au naturel
At first, Marlene McKinnon takes French lessons because she thinks it'll make her seem civilised and worldly, with all her talk of culture and cuisine. She quite likes the way that words such as adieu and soirée roll of her tongue, testaments to a place she'll only ever go if she survives this war. French is the language of beauty and of the gods, something well suited to her, or so her tutor says; it makes her laugh, because she's attractive, not beautiful –a bird's nest of hair and slightly too plump lips make you a sex symbol (a femme fatale, she reminds herself in her newfound bid to absorb every bit of it all as she can), but certainly not a Muggle prom queen – and they both know that most of the gods were Roman.
Sirius Black watches with a smirk as she reads Les Miserables in the back corner at Order meetings, hidden from Moody's disapproving eye by the hazy cloud of smoke that rises in twisting curlicues to mark her presence in any room. He makes fun of the newly found lilt in her voice, mocking her with a fake accent and the fact that he's started wearing a beret alone.
"Mack," he asks, one night when they're all straggling home in twos and threes – Potter's gone ahead with that lithe little wife of his, stroking her swollen stomach with an intensity to make Marlene weak in the stomach– "what's with all the French, anyway? You tryin' to catch yourself a man or something?"
"So what if I am, Black?"
"You could catch me without trying."
If there was one thing Marlene has learnt throughout the years, it's that arrogance was never befitting for a hero, and yet Sirius makes it seem almost natural. There's a method to his flirting to bring the most grown up woman – and, at six and a half years older and several thousand blasé encounters more experienced than him, that's exactly what she is – to her knees.
Before she knows it, they're trapped in a Muggle diner somewhere in Southern London, and she's feeling sick to her stomach after more greasy pancakes than even he could devour. Marlene wonders if there's a method in this madness, and then she lights another cigarette, tossing Black (his name changes with her moods, and right now she's feeling less than friendly, because Merlin, cramps are a killer, and she wouldn't expect him to understand that) one of his own.
"You know," he notes, "you look better without that cloud of smoke. More… natural."
"Stop trying to get into my pants, Black."
"I'm not saying it because I like you or anything," he says, in a voice that indicates that's exactly what he means. "You just look different. Au naturel, to put it in a language you understand."
The French sounds completely idiotic coming from his mouth, and she hates to think what criticism her tutor would have for his pronunciation, but it makes her laugh. Sirius keeps on doing it then, rattling off phrases in broken French that have no real context, and Marlene can't quite tell if he's teasing her or not.
Sooner or later, she shuts him up with a kiss, because he's tearing apart a language that flows better from her tongue than the one she was born with, and she thinks this whole thing is a faux pas, because neither of them should be doing this, but Merlin, he's got a nice body.
She's pale and milky, with layers of artwork smearing her skin and yet another cigarette hanging from the corner of her over-glossed mouth in a half-hearted attempt at feeding the nicotine addiction that eats away inside her like parasite, and he's dark skinned, with the exact same eyes as those they spend their nights trying to kill. In their dishabille state, clothes scattered over their shoulders and her fraying lounge chair, Marlene can't help but think that this is possibly the most beautiful they've ever been.
--
Three weeks later and their tête-à-tête has sprung to fruition in her womb. Marlene stumbles through the motions, thinking that his 'au naturel' comment makes sense in a completely different context now. She's still having weekly French lessons and wearing the beret that Sirius presented her after a meeting with a bow and a subtle nod that said "last night never happened, okay?" But now, she wonders if it's worth it, because she's never going to be able to climb the Eiffel Tower or drown herself in warbling French opera and wine with a baby on the way.
The first word that comes to mind is surreal, but Marlene McKinnon is a rational woman, who knows of the difference between lust and love and exactly what havoc war can play on a family in a time like this, and such a naïve view of the world will not help right now. Instead she retreats further and further into corners – both in meetings and in her mind – and wonders how she's going to tell Sirius, for whom fatherhood is about as big a possibility as crashing his stupid bloody flying motorbike.
She hasn't even told her family yet, because the last thing she needs right now is her brother's fist in Sirius' face and her mother's panicky voice in her ear. Her Dad's whole side of the family is involved in the Order, they understand the concept of death, and Marlene doesn't want the shock of her pregnancy – it's such a foreign word, and that thought makes her laugh, because her obsession with French has made her more of a foreigner than anyone she'll ever know – to be the thing that kills them.
"Mack?"
"As in Miss Mary," she jokes, because anything is better than seeing the confusion on Sirius' face – he's too young, too young for this, she thinks, decidedly ignoring the fact that James and Lily Potter are the same age. "You know, the Muggle clapping game?"
He continues to look at her blankly, and she says, "Don't worry, I'm a half-blood. Its' some stupid Muggle thing."
"Why aren't you talking to me?" The arrogance is gone, stripped from his face and replaced with dark purplish moons under his eyes and a-not-so-infectious grin, and she suddenly wonders has he decided he loves me? "It's as if you're dead."
"The first quality of a hero is being dead and buried, Sirius, and I don't want to be a hero."
She brushes it off with a quote from another one of those thick, dusty French tomes she read – though now, in the heat of the moment, she can't quite remember which one – and then they're interrupted by Moody, crossing from the window and saying. "Death Eaters. At least five of them, near the entrance to St Mungos."
They quickly disparate to the sight of the battle scene, Marlene ignoring the warning in her mind that Apparation is probably very bad for the baby, even at only five weeks, and then they're lost in a haze of smoky curses not unlike the menthols from which she's always taking a drag. It's a fierce battle, and her body is tossed from side to side and she can almost feel Sirius Jnr – not that she'd ever name her child that, because for all the things she ever felt for Sirius, affection for his arrogance was far down the list – kicking away in protest, and then she falls to the ground.
Travers leans over her, trying to leer but failing miserably, and it's almost poetic justice that she's that this baby's going to die with her. If Marlene had really wanted it, she'd have told someone by now, instead of hiding it from everyone, including herself. Something tells her that's horrible, but it's just birth and death and the succession of life.
"Sirius!" Marlene screeches, her head too close too the ground to notice if he reacts. "I'm pregnant!" There's a flash of green light, and vaguely she wonders if there's French people in heaven, and then she whispers c'est la vie and dies, a death as far from natural as she's ever been.
Dedication: Persephone, Gaia, Athena, Aphrodite, Hera, Iris, Hermes and Rhea, my buddies at Mt Olympia.
This was written for Gaby Black's French Challenge on the Harry Potter Fanfiction Challenges Forum. The idea was to use a famous French quote - in my case, it was "The first quality of a hero is being dead and buried," by Marcel Pagnol - and a selection of French words commonly found in English. The words I used were (in no particular order): c'est la vie, adieu, déshabillé, faux pas, femme fatale, tête-à-tête and soirée.
I'm not entirely sure what to make of this - the idea seemed a lot better in my hair than it does now that I've typed it up - but this is where inspiration led me, to two of my latest obsessions (the First Order, and rambly fics), and any praise or criticism is greatly appreciated.