Written for the Potter Complex, 2024/2025 championships, round 1: Lost.

Sirius Black was in a mood.

Truthfully, that was not very surprising. Being cooped up inside of your childhood home – your unhappy childhood home, the constant reminder of your uselessness and failure – is bound to cause some difficulties. It also wasn't anything new; Sirius had been in a mood for about two full weeks.

But he was in a really foul one today, starting around noon-ish, when he had realised quite suddenly that he hadn't got his dragon-hide jacket with him any more. This jacket had been given to him by James himself the very first Christmas he'd ever spent at the Potters, so you can imagine how much it meant to him. It was his everything. It had grown with him through the years both literally and figuratively, and, upon discovering it hadn't been lost when he'd been sent to Azkaban, but returned to number twelve, Grimmauld Place, along with some of his other belongings at the time – he had been happier than he'd thought possible.

And now it was gone. His favourite jacket, the jacket that kept nightmares at bay (and he had many of those here) was gone.

So to say he was in a mood really was an understatement. He was ravenous. He hadn't been outside in weeks. He couldn't have just lost it; it had been stolen.

'KREACHER!' he bellowed, and it woke up his mother's portrait, which screeched about all he'd ever done wrong in his life (and that was a rather long list in her eyes).

Kreacher appeared, the crack of his Apparition hidden below Mother's screams. Kreacher sneered, then bowed so low his nose touched the floor.

'Tell me – honestly! – have you taken a jacket? My jacket? Dragon-hide, black, the one I wore yesterday. And don't you dare lie to me!'

'Kreacher has not taken Master's filthy blood traitor jacket,' the elf said. 'Of course not, oh, no, what would my poor Mistress say—'

'—DISGRACEFUL!' Mother's voice reached an earsplitting shriek as she demonstrated exactly what Kreacher's "poor Mistress" had to say about that. 'This is the house of my fathers, of my fathers' fathers! You are nothing! You are less than a stain! And I should have—'

'Oh, SHUT UP!' Sirius bellowed, throwing his arms up, rushing out of the dining room to silence her. 'Just SHUT UP for once in your miserable life!'

But that only made her screech louder. 'Ungrateful! Filthy! Blood-traitor SCUM!'

Kreacher gave a slow, horrible smile, his watery eyes gleaming. 'Mistress is right,' he murmured. 'She is always right. Master does not deserve fine things. Master does not deserve this house. Master does not deserve anything at all ... Oh, just look at the way he treats my poor Mistress ...'

Sirius had finally managed to shut the moth-eaten velvet that covered his mother's portrait, and he turned to Kreacher with a sharp look. He barely registered his own voice, hoarse and shaking with rage. 'Where is it?'

Kreacher's eyes still glittered. 'Kreacher does not have it, Master. But perhaps Master should be asking—'

Sirius grabbed the elf by his bony shoulders. 'Ask whom, Kreacher? Answer me, you worthless—!'

But Kreacher had Disapparated, no doubt running off to beat himself against a wall somewhere. Ah— there it was, the pounding on the walls, the pounding on the floor, the pounding in his head. It broke with the endless silence he otherwise had to endure. A silence in which he had nothing but his own mind, his miserable old house-elf, and the portrait of his mother for company.

He needed that jacket. And he was going to find that jacket. Even if it meant tearing the whole bloody house apart.

He went up the stairs. If Kreacher hadn't taken it (which he wasn't entirely convinced of, but with Kreacher, one could do little more than ask) then it had to still be somewhere in the house. And since he knew he'd had it yesterday— hadn't he? He closed his eyes. Yes. He had. He'd sat in the drawing room, staring at the tapestry, trying to come up with the best way to destroy it once and for all.

Since he knew he'd had it yesterday, in the drawing room, and not after – where had he gone afterwards? The kitchen? But he hadn't had the jacket on any more, had he? – the drawing room was the best place to start.

He entered the drawing room and looked around. No jacket draped over a chair. No jacket thrown carelessly onto the sofa. He opened the writing desk, half-hoping it had somehow ended up shoved inside— Nothing.

But it had to be here somewhere, and so he overturned everything. He emptied the drawers, pushed the books off their shelves, got rid of the contents in the desk... he pulled the cushions off the sofa and chairs and even checked inside the dusty vases that decorated the mantlepiece, that had once, in a very distant past, held flowers.

Nothing. Again.

The jacket was nowhere to be found.

