Note: If this chapter is late. It's because I've been strolling through wtfbadromancecovers on tumblr… and in public. I'm at school. That is all

Chapter Eleven
Third Time's the Charm

The day after getting the go ahead from her brother, Sirius made his move. He was reinvigorated, but he wasn't totally sure why. Her brothers had never really been a problem. He never worried about them or what they would do to him. But regardless of the reason, Sirius wanted desperately to get Ophelia to go out with him. And he proceeded to do everything he could think of to get her to agree, and finally she broke down,

"Fine. Last chance, Hogsmeade, no shrieking shack and if it goes sound I will never speak to you again." She snapped at him before turning and walking away. He went back to his dorm to celebrate, only to find a rat on Peter's bed, with Remus trying to coach him back into human form, and James laughing uncontrollably on the bed.

Finally, Sirius though as he woke up Saturday morning. It was time to get ready for his date. He didn't dress up, knowing the Ophelia would just laugh at him for being dressed to the nines. Besides, he knew that he looked good no matter what he wore. He walked out of the school and buttoned up his coat. It was November and it was cold. He waited for Ophelia and after a few minutes she appeared.

She wore pants, it was too cold for anything else, and a warm looking purple coat that brought out her bright blue eyes. He felt his heart pound but he quickly told himself it was because of the cold. Sirius Black didn't do love. He wanted to date her because she had been turning him down. He was going to keep it up until they had a good date.

At least that's what he told himself.

"Ready to go?" She asked when she got to him. The cold had already gotten to her, turning her cheeks and nose red. She shivered and crossed her arms.

"Yeah, let's get you something warm before you freeze to death."

"I have little tolerance for cold. I usually bundle up in the Slytherin Common room." She half joked, walking towards the little village.

"So do I have to find us a little place to hang out where no one will see us?"

"You could, but I won't go there. I need to pick up a few things for Christmas, and seeing as I agreed to this date, you'll just have to go with me." She shrugged. He smiled, he knew, in Ophelia Speak, that was her way of saying she wasn't totally embarrassed to be seen with him. That was something else that drove him crazy. Most girls bragged about dating him, she didn't want anyone to know.

"Speaking of, what do you want for Christmas?" He asked.

"I never tell people." She shook her head. "I prefer to be surprised and if I don't like it, then that's one less thing to clutter my room." She looked at him and smiled. "My brother says that's a very cold way to think, but I like for people to have to really think about my Christmas presents, thinking about what I would like." She shrugged.

"That makes zero sense." Sirius informed her.

"I don't care. As a human being, it is my right to not make any sense."

"Yeah, you're exercising that right, maybe a little too much." He smiled at her and she shoved him. He stumbled a bit and laughed, walking back over to her. They walked into the little town and she led him to Honeydukes. She bought herself a couple bags of candy and he bought a couple things, making mental notes of what she bought, because it meant she liked it.

She walked out of the candy shop and looked back at him. "What about you, do you have any special Christmas requests?" She asked.

"No, if you won't tell me, then I won't tell you." He smiled. "You'll just have to surprise me."

"Alright." She nodded. She already knew what she was going to buy him. It was just a matter of finding it. "You probably won't get it until after Christmas unless you go to the Christmas balls." In the Pureblood circles there were about six or seven balls held around Christmas, her family's was one of them.

"Well I might just have to wait until after Christmas. I avoid those balls like the plague." He informed her. She just shrugged, she wasn't going to fight with him about it.

"Fine, I'll make sure you get it when we get back."

"I don't even think I'm going home for the holidays. I usually don't. Unless James leaves, and Remus leaves." He didn't really plan to stay around just to hang out with Peter. No one wanted to actually spend any one on one time with the boy. Remus put up with it in potions but always complained that Peter was utterly useless and usually managed to mess something up that Remus would have to fix in order to keep them both from failing, or killing whatever the potion was fed to.

"Well why don't you go to James's?" She asked.

"I don't want to be a burden to his parents. They've always been really nice to me and I don't want to ruin their family Christmas." She stared at him a moment. Was that Sirius who just said he didn't want to be annoying? She had to have heard wrong. "Let's get something to eat, I'm starving." He nodded.

"Alright." She shrugged and the moment was over, he was back to the Sirius she'd always known. They found a place to eat, Restaurants were few and far between out in Hogsmeade, where most just went home to eat. But they had a couple of places.

after eating their lunch, the two of them just walked around for a while before finding a place to sit down and just talk.

"So, have you heard anything about Regulus and what we overheard?"

"So you do acknowledge that you heard something?" He asked.

"Sirius." She sighed. "I never denied hearing anything. I just didn't want to get involved." He shook his head.

