Eugh. Real Life is getting in the way of my fictional existence. Sorry about that.

Okay, So I know that everything is a tad confusing at the moment, a lot of my reviews are questions such as "Who is Harry with?" "whats going on?" etc… Just to clarify, this amount of confusion is intentional. I'm an evil writer but I like keeping people in the dark. Insert evil laugh.

Anyway, hopefully the plot is going to be moving on a little faster now. Hope ths next bit is up to scratch, and thank you millions for all the reviews and subscriptions.

And thank you to all my lovely reviewers who have stayed with this story despite my sporadic updates. I want to sleep with you all.

Standing at the edge of the lobby, eyes narrowed critically, Sirius paused before walking in the direction of the front desk. Despite having been reintegrated into society since his rescue from the hell-hole that was vitae Lacus, he still wasn't comfortable in large, crowded spaces. It also didn't help that every movement felt like a conscious effort to restrain himself from ripping apart the next person who looked sickeningly happy.

He hadn't always been like this he reflected as a random passerby beamed at him for no reason. He could remember when he had been one of the most carefree and cheerful person he knew. He could remember when smiling and laughing had been incontrollable expressions of joy, finding amusement and mischief in the simplest of pursuits. He could remember being willing to help friends with whatever they needed and never requiring anything in return. He could remember what it was like to have people whose company he enjoyed, who he could confide in and have inside jokes with.

Now, the presence of most people felt grating, like sandpaper being dragged across his skin. The world was a little less colourful, the sound of laughter made him cringe, the endless murmur of the world around him felt suffocating rather than liberating. The rage that encompassed his heart and coated his skin seemed to rule him rather than motivate him. His actions were now designed to hurt, his words intending to wound, repentance never making an appearance.

"He's come back wrong, He's come back wrong, He's come ba-"

Sometimes (although he'll never admit it), he repeats the phrase he wrenched from her mind, that day that she realised how different (how wrong) he'd become.

To tell the truth though, he suspects (he knows) that he's been this way for a long time. His time in Azkaban had already broken him, just a little (just a lot), so all the subsequent time in the veil did was expose the cracks already there.

Instinct makes him hide this piece of himself from everyone (from himself) and pretend to be the same happy-go-lucky man-boy he was before the war.

Conscious thought makes him slip that tiny note of threat into the scarce words he speaks, sliding the words out slowly, caressing each syllable with the prolepsis of danger.

The curls of his face form a smirk that's too arrogant to be comfortable but the woman (the girl) behind the desk doesn't seem to care. She looks at him from underneath her eyelashes, pushing her chest out and smiling coyly. She isn't looking in his eyes, her gaze is raking over his body appreciatively, which is probably why she isn't cowed by the ice that slinks across his eyes.

Her tongue sweeps unnecessarily over her bottom lip before she speaks to him but he flicks his attention to her eyes instead. The pale lack of depth that he seems only reinforces his distaste for her. The emptiness he can see isn't from the careful disguise of her thoughts, this twenty-something woman isn't hiding, she's just barely lived, just a girl masquerading as an adult.

His lip curls, her coy expression falters and for a second, just for a second; he wants to shake the shallowness out of her.

He wants to force the connection that he craves with another human into her, cram knowledge and pain and sensation into the empty shell that is her head. He wants to try and create the companionship that sex replaces with this soulless template of a person. This fragile clay that he could mould into a person he could stand to be around.

And then she laughs nervously.

The hazy thought process fades, the possibilities he has been entertaining crumble and the derision in his face melts back into the smooth expression of neutrality.

He is careful to keep his voice light and expressionless as he lounges across the counter to put the girl at ease.

"Don't suppose you could point the way to Hermione Granger's office could you?"

Dying for a coffee, must remember to stop by Flourish and Blotts on my way home, Mary said she wanted that book with the pink co- daughter, Rosy , aged ni- no, Shouldn't feel guilty, what they don't know ca-

"So why do you think you are a good candidate for this role Mr Kazchinsky?" Hermione asked smoothly, narrowing her eyes and focusing her search.

I'm going to end it soon, it's not like it means anything, besides It's not like I'm sleeping with anyone sh-

"Thank you for coming in today Mr Kazchinsky." Hermione smiled to remove the sting of interrupting his explanation of his previous job. She reached out and shook his hand. "We have everything we need."

She shuffled the papers on the table in front of her and stood. The man across from her stood as well looking slightly nonplussed. She briefly shook hands with him before exiting, leaving him standing in the interview room with a rather lost expression on his face.

