A Marauder's Guide to Falling Forever

Chapter Four

Remus laughed before his face turned back into something more serious.

"You know they are going to have a difficult time processing your return like this," he said sadly, "Sirius has been a mess."

Sirius.

"Sirius?" Marlene felt her face change into an expression of surprise. "Why has Sirius been a mess?"

The lines of Remus's forehead drew into a frown. "You do recall that you've been missing for months, right? Everyone has been looking for you."

Marlene knew that leaving abruptly in heat of everything prior to summer had been risky. She had been overridden with emotions from Mrs. Potter's death, and James' resentment towards her for being unable to prevent it had been the first major blow. Losing Sirius shortly after had broken her heart into a million pieces. Then, Lily's inability to cope with her parents deaths had drawn her into a great depression in which she had shut everyone out. Marlene had never felt more alone and unwanted.

So she left. She packed a small bag, told Emmeline that she was going away for a bit and didn't know when she'd be back. And then she left. For nearly six months, apparently. How had time flown by so fast without her even noticing?

It wasn't as if she didn't know they were trying to find her. At one point an owl from Lily had tracked her down, but she hadn't been ready to write to her, to explain why she had left without saying goodbye. She left her emotions at her flat in London and that was where they were going to stay.

Sirius had possibly attempted to contact her with the enchanted mirror too, but he would have been unsuccessful since she knew it was safely stowed away in her dresser drawer.

"Yes, well," she stumbled a bit. Give it to Sirius to cause her to fluster. As much as she had changed during her time away she hadn't been able to completely rid herself of him. "I don't know why he would care that much."

"Are you daft?" Remus sounded angry again and his tone, rather than his words, caused Marlene to recoil in her chair. Remus didn't normally speak like that, at least not to her. "Sirius loves you. How could you think he wouldn't worry himself sick about you disappearing? Don't you remember how he was after Hogsmeade? He nearly got himself sent to Azkaban trying to break into St. Mungo's to get to you. If Lily doesn't kill you, surely Sirius will."

Sirius loves you.

"Well he has a funny way of showing it," Marlene grumbled bitterly, pushing away the unwelcome feeling of hope beginning to bubble in her core. But she knew Remus was right about the fact that she had definitely handled her departure poorly. Order mission or not, she really should have written.

"I don't want to get in the middle of that mess of a romance the two of you have going on," Remus's expression changed and he let out a strained laugh. He stood from the table and moved back into the kitchen to wash his cup and put away the kettle, "but he literally stopped by your apartment almost every day to see if you'd come home. Chased your ghost to a few different countries when he heard any information about a girl that fit your description."

"Did he really?" Marlene felt a mixture of disappointment and gratitude to hear that. But she would have been happier if he had just let her go like he told her he would. Caring about Sirius was toxic, and she had had a very difficult time getting him out of her head. She had nearly gotten there and like a flood bursting through a dam, it only took one sentence from Remus's mouth to undue the progress that she had made.

"We've all be anxious," he stressed his point once more.

"I am sorry that I worried you Remus," she said sadly, "that I worried all of you."