean, they let us in on some things. And from here on out, I'm sure it'll only get easier and easier to integrate ourselves in the group."

Sirius bit his lip, and his mind wandered while Lily, James, Peter, and Remus argued over how angry they should be. His thoughts kept coming back to Regulus and the fit he'd thrown earlier when he'd seen Lily. Sirius grimaced when he remembered what he'd called her. Perhaps Regulus was farther gone than he thought.

He really hoped Regulus had calmed down so they could talk.

"—Sirius?"

He was a little anxious, too, wondering how Regulus had handled being shut in his room. Sirius hoped he hadn't broken the door down. Normally Regulus was way too quiet and reserved for that sort of outburst, but with how angry he'd been…

"I said, Sirius!"

"Sorry, what?" Sirius stumbled a little.

Remus raised an eyebrow at him. "Lily was asking you a question about your brother," he said.

Sirius flinched. James and Peter didn't know about Regulus yet, and truthfully he hadn't wanted them to. He wasn't sure why, but he felt he would have preferred to keep the whole situation a little more secret.

"Sorry, what Lily?"

"I was just checking to make sure you still had his wand. It would have been disastrous if you had left it at Aberforth's."

"Oh," Sirius felt his pockets. "Yeah, I've still got it."

"Why do you have your brother's wand?" asked James curiously.

The five of them turned a corner.

"My brother's staying with me now…because our parents are psychopaths and I don't want him around them. I took Reg's wand with me tonight because I just didn't want to leave it lying in the house while I was gone."

"But why did you take it from him in the first place?" asked Remus slowly.

"I didn't take it from him, he left it in the living room."

"Where was he?" Remus was confused.

"Locked in the bedroom."

"…Sirius!"

"What?" Sirius said indignantly. Peter and Lily were walking between them, and their heads were whipping back and forth at a dizzying pace as they tried to keep tabs on the argument.

"Why on earth would you lock him in your room?"

"Because I had to leave, and he was being a brat," Sirius turned to Lily for help. "Wasn't he, Lily?"

"Don't drag me into this!"

"Well he was!"

Remus rolled his eyes so hard Sirius was surprised they remained in his head. "Sirius," he moaned. "You can't just shut him away whenever you guys have a problem. You won't make any progress like that; plus it's dangerous. What if something had happened and he'd needed to get out? Or to use his wand for something?"

"Oh I hadn't thought of that," commented Lily in an offhand voice. "I bet you'd feel like a real prick if Regulus died in a housefire or something."

Sirius's pace unconsciously quickened.

"I didn't consider that…" he mumbled.

"I'm sure your brother's fine," James said assuredly. "He's not four year's old, is he? He's like, twelve or something."

"Thirteen," Sirius corrected him automatically.

"Whatever. Listen, don't freak out about this, seriously if you're not careful you're going to turn into one of those obnoxiously overobsessed parents that nobody wants to be friends with. Peter, we turn here…"

James and Lily led Peter off down a street to the right and Sirius continued on with Remus after waving idly at them, still preoccupied by their conversation.

"Sirius," the werewolf began, but Sirius cut him off.

"Remus," he said firmly. "I just want to get home."

ﯕⱤﯕⱤﯕⱤ

Sirius would be lying to insist he wasn't at all relieved when he returned to his apartment and saw it still standing. With a sigh, he let himself inside and ventured down the hallway to his room. He unlocked the door and stepped inside.

"Regulus?" he asked, dumbstruck. The entire room was a wreck; everything was broken. The wallpaper was sliced to ribbons, there were holes in the wall, half of Sirius's possessions were lying in pieces on the floor, the window was cracked, and there, standing in the very center of it all was Regulus Black, arms folded and a completely passive look on his face.

"What…the hell?" Sirius yelled. And to think he had been upset earlier at the thought of Regulus burning to death in his apartment, that was almost a welcome image now! Sirius without thinking raised his wand and pointed it at Regulus, making to hex him for what he'd done. It would be easy, after all, he'd done it before, plenty of times at home when they were younger, or when they'd argued up at the school…

…but he found himself pausing. Sirius made himself lower his arm back to his side. He couldn't retaliate like this, could he? His circumstances had changed. He wasn't just an annoyed older brother anymore, he was a parent. Or a guardian at the very least. He needed to calm down.

