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Sirius hates himself and everything in him. He hates himself so much. He is so fucking stupid. He had told fucking Snape how to get into the Womping Willow. He was stressed and had been having a hard day and it just slipped out; and it ruined Remus’ life. The others won’t talk to him now and he understands. He wouldn’t talk to himself either, if the roles were reversed.
He is sitting in their dorms, on his bed. The others aren’t here right now. They were in classes—which Sirius was skipping. He does that a lot these days. He just doesn’t see the point. He has lost the only people who had ever cared for him. For something as stupid as a fucking grudge. He needs something. He just feels so numb all the time. They aren’t even horrible to him—they just ignore him.
Sirius can’t get out of his head what James said to him. “You’re just like them! You’re a fucking Black!” James yelled, before running off to try and save Snape and Remus both.
Sirius had never seen James angry like that at him. Oh, he was so so angry at Sirius. Sirius knows he deserves it but it still hurts more than anything else in the world. Because this is James. The James who will never yell at him. The James that is always there for him no matter what. The same James that is going out of his way to avoid him, now.
Sirius knows he deserves it, he knows he deserves worse than what they are giving him. Still, he would rather them yell and scream at him than this silence. At least then he would know where he stands.
He is so alone now. He has no one. He feels nothing. He’s like a wallflower, except this wallflower deserves what it gets. He needs the punishment. Yet, he isn’t getting it. He doesn’t get why they don’t just curse him. Yeah, he remembers all of them saying that what his mother and father did is abuse, but doesn’t he deserve it? He definitely did now. If no one else would punish him—he would have to do it himself—the only way he knew.
Sirius grabs his wand. He never tried to use this curse on himself, but it feels right, feels fit. He deserves it, after all. He deserves the pain. After what he did to Snape—what he did to Remus. This is the least he deserves.
He puts the wand to his chest and mutters, “Crucio!”
It only lasts a second, but it hurts. Half of him didn’t expect it to work. The whole point of the Cruciatus Curse was that it doesn’t work if you don’t mean it. Sirius means it, he needs it.
He didn’t even realize that he was crying. But there are tears streaming down his face. It’s all too much, the numbness, the pain, the guilt. He backs up against the wall and once again, puts his wand to his chest. This time, when he says the curse, he fucking means it.
“Crucio!”
His whole body explodes in pain. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. He deserves it. He had betrayed his closest friends. He collapses against the wall, screaming in pain. He forces himself to keep his wand pointed at himself, despite the fact that he can barely think. Everything hurts and he thrives in it. It feels like his veins are twisting around each other. It feels like his bones are being grinded together. It feels like his body is reshaping itself. His arm falls to the floor and he sobs in relief as the pain fades.
His body still aches but it isn’t the all consuming pain that it is when the curse is on him. Is he crazy if he says that he needs more? That it isn’t enough? That he deserves to be punished more?
He sobs as he raises his wand again, he can barely sit up, and he hurts so much. Yet, he still manages to point his wand at himself and utters the curse. “Crucio!”
Yet again, he is tossed into unfathomable agony. He falls to the floor sobbing and screaming, curling in on himself, yet still keeping the curse going. He can feel every bad thing about himself going through him. Everything he ever did to make him like his family. Part of him hopes that if he tortures himself enough, the pain will force out the Black tainted parts of him. He keeps the curse going longer than the other one. Only stopping when he feels like he is going to pass out.
He is sobbing and shaking so much that he can’t even hold his wand steady. I deserve this, he keeps reminding himself. I deserve this. I deserve this. I deserve this. He repeats it again and again. He is choking on his guilt and pain and wishes that he could just disappear. He remembers James telling him that he doesn’t deserve to be tortured, and that his parents are evil for doing this to him. Sirius wonders if James still thinks that. Now, he’d probably agree that Sirius needs this discipline.
He is having trouble breathing, he has to gasp for breath. Every time his chest expands and retracts it is agony. His whole body is shaking and he knows that if he does much more of this he is going to pass out, and yet, he still holds his wand up and points it at himself. Some might call him crazy—Sirius relishes in the fact.
“Crucio!"
His body convulses as the pain rips through him. A scream builds its way through his throat until his voice is echoing through the room in sheer agony. He forces himself to keep the wand on himself, even as he wants to beg the pain to stop. He keeps the wand on himself as he convulses on the floor. He keeps the wand on himself as he sobs through screams. He keeps the wand on him until he quite physically can’t make himself move, and his arm goes limp. He’s a sobbing mess on the floor.
Sirius can’t move any part of himself. He is shaking and limp, his breathing is ragged. He can’t even take a deep breath without wanting to scream in pain. Still, somehow, he feels it isn’t enough. He has betrayed the only people who have ever cared about him. The people that loved him despite his last name—and he went and proved them wrong. He doesn’t deserve to be in relief.
