Necropsy

Sirius knows exactly what day it is, which is why he's only half surprised to get Andromeda's letter. I went to the wedding, it reads. Cissy said there that you ran away from home. Are you safe? Where are you staying? Can I see you?

Andromeda and James barely know each other, and Sirius has never met Andromeda's family. Even Andromeda and Sirius have barely one another in the years since she quit the family. He figures it will save everybody some awkwardness if they do this one-on-one, so he Flooes to The Leaky Cauldron the next morning to meet her. She looks tired and hungover and sad with great bags under her eyes, which are brimming and threatening to spill. Her skin looks sallower than Sirius has ever seen it.

"Did you see my brother?" he can't help but ask her. "Did he look all right?"

"We didn't talk," says Andromeda with a half shrug. "He's icing me out as much as your mum is."

He knows better, but Sirius still feels a pang of disappointment at this. If Regulus could only forgive Andromeda, then maybe he and Sirius—maybe—

"It's not too late for you," she adds now. "You can still go back. It's only been a couple of weeks, and you haven't done anything as final as marrying a Mudblood. They'd probably take you back if you…"

But Sirius couldn't go back even if he wanted to: Andromeda must know that much. He's only been off the tapestry for two weeks, but this estrangement has been coming ever since his first night at Hogwarts when the Sorting Hat proclaimed him a Gryffindor—since he found out his best friend was a werewolf and decided to keep him—since the first time his mum shouted at him that he decided to shout back.

"If you regretted leaving that much," says Sirius, and he tries to keep the bitterness out of his voice, "then why stay gone? Why have a kid with him?"

She stiffens. "I'm not saying I regret it. I'm just saying I can… understand the impulse to go along with who they want you to be. I should warn you that being your own person can be lonely."

"You don't get it," Sirius mutters. "Moving in with James was never about being my own person. All I did was…"

Hop from blind loyalty to one family to another, he's thinking, but he doesn't say so. He'll go to his grave before he admits that to anybody, even to her.

"Is it selfish of me to want them to want me to go back," Andromeda asks now, "considering that I wouldn't do it if they asked?"

"No," Sirius lies, his lips twitching. "No, I don't think that's selfish at all."

xx

A/N: And the fic is complete! Sorry it took me so many years hahaha