"Regulus," he asked. "is there a particular reason you decided to destroy my bedroom?"

Regulus, who had up until that point stared on with a completely blank, emotionless expression, suddenly started. "What?" he seemed confused. "Aren't you—"

"Never mind, maybe it doesn't matter," Sirius admitted. He sat down on the bed and motioned for Regulus to join him. He didn't, and continued to stare at Sirius as though he were some ungodly creature come crawling out of the earth.

Sirius continued talking anyway.

"You can't act like this, Regulus, okay? Saying those awful things to Lily, who is one of the kindest people on this planet—occasional instances aside—wrecking my room like this. I'm not asking a lot here, just give this situation a chance, please, because I might not be all that smart, but even I can see far enough down the future to hazard a guess at where your life's going…and with the way things are looking, this situation's the only chance you've got of not ending up in prison or dead by the time you're twenty. Is that what you want?"

Regulus didn't say anything. He was almost determinedly silent.

"All right," said Sirius, standing up. He threw Regulus his wand. Regulus caught it, surprised. "You want to go wait in the living room for a few minutes, please? I'm going to try and see how much of this I can clean up…"

Regulus stared at him incredulously for a few more seconds, then swiftly walked to the door. "I sent your owl off with a letter to one of my friends," he offered.

"Okay," was all Sirius said. Regulus left the room, closing the door softly behind him.

When Sirius emerged forty minutes later, he approached his brother again. Regulus was sitting cross-legged on the sofa, reading a book he'd brought with him. He looked up with slight interest when he noticed Sirius's presence.

Standing over Regulus with both their jackets in his hand, Sirius heaved a sigh. "Want to go out to dinner?" he asked.

ﯕⱤﯕⱤﯕⱤ

Dinner was a quiet affair. Regulus tried to pay for his food but Sirius wouldn't let him. They argued for a long while before both standing up in exclamation, setting money on the table, and walking out, leaving the confused waiter with a tip roughly equal to half the overall bill. Then they walked back home.

Sirius's tawny owl was waiting for them, perched in the tree by the door. He fluttered down to Regulus's shoulder and dropped a letter into his hands before throwing himself at Sirius. Sirius caught his bird against his chest and said in what he hoped was an offhand voice, "Who're you writing to, Regulus?"

Regulus rolled his eyes as Sirius attempted to unlock the door one-handed.

"Rabastan," he answered simply. It wasn't worth it to him to lie, Sirius would only keep bothering him about it.

"Lestrange?" asked Sirius critically as he let them inside and fumbled blindly for the light switch.

"Yes, Lestrange, our cousin," said Regulus spitefully. He pushed past his brother and walked towards the bathroom. "Not that I'd expect you to remember any of your family."

"Regulus," Sirius groaned. He tried to follow him but the door was closed in his face with a sharp snap. Moments later he heard the shower running. "All right," he conceded. "I won't push it. Just please come to bed when you're done. Don't even think about trying to sleep in the living room again, I'll just drag your ass to the actual bed if you do…"

"Whatever," Regulus muttered. With his back to the bathroom wall, he slid to the floor. The shower was on behind him, but he didn't feel like getting in just yet. Idly, he flipped open the letter from Rabastan.

Regulus, it said.

Have you seriously allowed yourself to be kidnapped by that insane, blood-traitor of a brother of yours? I wouldn't have expected you to put up with it. I can't see this whole thing lasting more than a day, Sirius has already proven he can't stand the thought of living with real Blacks, hasn't he? He'll bore of this soon. However, if you haven't already gotten yourself thrown back out into the streets, though, don't push for it, seriously. Stick around for a while, you can make the most of this.

Let me know if Sirius does anything interesting, and I can tell my brother. He's extraordinarily curious for some reason. Actually the advice I just gave you was mostly his.

If nothing else, keep on Sirius's good side long enough to see if he'll let you come over here next week, it's Bellatrix and Rodolphus's anniversary and we're having a party-type thing. Let me know.

Rabastan.

When Regulus finished Rabastan's letter, he held it under the jet of water falling from the showerhead. The ink ran on the page and soon it was soft enough to send down the drain. Regulus wasn't quite sure why, but he didn't like the idea that Sirius might ever read it, and going through his mail was exactly something the annoying fucker was inclined to do.

Shaking his head, Regulus got undressed and finally hopped under the hot water, thinking about an awful lot of things.