Rabbit: December 1971
Title: Rabbit
Chapter Number/Title: December 1971: Air (58/100) [[ Previous | Next]]
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1941
Workshop?: Suggestions welcome.
December 19, 1971
Air
The mob of black-robed students thronged around the platform, slowly filing in through the doors of the scarlet train bound back toward London. Rabastan and his friends, now well conditioned to the Established Traditions of Slytherin House, waited with varying degrees of patience while the older forms settled in. Rabastan stood on tip-toe, looking for Sirius.
“Do you think he’s already gone in?”
“Most likely,” answered Evan. “Probably with Potter and the like.”
Rabastan hadn’t even considered that. The air suddenly felt very thin, and his heartbeat very strong. “He wouldn’t do that, would he? He’s had all of school with them!”
Darren clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t listen to Ev. Sirius probably’s got us a cabin already. Primo real estate.”
“You’re right.” He shook off the temporary worry-an easier task with Darren’s cheer to help. “I’ve never seen you so chuffed,” he noted. “Did I miss some news?”
“He’s finally going back to his mummy dearest,” Evan teased.
Darren rolled his eyes. “You mean, I’m finally going back to decent food and being able to wear my own robes and not these drab grey-and-black sackcloths day in, day out. Can’t you taste it, lads? Freedom.” He closed his eyes and stuck out his tongue, waggling it around the air as if to catch the flavor. Instead, a snowflake fell.
“Snow!” Rabastan shouted.
Darren’s eyes snapped open wide. “Seriously? Now there’s snow? Now that we’re leaving?” He pursed his lips and looked angrily up at the sky. “Curse you, gods of the sky.”
“I bet there will be even more when we come back,” Rabastan said. “And then we can have a huge snowball fight.”
“Snowball fight?” asked a voice behind them. “Who’s planning a snowball fight?”
Rabastan didn’t need to turn to know who it was. The boyish timbre, the unbound enthusiasm, the complete lack of awareness that some conversations did not include him: Potter.
“Shouldn’t you be on board already?” Rabastan asked.
James laughed. “I was. Left something, had to go back for it.”
Rabastan’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, but he wasn’t sure what he suspected. “Where’s Sirius?”
“On board already. Thought you knew-he already bid us his farewells and all and went to get a compartment. Said he had to catch up with you lot.” Potter rolled his eyes. “As if we hadn’t all been in the same castle all autumn.”
Darren grinned and elbowed Rabastan in the ribs, a little too hard. “Told ya.”
The crowd shuffled forward, finally bringing the boys to the doors of the train.
“So,” James said, swinging his bag more securely over his shoulder. “Snowball fight. We’ll be there, first good snowfall. Snakes versus lions.”
“No way!” Rabastan shook his head furiously. “That leaves us with Snape!”
James laughed again, so hard that he nearly snorted and had to recover. “Priceless image, Snivellus trying to have fun like a normal person.”
“It’s not fair,” Rabastan argued.
“Since when do Slytherins care about fair?”
“Since your rules are rubbish.”
“Blame the Hat, Lestrange.” With that, Potter slipped into a corridor. He seemed to have vanished into a compartment, but then his head of unkempt hair popped back out. “Oh, and you’re the other way down. Happy Christmas!”
Exchanges with Potter always left Rabastan with a sense of vertigo. Another person, he might suspect of being manipulative somehow, with his cheerful insults and aggressively friendly act. But Potter always seemed too genuine for any of that. That, too, made Rabastan on edge: was anyone really that uncomplicated? Surely Potter was hiding something.
“Over here!” Darren called, breaking Rabastan’s train of thought.
He and Evan hurried down the corridor, stumbling past other students, and came to the compartment that Darren had found. Inside, Sirius was lying casually across one row of seats, his eyes closed, his arms behind his head, and his heels resting against the compartment wall.
“‘Lo,” he said, opening one eye. “Took you long enough.”
The boys filed in. Darren and Evan moved to the free bench. Rabastan cocked his head and looked down at Sirius. “Care to move?”
“Nope. Peasants have to sit on the floor.” He closed his eyes again, though his wide grin betrayed any illusion of a man at rest.
Rabastan raised an eyebrow, set down his satchel, and then plopped down-onto Sirius’s chest.
“Oof!” Sirius’s eyes opened wide in surprise. “Not-on!”
