no man's land

"Peter, it's only been a few weeks," she laughed, wondering where all of this was coming from. He had been a great friend before, but the compliments were stretching and tripping over themselves now. "Thank you though. You look...well, tired. Is everything alright?" she asked, stopping to turn and face him. "I know that things might be awkward, but you can always tell me things Peter. I meant it before, and I mean it now, you and I shouldn't hide anything."

"What the fuck," Sirius laughed at the next claim, his eyes roaming over his so called friend as if looking for where he had gone. "I guilt trip you? For what?" he cried with indignation. "I've never guilt tripped anyone, if I wanted to make someone feel bad I'd have better ways of doing it." That he did, and it was taking every ounce of strength not to use them now. He was pissed off, and perhaps more importantly, he was hurt, and that made it very difficult not to lash out in a way only Blacks new how; with words you could never take back.

"I think you feel insecure and you're taking that out on me," Sirius answered with a shrug, stepping back from Peter. "I think you're scared and jealous and drunk." He shook his head, exasperated. "No, I'm not doing this. I'm not standing here, listening to you try and ruin the one good thing I have, fuck that." His hand twitched with an urge to shove Peter, to hurt him as he was being hurt, but he just shook his head again turning on his heel.

The words left him raw, torn open, but for once he didn’t back down. His fists curled tight at his sides, nails digging into his palms as his friend turned away. He wanted to run after him, to grab his shoulder and take it all back, to beg him to listen but his pride rooted him in place. His throat burned, eyes stinging with unshed tears, but he kept them fixed on Sirius’s retreating figure.

The silence that followed was crushing, filled with every unspoken word, every moment he’d felt overlooked, every pang of loneliness he couldn’t voice. Somewhere deep in his chest, beneath the ache, there was a flicker of something unfamiliar: standing up for himself had hurt like hell, but it hadn’t broken him. Peter stayed there, trembling, hollowed, angry, and tearful, feeling the cruel sting of both victory and loss as the wizard disappeared into the crowd. And in that emptiness, he felt it all-- the ache of being left behind, the helplessness of wanting more, and the bitter knowledge that he couldn’t reach out, couldn’t fix what had just snapped between them.

As he listened, he watched the way that Pettigrew handled the clock. Unexpectedly, he found himself glad that he'd brought it in. He'd been tempted to leave it and to re-attempt the repair himself, some other time. He was not entirely certain why he was glad. Neither did he think on it. The emotion was simply there, like the blue sky stretching through the clock's overcast clouds, natural and harmless.

"Ancient magic is precious," he said simply, not especially caring whether Peter agreed. "It would be insulting to throw it aside, when it could be fortified and continue to thrive for yet more centuries. It would be a tragic loss." Now, it was his turn to pause. Then he added with deliberate precision, mirroring Pettigrew's earlier words. "That's true of more than clocks, too." Having stated that thinly veiled ideology, Rabastan studied Peter and smiled more lightly. This situation amused him, more than he would ever have anticipated. "You certainly had a talent for getting into restricted places at school. Perhaps it's time I forgave you for that unfortunate incident." Perhaps. "When shall I return for the clock?"

He let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding, eyes still on the pendulum. “Tragic loss,” he echoed quietly, though it wasn’t clear if he was agreeing with Rabastan or only with the sentiment the object itself seemed to carry. Either way, the words felt true.

Only after a long pause did he look up again, meeting Rabastan’s gaze with a flicker of surprise at his own engagement. The corner of his mouth twitched, almost a smile. “You can come back for it on Friday. It should be steady by then.”

And with that, he set the clock carefully aside—though his hand lingered on the glass for just a moment longer than necessary, as if it were harder than expected to let go.

where: just a few hundred yards from the fountain.

Over the course of the Fayre, Willa had been seemly distracted from mixing and mingling in one corner of Hogsmeade, to exploring the range of different season produce which the local vendors had on display. She had actually managed to pick up a rather delicious seasonal collection of herbal teas from Madame Puddifoots. Swinging the bag loosely around her wrist, Willa couldn't wait to find a place to rest. Her shoes, albeit fashionable, were not practical in the cobbled alleys of Hogsmeade.

Willa had been relieved to see a vacant wall nearby the fountain. Her body making a bee-line for the area when there was a seemingly bright flash nearby. Blinking slowly, people began to flurry around her frantically. Utter confused, Willa's eyes followed along the crowd as people scattered in all directions. Scattering crowds were never a good sign. Before Willa could turn on her heels to follow suit, her eyes caught glimpse of Peter, looking particularly distressed nearby.

"Peter?" Willa called out, voice lost in the frantic crowd. A loose and irritated sign falling from her lips, Willa made the decision to push through the crowd. Slightly breathless when she eventually reached him, "Peter? Are you alright?"

“Willa!” His voice was urgent, unsteady, and slightly slurred, though the worry behind it was unmistakable. “Are you—are you safe? Are you—” He stopped, swallowing hard, then reached out as if to guide her somewhere safer. His hands shook just slightly, betraying how rattled he was. “You shouldn’t be here, not with this… this—” He waved vaguely at the green lights, his words trailing off as his brain struggled to catch up.