He ran his hands through his hair, gripping it tightly. He squeezed his eyes shut. Think, think! It couldn't just be gone. Things weren't ever just "gone". It had to be somewhere. If Kreacher hadn't stolen it, he could have hidden it. Burnt it. Handed it over to someone else. Hadn't he said?

'Perhaps Master should be asking—'

But ask whom? Who could have possibly stolen— Oh.

Mundungus Fletcher.

There was no other option. He must've taken it to sell at some auction.

Panic and fury and despair all set in at the same time, and he had to sit down so he wouldn't lose his footing.

Gone. The jacket was gone.

Sirius clenched his fists. Fury won out over the other two first, and it blurred his vision.

Mundungus fucking Fletcher.

Of course it was him. That thieving, rat-faced coward. How many times had he been warned not to touch things in this house? How many times had he been caught stuffing bits of silverware and other trinkets into his filthy coat? Not that Sirius cared about him taking some of those things off his hands, but now look what came of it. Now look what he'd done. Look what he'd taken because he considered everything here to be a free-for-all. He'd taken the only object in the house that actually meant something.

Sirius shot to his feet again. He needed to find Dung. He needed to get his jacket back. He needed to—

What? Find the bastard and hex him into next week? Run away and risk everything for that low-life?

Sirius turned around and gave the chair a harsh kick— the pain did not subdue his anger; if anything, it intensified: he hated this house, he hated the Order for letting Dung anywhere near it, he hated that he was stuck here, useless and alone, whilst that filthy thief walked free with his jacket.

The jacket James had given him.

James.

Sirius pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes as despair won over. He sat back down again, and let the tears fall freely. It wasn't just a jacket. It was James wrapping an arm around him and saying, 'You're one of us now, mate.' It was the warmth of Christmas at the Potters', the feeling of having a family, a real, proper family for the first time in his life. It was every stupid, reckless thing he and James had done together, every late-night adventure, every whispered conversation about dreams and futures ...

He realised then how exhausted he was. Too exhausted for the panic, or rage, or even the despair to hold.

For a long moment, he just sat there, staring blankly at the wreckage of the drawing room. The empty shelves, the scattered books, the upended cushions.

It was a mess.

He was a mess.

So his gaze roamed across the chaos he had made until something caught his eye. There, beneath the desk, amidst the desk's contents, half-hidden beneath an open book, was a flash of silver.

Yes, he could see it clearly now, as he crept closer. It was a small, rectangular box. Dulled with age but undoubtedly silver. A miracle Dung hadn't stolen it yet.

He brushed some dust off it and saw a crest engraved on the lid. The Black family crest, of course. Because what else would it be in this wretched house?

It was heavier than it looked.

The hinges were stiff with disuse. He dug his fingers into the edge of the lid and pulled – pulled – pulled until, with a sudden snap, the lid gave way and he could take a look inside.

There was some rolled-up parchment there, and he hesitated for a moment before pulling it out. What did it matter if it was cursed? He'd deal with that later if he had to. So he rolled out the parchment—

And his breath hitched. Because he recognised the handwriting, though he hadn't seen it since... well, not since that final letter, the one he'd tossed right into the fire at the Potters, without even reading what they'd had to say ...

And now ...

Sirius, my dear son,

He nearly dropped the paper. He had dropped it, in fact. The parchment had fluttered down to the desk. For a moment, it was like he was sixteen again, standing in this very room, his mother's voice ringing in his ears, drumming along the beat of his heart, telling him he was a disgrace to the House of Black.

He clenched his jaw and picked up the parchment again, forcing himself to read all they had to say.

Sirius, my dear son,

If you are reading this, that means you have been led back home at last. You will understand, in time, I hope, that blood is thicker than the foolish whims of youth. You are a Black. This house is yours. And if you look hard enough, you will see that it has never stopped waiting for you.

We have never stopped waiting for you.

That was all.

There wasn't even a signature.

There was no need for one, though. He recognised this handwriting anywhere.

He set it down and took a steadying breath. Her voice had echoed in his mind as he read that letter and now she still wouldn't leave. He could almost hear her whispering in his ear, though he could not make out what she would say.

He swallowed hard and turned his attention back to the silver box. There were other things where the letter had been: a tiny, dulled, once-silver rattle; a figurine of Merlin, no bigger than his thumb; a photograph—

A pang shot through him as he took a closer look at the photograph, unable to help himself.