Before Sirius could do anything to stop it, Darren leapt across the compartment and landed with a cackle onto Sirius as well.
“I say, Rabbit,” Darren said, laying on his smarmiest accent, “you’ve found the softest seat on the train!”
“Ugh,” Sirius groaned. “Gerroff.” He jerked his hips and rolled, toppling the boys into a pile on the ground. As they pushed themselves up off the train’s rough carpeting, an infection of laughter spread.
“That floor’s probably filthy,” Evan commented, watching them all from his ordinary seat by the window.
“You’re filthy,” Darren retorted nonsensically, though he then brushed himself off and took the seat next to Evan.
Rabastan and Sirius pushed themselves back onto the seat.
“So,” Sirius asked, “Where’s your fourth?”
Rabastan wrinkled his nose. It wasn’t right, that someone else had what should have been Sirius’s place in their House. “Staying at school.”
“Can’t say I blame him,” said Evan.
Rabastan shrugged. “Can you imagine, though? Being alone for Christmas? Even if his family are terrible Muggles and Muggle-lovers, it must be lonely.”
“You feel sorry for Snivellus?” Sirius’s brow darkened, hiding his grey eyes.
“No!” Rabastan folded his arms. “I just… it seems pathetic, that’s all.”
“Pathetic’s right.”
An idea niggled at Rabastan’s mind. His arms unraveled as he leaned in to share. “Maybe we should send him a present.”
“Can we send him proper shampoo?”
Darren guffawed, and even Evan sniggered at the suggestion. Rabastan elbowed Sirius, though he could not stop the smile tugging on his lips.
“I’m serious!” Rabastan insisted. “Mother always makes me buy a gift for Jack Travers. It’s the same idea.”
Darren’s eyebrows raised. “Aren’t you cousins with Travers, O Great Genealogy Master?”
Rabastan’s cheeks grew hot. Jack Travers was, in fact, as closely related to him as Darren Avery, but they had never been as close. “Well, yes, but-”
“Travers,” Evan added, “is poor because his family gave all their gold to a lost cause. That’s different.”
The other three boys came to attention.
“Dish,” Darren ordered.
Evan looked around with confusion on his face. “You don’t know? Surely-Rabbit, you must know…”
Rabastan slowly shook his head. “I know they used to be respectable, back when Aunt Theophila married in. But loads of people lost money in those days. It’s not like I asked what they invested in.”
Evan rolled his eyes. “They invested in the war, obviously. In Grindelwald.”
The final consonant of the infamous name cut into astonished silence.
Rabastan leaned back in his seat. His gaze drifted toward Sirius, who seemed to be coming to a slow realization.
“Did you know about this?”
Sirius shook his head. “Just… something my father said. This just… makes it make more sense. That’s all.”
It did make sense. Perfect sense, really, so much that he felt like a fool for not having known.
“You buy Jack Travers a gift,” explained Evan with a wry smile, “not because he’s poor, but because of the reason he’s poor.”
The information hung over them for a few seconds until Darren broke the silence. “It doesn’t add up. The Lestranges help out the Traverses because they’re family. They’d do the same for us, and we for them, if something terrible happened. It’s not like they invested all their gold in Grindelwald, too. Or any of it. Not that there’d be anything wrong with that... ”
Everyone’s eyes were on Rabastan. He was sure his stomach had somehow sunk into the seat and left his body. “They didn’t have to send gold,” he replied. “They sent their younger son to die in his army instead.”
Evan and Darren quickly found other interesting train fixtures to look at instead. Only Sirius managed to look him in the eye still. He grimaced and nudged Rabastan. “That was him. Not you.”
“Yeah.” The compartment felt very small, suddenly. He stood up. “I need to get some air.”
He left his satchel on the floor and slid the compartment door open to leave. The problem with a train was that there was no fresh air to get. He took deep breaths and walked swiftly down the long corridor, trying to clear his mind. His grandfather had made it clear enough last Christmas: Rabastan was to follow in his great-uncle’s footsteps, his life as the investment in this new cause, this rebellion, whatever it was that the Blacks had rejected. He felt bile rising in his throat and turned toward a corridor window, trying to find some way to open it for the cold, snowy air. There seemed to be a sort of latch, but he couldn’t work it properly, and his fingers grew more and more clumsy.
Suddenly, a cool breeze hit him. He looked over and saw Sirius, wand pointed up, sending a gentle but cold wind flowing from its tip.
