Story prompt: The song "Bad Enough For You" by All Time Low
And I know how to get you crazy, how to make you want me so bad it hurts.
Sirius remembered that one day clearly, the day that he decided what he had to do in order to obtain the object of his affections. In order to win.
Sirius would do anything in order to win. Especially if it was for her.
They'd all been fourth years in Charms class, and it was like any other day - he and James mastered aguamenti on the first try and used it to mess with Peter. Remus looked on with a feigned disapproval, attempting (and failing) to hide the smile that was always on his face when his friends messed with each other. Lily looked on in true disapproval, and would attempt to scold James; James would return by egging her on with a wink and his hand in his hair, tilting his chair back so only the back two legs were on the ground.
And Marlene wouldn't even spare Sirius a look.
She would turn and flirt with the bloke of the week, flipping her pretty hair over her shoulder and flashing him her white teeth that were brightened by her red lipstick.
Her red lipstick…
Back to the topic at hand.
He remembered exactly who it was, also - it was the creepy Lestrange, the younger one that wasn't set to marry his lovely cousin. All of the girls went after him, though, no matter how cruel he was. Apparently he was alluring in the aristocratic sense that all of the purebloods do. The muggleborns learned quickly to avoid him because he wouldn't give him the time of day, and while he primarily "dated" purebloods, he was known to occasionally take a half-blood into the broom closet. As Marlene was a pureblood, he would eventually give her the time of day. Lestrange always gave women the time of day, especially ones as beautiful, and pure, as Marlene. Then, he would dump them and move on to the next witch that threw herself at him.
It was Marlene's modus operandi. She went after the blokes who only kept women for a few weeks; she'd try to make them fall in love with her, occasionally succeeded, and then one of them would end it when they realized that the other was not going to change. Then she would move on to the next challenge.
This was precisely why she wouldn't give Sirius the time of day. Sirius was too… too nice. She'd told him that herself about a week after the Charms incident.
"Give me the time of day, Marlene," he asked her, lounging on the couch and pretending to be casual. She laughed her tinkling laugh, one that was typically music to his ears, but seemed to be mocking him. Her ruby red lips were also formed into a mockingly sad smile, her brown eyes filled with the same expression.
"Oh, sweetheart, I wish I could," the word sweetheart fell off of her tongue slickly and he'd suppressed the flinch. He closed his eyes so that she couldn't see the hurt flash in his eyes at the term of endearment. He'd wished he could hear it with a serious tone.
"Then why don't you?"
"I'm with Rabastan, you know that. You stare at us all of the time," he opened his eyes to see her smirk, leaning back against the couch and crossing her legs, drawing attention to the skin left exposed by a skirt centimeters too short.
"He disgusts me." Marlene didn't reply to the comment and they sat it silent for a couple of minutes, staring at each other. She got up and stood behind his head, smoothing his hair out of the way of his forehead.
"He's a challenge, Sirius. You're not. You're too easy, sweetheart. Too easy." she spoke as though she felt genuinely sad for him, causing a scowl to form on his face. She leant down and kissed his forehead, her hair brushing against his face, leaving a red mark in the shape 0of her lips on it.
It'd taken all of his self control to wash it off when he went back to his dorm.
That night was a year previous to where he was now, and he'd changed quite significantly; he was still a Beater on the Quidditch team, friends with the same people (although Evans may be adding herself into that group soon, judging by the looks that she'd been giving James), he went into the Shrieking Shack every 28 days since they'd become fully fledged animagi toward the beginning of 4th year, but most importantly, he'd been putting his plan into action.
His plan was perfect, really. After the summer he'd had (Bellatrix Black was almost Bellatrix Lestrange and the dear woman was over almost every day planning with his mother, and apparently the woman didn't take Sirius' comments about her fiance well. He has multiple scars for proof now), and the year he'd had attempting to get Marlene's attention, he could kill two birds with one stone. He could piss off the Black family by dating everyone except for the "sacred twenty-eight", and gain Marlene's attention at the same time.
He knew exactly what to do, and knew it was right as soon as he saw Marlene's expression when he had that Gryffindor from the year below draped over him - she was a muggleborn, of course, he couldn't avoid the perfect opportunity throwing herself quite literally at him - and Marlene couldn't keep her eyes off of him. As he was kissing her neck, he smirked at her (he'd recently been told it drove women insane) and she rolled her eyes, turning away from him and resumed flirting with the Ravenclaw as though she hadn't seen him.
He was going to drive her crazy, and she was going to be a puddle in his arms by the end of the year. He just knew it.
