#hp x reader
Pairings: Young ! Sirius Black x Reader
Warnings: angst, swearing, heartbreak
Word count: 2k +
Summary: Good or bad, sometimes all you need is closure.
A/N: Again, it’s been ages since I’ve posted anything but I had this one sitting in my drafts so I thought I’d go back through, fix it up a little and post it. Originally it was 5k + so I’ve broken it in half. I’ll post the other half once I’ve finished going through it. I really hope you like this one ! x
Tags:@the–real-wombat@sleepylunarwolf@strangenerdsstuff@ashkuuuu@dottirose@fairywriter-oracle@miraclesoflove@daddy-padfoot@angelastein2010@addled@disneykidafi@wanna-see-my-lease - you can add yourself via the link on my masterlist or send me an ask
The storm rages.
It blankets the city in a thick sheet of rain, thunder rumbling in the distance as the lightning flickers through the dark clouds. It was wild and chaotic, the worst storm that London had had in months; the big, fat drops of water enough to send everyone scurrying under cover. The drizzly evening matched your mood perfectly as you sat in your car, goose bumps prickling along your skin from your damp clothes, the windshield fogging up even more with each frigid breath.
You close your eyes and sigh, clenching and unclenching your fists around the steering wheel as you war with yourself. You’d made the decision with a clear head this morning, convincing yourself it was what you wanted to do, but now you weren’t so sure, a rolling train of insecurities flooding through your mind. Opening your eyes you glance over at the box sitting on your passenger seat, a thousand memories you didn’t want to think about mixed in with the knick knacks. That damn box had been mocking you for the last five days and you’d finally had enough. After all, you were the one that had the ridiculous notion in your head that doing this was going to bring you some kind of closure; that seeing him again, when neither of you were angry and out for blood might take away some of the hurt.
Sucking your bottom lip between your teeth you look through the window, to the townhouse your parked in front of, the large front windows lit up from inside. You loved those windows, the way the sun would pour in first thing in the morning, warming your favourite spot on the couch. It didn’t seem fair, that the house you used to call home still had so much life to it while you were barely making it through each day, drifting further and further from the person you used to be. Your car keys jingle in your hand and once again you’re fighting yourself over what to do. You don’t even know if he’s home, you could just drop the box off at the door and leave, make a clean getaway and go back to pretending your moving on with your life but…
No. Despite everything you need to see him.
Dragging the box up onto your lap you give yourself no time to overthink before heading out into the rain, shivering as cold water runs down your back. You hurry up the driveway but by the time you make it to the front step your still saturated, the reasonably neat bun you’d worn your hair in now a soggy, limp mess at the back of your head. The flood light comes on above you and you freeze, eyes wide as the lock on the door clicks. You start wondering how quickly you can run back to your car before he realises who it is but before you can make any kind of choice the door swings open.
Your throat constricts, your heart beating so fast inside your chest you’re worried it might just give out. Sirius stands there in the doorway, bathed in the soft glow from the house, wearing a thin t-shirt and a pair of grey sweats. His curls are deliciously messy, haphazardly pulled back in a loose bun and there’s more scruff on his face then you were used to seeing. You force yourself to swallow around the hard lump in the back of your throat.
His brow dips as he looks at you dripping on his welcome mat, clearly as surprised to see you as you were over being caught. You shuffle awkwardly on the spot, feeling your cheeks get warm.
“Hi…” You thrust the box towards him with the lame greeting. “I found some of your stuff mixed in with mine and I just thought I’d…drop them off.”
“In the middle of a thunderstorm?”
His voice is like a hard slap to the face, at the same time making you miss him more while also dredging up all the heartbreak you’d tried squashing down. Your relationship had crumbled to pieces in front of your eyes eight weeks ago and by the abysmal end you weren’t on speaking terms. You’d packed up your things and walked out without so much as a backwards glance.
“Yeah… I was - I was on my way… home.”
