"You can't judge a book by its cover, Rhea"
"Yeah well, I can judge a person by their thoughts"
For Rhea Devereux, being in other people's mind was as easy as taking candy from a baby. Being born with the gift of Legilimency, it was something she wa...
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On Christmas morning, Theo, Sirius, Regulus and Rhea were at the kitchens. The Devereaux siblings always ate before opening the presents, something that Sirius and Regulus thought was curious when they told them that the day before, but accompanied them anyway.
"If you don't hurry up, I'll leave you" said Sirius, who was excited to open presents.
Spending Christmas with his family was something he didn't really like. He hated it, actually. They would open presents quietly and then each of them would spend the rest of the day by themselves. This year, Orion and Walburga went to visit a friend, and Regulus and Sirius decided to spend the break at Hogwarts.
"Then go, nobody is stopping you" mumbled Regulus and only Rhea heard that.
She knew that as the years passed, both brothers weren't as close as they were when they were kids. Sirius spent his time with his friends, and hardly even greeted his brother at school. And Regulus did the same.
When Sirius' family found out that he was a Gryffindor, they began to treat him differently. He had always been something of the black sheep of the family, disobeying his parents and going against them. So that was the last straw.
Fortunately for Orion and Walburga, they still had Regulus, their golden boy. Not only was he sorted into Slytherin, but he also blindly followed all customs and rules, nodding to everything his parents said.
That was perhaps what broke the relationship they had as brothers.
Sirius didn't know, but Regulus admired him very much. And Regulus didn't know, but Sirius loved him very much, perhaps even more than himself.
But you would die before you see the proud Black brothers say that out loud.
When they finished eating, Sirius went up to the Gryffindor tower, Regulus and Rhea went to the Slytherin common room and Theo returned to his bedroom, telling the last two that he would meet them in a second.
Rhea knew how excited Sirius was to open presents with his house mates, and she understood that he wanted to spend this time with them. He even told them to come up to accompany him and his friends, but noticing Regulus' discomfort, both Theo and Rhea said they would see him later.
Rhea felt her heart break a little when she opened her mother's gift. It was another framed photo, but unlike the one she had given her a few Christmases ago, this one was one of her and Theo, they might have been four and five years old. Theo was hugging Rhea, who was laughing.
It was there that she said goodbye to Theo and Regulus and left the common room. She still had the photo in hand when she got to the attic on the Clock Tower. The day was cloudy, but there were a few rays of light. Sitting on the windowsill, Rhea cried for the thousand times that week.
She was tired of feeling this way. She hadn't spent Christmas with Brianna and Daniel because of her father, who seemed to still be ruining her life over and over again. Rhea was sure he was the root of all her problems.
But she just cried, not knowing what else to do, as she watched the Black Lake and the Forbidden Forest from the tall window of the tower.
✧☽✧
Rhea spent most of the morning there, sitting, watching the horizon. She was thinking about how bad she had acted. She hated herself for having ignored her friends, for having walked away from them.
And she hated herself a lot more for doing the same to Remus.
Despite having spoken with him, with a certain ease, she still felt strange. Not because of him, but because of what she did to him.
Rhea felt that nothing justified having walked away from the people that mattered to her, and the more she thought about it, the worse she felt.
Yes, Remus had spoken to her as if those months in which she ignored him had not happened... but what about her friends? Would they react the same? Or would they be mad at her? Lily would have told Josie, Josh and Marlene about her father escaping, Rhea supposed. Therefore they would know why she had acted like that all those months.
But again, she felt like it wasn't justification enough.
Rhea stayed there, thinking. She hardly noticed when Sirius sat next to her.
"Hey" he said, handing her a chocolate.
"It's usually Remus the one with the chocolates," Rhea tried to joke, but the lack of a smile on her face made it difficult.
Sirius smiled and nodded, "yes, he actually asked me to give it to you..."
Rhea said nothing, but there was some confusion in her expression. She thought that the conversation she had with Remus was just one out of courtesy. But did this gift mean that he understood? That perhaps he knew what she had been through?
Remus should hate her. He had every right to do so. Rhea knew that she had spent a lot of time with Dolohov while she ignored him.
Rhea came to the conclusion that Remus knew. And Sirius had told him.
"You told him, didn't you?" Rhea asked, but her tone wasn't one of anger or hate, but perhaps sadness.
Sirius looked at her, then looked at the chocolate, and then at her again. He looked embarrassed, as if he were a child that got caught stealing a small candy from a store.
"I'm sorry," he murmured, "I wasn't the one who should have told him."
"I never planned to tell him" she said looking at the horizon, and her tone did not have a trace of anger, "it bothers me that you told him, I guess so... but if you hadn't, maybe he would still hate me"
"He never hated you, Rhea, not really," Sirius said and she looked at him, "as much as he wanted to, I know and I'm sure it would be impossible for him to hate you. And the same goes for you, you could never hate him, even if he does something terrible, horrible, you would never hate him"
Sirius said that while looking at the horizon, in his hands he held a small round rock, one of those rocks that are perfectly smooth from having been in the water for years, perhaps decades or centuries. It was as if, by saying those words, Sirius was talking about someone else.
Rhea knew that, as much as what Sirius said was true, in those moments he was thinking of someone else. She had no way of knowing who the person was, seeing as she was still drinking the blue potion daily.
Sirius shook his head and took a breath. He now seemed determined to do something.
"I have to go... um... James is waiting for me" he said smiling at Rhea, who was looking at him curiously.
"Yes, of course," she replied as she watched Sirius disappear down the stairs.
Rhea thought about what Sirius told her and she knew that even if Remus did something terrible, horrible, she would never be able to hate him.
And she was comforted to know that maybe Remus didn't hate her either, not really.