He took a shaky breath, trying to steady himself and keep his panic in check. “Stay close to me, alright? Let’s… let’s get somewhere safe.” Even drunk and exhausted, his eyes stayed on hers, his single thought clear: get her out of the crowd so they could talk, away from all the chaos.

"But enough about me," he added, letting the edge of a smirk appear, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. "How’s the job treating you? Still chasing trouble around every corner, or has Hogsmeade been… unusually peaceful lately?" He waited for her answer, hands clenched just a fraction under the table, careful that the tension in his shoulders didn’t give him away.

He ran a hand through his hair, eyes flicking over the flickering fayre lights. “I don’t know where I belong anymore. Every time I think I’ve found a place, a role… it shifts. And I’m left wondering what I’m doing with myself, why I even bother half the time.” His laugh was short, humorless, and he caught himself spilling more than usual—but didn’t stop. “Maybe I’m seeing it too clearly… or maybe I’m right. Either way, it’s exhausting, and tonight… tonight I just don’t feel like pretending it isn’t.”

"Merlin, you think an awful lot of yourself, don't you? Poor Peter. Our friends are happy and it's all about you. I'm not in a relationship, I've not got a career, I've not got a family. Had it ever occured to you that all of that - everyone else 'moving on'" - he said the words in air quotations - "could have made us closer?" He shook his head, stepping back as the anger reared up inside him. He knew he should walk away, let this end here and go no further, but it was so so hard to make any sensible decisions when the anger that was his birthright came into play. "I thought we were brothers, the four of us, I didn't know you felt otherwise."

He let out a bitter laugh, shaking his head. “You guilt-trip me into being the friend I’m supposed to be, the one who sees things the way you do, who reacts like you expect, who doesn’t… feel differently. And then you act surprised when I say something, anything, that shows I notice I’m not just behind, I’m overlooked. I’m not asking for more than anyone else, I’m not asking for special treatment—just a damn acknowledgment that I exist as more than the guy tagging along, the one always trying to catch up.”

The boy's jaw tightened, eyes sharp. “You think I don’t want to be closer? That I don’t want to fight and stand with you all? Of course I do! But it’s hard to be that person when every time I open my mouth, every time I feel something—anything real—you make me feel like it’s a crime, like I’m failing at being part of this group just because I see the cracks you don’t want to look at.”

He glanced at her, genuine curiosity softening his expression. “How’ve you been, Mare? Really… I mean, since the last time we… well, you know.” He quickly covered the awkward pause with a shrug. “Just… everything. You look good, happy even, and I want to hear about that, if you’ll tell me.” He tried to push aside the doubt gnawing at him about his other friends, the feeling of being overlooked, and focus on the simple joy of being here with her.

James could feel his chest tighten and a flare of anger heat it like a furnace. He would have expected to hear this from someone else, but never from Peter. Not one of his friends. "You don't mean that," he said woodenly. "You were there too and as I recall, we all had fun."

In his years of being friends with Peter, he felt blindsided by what his friend was saying. It was one thing to hear it from a rotten Slytherin or a professor, even Evans or his father, but this was a new and quiet form of anger. James could argue with Peter's perspective but it had years worth of situations he was starting to rethink. "Guess I'm not a true friend," he said with a wet laugh, a sound that was as empty as his words. James nodded, thinking that maybe he caught Peter on a bad day but even if Remus had a bad moon or Sirius was in a mood, none of them would be as destructive as Peter was just now.

He valued James more than he could ever explain. James, who had been the center of their world, who could make Sirius laugh when no one else could, who pulled Remus into the light when he retreated too far. James, who had made him feel like maybe he belonged in that circle, even on the days when Peter wasn’t sure. He had meant what he said, but he wished desperately that he could take it back, soften it, tell James that it wasn’t the whole truth of how he felt.

Instead, he stood frozen, doubts clawing through his chest— doubts about himself, about his place with them, about whether this had all been a mistake. He didn’t know why he pushed when all he wanted was to hold on. Maybe because if he drove them away first, it would hurt less than waiting for the day they decided he wasn’t worth keeping. His throat burned. He couldn’t move, couldn’t call after James even though he wanted to. He just stood there, watching the other boy retreating back, the sound of the bell above the shop door ringing out like finality. And Peter stayed behind, startled, confused, and hurt— wishing he hadn’t said a word, and knowing he couldn’t take any of it back.

Peter stood his ground as Sirius neared him, his gaze defiant as he met Sirius's. In the back of his mind Sirius noted the bravery, bravery that he had admittedly occasionally thought Peter lacked. Most of Gryffindor house had been brave to the point of recklessness and Peter, in Sirius's eyes, had always been slower to join in with that reckless abandon. "James is different," he said, "I'm not going to deny that or apologise for it. I can tell you now that I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for him so don't expect me to feel guilty for it." It was a harsh thought, and one he tried not to think about, but a true one. If James hadn't been there to pick Sirius up when he left his family, he would have been gone; either in another country altoghether or through more permanent solutions. He pushed the thought aside, focusing again on Peter. "It's not about who we'd pick, we're not thirteen anymore, Peter! I'd die for every one of you."