You choke out the last word. You didn’t think of the apartment you moved into home and you don’t think you ever will. This was your home, the place you’d shared with Sirius for the last five years, the place you missed with your whole heart.
Sirius blows out a long sigh and shoves his hand through his hair, tangling it up even more. He chews the corner of his lip, eyes darting between the box in your hands and your dishevelled appearance. An awkward, miserable silence settles between the two of you as you lightly bounce on the balls of your feet.
“I guess it’s kind of cold out here,” His tone isn’t angry but it’s not all that welcoming either. “You can come in while the rain eases.”
Yes.Yes… that’s all you want. To go inside and forget all about the last two months, and the three before that were you and Sirius were constantly at each other’s throats. You want it to all go back to how it was before, when you knew that he was who you wanted to spend the rest of your life with. When your friends didn’t have to feel guilty over spending time with one of you and not the other. You just wanted it to go back to when Sirius loved you more than anything else…
You knew it wouldn’t though. There was no going back.
You shake your head as you take a step back, willing the few tears in the corner of your eyes to stay there. You place the box down, suddenly remembering why you were there in the first place.
“I - I gotta go.”
No more than five feet down the driveway you feel Sirius’ hand grab your arm, stopping you from leaving. His grip isn’t tight, you could pull away if you wanted to, but his touch feels like a live wire on your skin and you can’t move. Another crack of thunder - this one closer - sounds above your head, the rain cascading down over your body as you look up at your ex, his shirt now glued to his body, accentuating the planes of muscle under the fabric.
“You can’t drive in this weather,” He reasons. “Come inside.”
Against your better judgement you let him lead you into the house, immediately missing the warmth of his touch as he lets you go to close and lock the door. You wrap your arms around yourself, only now realising how much you’re actually shivering. Sirius seems to notice as well because he frowns, his hand twitching by his side as though he’s trying to decide if he should reach out to you again. He looks conflicted, like he’s tossing up over whether he should care or not that you’re cold.
“I can get you some dry clothes,” He says, motioning towards the hallway. “Why don’t you have a shower and warm yourself up, I think there’s still some of your stuff in the cupboard. I … I didn’t go through it.”
“It’s fine,” You force out, your voice no higher than a whisper. “I don’t want to impose and I really should be going anyway.”
“I told you, you can’t drive in weather like this. A shower won’t hurt right? You’ll feel better.”
It might hurt, you think. But truthfully a shower did sound pretty good right about now.
Once you agree you follow Sirius down the hall, stopping a couple of doors before he does. You flip on the light in the bathroom, breathing in deeply as you smell his body wash lingering on the air. Everything looks exactly the same - minus your makeup littering the vanity and it makes you kind of sad. Sirius taps his knuckles on the door jam, making you jump as you turn to face him. He holds out some clothes, looking at everything except you as you take them gratefully. There’s a bitter sting in your chest as you notice they’re his clothes. You suppose there’s nothing of yours still here but it still makes your throat feel dry as you hold them against your chest.
“Thanks,” You mumble.
“Take all the time you want, don’t feel like you have to rush or anything.”
He walks away and you shut the door, leaning back against it heavily as you bring the clothes up to your nose, inhaling the scent on them, catching the barely there whiff of your perfume. It was the t-shirt you always used to wear to bed. Faded, old and full of more holes then a golf course, but you loved it and not all that long ago Sirius loved seeing you in it. Leaving them on the vanity you turn on the tap, letting it warm all the way up before stripping out of your clothes. You step under the stream of water, cold feet burning as the water hits them. It’s the right kind of pain though. There wasn’t much better than a shower when you were cold.
For a few minutes you just stand there, the heat relaxing some of the tension in your muscles. You think about everything that had happened tonight, confused why Sirius was acting the way he was. There was a part of you that had assumed he’d slam the door in your face, spit something hurtful and tell you that he never wanted to see you ever again. Best case scenario you thought he wouldn’t open the door at all, just leaving you standing outside looking like the fool. The fact that he was being kind of… nice made you feel guilty for thinking those things about him. Just because you weren’t dating anymore didn’t mean that he was going to stop caring. Of all the things that Sirius was, he was never cruel. Tonight more than proved that.