He tries to move his arm to put his wand back on himself but he can’t. He can barely think through the pain—let alone move. He grits his teeth and makes himself sit up, choking on sobs. Merlin he hurts so much. He manages to sit up, leaning against the wall. He bites his lip to stop himself from crying out, and points his wand at himself for the fourth time.
He lets out a sob as he chokes out, “Crucio!”
He screams as the curse takes hold of him but it only lasts a second. He starts sobbing when it ends. Why doesn’t it last longer? He needs it to last longer. He has betrayed the people he loves the most in the entire world. He doesn’t deserve to be in peace.
“Cruci—” he cuts off with a sob. He needs this to work. Why can’t he say the spell?
“Cruc—” he sobs again, cutting himself off. He knows that he was afraid, he hates this spell and the pain that comes with it, but he deserves it. He has to use it.
“Cru— Cruc— Cruc—” he sobs as he trips over his words. In his haze of pain he doesn’t hear the door opening or the people coming in. He doesn’t hear their gasps of breath. He doesn’t see the horror on their faces. “Cruc—”
Suddenly, someone was at his side, pulling the wand from his hand. He starts shaking his head and crying.
“No! No, please!” he begs. This person doesn’t understand—he deserves it. “Please, I deserve it.”
His vision was so blurry and tearstained he doesn’t realize who is beside him until they start talking, “Sirius! Stop!”
It’s James.
He looks up at him, begging him to understand. “I deserve this.”
James makes a sound like he is pained. His voice is broken, “Sirius. . .”
Sirius doesn’t like this. James shouldn’t be sad. James should never be sad, he is the sun. He should only shine. He doesn’t understand why James is upset. Sirius deserves this. Why can’t James see that?
Sirius tries to rub his eyes, so he can see, but the moment he raises his arm, he moans in pain. James yells something to someone else in the room and he vaguely hears hurried footsteps. He feels a cloth wipe his eyes, and when it pulls back he can actually see what’s happening. James is crouched in front of him looking absolutely devastated. Sirius just wants to make him happy again.
“Jamie,” he slurs. “Don’t be sad.”
James lets out a wet laugh that was devoid of humour. Then he looks at Sirius with the most desperate look he has ever seen James look. “Please tell me you weren’t doing what I think you were.”
Sirius looks at him, “hmm?”
James looks him straight in the eye, “Tell me you weren’t using the Cruciatus Curse on yourself.”
Sirius is confused. Why was James upset about that? Doesn’t he understand that Sirius deserves it? He has betrayed them, and he deserves to be punished.
“I deserve it,” he repeats.
James lets out a sob and shakes his head, “You don’t, of course you don’t.”
Sirius shrugs, then winces, “‘s punishment.”
James shakes his head, “There’s a difference between punishment and torture. You know that, right? Please tell me you know that.”
James sounds so desperate and Sirius just wants to say yes and comfort him. The truth, though, was no he doesn’t. He was raised with this curse as punishment, if he did something really bad—Cruciatus Curse. He has done something bad now, actually something terrible. He deserves this. He deserves this at the bare minimum. In the end, Sirius doesn’t answer James’ question, just saying:
“I deserve it.”
Sirius really feels like he’s going to pass out. The pain is getting to him now that he’s gone more than five minutes without the curse. He groans and leans back into the wall. He hates the pain, and he relishes in it. Like two different parts of him fighting.
“Hey, hey, I know it hurts, Remus and Pete are getting you a potion. Just hold on a little longer,” James soothes.
Sirius is even more confused now. Remus and Peter hate him. He can kind of understand James helping him, maybe. But Remus and Peter? No way. He’s in too much pain to ask James about it, though.
Sure enough, after a few minutes, he hears footsteps hurrying to them and he sees Remus and Peter sit beside them, their arms full of potions. None of this made sense. Why are they helping him? They hate him, and for good reason.
Remus hands James a potion and James takes it. “Sirius, you need to drink this, okay?”
Sirius nods and James helps him swallow the potion. Almost immediately he feels better. He’s still in pain but it’s the aching kind of pain, not the all consuming agony that he was in a couple minutes ago.
“Thanks,” he tells James.
“Do you feel better?” it's Remus this time. He doesn’t understand why Remus cares, Sirius had hurt him. Why doesn’t Remus want to hurt him back?
“Yeah,” is what Sirius says, instead.
All three of them let out a breath, like they are relieved that he isn’t in pain. It doesn’t make any sense. They should relish in the fact that he can’t move without groaning. They shouldn’t help him feel better. This is so different from anything else he had ever gotten.
“You scared us,” Peter tells him.
