A/N: For those of you who don't follow me on Twitter: I have braved my insecurities (and my mother's voice) and auditioned for the American musical television show "Glee". I promised my Twitter followers that for every 100 "gold stars" my audition video gets, I would update one of my 2 WIPs. They got me 100 stars in 3 hours.
This update was the least I could do. :-)
For those of you interested in seeing my audition video (and I don't blame you if you're not at all interested), take a look at my Twitter page (the link is on my profile) or take a look at the link on my profile that says "Glee Audition". If you think it's worthy, vote! You can vote as many times as you want, and all you need is a MySpace page.
To all my reviewers: Thanks for the continuous support! Real life is crazy, but you guys make updating so much easier!
AMY - I love you. You're awesome.
Chapter Two – A Brush with the Past
"Who was Sirius dating when you all first left Hogwarts?"
"Pardon?"
"After Hogwarts. When you were first inducted into the Order? Who was Sirius dating?"
"And by dating, you mean…?"
"I'm not speaking a foreign language, Remus. By dating I mean dating."
"Yes, darling, but you're attaching Sirius to that word so I can't help being slightly confused."
Hermione sighed and looked back at the page of notes in her lap. She and Remus had decided to turn in early that night, as most of the house had decided to go out for one reason or another. They had been sitting quietly in bed, Hermione going over her interview notes and Remus reading a report one of his underlings in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures had written regarding the vampire population, when Hermione was reminded of the lost love that was written in her notes and decided to investigate further.
"Sirius wasn't born a playboy, Remus. I'm just trying to get to the bottom of why he does what he does."
"Well, what does he say?"
"He said there was a girl."
Remus glanced at her with an amused arched eyebrow.
"I think he's having a go at you, love. Sirius has never been serious about a girl in his life."
Hermione gave him a look that told him she wasn't amused by his pun, and he gave a chuckle.
"I think you should ask yourself who Sirius didn't date. He had gone through half the Order by Christmas."
Hermione furrowed her eyebrows, thinking.
"Was there anyone that he was close to – friends, that is – other than the three of you?"
Remus shrugged.
"By the end of our first year in the Order, we had lost so many people and gained so many people that James and I stopped paying attention to Sirius's behaviour and concentrated on our own lives."
"But surely you would have noticed if someone had caught Sirius's eye exclusively. I mean, you all were thick as thieves," Hermione pressed.
Remus, who hadn't been paying too much attention to the conversation, seemed to acknowledge that her curiosity would not be abated by a flippant line or two. With a deep, long-suffering sigh, he put the report on the nightstand before wrapping a long arm around her and drawing her close to him.
"Alright, my love, let me think," he said slightly-patronizingly, looking out into space with purpose. "After Lily and James married, Lily insisted on having a weekly Marauder dinner. We were all invited, as well as the women we were dating at the time. That would have been the only opportunity for us to meet anyone that Sirius was "dating" but…" His brow furrowed. "I don't think he ever brought the same person more than once."
"Never? C'mon, Remus, think," she said, turning on her side to watch him intently.
He sighed.
"James and Lily were the only real "couple" in our group, love. I only dated one person during the first war and she…" He trailed off and to Hermione's surprise, she saw the same deep pain in Remus's eyes that Sirius had had earlier.
"She what, Remus?" she asked softly.
As if waking from a reverie, he jolted slightly and turned to her with a small smile.
"She died. She was killed the same summer as James and Lily." Then he sighed. "But in terms of the Marauders, James and Lily were the only stable couple. Sirius, Peter and I usually went stag, but when Marlene and I were together, Sirius took to bringing random girls who he barely acknowledged the entire time. I think he just didn't want to look as desperate as Peter."
Hermione's ears pricked up.
"Marlene? Marlene McKinnon?"
Remus frowned.
"Now how do you know that name?" he asked.
She rolled her eyes.
"Remus, darling, you can't possibly think that I didn't do any research on the Order while I was living here that summer before fifth year, did you?"
He chuckled, shaking his head.
"I suppose I should have known better. But yes, love, Marlene McKinnon."
Hermione's mind was whirring.