Rinsing the body wash off you stepped out of the shower, digging your toes into the fluffy mat as you grabbed your towel, the steam still swirling around the small room. You take your time drying off, nervous about heading back there and facing him. You don’t know how to talk to him anymore, even though at one point he’d been one of your best friends - long before he was your boyfriend. You’re just slipping his old t-shirt over your head when the light cuts out, bathing you in sudden darkness. You reach blindly for where you think the switch is, flipping it a couple of times when you find it, groaning when it does nothing to help. It takes a couple of goes but you finally find the door handle, fully expecting that the bathroom globe had just blown and the rest of the house would still be lit up. The whole house is in darkness though, the hairs standing up on the back of your neck as you head towards the living room, an eerie kind of silence filling the house. It’s too quiet without the background noise of the tv or fridge, the only sound coming from the storm outside.
“Sirius?” You call out hesitantly, the lightning flashing in the windows casting long shadows along the walls.
You feel something graze across your shoulder and you turn quickly, the scream dying in your throat as you see Sirius standing behind you, his face lit up by the torch on his phone.
“The whole streets out,” He says flatly. “Does your phone have much battery?”
“Uh…” You head back into the bathroom, the light from Sirius’ phone making it easier to see where you left yours on the vanity. You frown when you check the battery levels. “It’s only got about thirty three percent, won’t last long.”
Sirius groans, scrubbing a hand over his face as he looks off towards the living room, a frown on his face, his expression guarded, unreadable.
“You don’t remember if we had a torch do you?”
“I don’t think so,” You answer, wrapping your arms tight around yourself. “I think there’s some candles in the lounge though… or there was.”
Without a word he shuffles past you and walks down the hall. You follow behind him, watching as he grabs some candles from the cupboard on the tv cabinet. It feels a lot like he just packed you away, hid all the things that reminded him of you. He grabs the matches from the same cupboard, striking one and lighting the candles he’d scattered across the coffee table. Soon the room is illuminated with a soft light. It feels warmer somehow, like it’s taken the chill off the room. Sirius sits on the couch and suddenly that awkward silence is back.
Biting your lip you move across and sit down, keeping as far from him as possible, holding your hands tightly in your lap. You hate how it is between the both of you, how this breakup had rocked the two of you down to your core. While you were simply trying to make it through each new day, Sirius had put walls up around himself and was clearly in no hurry to let you know how he was really feeling. You bite the edge of your lip and wring your hands together.
“Crazy storm hey?” You aim for light hearted customer service voice but it comes out forced and a little flat.
Sirius scoffs.
“You want to talk about the weather? Really?”
“Well it doesn’t seem like you want to have any other kind of conversation… actually it seems like you prefer not talking at all, so let’s just sit here in awkward silence.”
“There’s nothing to say.”
“You and I both know that’s not true. I just want you to talk to me Sirius, hell yell at me if it’s going to make you feel better; get everything off your chest. Just say something.”
“Why now y/n? Why do you suddenly want to air all our dirty laundry? It’s not like you were this desperate to talk about it before.”
“That’s not fair,” You reply, digging your fingernails into the palm of your hands. “I tried talking to you, for months before we ended things Sirius. You’re the one that never wanted to deal with it.”
Sirius stands abruptly, stalking to the other side of the room before whirling back to face you, that unreadable expression - the one he’d been wearing since he opened the door - finally breaking. You can’t see him properly from all the shadows in the room but you can see enough to notice the hurt in his eyes. He opens his mouth a couple of times, trying to find the right way to say what he wants to. When he can’t, he storms from the room. You watch him go with a frustrated sigh.
It was all coming to the surface, everything before and after the breakup, all of the feelings the two of you had buried, squashed down and tried to pretend didn’t still exist. The flood gates were open and good or bad the two of you needed closure.