"Yeah, I know." He didn't want to fight with her about it again. "No I haven't heard anything about it. No action was taken, Regulus hasn't brought it up and Dumbledore certainly isn't about to tell me anything if he heard it." Sirius hated that he wasn't able to see his brother be taken down for his bigoted ways, but he would settle for waiting until they had solid proof. Because the more he thought about it, his mum would have freaked out and probably turned her psycho-wrath on the school if Regulus had been punished based solely on the testimony of the son she hated.

Because there was not a doubt in Sirius's mind that his mother hated him. She never out and out said it because she didn't need to, they both knew it.

"Well if there is anything to be found, Dumbledore would find it."

"Would he?"

"What do you mean?"

"I know Dumbledore takes this seriously, but I don't think he'd want to hear that a fourteen year old is running with Voldemort, especially a fourteen year old in his school." Ophelia thought about that.

"Well the alternative is to ignore it and let Regulus recruit people all over the school. And I don't think he would want that. So I disagree with you. I think, if there is something to be found, Dumbledore will find it and take care of the problem. " Sirius just shrugged.

"I hope you're right." He said. He didn't hold much faith anyone though, especially when it came to Regulus. He'd gotten away with so much and in Sirius's life, the people around him tended to prefer Regulus, because he was the perfect on. All because he believed that ridiculous idea that purebloods were better. He looked at Ophelia and reached out, moving her hair out of her eyes. She looked up at him, a bit surprised and smiled.

"Is that one of your moves?" She asked.

"What?"

"One of your moves that leaves girls' knees weak and convinces them to date you even though you've got a trail of broken hearts behind you?"

"You're here on a date with me despite my broken heart trail."

"Yeah well, as my brothers like to remind me, I have no sense of self preservation." She shrugged. He gave her a half smile.

"Yeah? And now you listen to what your brothers say?"

"Not if I can avoid it. But once in a blue moon something they say imbeds itself in my head and I realize they're not totally wrong on that fact, though ninety percent of the time, they are very, very wrong." She shrugged. He laughed and held a hand out to help her up. She took it and pulled herself up, brushing off the back of her pants.

"We should head back to the castle, it's getting colder." He noted. She nodded in agreement and walked with him back to the castle.

"If you weren't a Gryffindor, what house do you think you'd be in?" She asked.

"Ravenclaw." He answered. She shook her head.

"No, I think you'd be a Slytherin." He glared at her.

"I would never be a Slytherin."

"there is nothing wrong with being a Slytherin. I don't get why everyone hates us so much."

"Most Slytherins are prejudice, cocky little wankers."

"Thanks." She deadpanned.

"Most." He repeated.

"That's not their house that does it though. And Cockiness is a trait for all the houses, except maybe Hufflepuff. You Gryffindors can be right gits, look at yourself and James. And Ravenclaws are the same way, but they're cockier about their knowledge. And we're not all prejudice." She added. "One can be a bigot and not in Slytherin. I think you would have made a great Slytherin." She shrugged. She liked her house and she found it really annoying when people said bad things about the Slytherins. The other houses had just as many flaws.

"James and I are not cocky." He argued.

"You are the most cocky person I have ever met in my life Sirius." She looked at him. "Sometimes it seems a bit put on. No one is actually that full of themselves." He frowned, thinking about that. No one had ever said that to him before. No one noticed if he was faking his good mood, well James did, but he learned to. He had spent enough time with Sirius to notice things like that. He shook his head.

"Nope, I really am that cocky, it's hard not to be when you're this awesome." He smiled at her. She didn't smile back.

"I'm not stupid Sirius. I notice a lot more than people give me credit for. You claim people can't hurt you. That what your family does doesn't get to you. But I see it, every time your mum sends Regulus a care package. I see the look." She informed him.

"I wasn't aware you paid so much attention to me." He said.

"it's hard not to, you're just so captivating." She shrugged. He grinned, sincerely.

"You're so strange." He informed her.

"Thanks." She said as they walked up to the castle. He stopped her from going in, leaning in close to her.

"Sometimes it sucks, my own parents hating me, but the alternative is acting like them to make them love me and I could never do that." He shook his head. "I have to be myself, no matter what my parents think."

"But you're not always being yourself if you have to put on a mask of happiness." She looked up at him.

"Well it's easier to do that than having people ask me what's wrong. Because they never really want to know.

"Some of us do." She argued with him. He looked at her a moment more, and then leaned down, kissing her. Her lips were cold and a bit chapped but that didn't bother him in the least. After a moment they warmed up, just in time for her to pull back.

"I've wanted to do that since our first date." He smiled and turned to walk away, leaving her standing there. After he was gone, a small smile formed on her lips and she turned to walk into the castle.