"He's having an affair." Hermione handed over the file to Kingsley as the door slid shut behind her. "That's the only thing of interest I found in there."

"but?" Kingsley prodded, hearing the subtext in her voice and thumbing through the file idly. "What's your recommendation?"

"Don't hire him." She answered immediately, elaborating when Kingsley quirked an eyebrow. "He has too much of a conscience which, not only makes him scream 'guilty', but also means that he may find some aspects of the job a little too indelicate."

"What else?"

Hermione's mouth twisted into a sardonic half-smile. "Who said there was anything else?"

"Well if he was just too vanilla for the job, your would advise I simply beat it out of him – What's holding you back?"

Hermione took the file he was holding out to her and paused for a minute. "He's screwing over the woman he loves." She pointed out coolly at last. "What makes you think he would think twice about doing the same to the company he works for?"

Kingsley chuckled as her words sunk in, turning to call after her retreating back. "You really don't trust anyone do you?"

"Nope. That's what you pay me for."

Heels clicking on the stone floor of the corridor, Hermione made her way back down to her office, nodding hello and accepting files from people as they passed her.

"Thank you Kate" Hermione nodded to her secretary and scanned the piece of parchment she had been handed.

"Also, Miss Lovegood stopped by, she wanted to know if you were free for drinks tonight?" Kate handed Hermione another stack of files and took the ones in her hand from her.

"Send her an owl saying yes – here hand me back that file…no the one on top, yeah that one – and can you notify the auror department that I need to see the senior staff by the end of the day?"

Hermione turned to enter her office but ground to a halt when she saw a head of spiky black hair sitting across from her desk through the glass door.

"KATE!"

Kate came hurrying back looking slightly terrified. "Yes Miss Granger?"

"Why is there a man in my office?"

"well..I - you said that Mr Potter could be let in whenever – "

"That's Harry?" Hermione interrupted looking relived.

"Well…yes, er, who else were you expecting?"

Hermione stared at her for a second. "No one." she said eventually. "Make sure the auror department know that I mean before my end of the day, not theirs."

Kate nodded and walked back to her own desk.

"Harry!" Hermione greeted him brightly with a one armed hug as she deposited the stack of parchment in her hand on her desk.

She's vaguely aware that he squeezes her a little harder than usual and the hard bulk of the muscles in his arms feel a little more threatening than comforting today. She situates herself in her chair behind her desk, gesturing for Harry to take a seat as well, choosing to file away the tangible undertone of darkness in their greeting away as a misunderstanding. His green eyes are looking at her expectantly, as if waiting for her to say something and she's suddenly afraid that maybe, the mind-reader is a step behind everyone else, that she's missed something vital.

She licks her lips. "How are you?"

She nearly winces at the dark look that flickers through his eyes and for just a second, she thinks that her childhood companion looks a lot like his godfather, the man she's desperately trying destroy.

"Hermione." He croons her name softly, as if he's comforting her, but his fingertips are digging too forcefully into his palms for their to be any sweetness to the syllables.

All too suddenly she realises where this is going and the crisis averter inside her attempts to shift the mood. She stands up suddenly.

"I know what you're going to say." She inhales deeply for a minute and runs her fingers shakily through her hair. "I can explain."

He tilts his head and looks at her through narrow eyes. The terrible feeling that she has underestimated him steals through her bones. She hasn't felt this unsure of herself since Hogwarts, not since being the top of the class was her only priority, not since she was trying desperately to keep herself together and save the world at the same time.

She swallowed.

"I did arrange for Pansy to leave-" Now she does wince. "-permanently. But I only did because she was using you. All she wanted was a by-line, she didn't want you."

"Snape."

"Yeah." She was slightly disturbed to see not a flicker of emotion on her best friend's face.

"But she didn't get that from me." Harry pointed out calmly. "So if all she wanted was a by-line, I clearly wasn't being useful enou-"

"She was cheating on you as well." Hermione interrupted him with the childish enthusiasm of a student who knew the right answer. "She was sleeping with someone else, that's how she got the tip. I know you cared about her and I figured it would be best if-"

"I don't care about her." Harry stated it as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Hermione blinked. "What?"

"I can't even remember her last name."

"Wha-?" The temptation to slide her mind across the side of his head and find out what he was thinking was growing stronger by the second.

"She mentioned it once. Didn't stick."

"So what were you doing with her?"

"Just hanging. No big deal." Harry stood as well, tucking his hands into the pockets of his jeans and staring back at her levelly.

"So, you aren't pissed that I extradited your girlfriend?" Hermione asked stupidly.

