CHERRY // marlene mckinnon

-thirty five

Aurora and Regulus had long returned from the Rosier's house and back to their bleak and dreary household. September was only a couple of weeks away, which meant that the school year would start again soon.

The Black family, or we'll, Aurora and her family at least, we're currently at Diagonal Alley, picking up her and Regulus's school supplies. They had gotten most of their things, only a a few stuff were left.

But Aurora was growing tired of her mother and her complaints about the many halfbloods and muggleborns present.

"How dare they-"

"Yes yes we get it, how dare they come here steal our magic." Aurora mocked her mother and what she had been repeating for the past thirty or so minutes.

"Did you just—mock me?!" Aurora only let out a mischievous smirk, much to her mother's displeasure. At this point, even Orion seemed to tired of Walburga's continuous chatter.

"Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to do some shopping myself." Aurora told them, expecting the worst.

"Why? So you can run off with some muggles?" Walburga scoffed. She still thought very lowly of her daughter after the events of the previous school year.

"I don't know, maybe." Aurora replied, only to get a reaction out of her mother. She was much more confident these days, and stood up to her parents quite frequently. Walburga and Orion didn't even bother using curses at this point, and all they saw when they looked at her was the son that they could no longer call theirs. "Alright Reg, wanna come with me?"

"What?! I never allowed you to go!" Walburga spat, almost too loudly.

"Be careful mother, there's an awful lot of purebloods here. You wouldn't to embarrass yourself like that now would you?" Aurora taunted, and Walburga quickly stiffened.

"Let's go Reg." Regulus let out a breath he didn't even know he was holding, relieved that he wasn't left alone with them.

"Finally, it feels so peaceful without them." Regulus walked alongside his sister, who was dragging him to Flourish and Blotts to buy the rest of their school books.

The bookshop was quite literally magical inside. But with the school year emerging, it was also crowded with people.

"I'm going to try to get what I need. Hopefully I don't drown in this crowd." Regulus told his sister, before he left to find the books he needed.

"Alright, see you in a bit." Now Aurora knew she had to get her schoolbooks first, but a little bit of browsing for herself wouldn't hurt anyone. She looked through the tall shelves filled with various books, but didn't really seem particularly interested by any of them. And she already owned most of them too.
"Nothing I don't have."

She then managed to get through the crowds of people and pick up the books she needed. "Why are there so many children? Do they just pop one out every two years or what? Thank Merlin I'm not planning on having any of those annoying little shits." She talked to herself, but got a weird look from a nearby child. "What?"

Aurora finally got the books she needed but still struggled to get past all of the people. And much to her displeasure, she ended up bumping into someone, causing all of her books to fall to the ground.

"Are you serious right no—" But she stopped herself as she realized who she had bumped into. "Well shit. It really is you."

"Well isn't this a lovely little reunion. How have you been, sis?" Sirius smirked, helping her pick up her books and get up.

"You know, this is the last place I would have expected you to be in." Aurora finally spoke, still kind of stunned.

"Yeah, yeah, well Moony dragged me in here. And honestly, if it wasn't for him then I wouldn't remembered that we actually need books for school." Sirius explained, his tone turning slightly disinterested when he mentioned books. "So what are you doing here?"