"The McKinnons were purebloods, weren't they?"
Remus shrugged.
"I'm not sure. Blood purity wasn't high on the list of conversational topics between us."
"I'm sure they were. Which would mean that they would have been in the Blacks' social circle before the war…"
She trailed off, lost in the admittedly-problematic direction her brain was going. It made a certain amount of sense. The one girl Sirius wanted was – at the time – the only girl his best friend had ever really had feelings for. And with her death, any hope of happiness would have died with her. Especially since he was chucked in Azkaban so soon after.
How the thought of her death must have festered…
"Ouch!"
A sharp jab in her side woke her up to a pair of amused amber eyes, an eyebrow raised in expectation.
"You stopped mid-sentence. What do the McKinnons have to do with the Blacks' social circle?"
She rubbed her side with a pout.
"I was just thinking of something Sirius said this afternoon, that's all."
He sighed, glancing at the papers in her lap.
"You know, a lesser man would get suspicious of his girlfriend's sudden interest in his best friend's love life," he warned.
She smiled slightly, leaning over and giving him a kiss on the cheek.
"Well, we know you're a better man."
She saw him smile and she lay back against the pillows with a small huff of air.
"It's just…this is starting to get a little more complicated and I need confirmation on some details in order to flesh it out. It's always the small details that are particularly important in my books and this one is going to keep me up all night," she declared.
Remus smirked.
"Well," he whispered, sliding down along her body so his lips were right next to her ear, placing soft kisses on the shell and nuzzling her neck when she shivered. "If you're gonna be up all night, I suppose we must find something to keep you occupied."
She let her eyes flutter closed, the parchment on her lap falling noiselessly to the floor as Remus shifted himself over her body. She let her head fall back as his lips journeyed to her neck.
"Hmm…and what do you have in mind, Mr. Lupin?" she asked, feeling her body react to him as his hands caressed down her curves.
"Oh, I'm sure I'll think of something…"
He kissed her deeply and rolled onto his back, bringing her with him and causing her to squeal. With a deep chuckle, he reached over to the side table and with a flick of his wand, the lights went out.
Unbeknownst to the two lovers, a dark figure sat in the corner of the room next door, cigarette to his lips as he listened to the breathless moans of the blissful couple. His eyes were bloodshot – a result of drink and tears. A naked body lay sleeping in the bed, but he paid her no mind.
The sound of Hermione's quiet cry of ecstasy made him shudder with longing, the ash of the cigarette dangling precariously from the burning tip. He closed his eyes, imagining his hands caressing the brilliant bookworm's curves, his palms sliding along her soft alabaster skin. He ignored his best friend's groan, replacing the werewolf in his mind with images of his own body moving against hers, his cock pulsing within her needful body.
The sound of rustling broke him from his fantasy, turning his attention to the stirring body in his bed. He wracked his brain to remember her name. Something ending with an 'i'. It was always something like that, like 'Candi' or 'Tiffani' or 'Staci'.
"Siri?" the saccharine voice said drowsily when she noticed she was in the bed by herself.
"Over here, love," he said from his corner, extinguishing his cigarette before standing and stretching his long, lithe body.
"What are you doing all the way over there, silly?" she teased, her soft brown eyes reflecting the moonlight.
"Couldn't sleep," he replied non-committedly. It was true, but not anything new. Insomnia was the unfortunate by-product of twelve years in Azkaban and an additional five in the dark recesses of the Veil.
"Well, come back to bed. I'm sure we can find a way to tire you out," she said coquettishly, flipping her long, blonde curls over her shoulder and batting her eyelashes.
Sirius returned to the bed, wordlessly slipping in next to her and laying on his back, gazing at the ceiling as he tucked an arm beneath his head.
"Were you thinking about Azkaban?" she asked, propping her head up on her elbow.
He looked at her sharply.
"Why do you think that?" he asked, almost holding his breath in a hop that he dared not entertain.
She opened her mouth as if to say something – and from the sudden spark in her eyes, Sirius was certain she was going to say something intellectual and profound – but in an instant she closed it again. She surveyed him closely before breaking eye contact and shrugging, her manicured nails making tiny circles along his torso.