“Why?” Sirius asks. He hopes that all the questions he can’t put into words made it into that one word. Remus looks at him like he is crazy.
“Oh, I don’t know,” he starts sarcastically. “Maybe the fact that you were using the fucking Cruciatus Curse on yourself!”
Remus sounds actually mad and Sirius doesn’t know what to do, he hates when Moony is anything other than happy and peaceful. Now, he looks the most stressed Sirius has seen him in a long time.
“I don’t get why you care,” Sirius says and Remus scoffs.
“You. Fucking. Tortured. Yourself.”
“I hurt you, though,” Sirius argues. The potion might have helped but the pain is coming back and he is having a harder time concentrating.
“What you did wasn’t cool,” James says. “Actually it was quite fucked up. But you can’t just use an unforgivable on yourself because you did something wrong.”
“Why not?” Sirius snaps. Why couldn’t they understand? “My mother did.”
“And your mother was a crazy bitch who used dark magic and should be in fucking Azkaban,” Remus snaps right back.
Sirius winces and Peter hands him another potion. He drinks it gladly. It tastes horrid but it does help with the pain.
“What I want to know,” Remus starts, his voice like acid. “Is how the fuck you managed to use that curse on yourself. The whole point of the spell is that you have to mean it. You’ve been on the receiving side of it too many fucking times, why the fuck would you use it on yourself?”
Sirius looks at Remus, right in the eye, hoping that he can the sincerity, “I hurt you.”
Remus looks away, “Yeah, you did.”
Sirius brings his knees up to himself and puts his arms around them, trying not to cry. He knows he hurt Remus, but hearing him say it like this is just too much. He can’t help it and lets out a sob. His whole body shaking.
He feels someone put their hand on his shoulder, “Mate, it’s okay, we know you’re sorry, okay. We’ll figure it out.”
Sirius nods to Peter. He loves him so much, but honestly it won’t mean anything unless Remus says it. Even James won’t be enough right now. He knows he’s being selfish but he needs Remus more than anyone else right now. Still, he needs anyone and Peter is right there. He leans into him and just sobs. Peter holds him the whole time without once complaining.
Eventually, Sirius pushes himself back up. Looking at all of them in shame. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I know I’m being selfish.”
James shakes his head, “You’re not.”
“This is my fault,” Sirius snaps back. “I brought this on myself.”
The others stay quiet. Sirius nods. “Yeah, that’s fair.” And it is. All of this is his own fault, they don’t have to be helping him and he totally understands that. He starts to get up but James pulls him back down.
“Sirius, sit down,” he tells him firmly. Sirius rolls his eyes.
“You all obviously don’t want me here, which I get, I wouldn't want to be around me either, so just let me go.”
“Yeah, well we’re not horrible people!” Remus snaps. “You’re right, you’re the last person I want to see right now, but you decided to go and curse yourself so here I am. So don’t you dare try and argue or make this harder on us because all of us are fucking suffering for something you did.
“I don’t know why you did that but I almost killed Snape and James. Yeah, it was shitty. Yeah, I hated you for it. Yeah, I wish you never had, but you did. And it’s over. I’ll hate myself for what I could have done to Snape. You can hate yourself for telling him, but you don’t see me taking a wand on myself, do you?”
Sirius opens his mouth but Remus isn’t done, “No. Shut up. I might hate you right now but beleive it or not, but I actually have fucking morals and given the fact you just fucking tortured youself, I think I fucking have to be here!”
Sirius doesn’t have anything to say to that. He opens his mouth and closes it again. He knows that these are hollow words but still, maybe it would change something, “I am so sorry, Remus.”
Remus looks at him skeptically, and Sirius meets his gaze. He hopes that Remus can see that he’s telling the truth. He knows that he fucked up. He knows that he doesn’t deserve to be forgiven and he understands that. He just doesn’t want to live without the three people he loves the most in the entire world.
“I’m not going to ask for your forgiveness, because I know I don’t deserve it, but if you can’t forgive me then just let me do this, it’s the only thing I fucking know how to do when I fucked up,” Sirius begs.
Peter looks hurt, Remus looks away and James looks him in the eyes and says, “We’re not just going to stand here and let you destroy yourself.”
“You don’t get it!” Sirius yells, half a sob. “I deserve this! I fucking deserve this!”
“You don’t.” Sirius whips around, it’s Remus. Remus is telling him that he doesn’t deserve to be hurt, even after what he did to him. “Yeah, you fucked up, but fucking no one deserves this. And frankly, I hate seeing you like this, Sirius. Because Believe it or not, you actually do have people who care about you.”
Sirius could fucking cry. “You still care?”
Remus looks him straight in the eye and says, “I’m not your parents, Sirius. My love isn’t conditional. As much as I try to hate you, I don’t think I ever could. And I would never, never wish this on you.”
