This one-shot is my entry for round 5 of the QLFC.

Prompts:

(dialogue) "I wouldn't blame you if you hated me."

(restriction) no female characters

(word) casual

Cold, dark and painfully lonely.

It was how it had been at 12 Grimmauld Place during Sirius' childhood. Sure, there had been Regulus, who always stayed by his side and would always take part in every game Sirius created. But Sirius was the heir and Regulus was the spare, no game in the world could have erased that fact or changed how different the adults treated them. Sirius wasn't Orion's child as much as he was his heir, a title that weighed heavily on his small shoulders.

So, when Sirius found himself far from his home and family for the first time in his life, with the Sorting Hat on his head and his newfound friend James looking at him expectantly from the line of first years who were still waiting to be sorted, he made a choice. Better be openly hated by his relatives than treated with the cold respect befitting the heir. The hat told him he would be a fine Slytherin, and Sirius didn't refute its claim because he knew it was true. But he also knew he would find nothing but the dishonest respect due to his heritage and the political games he had seen his parents take part in so many times in the past in the green and silver House.

Gryffindor was where he would be free enough to be himself, whatever that could mean. His brother would go through hell to live up to the expectations their father put on them. He would want him to right Sirius' wrongs, but Sirius would be loved by his new friend. I wouldn't blame you if you hated me, he had written to Regulus in his first letter home. What other choice could an eleven-year-old make?

And so he became a Gryffindor, where he soon enough became popular and looked up to. Sure, he wasn't perfect. No brave, self-sacrificing wizard could have been and continued to be so selfish, but he had stood up against his family. That was bravery, too, wasn't it? Nobody needed to know how he had knowingly sacrificed his brother for a chance at happiness, first when choosing the red and gold tie and then when refusing to join the Dark Lord. Regulus was a Slytherin from a Dark family anyway, everybody knew he would eventually become evil.

Cold, dark and painfully lonely.

It was all Sirius could remember from 12 Grimmauld Place, and it was all he would ever say about Azkaban if he ever left the place.

Twenty years after his Sorting, Sirius couldn't regret any of his choices, not even the one to stay in the infamously maddening prison. Madness ran in his blood, there was nothing a fortress full of criminals and Dementors could do to worsen his sanity.

The lack of food, the cold and the screams, both of fury and pain, were hard to live with, not even he could deny it. But outside the walls of the hellhole that was Azkaban was the reality of what had happened on Halloween night 1981, and the thought of it was more shattering than any Dementor could ever be. Sure, the wizarding world was free and peaceful, but how could it still be the wizarding world he had always known when James Potter wasn't part of it anymore? The Marauders were no more, scattered between Godric's Hollow's cemetery, Azkaban, Scotland where Remus had sworn to go back to after his mother's death and wherever the traitorous rat was hiding. A world without James or the Marauders wasn't worth living in, and so Sirius was staying in his small cell, where everything would remain as he knew it.

The dark walls hadn't changed since the first time he had stepped foot in the cell, the worn out cot was still in the left corner and the steps of the Aurors bringing new inmates in still echoed the same way in the corridor.

Here, where his world was reduced to stone walls, a cot and screams, Sirius was free to pretend. Peter, sweet Peter, wasn't a traitor, James was in his house trying to come up with new ways to prank his parents, a habit that had stuck through his coming of age, and Remus was still acting casual and using his nerdy looks to get away with everything.

Sure, there was a godson he had sworn to take care of out there, but Hagrid had said Dumbledore would look after him. The child couldn't be anything but alright then, right? Godson or no godson, Sirius wasn't ready to face the reality yet. And so he stayed. That was until the Minister had come to taunt him and left behind a copy of the Daily Prophet, with a picture of Wormtail on the first page.

Warm, bright, but still painfully lonely.

Freedom wasn't exactly what Sirius had imagined, mostly because none of his daydreams included being chased after by an army of Dementors. The sun burned after twelve years without bathing in its warmth, and so Sirius stayed in his Animagus form. Padfoot was way more discreet than a ragged man in a prisoner's uniform anyway.

Sirius only stopped running when he entered the Forbidden Forest. He knew the place like the back of his hand, having spent so many full moons roaming the woods with the Marauders. He avoided the centaurs' territory and settled close enough to Hagrid's hut to be able to see the students on the school grounds but far enough away not to be found by the groundskeeper or an unsuspecting Care of Magical Creatures class.

He observed the students for a long time, seeing himself and his friends in the carefree students laughing by the lake despite the Dementors' presence. It was the same uniforms, the same House rivalries, hidden behind playful banter and pranks.

Then, he saw Harry. Who would have thought it would hurt so much?

It was the same round face, the same messy dark hair and the same thin figure, and for a brief moment Sirius saw a prepubescent James. He hadn't thought much about his old friend lately, not wanting to be drowned in his guilt and regrets when the traitor was still running free. But as soon as he saw James in the boy walking towards the Quidditch pitch, the image disappeared. Harry wasn't loud, wasn't holding himself with the confidence of someone who believes himself to be the next Merlin, didn't have the mannerism of a well-raised Pureblood.

Despite all their similarities, Harry wasn't his father, and seeing a carbon copy of his friend being so different, so not James, hurt more than seeing a child who looked nothing like his old friend like he had expected to see.

So Sirius stayed hidden. That's what he had always done best, after all. Becoming one with the shadows as a child, only to step right into centre stage to better disappear in the crowd of red and gold as a teenager. Being seen and valued had its charms, undeniably, and Sirius had made sure to be valued plenty when time was best. But not being at the centre of attention allowed one to be truly free, something he had learned from his brother at a young age. He had spent his last ten years of freedom walking the line between the two to have the best of both, and would continue to do so when his time came. But for now, he would stay hidden.

Harry was struggling, he could see, but Harry was not James. He had observed him long enough to see both of these things, and knew he wasn't ready to step in and properly interact with the boy, not yet anyway.

And so he would wait, hidden in the shadows of the forest. Was it truly selfishness, if his sanity was at stake?