1 YEAR LATER

A lot had happened in the last 4 hours; I had floo'd over to Lucy's apartment after realising that I was late and had been for two months now. Lucy, ever the rational friend, managed to calm me down long enough for us to run the test and we sat together, waiting for the test to work. Merlin, I'd almost broken her hand by tightening my hold on it when the potion turned blue. She'd proceeded to hug me close as I broke down into tears caused by just how unexpected this all was. Rowena, two months – two months I had actually been with Sirius! How was this even possible!

Once I'd managed to calm myself down enough to talk, I'd told Lucy that I needed a few days to think about how to tell Sirius – if I was even going to tell him. She had been supportive, up until she'd heard that I might even end up keeping it one big secret from my boyfriend and then from that point, it was impossible to hold her back. She stormed right over to the fireplace and floo'd directly to the apartment Sirius shared with his friends.

Her actions had been so quick that I hadn't processed what she was planning on doing until it was too late. I sat anxiously waiting until Lucy returned, followed shortly by all four of the marauders.

My eyes widened at the sight of them, and I looked towards Lucy who rolled her eyes and explained, "Apparently they didn't trust me enough to only send him." By him, she meant my boyfriend who was busy brushing the soot off his clothes as he scanned the room.

The moment Sirius's eyes settled on me, the blood drained from his face. I sniffled quietly, wondering just how I was going to say anything now. Rowena, what was I going to do! I was too young to become a mother and I guess it was only a small mercy that I'd found out after we left Hogwarts. Even if we had only left Hogwarts a week ago. Merlin, this was all so hopeless. I hadn't even found a job yet. I couldn't even support myself, how was I going to support another person!

"Babe," Sirius called out gently, crouching down in front of me and taking my hands in his. "Have you been crying? What's going on? What's the emergency?"

I sniffled again, pulling my hands out of Sirius's. Rummaging beneath the blanket for the potion, I held the small vial out towards Sirius and his eyes flickered cautiously towards it. His eyebrows furrowed in confusion and I felt stupid for expecting him to immediately know what the potion was for. But, for some reason, I just couldn't bring myself to say the words.

Sirius took the vial, looking between it and me. "What is this? Babe? Why aren't you saying anything?"

"It's a pregnancy test," Lucy piped up, exasperated by my continued silence.

Two things happened at once; Sirius froze whilst James burst out into laughter, managing to say between his laughter that he wasn't even surprised. Sniffling again, I looked around the room to find that James had collapsed onto one of the sofas in his laughter. Peter, poor Peter, looked overwhelmed by the news as if he was the father. And as for Remus, he didn't seem to know which to do first; silence James, reassure Peter that this didn't affect him, hex Sirius out of his stupor or comfort me.

Lucy, perched on the armrest beside me, looked down at Sirius with barely concealed irritation. "You've managed to knock her up so you'd better do right by the pair of them Black, or else I'll render you unable to even think about having another kid."

"Sirius!" I whined, kicking him when he remained unresponsive. The kick seemed to do the trick. He blinked out of his daze, looking up at me in shock and Merlin, the smile that started to grow on his face would have taken my breath away from me if it wasn't so very annoying. "How did this happen?"

"You should know," he said with an incredulous chuckle. "You were there."

"I just – I thought you'd be better at the contraceptive charm," I said with a sigh, not knowing what else to say.

"I spent a year chasing after you," he shot back, rising to his knees to hug me. I was reluctant to let him hug me and actually tried to push him away. But he held on firm and soon enough, I melted against him and hugged him close. Breathing in his calming scent, I let out a deep breath. "I didn't exactly have any time to practice the charm, love."

"What are we going to do now?" I asked against his shoulder, relaxing a little more when he started to rub his hands up and down my back in soothing circles. "This isn't some Pygmy Puff Sirius, it's a baby."

"We'll be fine," he assured me, drawing away from me and squeezing my shoulders comfortingly. "Trust me."

"That's what you said when I offered to cast the spells instead," I grumbled, scoffing when the corner of his lips curled up into a small smile.

Rising to his feet, Sirius turned towards James who finally had managed to compose himself. "If you've stopped laughing you tosser, you'll probably know the answer to what I want to ask. How long do you think it'll take to get a marriage licence?"

"Marriage licence," I cut in incredulously, rising to my feet and sharing a look with Lucy.

"A week at the earliest," James said after a moment's thought as if I wasn't protesting in the background. "A month at the latest. You can drop by the ministry tomorrow Padfoot."

"That's not what we're doing," I protested, my words falling on deaf ears.

"Don't worry love." Sirius reached out to wrap an arm around my waist and looked curiously down at me. "How far along are you?"

"Two months," I said cautiously, not seeing why that was important.

"I've still got seven months to convince you."