"Just seems like the kind of thing that would keep you up at night, is all," was all she said.
He frowned.
"That wasn't what you were going to say, was it?"
She looked up at him, surprised that he had found her out.
"I…well…" She took a deep breath. "I suppose it's hard for me to fathom the darkness that you must have to deal with. The psychological ramifications of being around Dementors are still unknown, but not only that, you were in a state of literal nothingness for five years…I just…I'm amazed you aren't mental."
"Who says I'm not?" Sirius mumbled bitterly, more to himself than to her.
She looked at him for a moment longer before heaving a sigh, sitting up.
"I should probably go," she said.
He looked up at her, taking in the pale skin, the halo of blonde curls, the soft brown eyes – so familiar and yet impossibly so. Beauty and brains. They went together so rarely – especially amongst the women that frequented his sheets – that he felt more than a little refreshed by it.
"You don't have to," he said softly. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to get broody."
She chuckled, her hand caressing his cheek.
"Sirius, do you honestly think I hadn't heard about you before I met you last night? You're just a bit vulnerable right now. If I stayed, it would just make the morning all the more awkward."
Before he could speak, she slid off the bed and started getting dressed. He watched her, realizing for the first time that she sincerely was different from the women he brought home. She played dumber than she actually was – a feminine trait that Sirius still didn't understand – but there was a classiness about her that he wasn't used to having around him.
Not in the girls he actually slept with.
The ones he didn't sleep with were a different story altogether.
"So," she said, straightening the skirt of her simple yet understatedly sensual grey jersey dress. "I suppose this is good-bye."
He took a deep breath.
"I'd like to see you again," he said.
She gave a soft smile.
"I don't think that's a good idea."
"It wouldn't be for sex," he clarified. "We could meet up for coffee. To talk."
She gave a little chuckle and dug into her clutch, materializing with a tiny notebook and quill. She wrote something and tore it off the pad, handing it to him.
"I live in Nottingham," she said. "I don't expect you to make a trip all the way up there from London, but if you decide to…" She nodded to the paper and he looked at it, seeing a neatly-written address.
"I might just floo up when you least expect it," he said with a smile.
She laughed.
"I'm a busy woman, Sirius. Write first, yeah?"
He smiled slightly.
"You can bet on it."
She nodded and put the notebook and quill back in her clutch before turning to the mirror to do a final primp. Sirius watched with a slight smile, wondering when the last time a woman had left willingly – especially when he wasn't quite ready for them to go yet.
It had definitely been awhile.
"Alright, Siri," she said, turning to him with a flirtatious wink. "It's been fun."
"Yeah, it has," he said sincerely.
As she turned to leave, he realized that he had never truly remembered her name.
"Oh…um…" he started, trying to figure out an easy way to ask, but she interrupted him with another slight chuckle.
"Amanda," she said. "Mandy, for short. Mandy McKinnon."
Before he could say anything, she walked out of the room. He could hear her heels treading carefully down the stairs and the front door close. He heard the click of those heels – those sexy, fuck-me pumps he had admired through most of small talk they had attempted before abandoning pretence and coming back to the house – on the cobblestones outside before the silence of the night overwhelmed him once more.
Mandy McKinnon.
He tucked the piece of paper away carefully, making a mental note to revisit it when his head had stopped spinning. He hadn't expected the familiarity to materialize into a factual reality. Nor had he expected it when he was still trying to come to terms with his feelings for a similarly brilliant witch.
He lay back, grabbing the pack of cigarettes from the side of the bed and lighting another one.
It didn't matter anyway. She had left. They all left. All the ones worth keeping, anyway. Exhaling a long, thin wisp of smoke, he closed his eyes and counted to ten.
'Bury the past, Sirius,' his inner voice said. 'You've had a brush with it but don't let it get to you. Not again.'
"Easier said than done," he replied aloud, before crushing the partially-smoked cigarette in the ashtray on the bedside table and turning to his side, determined to wake up from the sweet dream – or was it a beautiful nightmare? – of Mandy McKinnon and Hermione Granger.
Thanks for reading! Hope you liked it!