#userpetuniaevans

1959. (1825 days, 2 hours, 34 minutes, 12 seconds.)

there is nothing out of the ordinary about sirius’ tattoo. nor sirius. (but that is only when he is born. after, who is to say?) he is first born of the new legacy of the black family, and his parents beam with pride. (it might as well be the last time.)

his tattoo is considered rather late for purebloods—they meet their soulmates within two to four years: their parents want to make sure the soulmate meets their standards in money. if they don’t, you’re steered as far away from them as possible. to someone more suitable. (richer. always richer.)

but his parents do not care. not yet. it is too young for him to find someone, and until then, they find the pureblood girl with the largest dowry.

sirius does not know his entire life is laid out for him, in intricate patterns of success, bending waves of skill, and smooth slopes of comfort. he does not know that he is to be a carbon copy of his father, and his wife his mother. it is the way it goes. it is the way it has gone, for thousands of years before him.

for he is pureblood, and pureblood is tradition, and tradition is family.

and there is nothing more than family.

but what his family does not know, is that sirius is not going to be a carbon copy anything.

his path is to stray far away from a pureblood one. (and even purebloods know better than to argue with fate.)

1960. (1704 days, 2 hours, 34 minutes, 12 seconds.)

marlene mckinnon is born pureblood.

but she is born a blood traitor—though her blood is pure, her family’s beliefs are not.

families like her’s are not rich. they are not successful. (but what are the purebloods to say, for what do they know about happiness?)

her family does not raise her on a path. does not make her a carbon copy of anything. marlene mckinnon’s path is meant to be marlene mckinnon’s. and so her parents lavish her with all the love they possibly could, and her siblings (two older sisters, and three older brothers) teach her the importance of being grateful.

she must be grateful. because though she does not have the money, nor the success—because she is a blood traitor—she is happier than any of them could ever be. (that is, ignoring her timer.)

1964. (0 days, 0 hours, 0 minutes, 0 seconds.)

they become neighbours.

how? (is the question asked by gossipers, for one is a poor blood traitor, and the other a rich pureblood.)

the mckinnons scrap up enough money to buy the dingy, slightly-ever-so-bigger-than-their-old-home, broken cottage to the right of the black manor. the contrast is nearly laughable: a beautifully intricate, imposing mansion, juxtapositionally next to the seemingly impossibly small, shattered flat.

but the mckinnons is filled with laughter from day to night, and the blacks sleep in different rooms, on different sides of the mansion. (now that, is laughable.)

sirius is told to never leave the house without an adult (usually his nanny), but since when does sirius black listen to instructions?

they meet at the fence.

he teases her about her ragged robes and tattered shoes. (but her bright blonde hair glints in the sunlight, and her smile is brighter than any star he has ever seen.)

they don’t notice their timers have fallen down to 0:0:0:0.

1971. (3650 days, 7 hours, 32 minutes, 2 seconds.)

they do not meet again until seven years later. the mckinnons have moved once again, the blacks will not. (the manor is home for them, their wives, and their children. it’s how a pureblood family works.)

marlene makes fast friends, and sirius does as well. it is the beginning of an era. (sirius black does not go by sirius black anymore, just sirius. he does not want to be a black.)

they cross paths occasionally—they are friends of friends. neither notice they are each other soulmates, and neither of them match their timers.

and so they are left in the swirling madness that is love, to scramble and swim for themselves, and make it to the surface before time makes fools of them both. but what they don’t know is that love always drowns. always kills. (and it almost never ends happy.)

it is deadly, dangerous, and most of all, it doesn’t work.

marlene mckinnon and sirius black are meant to love.

they are also meant to die.

(it’s fate.)

(and what are you to say to fate?)

1972. (3285 days, 13 hours, 8 minutes, 54 seconds.)

they are still not friends yet.

marlene mckinnon is friends with lily evans, dorcas meadowes, and mary macdonald. lily evans will never stop hating james potter, and marlene will never stop being friends with james potter. and james potter will never stop being friends with sirius black.

and so they are stuck. in a never ending circle of young teenage angst, left to fend for themselves until they learn. (they will. they must.)

they are left to drown. (again and again and again.)

1973. (2920 days, 2 hours, 18 minutes, 43 seconds.)

history repeats itself, which is why it is taught: so that you can know what’s coming.

and history is right. history writes itself in loops, and loops, and loops, each situation mirroring the one before, different time periods and different people. it is how it works.

marlene mckinnon and sirius black are meant to die, but not together, and certainly not at the same time.

fate has decided that they are to leave this earth they call a home with differences of time, changes of heart, and lovers of soul.

1974. (2555 days, 3 hours, 27 minutes, 32 seconds.)

their timers keep on ticking down. away, away, away. sometimes they tick loudly, others they do not make a sound at all. sometimes marlene wishes she knew her soulmate—time is running out, running, running afar, but others, she is content with who she is. after all, they are in the midst of a war. a silly teenage romance pales in comparison—anything does, really.

she knows lily and james are soulmates (everyone does except them it seems) but no one seems to know hers.

and so marlene mckinnon is left once again in the swirling whirlpool that is life.

1975. (2190 days, 23 hours, 52 minutes, 4 seconds.)

sirius black is accustomed to his titles. some he is proud of, others not so much, but he knows them. he knows what they call him behind their backs, and he embraces them as though they were lost children. do not give them power, chants in his mind. there are things that he can control. his childhood was not one of them. and so, his parents’ voices remain nagging in his mind, over and over, day after day.

sometimes, he is able to set aside the yelling voices, to allow his mind to rest, but others, he cannot be so lucky.

after all, he is sirius black, the most broken of them all.

