23rd September, 1977
James had his date with Lily yesterday.
Sirius stopped writing. He didn't know what to say. For some reason, he was feeling numb this morning. Disconnected. He thumbed his left wrist with his right hand, taking in the details of the cuts there.
He has another one with her on Saturday.
Already, James was beginning to distance himself from Sirius. All he talked about was Lily. The colour of her hair, the colour of her eyes, the sound of her voice, what she thought was funny, what she didn't think was funny. The noise she made when startled.
I think I'm losing it. I really think I'm losing it. You know I cut myself yesterday? Like the muggles do? And you know, it actually bloody helped a little bit. James almost caught me though, when he came in. But he didn't. And he fucking believed me when I told him that I wasn't crying. I'm sure he doesn't even suspect that there isn't anything wrong. But you know what? I shouldn't be upset about that, should I? He's not supposed to know there's something wrong.
I don't want him to know there's something wrong. Right? Right.
I don't actually intend on stopping this, you know. It's my body and there's no reason I shouldn't. It's cold out anyway so it doesn't matter if I do because I can cover them without suspicion. No one needs to know a thing.
Sirius looked up at the sound of his stirring roommates. It was still early for a Sunday. Until now, he had been the only one awake. A loud yawn and stretch told him that James was now conscious. He took a deep breath.
I thought about suicide yesterday. Out over the lake, on my broom. I took a 70 foot drive to the surface and almost went in. I wanted to see what the fall would feel like. Remus yelled at me but he thought it was just a Quidditch stunt and then I came back here and cut myself.
I think I'm losing it.
And really, this whole thing is stupid if you think about it. I shouldn't be this shredded up over James, anyway, you know? I'm just in love with him. That's all. No big deal. It doesn't matter. It shouldn't matter. It does matter. Why does it matter? Why should I care if he decides he loves Evans instead? It's not like he was ever going to love me in the first place. He isn't gay. I deserve this. This is my fault for ever being a fucking poof to begin with. It's my fault to for falling in love with him. So what if he did save my life? James and I have saved Remus' life and you don't see him falling in love with either one of us.
I'm losing it.
Sirius noticed with a slight intrigue that his hands were shaking. Ink, lavender ink, splashed off his quill and onto the page. He closed his eyes. This was stupid. He just needed to suck it up and get over it. He was being stupid.
Remus noticed my jealously yesterday and actually asked me why I won't admit to having feelings from him. This scares me because that means other people might have noticed too. I need to get better at hiding things, especially if I'm going to keep up with this whole cutting thing.
Anyway, I think James is up now which means he'll be bothering me in about four seconds. Later,
Sirius.
Unsurprisingly, not long after Sirius had slammed his journal shut, James head popped suddenly through his curtains. Thankful for the long sleeved shirt that he had worn to bed, Sirius looked tiredly up at his friend.
"Can I help you with something, Prongs?"
"Yes, you can help me, Padfoot. You can tell me what's climbed up your ass this week and provide me with instructions on how to rid you of it." Sirius glared.
"What makes you say there's something up my ass?" He asked, putting his journal into his bedside table and locking it. He pulled his curtains open entirely to expose the rest of his friend, who – to his dismay – was only wearing a pair of snitch-laden boxer shorts. James just sighed, shook his head, and walked into the bathroom. Bothered by this, Sirius got up and followed him to the bathroom door. "There's nothing wrong with me, Prongs."
"You've been off all week," Sirius hear James' echo from inside the bathroom. "I don't know what's going on with you but I'm not going to lie, I'm getting a little concerned." Sirius didn't like this.
"I just haven't been sleeping lately." It was true. "I don't know why, but I just haven't been able to sleep." The bathroom door opened and James, still mostly naked, leaned against the doorframe to look at his friend.
"Yeah, you look like you haven't been sleeping. Maybe you should go talk to Madam Promfrey, mate. Maybe she can give you something." Sirius shook his head. The idea made him shudder.
"I don't think so. It'll pass. It happens sometimes." James looked at him some more.
