Lucilla

It felt weird to be passing everyone their timetables at breakfast. I still wasn't used to the authority of being a prefect. I could even give detentions if I wanted to.

It looked like I had my very first chance to hand out a detention right now. Sirius Black was heading over to our table, and he didn't look pleased.

"REG!" he shouted, grabbing him by the collar and pinning him to the wall. "What's this I hear about you fucking my Marlene?"

I dropped the glass I was holding. Pain twisted and shot it's way up from the pit of my stomach through to my chest. I hadn't realised I felt so strongly for Regulus Black.

"It's not true!" he gasped, struggling for air, as Marlene McKinnon herself arrived.

"Sirius, let him go, it's not true!" she snapped at him, trying to pull him off.

"Then I want to know why he's telling everyone," he snarled.

"He's not," I said blankly, not realising what I was doing. "He's never said that."

"Who the fuck are you?" McKinnon rounded on me.

"I'm no one," I said hurriedly.

"I'm going to hex the shit out of him," she growled, pulling out her wand.

"What on earth is going on?" Professor McGonagall had arrived. "Black, let him go. Detention! Twice in two days Black! I want to see you in my office. Detention for you too, McKinnon."

Sirius let Reg go, gave him a filthy look, and stormed off. Reg rubbed his neck where Sirius had gotten hold of him.

"Reg?" I asked quietly. He turned abruptly and stalked out of the Great Hall. I ran out after him, finally catching up with him after he'd sat down at the lake.

"I don't like what he turns me into," Reg said suddenly, after a few minutes of silence. "He makes me so angry, then I just forget everything else and I can only focus on one thing." He turned to me. "I promise, I've never slept with her. I've barely even spoken to her since third year. I expressed an interest in her once and she made it perfectly clear that she didn't want to know."

He sounded like he was pleading with me. Why was what I thought so important?

My thoughts must have shown on my face, because he laughed, a hollow laugh without any real humour. "You don't see yourself very clearly at all, do you? You don't know the mere effect your presence has on me. You make me want to be a better person... a better man."

"I believe you," I said, once I'd found the words. "About McKinnon. Not about me."

"Why not?"

"Why would you even mean any of that?" I asked. "Look at me! I blend into the background. I'm not clever or witty or even really that special to look at."

That was when he kissed me.

It wasn't gentle. It was like a forceful ball of energy when he grabbed the back of my neck and firmly planted his lips on mine. I hesitated for a moment, before kissing him back.

"You see what you do to me?" he whispered after we'd broken apart. "It pisses me off so much that you can't see how special you are to me, you wind me up so much that I just had to give in and kiss you and it shouldn't have been like that at all."

"How should it have been then?" I asked him.

His hands didn't touch me this time. He leaned in slowly, his grey eyes on my lips, and kissed me gently and tenderly.

"You deserve the best, and I'm going to be the best. For you."

After that, we were a real couple. Not many people knew, as we only ever kissed or held hands in private. But we studied together, sat together in classes, and were always in each others company.

Christmas was coming up and my mother had written to me to remind me of the Malfoy Christmas ball that we held every year, hinting at inviting Reg to stay for a few days over the holiday.

Why don't you invite him mother, and while you're at it, invite his whole bloody family, I thought irritatedly to myself one morning while sipping my (black) coffee. They always came anyway, I didn't see what difference it would make. Today was a Saturday, and I was to meet my mother in Hogsmeade and travel with her to Madam Malkin's in Diagon Alley to get my dress for the ball fitted. I knew she'd throw a fit if I turned up without make up on so I applied it carefully that morning, choosing my clothes carefully, as it was cold, but I had to look presentable and respectable. Upholding the family name was so exhausting sometimes.

I met her at ten o' clock sharp, with Alecto and Cal, and Reg came to see me off.

"Mother, this is Regulus Black," I introduced him, and he bowed respectfully, while Cal and Alecto giggled in the background.

After a few minutes of small talk, we Flooed from a back room of the Three Broomsticks into Diagon Alley. Usually we apparated, but with so many of us unlicensed, it made more sense to travel by Floo Powder.

Mother had chosen my dress, of course, and I disappeared to change, while Alecto and Cal browsed.

"Sweet Circe," Alecto gasped as I stepped out. "You could model, you know that?"

I giggled. "Don't be ridiculous."

Madam Malkin pinned my dress to the correct size. "You've grown three inches and lost two dress sizes. What on earth have you been doing?"

My mother nodded approvingly at me. "Take a look, darling."

I spun to look in the mirror. I was wearing a smoky grey dress, strapless and tight at the bust and waist, but loose with a feathery texture from the top of the hips, flowing down to my feet, where Madam Malkin was currently directing the pins into place for the hem with her wand.

"Shoes!" Cal squealed from somewhere.

"Oh yes, shoes!" My mother gasped, as if she'd completely forgotten about them. Madam Malkin flicked her wand and two boxes zoomed forwards.

"It's a good job you mentioned them, Mrs Malfoy. Here are two pairs that match Miss Malfoy's dress; a pair of ballet slippers, which ought to be more comfortable for an evening of dancing with her beau, or a pair with a small heel, which I can place cushioning charms in."

"Merlin, don't get the heels," Cal wrinkled her nose. "They're disgusting."

"You don't want to end up taller than Reg," Alecto added.

"He's over 6 feet!" I said, exasperated. "May I try them both, please?"

It was a unanimous vote in the end to go with the ballet slippers.

"Darling, you look so beautiful," my mother had tears in her eyes.

"I remember when you came in here before you began at Hogwarts," Madam Malkin reminisced. "You were barely five feet tall, and you'd outgrown your robes by November!"

"She's grown up so fast," Mother sobbed. Alecto and Cal rolled their eyes and I disappeared to change back into my clothes.