"REMINDER"

REMINDER: a thing that causes someone to remember something; Lorelei Black looked through the photo album George had given her once more, seeing those pictures of Cedric... it just made her feel bad, she hadn't seen him for almost a year, and it had been tough she'll admit, especially because she refuses to grieve, but she's pulled through, and she'll be out of Hogwarts before she knows it, no more reminders of Cedric then...no more reminders...

Regan closed the door behind her as she stepped inside the bedroom not bothering to even look at Lorelei, she crawled inside her blanket and then turned away from the older girl staring ahead at the wall instead.

Lorelei sighed, "Reggie, how long are you planning to keep this 'no one understands me, I'm an edgy teenager' attitude up?" she asked having had enough of the kid ignoring everyone in the family, "It's getting old"

Reggie continued to ignore her.

"Listen to me, damn it!" Lorelei exclaimed, she was very well aware that she was taking her anger out with Regan but she didn't seem to care all that much since Regan did seem to need a bit of sense knocked into her brain, "We're all going to die, ok?"

Regan turned to look at her, her brows furrowed, "What?"

"Yeah, you heard me" Lorelei said, "We're all going to die, whether it be in war, an accident, medical reasons, old age — it's going to happen, and when it does I don't want us to be apart, Reggie. You've been my sister for as long as I can remember, and now you're letting some stupid house rivalry get between our relationship? For all I know, I could end up dead in this war, and still not have made up with you — so I want to, let's make up because I'm tired of not having someone to bully"

"Oh my, Salazar" Regan groaned in anger, "You're never going to get it, are you? It's not just about some stupid house rivalry, I could give two shits about my friends being in Gryffindor, hell, I wish things were as simple as that, but they aren't! I'm surrounded by deatheater families, not to mention I come from a bloodtraitor family, do you have any idea how much shit I take on from others? I have to constantly watch my back, get jinxed, get pranked, and belittled, all I ever wanted was that not happening with my own friend group — they're supposed to support me, they're the ones I should feel like I can talk to, but it's like I'm categorized into one box with them, a big green box labeled Slytherin!"

Lorelei was surprised, she always was when Regan would burst out like this — like every Black she repressed her emotions until it all came hurtling forward, but Regan? She was different while every other Black did it to postpone dealing with their own feelings, Regan had always been different than her parents and her cousin, even as a little girl Lorelei had watched her put everyone else first, caring about their feelings, their opinions, and to see that little girl sit in front of her looking so...broken...it hurt Lorelei, but she was sure not more than the girl herself.

Lorelei should've known what Regan was doing would only end with her being hurt, she should've known that it would've been about something more than some stupid house rivalry. Lorelei should've known. She was her sister, and though they weren't unusually close, she knew Regan, Lorelei was the one to blame here — she should've looked after her like Regan did all those years, never once complaining about the attention Lorelei would get on Holidays, or ever making her feel like she didn't belong with them, and how does Lorelei repay her?

Just another thing Lorelei messed up.

"I'm tired, El" Regan said, her voice cracking as she stared at the older girl and Lorelei then noticed her eyes — they'd never looked so sad, "I want this all to be over..."

Lorelei didn't know what to do, she knew that Regan didn't want any kind of physical touch right now, that was her thing — she didn't like to be touched in any way when she was sad, it was weird but Lorelei didn't want to upset her even more.

"Me too, Reg" Lorelei nodded, "Me too..."

With that Regan once again turned away from the Ravenclaw, burying her face into a pillow as she hugged it close to her chest, and Lorelei...well, she was left with the pieces of her past stuck in a photo album, and so she looked through them again and again until she fell asleep.

🫐

"IF ANYONE ASKS," Lorelei watched the figure of her dead uncle speaking to the hunched over house elf trembling with fear as he stared at his master with eyes wide as a tennis ball and lips curled into a thin line, "Just repeat what I say, and nothing else, you cannot reveal what I'm doing, where I am, or what happened in the cave, Kreacher. Do you understand?"

Kreacher merely bowed at his master before disappearing with a crack and leaving Regulus all alone in this crappy apartment with no one else, he had no one now, no one to go home to. He sighed before he sat down on the dusty couch, but then what shocked Lorelei the most was that he looked directly at her, "You need to find me" he said, his grey eyes —much like Lorelei's — boring into hers as he did.

"What?" Lorelei asked and he passed her a small smile, he tried to reach out to her but before he could—

Lorelei woke up with a gasp, she looked around as she could not believe the vividness of that dream — she didn't care that it was a long shot, but there is a chance that her uncle is still alive, there's got to be. He looked at her, and he told her to find him, there's got to be a reason that happened, and there's got to be a reason that he wanted her to see all this.

He'd possibly spent so many years in hiding, why now out of all those years does he want her to find him, and her out of all people? She hadn't even met him before in her life, and he didn't know her, but he trusted her, he had to have... she didn't get this dream for no reason.

Lorelei turned on the lamp on her desk, not bothering to grab her wand as she duh through her trunk for the journals that Regulus had left behind.

Things had started falling into place, there was no way that possibly the smartest person in her life had decided to write down every part of his life without a motive, and there was no way he'd just left them behind without a reason — he wanted someone to find them, and he wanted them to read them.

Regulus Black had set out an elaborate plan with just enough clues, and Lorelei was going to do whatever she could to get to it, she had to — she believes her family owes him that much, and if he really had no one to go home to? Well, no one deserves that.

Lorelei got to work, seconds turned to minutes, minutes turned to hours and before she knew it the sun was peeking through her window, she rubbed her eyes groggily before shutting the curtains, the day could wait.

She heard Regan get up from the other side of the room and pass her a confused glance, but she paid no attention to the brunette — Lorelei hated herself for how long she'd brushed her dead uncle off, he'd been giving her hints and she just hadn't been catching on to them.

What if he's in trouble and he's been signaling for her to help him somehow? Why her though? He could ask Aunt Si, her father, anyone else...

Why her?

By the time night had come Lorelei had just one journal left, and it was the year Regulus had turned into a deatheater from what she'd heard when she asked her grandmother's portrait about it, but right before Lorelei could open the journal up someone interrupted her.

"Merlin, El, planning to eat at all today?" George Weasley asked as he spun her chair around to make her face him, pulling up a chair of his own he sat in front of her and took in her appearance — even tired she managed to look more beautiful than anyone George had ever seen, it was all so weird for him — he'd had crushes before, yes, but not like this one — it was different with them, and Merlin, George hated just how much he loved it.

"You don't enter a girl's room without knocking, Weasley" Lorelei shook her head at the redhead, discreetly covering the journals with the vinyls she had on the corner of her table. He didn't need to know about Regulus, not now, not until her uncle wanted him to.

"Yeah, well, you don't spend a whole day without taking care of yourself either" George said as he bounced his leg up and down.

Lorelei frowned, "I was gonna come down soon anyway"

"Mm-hm" he said nodding at her, not believing her words, "Come on, dinner's ready and if I don't bring you down with me, my mum might disown me"

"Well, if you insist" Lorelei said mockingly as she pulled her beanie down to his nose and then ran out of the room.

George shook his head as he removed the beanie and then watched the brunette disappear — yeah, he was pretty sure he liked her.