“Thanks,” he mumbled.
“What’s a best mate for? You all right? Or are you going to be sick all over my shoes?”
The wind, though magic, did help. Rabastan nodded. “I’ll be fine.”
“Here: have a ginger newt.” Sirius handed it over and ended his spell. “Sweets cart came by just after you left, and we all loaded up with enough to share, so you wouldn’t miss out.”
He nibbled on the spiced biscuit. “Thanks,” he repeated.
“Yeah, well. Instead of thanking me, how about not abandoning me with Avery and Rosier, huh?”
“Sorry. I guess you could be with Potter and that lot instead, having more fun.”
“Pft, you’re plenty fun, when you aren’t trying to start pity projects for snivelling greasebags or pitying yourself for whatever your dead great-great-uncle-whatever did before you were born.”
He made it sound so easy to brush off. “My grandfather gave me a photo of him, you know. Said we all have footsteps to follow in.”
Sirius’s face contorted. “No offense, Rabbit, but your grandfather’s a bit of a nutter. Isn’t that why your father’s the head of the family?”
“Yes,” Rabastan admitted.
“So. Don’t worry about him. No one’s going to make you die in a war you don’t want to fight.”
Rabastan gave an unconvinced shrug.
“Well, I won’t allow it.”
Something about Sirius’ confident stance and tone made it almost seem like that was in his power. Rabastan nudged his friend with his shoulder. “Can I tell you a secret?”
“Course.”
“He looked like a bit of a nutter, too. The one from the war.”
Sirius waved a hand. “See? It’s that whole generation. Mad. Look at Dumbledore. Mad as well.”
Rabastan laughed. “Maybe you’re right.”
“Of course I am. I’m a Black. We know from mad.” He flashed a wild grin, as if proving his point. “Now, come on, I have a mountain of chocolate frogs and they aren’t eating themselves.” He threw an arm around Rabastan’s shoulders and turned them back, and Rabastan returned the gesture. Their arms brushed against the walls of the corridor as they walked, but they pressed on, side by side, linked arm over arm.
Rabastan’s anxieties, large and small, faded away like the landscapes out the train window. “So, apparently there’s to be a snowball fight when we get back…”
Chapter Number/Title: December 1971: Air (58/100) [[ Previous | Next]]
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1941
Workshop?: Suggestions welcome.
December 19, 1971
Air
The mob of black-robed students thronged around the platform, slowly filing in through the doors of the scarlet train bound back toward London. Rabastan and his friends, now well conditioned to the Established Traditions of Slytherin House, waited with varying degrees of patience while the older forms settled in. Rabastan stood on tip-toe, looking for Sirius.
“Do you think he’s already gone in?”
“Most likely,” answered Evan. “Probably with Potter and the like.”
Rabastan hadn’t even considered that. The air suddenly felt very thin, and his heartbeat very strong. “He wouldn’t do that, would he? He’s had all of school with them!”
Darren clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t listen to Ev. Sirius probably’s got us a cabin already. Primo real estate.”
“You’re right.” He shook off the temporary worry-an easier task with Darren’s cheer to help. “I’ve never seen you so chuffed,” he noted. “Did I miss some news?”
“He’s finally going back to his mummy dearest,” Evan teased.
Darren rolled his eyes. “You mean, I’m finally going back to decent food and being able to wear my own robes and not these drab grey-and-black sackcloths day in, day out. Can’t you taste it, lads? Freedom.” He closed his eyes and stuck out his tongue, waggling it around the air as if to catch the flavor. Instead, a snowflake fell.
“Snow!” Rabastan shouted.
Darren’s eyes snapped open wide. “Seriously? Now there’s snow? Now that we’re leaving?” He pursed his lips and looked angrily up at the sky. “Curse you, gods of the sky.”
“I bet there will be even more when we come back,” Rabastan said. “And then we can have a huge snowball fight.”
“Snowball fight?” asked a voice behind them. “Who’s planning a snowball fight?”
Rabastan didn’t need to turn to know who it was. The boyish timbre, the unbound enthusiasm, the complete lack of awareness that some conversations did not include him: Potter.
“Shouldn’t you be on board already?” Rabastan asked.
James laughed. “I was. Left something, had to go back for it.”
Rabastan’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, but he wasn’t sure what he suspected. “Where’s Sirius?”
