You Leave Me Breathless

By Lily Orange

Upon entrance into her sixth year at Hogwarts, Isabel Willoughby decides she is sick of her friend Sirius Black's incessant love games with all the girls in their year – her solution? To play Sirius at his own game, by creating the whole new persona of Amanda through the excessive use of Polyjuice Potion. However, as Isabel lets Amanda get incredibly close to Sirius – she finds herself slowly, but surely, falling in love with him...

A story of romance, friendship and humour

"Friendship often ends in love; but love in friendship – never." - Charles Caleb Colton

A/N: Merry Christmas (for yesterday, but it's still Christmas!)! Thank you to Stephie Cat-Kat, Ivy G., NovemberDreamer, wiatch, ClaireMarieCullen, vanillabean18, Flicka200, Rhiannon da crazygirl, vampire-luver101, Freya-Rhianna, sarlovesoccer and LaughingAngelsGibberish for your reviews; thank you to NovemberDreamer for adding my story to your favourites and thank you to NovemberDreamer, kraenky and for adding my story to your alert subscriptions! I hope you like this chapter, please review!

Chapter Fourteen

Can't Touch This

Isabel was angry. There was no way she was talking to Sirius now, after he questioned what she was doing with Jonas. It's not like it was anything more serious than a kiss! Why was he so bloody bothered?

Though she was so angry, she couldn't help the pangs of guilt she got when she remembered the things she had said to him. She winced, and thought that it was quite unfair for her to say stuff like that to the person who was supposedly her best friend. And she was angry at him for things he had said to a person who didn't technically exist. Why was she bothered? She was going out with Jonas, so it didn't matter. He thought she was pretty. He didn't think kissing her felt incestuous (she hoped).

Every time she thought she had decided to apologise and make up with Sirius, her anger flared up again as she remembered the things he said, and the way he was so unreasonable when he found her and Jonas.

"He is a stupid prat," Isabel hissed to herself.

"Sorry, Miss Willoughby, what was that?" Professor Griffin asked. He was teaching the class about non-verbal spells and it wasn't the easiest thing to master. So far Isabel had accidentally set Lily's hair on fire (but it was put out quickly and it didn't look much different – except the ends were slightly singed...) and turned the parchment in front of her into a chicken. Nobody else was having much luck either.

"Nothing, Professor, sorry," she apologised profusely – instead of taking in what he was saying (normally she spent all of the time in class taking extensive notes of everything that was said) she was arguing with herself in her mind about whether to make up with Sirius or not. The resounding answer, though admittedly stubborn and obstinate, was no.

"It's quite alright, Miss Willoughby, though don't do it again," he warned. "Now, non-verbal spells are definitely advantageous in situations such as duelling. Why would that be?"

Determined to redeem herself, Isabel's hand shot up in the air.

"Yes, Miss Willoughby?"

"The opposition cannot tell what spell you are using, and whether you are using one at all, so can cause a state of confusion and surprise, giving you the advantage," Isabel recited.

"Excellent, five points to Gryffindor. Couldn't have put it better myself," Professor Griffin smiled. "So – split up into pairs, and practice casting simple spells non-verbally and see if you can attempt to block them or guess what they are."

Quickly, the class split into pairs. Isabel was too slow to go with Lily – whose arm was immediately grasped by a cheekily grinning James – so paired up with Remus. Jonas didn't take Defence Against the Dark Arts, for some reason, so she hadn't the option of partnering with him. Remus shot an apologetic look at Sirius, who was left with Peter.

After a few tries, Isabel stamped her foot in exasperation – something, by the look on his face, Remus wanted to do too but was too controlled. "This is so frustrating!" she hissed. "I can't get any of my spells to work."

"Me either," Remus agreed, sitting down on the desk behind him. Isabel sat down beside him, twirling her wand in her fingers agitatedly.

Isabel looked at Sirius – he was laughing and joking with Peter, who was concentrating so hard his face was purple. Merlin, Sirius was annoying. Couldn't he take anything seriously? Schoolwork was not a joke.

Isabel didn't know why she did it, but first she was staring at him, and then, as quick as a flash of rogue lightening, she thought of it – "Levicorpus!"

And, a nanosecond later, Sirius was upside down in the air.

"Who did that?" Sirius asked, flapping his arms widely giving him the appearance of a baby bird who didn't know how to fly. Isabel's eyes widened in shock – did she do that? Non-verbally?

