I literally had this vision of Remus picking shattered glass out from Sirius’ palm, and the whole thing just expanded from there. I really like this whole concept of troubled youths though - maybe I’ll do something based on this later on?
(This sucks - I keep saying I’ll write longer fics and yet I can’t seem to do anything but oneshots. How annoying.)
“You’ve got to stop doing this.”
Sirius lets out a tiny groan, burying his head into the crook of his arm. They’re in some storage room, perched on upturned buckets, blood splashing down from the cuts on his hands.
“Stop what? Fighting? Brawling? Punching my hand through windows?”
Remus lets out a noise of fustration, roughly raking his hands through his hair. “All of them?”
“Sorry,” Sirius says. He leans against the wall, tips his head back to rest against the corner. “No can do.”
Remus sighs and bends over his hands again. The tweezers gleam in the cold light; sharp and metallic and vicious. Sirius bites down hard on his lip as Remus presses the tip into his skin, tries to ignore the stabs of pain against his skin.
“So,” he says, his voice coming out slightly strangled. “Anything else I should know?”
Remus sets the tweezers down. “Oh nothing much. Just that you’ve got another 3 weeks of therapy added onto your existing amount. And Snape is in the hospital with a broken nose and fractured rib.”
“Good,” Sirius mutters, and Remus sighs. “Jesus, Sirius. You’re not getting out of here if you don’t try to at least change.”
“Now why would I do that? Not like my parents are going to take me back. I’m stuck here till I’m 18.”
”Even longer if you don’t learn how to control your anger.”
They were all in here for a reason. Hogwarts School for Troubled Youth, the sign proudly proclaimed, erected outside of a dim, grey building. Once you went in, you often didn’t come back out.
Sirius scowls again, glaring down at his bleeding hand. He knew what his file said, had memorized every fucking letter on the paper. Officially he was in here for anger management issues, psychological trauma, violence and impulsive behavior. Unofficially he was imprisoned for being far too much for his parents to handle.
“Sorry,” he mutters. Remus flicks his eyebrows up in surprise. “Sorry for what?”
“Sorry for...you know. Beating up Snape and Malfoy. Putting my hand through the window.”
The corner of Remus’ mouth turns up. “And?”
“And for being a jackass.”
“Apology accepted.” Remus picks up the tweezers again; he smiles, his eyes wide and guileless. With a flick of his wrist the tweezer disappears, vanishing from between his fingers in the space of a breath. He winks and reaches forward; Sirius rolls his eyes as Remus pulls the tweezers from the mass of dark curls piled on top of his head. “Would you quit doing that?”
“Doing what?” Remus repeats innocently. He twirls the tweezers again; they snap in half between his hands. “I’m not doing anything.”
“Yes, Yes. We know you’re an incredible thief. And a pickpocket. And a magician.”
“Damn straight,” Remus mutters. He makes a fist around the broken shards of the tweezers and gently blows. When he opens his hands again the tweezers are whole. “I’m incredible.”
Sirius resists the urge to roll his eyes. “Can you get the glass out of my hand?”
Remus smirks. “Right.” He bends over, presses the tweezers into Sirius’ hand again, underneath the skin to where the glass shards were embedded into flesh. Sirius stifles a groan, bites down hard on his lip and lets his mind wander.
His gaze swoops down, towards Remus’ hands. He’s studied them, a lot, the long, slender fingers and the ropes of scar tissue that snaked their way along the skin. One of his fingers are crooked, bent in two different places, the only hint toward the scars that coated the rest of his body.
How many hours has he studied Remus, his laughs and his moods, the quiet, watchful way he observed the world? Always moving; his hands reaching up to brush against his hair, fingers tapping on his knees, the flashes of light as he flicked objects between his fingers, dropped coins into his pockets. He was sent here for stealing, hustling people on the street to scrape together enough money to save his dying mother. It all fell to shit when he stole from the wrong person, got his ass sent to Hogwarts.
Sirius bites back a moan as Remus probes too deep into the broken skin. He jerks slightly; the metal presses deeper into the bleeding skin, making him clench his jaw. Remus pulls back. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be.” Sirius takes a deep breath, gaze dropping towards the floor. Shards of blood-soaked glass litter the ground, countless others burried in his hands. “It’s okay. I can handle a lot.”