"Yeah well, I hope so. You get grumpy when you're tired and you haven't been any fun lately." Sirius didn't say anything. "I'm going to take the invisibility cloak over to the library today and mess around with some of the brainy first years. You should join me." Without waiting for a response, James closed the bathroom door again and Sirius could hear the shower running. Sighing, he walked over to his trunk and started rummaging around for something to wear. He could hear Remus waking up behind his curtains.
He figured he may as well tag along with James today. After all, he'd been up a whole 20 minutes and he'd yet to say a single word about Evans. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad. Besides, they had been spreading rumours about the haunting of the library for the past few weeks, and it would be too much to pass up an opportunity to follow up.
After fishing out a jumper which he liked to believe matched his eyes, he realized that changing was now going to be a challenge. He couldn't change out here, where he was in danger of Remus emerging at any moment from inside his curtains, and he couldn't change in the bathroom, where James too could discover him. After a moment's thought, he decided that his best option would be to sit on his bed with the curtains drawn and change his clothes there. He dug around a little more until he found a pair of suitable trousers and crawled back into his cave.
He changed his shirt quickly. Standing up outside of his curtains, he set about pulling on his pants. After buttoning them, he looked up to find Remus looking at him strangely.
"What?" Remus didn't answer him but returned to searching through his trunk for various homework supplies. "Didn't you finish that essay yesterday, Moony?"
"Yeah, I did. This is for extra marks." Sirius rolled his eyes, unable to understand his friend. He hoped James would be out of the bathroom soon, because he needed to use the toilet.
"You will never make sense to me, Moony," he told Remus. Remus just shrugged.
"What are you going to be up to today?" Remus asked. Sirius frowned slightly before answering.
"Prongs and I are going to go scares the first years in the library using the invisibility cloak." Remus groaned.
"Do you have to? I was going to go to the library today and I won't get anything done with all that screaming." Sirius smirked.
"Of course we have to, Moony. Our rumor has been spread around for a good while now. It's the perfect time to act." Remus shook his head and sighed.
"You'd better not get caught. McGonagall will skin you alive."
"We never get caught Moony," chimed in James, who was just walking out of the bathroom, wrapped in a towel. "You should come with us. You're in need of some fun." Remus actually appeared tempted for a moment.
"No, no not today. But I'll help you brew the Dragon's Eye. I promise." James sighed.
"Alright, fine. Be that way. But you should at least come to the library, or you'll miss the looks on their poor little faces." This seemed to be a reasonable request to Remus, who smiled.
"Alright, alright. You've got me there. I'll bring my essay stuff with me." James walked across the room and snatched the piece of parchment he was holding right out of his hand.
"I don't think so, Moony. It's Sunday. No more of this school stuff on Sundays. I forbid it." Remus glared and hit him with a pillow. The towel fell off his waist and Sirius, fled into the bathroom.
Groaning at his predicament. He sat down on a closed toilet and shut his eyes. Why? For the love of god why? He just wanted a normal life, dammit. Sighing, he dealt with his protruding member and cursed himself for being in this mess. One of these days, he would get over James, and he'd no longer have to deal with problems like this.
When he was finished, he flushed the toilet, to prevent any suspicion as to what he had been doing, and returned to the room, where he found both of his friends dressed and ready to go.
"This is going to be so wicked." James exclaimed. Unable to help it, Sirius even found himself smiling at the prospect of the day. He followed the two other boys down through the common room and they started down the various stairs and corridors that led the way to library.
"I still think this is kind of mean," Remus told them as they approached the proper floor. "They're only children." James smirked.
"That's what makes it so funny." He said with an evil grin. Remus looked reproachfully at him for a moment.
"God forbid you ever have children, Prongs." Sirius chuckled at this.
"No, no no. The little buggers would be the ones terrorizing him. Karma is gonna come back for you, Prongs."
"Karma, Shmarma. Here, get under the cloak. You sure you don't want to come along, Moony. Last chance." Remus shook his head.