1976. (1825 days, 19 hours, 13 minutes, 9 seconds.)

“don’t try fixing him,” they whisper. “let him be.”

but when was marlene mckinnon good at rules?

the first time they fuck is against the wall in the quidditch change rooms. they are sweaty and losers to slytherin, and they fuck like no tomorrow. marlene’s gasps reach sirius’ ears, and when she comes, he is next to follow.

they do not talk outside of this, whatever it may be, but every week, they sneak out and kiss until the sun rises.

marlene does not attempt to fix him. she does not attempt to love him, because a man like sirius black is hard to love, and marlene is not very good at loving. (neither is sirius.)

but when she falls, she falls hard.

1977. (1460 days, 11 hours, 2 minutes, 59 seconds.)

sirius black has kissed many women in his time, some just once, others twice, and a few, thrice. marlene mckinnon breaks his system. (figuratively and literally, he finds.) she is rash and ruthless, calm and caring.

her lips are hot against his as he shoves her to the wall.

their timers tick, tick, tick away. (neither of them believe in soulmates anymore. loving only means hurting, and why hurt more when there’s already so much around them?)

sirius black does not love, because he is not very good at it, and he does not like things that he is not good at. so perhaps it is with marlene that he does not try hard enough, and he does not hold on enough, and she slips through his fingers, gone, just like that.

perhaps he should’ve tried harder. but what’s done is done.

1978. (1095 days, 7 hours, 28 minutes, 42 seconds.)

sirius finds that it is very hard to live without marlene. he makes it through because he has to, he makes it through because he does. but does any of it mean anything?

so he chases after her again. his timer ticks rapidly on his wrist. this time, he makes sure he kisses her whenever he can, and he is nearly disgusted at himself—how could he, outright expect failure?

sirius black is not good at loving. marlene mckinnon is not much better. they do not try to fix one another, as that is not what they are meant to be. fate has ugly twists for them down the path, and they are not meant to change one another.

they are merely meant to give it all they can.

1979. (730 days, 2 hours, 57 minutes, 41 seconds.)

when they graduate, hats are thrown up in excitement, and sirius pulls marlene in for a wonderful, joyous kiss. they dive into the order together, perhaps not exactly hand in hand, but as close as they can. they realise this is war—not some type of romanticized version—this is war, this is death, loss, and pain. they will fight until the end, because if they don’t, who will?

marlene mckinnon does not become any better at loving, and neither does sirius. loving is something neither of them will master. (fate has not set them on that path of life.)

marlene mckinnon learns how to kill without remorse, and sirius black learns to slaughter family.

they lose friends. lovers. lives. and it seems that the world will keep on taking, taking, and taking. after all, that’s the only thing it was taught.

marlene mckinnon whispers promises of tomorrow into sirius’ ear before she leaves, and he swears he’ll be back for it. (both are broken.) rough edged people like them do not do well at loving. but it is not to say that they do not try. (it is perhaps now that they try more than ever.)

he kisses her roughly against the wall, and she kisses him back, biting his lip.

is this love, they both question, but no answer replies from either one of their tongues.

1980. (365 days, 9 hours, 7 minutes, 58 seconds.)

at long last, they compare their timers. they do not fear that they may not be each other’s soulmate—is this love, they are not quite sure.

their timers read the same numbers etched delicately on their scar-riddled arms in ink darker than the night sky. nothing changes, or so it seems. perhaps it’s marlene’s wild imagination that sirius’ kisses are a little lighter, a little softer, and perhaps it’s sirius’ mind that sees marlene stay the night, sheets tangled around her, hair a disaster on the pillow.

but she is very much real, very much there, very much marlene mckinnon, like the solidity of their kisses and gasps of each other’s names.

they no longer believe in soulmates, but if it’s the little black timer on their wrists that makes the night a little gentler, a tad easier, and a bit calmer, they are very much content to riddle with the notion.

after all, what harm can be done?

1981. (0 days, 0 hours, 0 minutes, 0 seconds.)

it seems funny, that only right after they figure out the fucks against the bathroom walls, kisses in streetlite alleyways, and smiles of morning afters into a relationship, that fate decides to take a torch to it all. quite literally, really.  

it seems rather unfair, that after all this they have done, all the lives that had been sacrificed, that it is to end like this.

looking back, sirius wants to hit himself on the head with a stick, but hindsight’s always twenty twenty, isn’t it?   

he and marlene had not quite figured out their sleeping arrangements as much as they had their relationship. (putting a name to it makes it sound terribly final, sirius realises, but he finds that he rather likes it.)

and so, it is not surprising that marlene spends the night at her parent’s—for either of them really. (oh, how he could’ve stopped her!)

when remus pounds at his door and whisks him away to the small, shabby flat of the mckinnon, sirius can feel his heart pounding. his timer ticks. it is loud. tick, tick, tick. it is loud, he says. remus looks at him sharply. it’s loud.

smoke fills his lungs, and he has to keep himself from choking, but nothing can defeat the beats in his chest, combined with the ticks of his clock. it is all so terribly loud, he thinks.

the flames pile high, and the small house has no chance. he hears himself screaming, running, falling, but nothing registers. it’s so loud, is the only thought in his mind. and just like that, like a wind on the shore (funny, thinking of water now), fate pulls marlene mckinnon right out of sirius black’s grasp, like a flame that’s burned too brightly.

and all of a sudden, it’s silent.

the ticking is gone. the pounding is gone.

it’s all just gone.

he can hear remus yelling after him, his arms wrapped around him, his quiet sobs.

but it’s silent, he realises.

it’s silent.

his eyes drop down to his timer, and the numbers have fallen down to 0:0:0:0, like they had a lifetime ago.