Harry shook his head and smiled crookedly at her. The breath left her lungs in a sharp sigh of relief. She glanced down and straightened some papers on her desk. When she looked up however, Harry had planted his hands on her desk and was leaning forward slightly looking more menacing than she had ever seen him.

"What I am, is pissed you extradited my fiancé, pissed you carry on keeping secrets from us all, pissed you won't just break up with Ron because it will ruin your image, and pissed that you don't feel the need to explain why you were in my Godfather's bedroom at 3:00am last night." She flinches as he finished spitting the words at her, suddenly feeling very small and kicking herself mentally for thinking that she could do all of this on her own.

She opens her mouth to apologise or maybe excuse herself but he rocks his weight back on his heels and holds up a hand to silence the words that are halfway out of her throat.

"You're playing God with our lives Hermione." There's a clear warning in his tone. "You'd better sort it out."

He turns and leaves without giving her a second glance, like she's nothing,

The hand she brings up to touch her forehead is shaking. Before she can fully collect herself there's a slight movement from the corner of her office and the door swings shut again as a new person enters.

She glances up from underneath her fingers to see the one person that could take this volatile situation and blow it all to hell.

He's giving her that look again, the one where his eyes follow every curve of her body, the one that's riddled with longing and salaciousness. The one that's behind every taunt, every insult, every insinuation he's ever made to her. The one that always catches her these days, the one that she can feel in the pricking on the back of her neck and the shiver down her spine.

Suddenly, she's angry. She angry and she's tired and she just so damn frustrated.

She's furious that everywhere she turns there's someone to ridicule or negate or condemn her for actions that she does ultimately do with good intentions. She's so full of rage that her life is full of men that treat her like she's something to capitalise on.

Ask not what you can do for Hermione. Ask what Hermione can do for you.

Before she realises that she's been slowly walking closer to Sirius and that his attempts to get her attention have failed to penetrate the thick, muggy feeling surrounding her, she's already curled her fingers around his collar.

His back hits the door of her office and she takes a split second to relish the look of shock on his face before she stands on tiptoes and kisses him.

She knows that there really isn't any logic to kissing a man because you're angry at their entire species. But really, there is. You see, this isn't a kiss for him, this isn't a kiss that's mutually pleasurable. The only person who gains anything from this kiss is her.

At the first press of her lips, she abandons any pretence of sweetness and savagely bites down on his lower lip. The tang of blood hits her tongue at the same time that his fingers twist deep into her hair and tug viciously. He twists her head round and opens his mouth to deepen the angle. It's a slow kiss, her tongue drags along the side of his painfully languidly, but its forceful and her nails are leaving crescent shaped marks in the skin above the collar of his shirt.

She also knows that she's noticing these specific details because she doesn't want to think about the fact that really, this kiss is amazing. Its her anger and his bitterness and both their panic, but as Sirius sucks violently on her tongue, she can't help but acknowledge the tingling down her spine. She just can't ignore the spirals of goodness that irradiate from the hand splayed across the small of her back.

Suddenly, she pushes him away, dragging a hand across her mouth, partly to remove any trace of his saliva and partly to disguise the fact that she's panting.

"What was that?" His words fall sharply across her ears as she turns away, forcing his hands to reluctantly drop her, and rapidly puts her desk between them.

She knows he won't leave until he gets an answer so she tries to word one that won't sound desperate.

He's moved away from the wall now and is standing the other side of her desk with his arms folded, the muscles of his biceps tense underneath the leather of his jacket. His eyes are dark and half aroused, his hair looks like she ran her fingers through it. Maybe she did. She doesn't really remember.

He has a smudge of her lipstick very subtly in the corner of his mouth and to her surprise, it doesn't actually look silly. She admits with a stab of anger, that she rather likes leaving a mark on him. She'd rather like to leave some more.

"Hermione?" His voice is reaching the silky tone that normally precedes some sort of manhandling. "What was that?"

"It was…" She bites her lip and gazes at him, her mind snapping back to the feels that motivated her to go after one of the best kisses of her life.

Suddenly, she starts to laugh. She starts to laugh hard. Sirius looks nonplussed as her raucous giggles get progressively more uncontrollable.

"That was a 'Screw you' to the patriarchy." She chokes the words out around the manic hilarity gushing from her mouth, struggling to stay upright as her belly starts to ache from her mirth.

She laughs.

Because if she doesn't laugh, she'll cry.

Brownie points if you can spot the Gilmore Girls reference.

As always, thank you for reading.

Nix. x