"There isn't room under there for all three of us anymore anyway." James shrugged.
"Alright then. Just make sure you get good seats." Remus went off to sit down and Sirius situated himself beneath the cloak with James. He closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath, taking in his smell. He smelled intoxicating.
In order to keep both of them fully covered, James and Sirius had to be touching each other at all times. This was something that Sirius was only just now realizing, and starting to regret, as butterflies shot through his stomach every time that their hands brushed together.
Just calm down, he told himself. You've done this loads of times before.
"Alright, let's go." James whispered. "We'll start with that group in the corner." They snuck quietly over to group of first or second year students, cozied up by a fireplace and discussing some assignment or other. They approached one particularly meek-looking one, each placed their invisible head on either side of their victim and one, two, three,
"Get out." They whispered together. The boy jumped and screamed and the two had to leap back to avoid colliding with his head. Sirius actually began to enjoy himself as they repeated this for a few of them before James started kicking chairs over, tossing books, and using silent charms to put out the fires. They kept this up in good fun for around half an hour, to the amusement of a near-by Remus. Giggling, silently, they turned a corner and Sirius felt James freeze beside him.
He looked around for a moment before realizing the cause for his friend's sudden stop. Lily was sitting beside the only fire that they hadn't yet put out, chatting lightly with a group of friends.
"He's not so bad, actually." She was saying. "Not nearly as pompous as I had been expected." The group of girls giggled around her.
"Have you kissed him?" One of them asked.
"No," she said, shaking her head. "He was very gentlemanly. He kissed my cheek when parted." There was a collective sigh and Sirius suddenly didn't feel very cheerful anymore. The cuts on his wrist started to sting. He glanced over and with a sick face caught a glimpse of the dreamy look that James was sporting. He knew their antics were over.
"I'm going to go find Moony." He mumbled. Checking that the coast was clear, he shimmied out from beneath the cloak and headed off in the opposite direction. He eventually did find Remus, pouring over a book, despite being forbidden from doing so.
"Oh, hey, you're back." Remus said, closing the book guiltily. "Where's Prongs?"
"Eavesdropping on Evans." Sirius grumbled, sitting down and laying with his arms crossed on the table. "He forgot we were busy." Remus gave him a pitying look.
"Well… I stand by what I said yesterday. When you're ready…" Sirius got up and walked away before he had the chance to finish. He didn't want to hear it. It's not like there was anything he could do anyway.
Sirius wandered aimlessly around the corridors for a while, shivering slightly from the cold draft that was blowing through. He eventually found himself on the astronomy tower, where he stood for a long time contemplating the fall below.
He wasn't going to do it, he reasoned with himself. It was a morbid curiosity was all. He was fine.
Even still, Sirius was unnerved by his recent obsession with falling, and he wasn't fully able to convince himself that his only interest was in curiosity. As he stood, leaning against the wall and looking over the edge, he thought about James. He thought about their history together; the day they met, their first prank, learning their animagus forms together. Above all else Sirius remembered how James had saved him. The way he had taken him in and taken care of him even when his own family had kicked him out.
As he stood, relishing in the moments that he now felt were gone forever, he did nothing to hinder the silent tears that slid down his pale, cold-reddened cheeks. James was starting a new life now, and pretty soon, there would be no room for him anymore. Why would there be?
To be honest, Sirius couldn't even think of a reason as to why James had ever had room for him to begin with. He was nothing but a fuck up from a dysfunctional family who had nothing to his name but a reputation for trouble.
He'd been lucky to get as much of James' attention as he had…
Sirius was startled out of his thoughts by the sound of a door opening behind him. A giggling Ravenclaw couple stumbled in, taking little notice of his presence. Cringing, Sirius wiped the wetness from his cheeks and turned around to leave, doing his best to block out the erotic noises coming from behind him.
He hurried out the door and down the spiral staircase that would take him back to Gryffindor tower. He just needed some rest, that was all.
And as Sirius turned corner after corner, all he could think of was the knife currently resting in his bedside drawer.