Remus meets his gaze. Sirius always loved Remus’ eyes; brown, flecked with bits of hazel and gold and bronze. There’s a ripple in one eye, a jagged chasm of black; Remus had just shrugged when Sirius asked him about it. “I got my head slammed into a lot of corners,” he muttered, then refused to say anymore on the subject.
He realizes he’s staring, eyes locked on Remus’. Remus flushes, blood rising to his cheeks; he tears his gaze away, looking down at Sirius’ hand. “I better,” he starts, then trails off. “I don’t want the wound healing over the glass. I better get this out.”
“Sure,” Sirius says, then stifles a moan as Remus shoved he tweezers back into his hand. He leans his head against the wall, teeth bared, forcing himself to stay still even as the pain snaked its way up his arm. “Where’s James?”
“Probably lighting things on fire behind the dumpster,” Remus mutters. Sirius loves it when Remus concentrates, all pursed lips and lowered lashes. “They found his lighter, though, and the can of gasoline under his bed. He’s pretty pissed about it.”
Sirius huffs a laugh, then winces as Remus slowly pulls out another piece of glass. The skin splits, blood trickling down his wrist in vibrant ruby ropes. He closes his eyes, heart pounding.
He’s always known, known the feeling inside of him. It was what started the fire, the raging inferno inside of him, the endless pit of fury that nothing could put out. He’s burning, burning and burning and burning and there’s not a damn thing that anyone could do about it.
God, he’s wrecked. He hasn’t spoken to anyone, hasn’t even seen Reg for 7 years. He wonders what happened to him how, if he was still the sweet-faced, innocent child that Sirius left behind.
“Sirius,” Remus says, and he’s jolted out of his thoughts, back into the storage cupboard with blood down his arm and Remus too close at his side. “Sirius, you’re doing it again.”
“Sorry,” Sirius breathes. “Flashbacks.”
Remus’ eyes go dark; he has his own demons to battle with. He still didn’t know what exactly plagues Remus, but he had a general idea. There were too many nights spent tossing and turning, listening to Remus’ pleads; Greyback! Please, not her, take me instead -
He wondered who Greyback was. He was going to rip him apart.
Sirius takes a shuddering breath as Remus removes another piece from his skin, feels the skin catch and tear. He bites his lip, embraces the feeling, the cold agony that helped cut through the whirling in his head.
He used to, when he was younger, used to trace bits of metal across his skin until he bled. The scars were still visible, though they easily blended with the scars that his mother carved on him.
And even those paled to Remus’ scars. He still didn’t know what caused them, all the rips and shredding. Patches that looked like burns, places where the skin hadn’t smoothed over. He dreamt of tracing them, sometimes, with his fingers and teeth and tongue.
He shudders as more glass comes out from under his skin, filling his veins with shattering lines. He’s burning, he knows this, burning up with all that rage and he’s in love with his best friend.
“So,” Remus says, his voice soft. “Why did you beat them up?”
Sirius forces a laugh. To be honest, he didn’t know. The day had already been tough, pressing on top of him like a goddamn pressure cooker and all it had taken was one comment (“Hey Black! On your way to fuck the whore?”) and he was on top of them, swinging punches left and right, feeling things cracking underneath his hand.
Later, locked in the office the rage, he had began shaking. Hard and fast, until the room spun around him in foggy waves and he needed to think, to breathe, to prove that something in this fucked up life was in his control -
He didn’t recognize the pain at first - that came after. All he could hear was the shattering of glass, the pounding of his heart, Remus’ low curses as he found him on the ground.
They weren’t allowed tweezers - apparently they were a suicide risk. But there was nothing Remus couldn’t steal, no lock he couldn’t pick and there was a pair in Remus’ hands a mere 5 minutes later.
And now...Sirius bites back a groan.
His hands hurt. His back hurt. His ribs and his legs and his raw, bloodied knuckles but nothing hurt as badly as being in love with Remus. Of staring out into the sea and knowing that you’ll never find land.
Sirius grits his teeth, so hard he thinks he might pop a vein. He swallows, tasting blood, watching the tweezers press into his hand again.
“Sirius,” Remus says, his eyes shadows and mist and dust. “Sirius, are you alright?”
Sirius takes a deep, rattling breath. “Never been better.”
Another shard of glass comes out, clattering onto the floor.