Something broke in him as Sirius spoke, the words striking deeper than he’d expected. He couldn’t quite make sense of it —of course they’d all take a hex for each other, he knew that— but when he pictured them doing it for him, it always felt… less likely. His voice cracked when he finally answered. "It's not about being thirteen, it's about being left behind— everyone's moving on and sure, they want you around, but it's been so damn easy to forget about me." His expression hollowed out, the raw edge of his confession leaving him too exposed, so he stepped back, bracing himself again, defensive. "It's fine, people move on when they get their own lives, right?"

Sure there were times that James went too far with teasing his classmates, a dark-haired and stalky Severus appeared in his mind. But he never did anything that would put other people in serious danger only ever aiding in harmless fun. He would also never let anything happen to his friends. James rolled his eyes as Peter continued on, not able to hold it in. "We were popular, Wormy. Everyone knew who we were; it's okay to admit that," he said.

"-that's not even remotely true," James said, talking over Peter without thinking about it until he clamped his lips shut. Fuck. James' jaw tightened and Peter's words felt like a firing squad hitting right through his chest. "I'm standing, Peter. Right here. On all ten toes and two feet. Is this you standing up? I apologize if you didn't have a great chumy time during school, but don't you dare put that blame on me as you never said anything once. You wait until a few years pass to take the frustration out on me? Blimey, Petey are you on something right now?"

"You still don't get it," he exhaled the words, a heaviness in his chest. His fingers curled into fists against the wood. “You think it was all just laughs and pranks and good times, because it always was for you! You never had to wonder if people actually wanted you there -- they always did. You made sure of it!”

Peter’s jaw clenched, his eyes dark. “You strut around like the center of the world and somehow convince yourself you’re the good guy in every story. But did you ever stop to think about how you made the rest of us feel? Standing in your shadow all the time?” He slammed his hand on the counter again, voice shaking with anger and hurt. “And it’s not my fault for not saying anything before! A true friend notices if they’re hurting a friend!”

When she looked back up, Peter appeared and she almost glanced away nervously before she smiled at him. "Peter," she said with some tone of surprise even though she should've expected he would be here. They hadn't talked since that night they shared a kiss and her cheeks burned at the memory. "Oh," she said, her face softening. "Of course, we're still us. I would like that at least. Are you enjoying the festival so far?"

"Wh--" Sirius looked around as if he was looking for someone else to confirm the madness he was currently experience. "I never said you were a joke," he replied, though it turned up at the end like a question. But then his jaw tensed, anger rippling through him at Peter's words. It came so easily these days, anger constantly simmering just under the surface since Regulus disappeared, since all his old acquaintance started popping up in his life again.

The accusation that Sirius treated his friends as less than his world, when they were quite literally all he had, bristled him and grazed the self hatred he tried so hard to keep hidden. He took a step forward. "What the fuck are you talking about, Peter?"

His fingers tightened the grip around the bottle as Sirius took a step closer and while he would've usually retreated, let go of whatever grudge he had, this time was different. Peter did his best to stand tall, his eyes firm on his friend, his face showing a mix of emotions-- from anger to pain. "Tell me I'm wrong, tell me James doesn't come first or Remus, if you had to pick-- bloody tell me I wouldn't be last."

Nothing could've prepared him for what Peter said next. It felt like a stone dropped to the pit of his stomach and he stilled. "What?" he heard himself say quietly, already shaking his head. "That's-that's not true. We-We've always included you. It's always been us four and it always will be. What are you talking about?"

James' eyes widened, not thinking that Peter had it in him to talk to someone like that with such raw honesty and it was directed at him. It felt like he was blindsided and slapped with cold reality. Was there something he missed? "Where is this coming from?"

His hands curled into fists on the counter, then flexed, restless. “Don’t act like I don’t remember, James. I was never the popular one, or the clever one, or the one girls giggled over in the common room. I was just—” he exhaled hard, searching for the word, “there. And half the time when I did try to say something, you’d talk right over me without even realizing.”

He looked at James then, the hurt naked in his expression, all the irritation giving way to something far more vulnerable. “So you don’t get to sit here and tell me I’m worth a hundred people when back then you made me feel like I wasn’t even worth one.”

“Parade you around? Are you taking the piss?” He asked with a short laugh, utterly confused by what the hell Peter was talking about. Sirius rolled his eyes as his friend continued, completely bewildered and a little pissed off at the accusations. “How much have you had to drink, Wormtail? You’re acting like a twat.” Because while anyone else might have laid down and taken it or placated Peter until he calmed down, Sirius wouldn’t. He spent his whole childhood being berated by his family - he still was - he wasn’t about to let his best mates do it too.

“Yeah. Right. Course I’m the twat.” The words were quiet, but they cut anyway, flat and unsteady, like he’d been holding them in too long. He shifted on his feet, restless, and this time he didn’t bother to look away.