“On board already. Thought you knew-he already bid us his farewells and all and went to get a compartment. Said he had to catch up with you lot.” Potter rolled his eyes. “As if we hadn’t all been in the same castle all autumn.”
Darren grinned and elbowed Rabastan in the ribs, a little too hard. “Told ya.”
The crowd shuffled forward, finally bringing the boys to the doors of the train.
“So,” James said, swinging his bag more securely over his shoulder. “Snowball fight. We’ll be there, first good snowfall. Snakes versus lions.”
“No way!” Rabastan shook his head furiously. “That leaves us with Snape!”
James laughed again, so hard that he nearly snorted and had to recover. “Priceless image, Snivellus trying to have fun like a normal person.”
“It’s not fair,” Rabastan argued.
“Since when do Slytherins care about fair?”
“Since your rules are rubbish.”
“Blame the Hat, Lestrange.” With that, Potter slipped into a corridor. He seemed to have vanished into a compartment, but then his head of unkempt hair popped back out. “Oh, and you’re the other way down. Happy Christmas!”
Exchanges with Potter always left Rabastan with a sense of vertigo. Another person, he might suspect of being manipulative somehow, with his cheerful insults and aggressively friendly act. But Potter always seemed too genuine for any of that. That, too, made Rabastan on edge: was anyone really that uncomplicated? Surely Potter was hiding something.
“Over here!” Darren called, breaking Rabastan’s train of thought.
He and Evan hurried down the corridor, stumbling past other students, and came to the compartment that Darren had found. Inside, Sirius was lying casually across one row of seats, his eyes closed, his arms behind his head, and his heels resting against the compartment wall.
“‘Lo,” he said, opening one eye. “Took you long enough.”
The boys filed in. Darren and Evan moved to the free bench. Rabastan cocked his head and looked down at Sirius. “Care to move?”
“Nope. Peasants have to sit on the floor.” He closed his eyes again, though his wide grin betrayed any illusion of a man at rest.
Rabastan raised an eyebrow, set down his satchel, and then plopped down-onto Sirius’s chest.
“Oof!” Sirius’s eyes opened wide in surprise. “Not-on!”
Before Sirius could do anything to stop it, Darren leapt across the compartment and landed with a cackle onto Sirius as well.
“I say, Rabbit,” Darren said, laying on his smarmiest accent, “you’ve found the softest seat on the train!”
“Ugh,” Sirius groaned. “Gerroff.” He jerked his hips and rolled, toppling the boys into a pile on the ground. As they pushed themselves up off the train’s rough carpeting, an infection of laughter spread.
“That floor’s probably filthy,” Evan commented, watching them all from his ordinary seat by the window.
“You’re filthy,” Darren retorted nonsensically, though he then brushed himself off and took the seat next to Evan.
Rabastan and Sirius pushed themselves back onto the seat.
“So,” Sirius asked, “Where’s your fourth?”
Rabastan wrinkled his nose. It wasn’t right, that someone else had what should have been Sirius’s place in their House. “Staying at school.”
“Can’t say I blame him,” said Evan.
Rabastan shrugged. “Can you imagine, though? Being alone for Christmas? Even if his family are terrible Muggles and Muggle-lovers, it must be lonely.”
“You feel sorry for Snivellus?” Sirius’s brow darkened, hiding his grey eyes.
“No!” Rabastan folded his arms. “I just… it seems pathetic, that’s all.”
“Pathetic’s right.”
An idea niggled at Rabastan’s mind. His arms unraveled as he leaned in to share. “Maybe we should send him a present.”
“Can we send him proper shampoo?”
Darren guffawed, and even Evan sniggered at the suggestion. Rabastan elbowed Sirius, though he could not stop the smile tugging on his lips.
“I’m serious!” Rabastan insisted. “Mother always makes me buy a gift for Jack Travers. It’s the same idea.”
Darren’s eyebrows raised. “Aren’t you cousins with Travers, O Great Genealogy Master?”
Rabastan’s cheeks grew hot. Jack Travers was, in fact, as closely related to him as Darren Avery, but they had never been as close. “Well, yes, but-”
“Travers,” Evan added, “is poor because his family gave all their gold to a lost cause. That’s different.”
The other three boys came to attention.
“Dish,” Darren ordered.