Sirius lets out a sob. He doesn’t think that Remus will ever know how much this means to him. To know that he still cares. To know that he hasn’t lost the person who means the world to him. It’s more than he could ever ask for.
“Thank you,” he sobs.
Remus’ lips twitched into a small smile, it was sad, but still, a smile. “This doesn’t mean I forgive you, Sirius.” Sirius nods, he knows, but it still hurts.
“I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to,” Remus confesses. “But I do love you, Sirius. Please never think that you have to do this to get us to love you. Love isn’t conditional.”
Sirius nods and promptly starts sobbing so hard he couldn’t breathe, as if to mock him, the pain from the Cruciatus Curse made itself known even more. Yet, Sirius feels too relieved to feel it.
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That night, he’s curled up against James in bed. He is aching in pain, but James was here so that makes up for the pain. It’s the first time in three months they have done this, and Sirius has forgotten how much he misses it. Despite the other three not blatantly ignoring him, he still doesn’t know exactly where he stands.
Remus says that he doesn’t forgive but he still loves him. Honestly, that’s throwing Sirius for a loop. Peter comes up to him and says that he’s glad that he’s back but he isn’t going to forgive him until Remus does. James tells him that he’s still his brother but he still hasn't forgiven him. Sirius understands, he really does, but still he’s unsure about whether he’s allowed to be here.
“James?” he whispers to him. He still is avoiding nicknames, not sure if he’s allowed to use them.
“Yeah, Pads?”
Sirius could cry. James still uses Padfoot. “I’m so so sorry that I did that.”
James pulls him closer, “I know. I know, Pads.”
Sirius wishes more than anything in the world that he could go back in time and not tell Snape how to get into the Whomping Willow. He wishes that he could have just never been friends with them so he didn’t cause all this pain. He wishes he had just died when he’d wanted to, when he was younger.
“I’m sorry I’m here,” he confesses. “I know it would be easier for all of you if I wasn’t.”
“What?” James physically recoils. “No, Pads, we all love you so much. We need you so much. We wouldn’t be the Marauders without you.”
Sirius looks up at him, “You said it yourself, I’m just like them. I’m a Black.”
James looks saddened. “I didn’t mean that.”
“Didn’t you.”
“Sirius,” he looks at Sirius like he’s begging him to believe him. “I was mad and worried and scared. You’re not like them, at all. You were never like them.”
Sirius lets out a sob and curls into James. James just holds him as he cries. Sirius hates crying, he was always told that boys don’t cry. He was always punished if he did. The first person he cried in front of without getting punished was James. He always feels the most safe with James. He tries to move closer to him, when his body decides that he needs more pain. He gasps.
James immediately sits up, “Sirius? Are you okay? Do you need a potion?”
Sirius shakes his head, muttering, “No, it’s fine.”
James looks at him, “Are you saying that because it’s actually fine or because you think you deserve the pain?”
Sirius stays silent. James knows him too well. They always know what the other is thinking. They’ve been in sync since the day that they met. Sirius just curls into James but James pulls back, looking seriously at Sirius.
“You’re not getting out of this,” James tells him. “I’m going to get you a potion.”
Sirius whispers no into James but he knows that James won’t listen. Sure enough, James gets up and tells him he’ll be right back. James comes back a few minutes later and gives Sirius a potion. To his credit, it does actually help.
“Thanks,” Sirius mutters.
“No problem,” James tells him, bringing Sirius back into himself. Sirius cuddles into him. He actually thought that he might be able to get to sleep, when James decides that now would be a good time to talk to him about earlier.
“Why’d you use that curse?” James asks. Sirius opens his mouth when James interrupts again, “And I want a real reason. Not ‘I deserved it’ or ‘I hurt you.’ I want to know the actual reason.”
Sirius hesitates, “Those are the reasons though.”
“Not all of them,” James’ voice is firm but kind.
Sirius curls into him more, “I just felt so numb. I felt so guilty and numb at the same time. You guys weren’t even being horrible to me, and that wasn’t fair. I hurt all of you and you weren’t hurting me back and it just didn’t make sense. And I just felt so guilty and this was the one thing that I always got when I did something wrong at home. It’s almost a comfort. And—and I thought that you would agree that I deserved it. I—I think that’s why.”
Sirius is sobbing into James by the end of that. James just holds him, not saying anything for a while, just holding him and Sirius appreciates it. Eventually, James starts talking.
“Sirius, no matter how mad we are at you, or how many times we fight, we will never wish this on you, okay? No one deserves that, especially not you,” James tells him.
Sirius tries to nod but only manages another sob. As he breaks down in James’ arms, he lets himself believe that things will be okay. That he hasn’t lost the only people he loves.