Lost
"What are you looking for, Remus?" Sirius asked more out of boredom than out
of an actual curiosity. Remus, who had been obviously searching for something,
was currently halfway under the sofa in the main drawing room that Sirius
secretly suspected housed a black hole.
"My watch. You remember the one I used to have back in school?" Remus's voice
was mostly muffled by the ostentatious piece of crap his mother had deemed an
antique of what Sirius suspected was a step up from the stone ages. Personally,
he had lived in fear of the monstrosity eating him alive when he'd been a
child.
"Small, gold pocket watch, right?" Sirius cautiously climped off his stoop at
the stairs and knelt down gingerly beside the sofa. "The house might have
swallowed it whole by now, you know," he tried to point out kindly, even though
he was certain it didn't sound to terribly kind.
"No. It has to be around here somewhere." Remus managed. He sounded a
bit desperate to Sirius's ears, so he hunkered down beside the man and with a
small amount of trepidation, stuck his hand under the sofa.
"Would it really be that big of a loss if you couldn't find it?" Sirius heard
himself ask after fifteen minutes of fruitless searching had turned up nothing.
He had the decency to wince though as the words left his mouth.
"Sirius, I know you and I haven't been all that terribly close, or even in
contact really for the last thirteen or fourteen years, so you'll just have to
believe me when I tell you that I'm as poor as a church mouse. Given that, and
given that the watch is 24 karat gold, don't you think I would have pawned it
off by now if I viewed it as a mere trinket?" Remus shot him a sideways glare,
which Sirius returned with a scowl.
"So why is it so important?"
"It's all I have left of my parents. We can't all inherent houses full of
possessions, you know." Remus resumed his search again, this time heading for
the dilapidated desk in the corner. Sirius had forgotten about the inheritance
laws that outlawed the passing of property to non-humans.
Looking around the huge monstrosity that had passed so easily into his own
hands, Sirius found himself, for the first time, genuinely envying Remus his
position.