Evan looked around with confusion on his face. “You don’t know? Surely-Rabbit, you must know…”
Rabastan slowly shook his head. “I know they used to be respectable, back when Aunt Theophila married in. But loads of people lost money in those days. It’s not like I asked what they invested in.”
Evan rolled his eyes. “They invested in the war, obviously. In Grindelwald.”
The final consonant of the infamous name cut into astonished silence.
Rabastan leaned back in his seat. His gaze drifted toward Sirius, who seemed to be coming to a slow realization.
“Did you know about this?”
Sirius shook his head. “Just… something my father said. This just… makes it make more sense. That’s all.”
It did make sense. Perfect sense, really, so much that he felt like a fool for not having known.
“You buy Jack Travers a gift,” explained Evan with a wry smile, “not because he’s poor, but because of the reason he’s poor.”
The information hung over them for a few seconds until Darren broke the silence. “It doesn’t add up. The Lestranges help out the Traverses because they’re family. They’d do the same for us, and we for them, if something terrible happened. It’s not like they invested all their gold in Grindelwald, too. Or any of it. Not that there’d be anything wrong with that... ”
Everyone’s eyes were on Rabastan. He was sure his stomach had somehow sunk into the seat and left his body. “They didn’t have to send gold,” he replied. “They sent their younger son to die in his army instead.”
Evan and Darren quickly found other interesting train fixtures to look at instead. Only Sirius managed to look him in the eye still. He grimaced and nudged Rabastan. “That was him. Not you.”
“Yeah.” The compartment felt very small, suddenly. He stood up. “I need to get some air.”
He left his satchel on the floor and slid the compartment door open to leave. The problem with a train was that there was no fresh air to get. He took deep breaths and walked swiftly down the long corridor, trying to clear his mind. His grandfather had made it clear enough last Christmas: Rabastan was to follow in his great-uncle’s footsteps, his life as the investment in this new cause, this rebellion, whatever it was that the Blacks had rejected. He felt bile rising in his throat and turned toward a corridor window, trying to find some way to open it for the cold, snowy air. There seemed to be a sort of latch, but he couldn’t work it properly, and his fingers grew more and more clumsy.
Suddenly, a cool breeze hit him. He looked over and saw Sirius, wand pointed up, sending a gentle but cold wind flowing from its tip.
“Thanks,” he mumbled.
“What’s a best mate for? You all right? Or are you going to be sick all over my shoes?”
The wind, though magic, did help. Rabastan nodded. “I’ll be fine.”
“Here: have a ginger newt.” Sirius handed it over and ended his spell. “Sweets cart came by just after you left, and we all loaded up with enough to share, so you wouldn’t miss out.”
He nibbled on the spiced biscuit. “Thanks,” he repeated.
“Yeah, well. Instead of thanking me, how about not abandoning me with Avery and Rosier, huh?”
“Sorry. I guess you could be with Potter and that lot instead, having more fun.”
“Pft, you’re plenty fun, when you aren’t trying to start pity projects for snivelling greasebags or pitying yourself for whatever your dead great-great-uncle-whatever did before you were born.”
He made it sound so easy to brush off. “My grandfather gave me a photo of him, you know. Said we all have footsteps to follow in.”
Sirius’s face contorted. “No offense, Rabbit, but your grandfather’s a bit of a nutter. Isn’t that why your father’s the head of the family?”
“Yes,” Rabastan admitted.
“So. Don’t worry about him. No one’s going to make you die in a war you don’t want to fight.”
Rabastan gave an unconvinced shrug.
“Well, I won’t allow it.”
Something about Sirius’ confident stance and tone made it almost seem like that was in his power. Rabastan nudged his friend with his shoulder. “Can I tell you a secret?”
“Course.”
“He looked like a bit of a nutter, too. The one from the war.”
Sirius waved a hand. “See? It’s that whole generation. Mad. Look at Dumbledore. Mad as well.”
Rabastan laughed. “Maybe you’re right.”
“Of course I am. I’m a Black. We know from mad.” He flashed a wild grin, as if proving his point. “Now, come on, I have a mountain of chocolate frogs and they aren’t eating themselves.” He threw an arm around Rabastan’s shoulders and turned them back, and Rabastan returned the gesture. Their arms brushed against the walls of the corridor as they walked, but they pressed on, side by side, linked arm over arm.
Rabastan’s anxieties, large and small, faded away like the landscapes out the train window. “So, apparently there’s to be a snowball fight when we get back…”