There, in an armchair he knew to be a deep shade of green, before the crackling fire, in this very room, sat a young woman that could only be his mother, for her face was precisely how he remembered it, more beautiful than her portrait downstairs and not yet wrought with sadness. She was smiling down at a young, black-haired toddler in her lap, who was wriggling impatiently, gripping a tiny blanket with both hands and attempting to drape it over his face. His chubby fingers clutched at the fabric, pulling it down only to peek up at his mother with wide eyes before giggling and hiding again.

The boy's mother – his mother – adjusted her grip, one arm wrapped securely around the toddler's waist to keep him from falling off. Her mouth moved, her eyes twinkled in amusement, but Sirius could not hear what she said. For the first time in his life, this saddened him.

The boy giggled again, peeking out from under the blanket, his little legs kicking the air in excitement. He flopped backwards dramatically and rested against his mother's chest.

She looked to her side, and Sirius' heart leapt. A man had stepped into view. He was saying something, looking sternly from the woman to the boy, before breaking out into a smile. He reached down and ruffled the toddler's already messy black curls. The boy wriggled even harder, attempting to stand on his mother's lap, bracing his tiny hands against his mother's shoulders as he pushed himself up.

The blanket fell to the floor as the toddler wobbled and lost his balance. His mother gasped and reached for his legs; his father swooped his off her lap just before he fell. The child beamed in delight and raised his hands towards his mother again and his father handed him over. She set him down again upon her lap and the blanket was given back. Then it all started again: she smiled down at him, and the boy wriggled, and his father appeared, and he tried to stand...

And Sirius watched them, over and over again, careful not to disturb them, careful not to break the cycle and let them know they were being watched. He didn't want them to change. He needed them to be like this forever.

Because he knew this toddler. Intimately. He was this toddler. And the parents ... though they resembled his own in appearance, they didn't in behaviour. He didn't remember them ever looking at him like that.

And yet ... here was the proof. They had been a family once, in a very distant past.

He let out a shaky breath and finally dared lift it up, causing the toddler to fall from his mother's lap. He watched as his father tended to the now-crying toddler, whilst his mother glared at him in fury, as if threatening to hurt him from where she sat, on the other end of the camera.

He shook his head. Some things never change.

But the moment was brief, and after he'd set the photo down, the toddler was already giggling again, trying to balance on his mother's lap.

He sighed, pressing his fingers into his temples. Where had it all gone wrong?

He looked back at the box, suddenly filled with the desire to know more, to see more, to find more. He put his hand in again and it brushed against something cold, something solid. He pulled out a rectangular tin, small enough to fit in his hand easily. He pried it open.

Inside were tiny, broken crayons, worn down to little nubs. He held them in his hands, each one, the red, the blue, the green, the gold...

Images flashed through his mind, of him and Regulus, lying on the floor of the drawing room, colouring. Regulus always stealing the gold crayon, Sirius pretending not to notice ...

Why had she kept this? Why had she kept any of this?

He set the tin aside carefully, and put the crayons back in. He reached into the box again, hoping to find an answer—

Something leathery. A string. He pulled it out, and – Merlin, he knew this so well – at the end of the string hung a tiny, jagged tooth. He'd lost this when he was six. He remembered losing it, crying about it. His father had told him to stop sniveling, to be a man, a Black. Mother had barely looked at him.

He didn't get it. He didn't understand. Mother had always been so against sentimentality. None if this made any sense.

And so his hand went in again. Because though it made no sense, all he wanted was to see what else was in there.

His fingers brushed against something soft this time. Fabric. A small blanket. He turned it over in his hands and ran his finger along the delicate stitching in the shape of the Canis Major constellation. He recognised it from the photograph.

The material was thin, well-worn, as if it had been held, clutched, slept with. And it had been.

It was his. He'd taken it everywhere.

Lifting it to his face, he inhaled deeply.

The scent that washed over him was intimately familiar to him. It was the smell of— of home. Of safety. Of a time before everything became so complicated, a time before he knew the ins and outs of pure-blood supremacy and the politics that came along with it, a time before before his parents' smiles faded, before bedtime stories and songs were replaced with expectations ... a time before their love became conditional ...

He lay down on the floor, curled up with his blanket draped over his face, taking in the scent with every breath, as if it could send him back to those long-lost days of his youth. He didn't know how long he stayed like that, eyes closed, memories pressing in on him from all sides, but when he finally crawled out from under the blanket, the world had already gone dark.