Chapter 1 - Drowning Himself

"Oh, for the love of all things perverted, open the door, James!" Cassy shouted.

"You're late, Miss Meadowes. Everyone else is already here," he informed her when he opened the door, hair as purposefully rumpled up as ever.

"Wonderful. Now, where is he?" she demanded and looked around the living room expectantly.

"In the bathroom. We think he's trying to drown himself," Remus Lupin grinned from the couch.

"Ah, good." She dropped her things on the floor and marched down the hall to one of the closed doors and began to bang on it. "Sirius, you egomaniacal git! You better haul your arse out of there in about five seconds; otherwise, I'm coming in! Because believe me, I have a very full bladder and I'm not quite sure how much longer it can wait."

Her friends out in the living room began to laugh and she thought she heard a chuckle come from within, but there was no other response.

"Okay, I'm now going to count to five. And you better be out of there, or at least decent by then. If not, I'll... well, let me get back to you about that part, but it shouldn't come to that! One... two..."

There was a splash, a curse, and then a disembodied voice saying, "You know, there is another bathroom in the house."

Sirius Black opened the bathroom door, hair and pajamas dripping wet.

And Cassy pulled him out into the hall, and then ran into the bathroom saying, "Yeah, but none that I like so much as this one!"

He turned to say something angrily in reply, but found he was facing a closed door.

"Hey!" he exclaimed. "Not fair..."

"He's all right!" James Potter shouted, bounding over to his best friend and nearly smothering him with a bear hug.

"No, mate, he is definitely not okay," Cassy said coming out of the bathroom and staring pointedly at his wet clothes.

"I thought you had to go to the bathroom!" Sirius said accusingly.

"Yeah, but I decided it could wait."

"Merlin's beard, Cassy, why is it that he listens to you when you have to take a piss, but not us?" James demanded.

"No clue, mate," she shrugged. "Feminine wiles?"

Sirius snorted.

Cassy raised an eyebrow. "What's that? Genuine emotion other than depression? Can it be?" She pulled him into a hug of her own before quickly recoiling. "Oh, eww, I forgot; you're wet all over."

"That's because he's too stubborn to take off his clothes before he gets into the bath."

James, Cassy, and Sirius turned as a whole to see Lily Evans standing stiffly at the end of the corridor.

"Hi, Cassy," she said tiredly.

"Lily!" Cassy ran over to her and almost squeezed the life out of her until Lily said, "Cass, you're all wet from hugging the egomaniacal git now."

"You heard me call him that, did you?" The corner of her mouth twitched upward.

"I think people in Madrid heard that remark, Cass," Remus said from somewhere in the crowd that had now gathered in the hall.

"Um, guys, do you think you could move?" Sirius said from the middle of the throng. "I need to get some dry clothes on."

"I can fix that," Cassy noted as her friends moved out of the way. She pulled out her wand, muttering. Then, a large cloud of smoke enveloped Sirius, leaving him very dry, and his hair very poofy and frizzy when it disappeared.

"Thanks," said a disgruntled Sirius Black, looking more Siberian husky than human.

"Sorry," she replied meekly and quickly muttered the counter-charm, returning him to his original state of wetness.

Glumly, he trudged upstairs, leaving a trail of water droplets behind him.

"It wasn't my fault, I swear!" Cassy said to her friends over dinner.

"Oh, sure, you didn't just decide to turn me into a ball of fluff, it just happened." Sirius moodily jabbed his fork into his food.

"Right!" came her enthusiastic reply. "It's my wand! It's been doing things it's not supposed to in addition to the spells I cast. It's been like that all summer."

"Looks like you'll be needing a new wand then," James said. "Another place to stop on our trip to Diagon Alley."

"Yippee," dead-panned Sirius. "Wait around in a tiny shop while Cassy tries to find a new wand and blows stuff up. Yay."

"Well, you don't have to stay," came the instant rebuttal. "God, what is wrong with you today?"

"What's wrong with me?" he asked incredulously. "What's wrong with you? First you force me out of the bathroom where I was perfectly fine—"

"You were not fine."

"-under the false pretense that-"

"It wasn't that false..."

"-you had to use the restroom. Then you turn my hair into some Afro thing—"

"Again, not my fault."

"—so I must ask: What's next? Going through my things and ridiculing me to my face?"

"No! God, Sirius, I'm not like that! You're not in your mum's house anymore!"

"Sure feels like it with you around."

Cassy's eyes widened and she glared at him for a good moment before she pushed back away from the table and stomped out.

Lily rose, too. "Sirius Black, it is one thing entirely to act selfish and depressed when you get an abusive letter from your mother, but it is another thing entirely to take your angst out on someone who is just trying to help you!"

Then she, too, walked out.

Remus opened his mouth to say something, but Sirius cut him off.

"I know, I know," he sighed. "She's right."

"Actually, I wanted to know if you were still interested in your piece of steak."

He handed his plate over to Remus, letting him take what he wanted before sullenly lashing out at the remainder of his potatoes with a spoon.

Cassy was hardly surprised when she discovered it was Remus who had been knocking on the door of the room she was sharing with Lily.

"Greetings and salutations, Meadowes," he said and swept an invisible top hat from his head.

"I was a right idiot for bringing up his mum."

Remus adopted a pensive expression. "Possibly."

"I went way too far with that comment."

"That's probable," he said with a slight incline of his head as he positioned himself at the edge of her bed.

"I should go apologize, shouldn't I? I came here because James said Sirius shouldn't be without friends, and now I'm just being mean."

Remus gazed at his old friend as he considered his possible responses. He wondered briefly if Sirius, or any of the others besides Lily, for that matter, knew just how much their words meant to this young woman. "Well, you did manage to get him out of the bathroom. That was a very positive accomplishment."

"Yeah, why was he trying to drown himself in the bathtub? I mean, as opposed to his normal moping about the house… And all of those vicious attacks he made on his food at dinner—What was that about?"

"You mean, James didn't tell you?"

Cassy shook her head. "It's something to do with his family, isn't it?"

"His, uh, mother—although she hardly merits the description—wrote him a, shall we say, rather cruel letter that he received recently. In the letter, she detailed her plans to groom her son, Regulus, for the Death Eaters, or at least for some illustrious career in the Dark Arts. She also mentioned rather frequently how Sirius was a horrid spot on the Black family name and how she would make certain that he would never find a home with any of relatives so long as he lived. Finally, she revealed how she was absolutely certain that all of his friends were not only Mudbloods and traitors to the wizarding race, but that we are all going to die a terribly slow and torturous death—and if she's lucky, it'll be at the hands of Sirius' certifiably deranged cousin Bellatrix," Remus concluded.

Cassy was unable to suppress a shiver as Bellatrix's name was mentioned. Bellatrix had tormented Cassy during her first year at Hogwarts, and Cassy remembered very clearly the handful of times that Sirius had stepped between her and Bellatrix, helping a classmate he hardly knew if only because he despised his cousin so thoroughly.

"Then my comment about his mother was completely inappropriate," she realized glumly.

Now Remus shook his head. "She was simply being herself. No, I'm fairly certain that Sirius was testing his strengths against a bathtub full of water because of what his mother said about Regulus. He certainly won't admit it, but he adores his younger brother. That's why he's always so cross with him."

Cassy finally uncurled her body from her squished position amongst her pillows. "I'm going to assume you came in here to talk about something other than me and Sirius."

"Yes," he cleared his throat. "I wanted to inform you that, since you were not present for desert, it was not brought to your attention that Sirius has quite the supply of ice cream lurking about in his freezer."

"Does he now?"

"Care for an early evening ice cream raid?"

She scurried forward. "Remus Lupin, I do believe we have ourselves a date with a freezer."

It was late the following day before Cassy could force herself to speak to Sirius. It wasn't that she was afraid of him at all, especially since Remus had talked to her; it was just that ever since their outburst, he hadn't even looked at her, much less said a word to her. She was afraid that somehow, this whole thing had badly affected their friendship. She knocked on the door to the room that he was sharing with James and was thankful that Lily and James could be heard arguing in the kitchen again so that there wouldn't be any interruptions.

"Yeah?"

Timidly, she pushed open the door. "Please say you don't hate me."

"'You don't hate me,'" he replied. He was stretched out on his bed wearing his pajama bottoms and not much else.

Now, had Cassy been any other girl, she probably would have swooned at the sight of his nearly perfectly toned torso, but this was Cassy and she was not part of the Sirius Black Fan Club. She pushed right into the room and sat down in the chair in the corner, completely unruffled by his current state of undress.

"So, I'm sorry—" Cassy began.

"Cass, you didn't do anything wrong," he stopped her. "I was being exactly who you said I was: an egomaniacal git."

"But you're not. I was just joking around. Remus told me about the letter, and I said some stupid things over dinner. You have every right to be mean and surly towards me."

He sat up almost immediately. "I do not."

"Yes, you absolutely do, and I hereby grant those rights to you."

"Well, I do not exercise any of those rights on you," Sirius told her stubbornly.

"Really?" she perked up.

"Really."

"So, then, you're not mad at me at all?"

"Nope."

"Oh, good, because I accidentally finished off the last of the mint chocolate chip ice cream."

"What? How is that an accident?" If there was one thing they both agreed on, it was that mint chocolate chip ice cream was the best in the world.

"Well, I wasn't alone. Remus—"

"I am now going to exercise one of my rights on you!" He announced decisively, standing up.

"Oh? And which right might that be?" she asked, fully ready to spring from the chair and run away, if need be.

"The tickling right," he smirked.

"Oh, no."

Cassy immediately dashed forward out of her seat, covering her sides as she moved. She couldn't get away fast enough, though, and Sirius tackled her to the floor. And seen as how he had landed pretty much on top of her, she doubted that she ever would get away now. Laughing so hard that she could barely breathe, Cassy shouted for him to stop, but he only attacked her ticklish spots more.

Things only got worse when James walked in.

Sirius stopped the tickling and looked up at the intruder from where he was sitting on Cassy.

"Oh. Am I...?" James waved his hands in the air suggestively. Apparently, he was done arguing with Lily.

"No!" Cassy and Sirius both said forcefully.

"Okay!" He held up his hands in defeat and closed the door, leaving the two friends alone again.

Sirius got up off Cassy, who, in turn, sat up.

"I think you should exercise one of your rights on him." She jabbed her thumb at the closed door.

"Strangely, I agree with you, O Ticklish One."

Cassy could only grin.

Author's Note: Bonjour! Thanks for reading the first chapter. We've got a long way to go, so sit tight. And enjoy! Comments, reviews, and all that fun stuff are always welcome!