"Um, Isabel? You look kind of shocked..." Remus asked.

"I think I just did that!" Isabel confided. Remus laughed loudly.

"Excellent spell, brilliant execution," he commented good-naturedly as Professor Griffin said the counter-curse and Sirius was back on the ground.

"Thanks," Isabel said bashfully. "I didn't mean too – he's just made me so angry and I couldn't help it! Merlin I'm like a spell-casting machine! Oh dear Merlin..." she said, whacking her head repeatedly off the table.

"Okay, Isabel, stop. You don't want to injure yourself, and your brain, now, do you?" he said, patting her on the back soothingly. "Why exactly are you mad at Sirius?"

"Did he not tell you about the events of Saturday night?" Isabel asked in surprise – Sirius would usually divulge everything to his fellow Marauders; well, always to James, most of the time to Remus as he was wise and would give a good perspective on things, and some of the time to Peter as he never really had anything wise to say about anything, except perhaps food.

Remus shook his head. "All I know is that he went off to find Amanda, and then he stormed back into the common room about an hour later and straight up to his dorm without drinking any more Firewhisky."

"Well... he kind of caught me kissing Jonas in an empty classroom," Isabel admitted, her face reddening. "And we sort of argued about... well, primarily what I was doing. He asked me what on earth I was doing and I told him it was none of his business and it kind of... progressed from there. Eventually I kind of, erm..."

"Go on," Remus prompted kindly.

"I kind of accused him of being a slut and of not being a virgin," Isabel cringed, "it was only because he was being really unreasonable and everything and I just can't believe I said it! And then he said I didn't have the decency to tell him why I wasn't talking to him in the first place and then proceeded to tell me to go and tart about with my boyfriend. I don't know why he was so bloody bothered!"

"Well... okay. Firstly, why won't you tell him why you aren't talking to him?" Remus asked calmly.

"I can't do that," Isabel said quickly. "I can't tell anybody! It's stupid but it means a lot to me and I can't explain it."

"Can't you just forgive him? It's kind of annoying to hear him go, 'Oh my Merlin, Isabel is still not talking to me! I wish she'd tell me what the bloody problem is!'" Remus said, doing a perfectly accurate imitation of Sirius' low, sexy voice.

Isabel smiled slightly. "I'll sort it out with him eventually, okay? Just... not now."

"I'll hold you to that," Remus grinned as they copied down the notes about non-verbal spells onto parchment.

*

Isabel was lying in bed – pretending to be ill and having a headache. In reality, she was perfectly fine. More than fine. But it suited her purpose to be ill – she had a date with Jonas. It wasn't that she wanted to miss it, because she didn't, but she had to because she hadn't really done much masquerading as Amanda recently and she needed Sirius to be head over heels for her! So she had mussed up her hair, put on a little bit of Lily's foundation (which was much paler than her own skin tone) and smudged a little mascara to give her bags under her eyes.

"Are you sure you can't make the date?" Lily asked her – Isabel had requested that she go and find Jonas and give him the note she had written for him to apologise for the fact she wasn't able to go on their date.

"No," Isabel said, feigning a sick voice, "I feel awful."

"Okay, then, I'll go apologise for you," she agreed and left Isabel to it. But, about three seconds later – Isabel counted – Lily's head popped back around the door. "Izzy, I'm really sorry, but I'm going out with James tonight – I'll check on you before I go to bed, but that'll be really late. Is there anything you'd like before I go?"

Isabel was praising Merlin internally when Lily said this as it would mean she wouldn't get suspicious when she came into their room and she wasn't there.

"It's fine, Lils, have fun," she smiled weakly, and, as soon as she was definitely sure that Lily had gone, she jumped out of bed, wiped the makeup off that she had applied to make her look sick, and filled a goblet with the pearlescent lilac potion, which she secreted in her jacket carefully.

She ran down the stairs, and through the common room – luckily the Marauders were nowhere to be seen – and in the direction of the girls' bathroom on the fourth floor. She was meeting Sirius around there (not by the toilets of course, as that would be completely unromantic) so it meant she'd get the best use of the hour the potion gave would give her once drunk. In the bathroom, she locked herself in a cubicle and drank the potion quickly. The familiar sensation of her body changing overtook her and soon she was the beautiful, bodacious Amanda.

She smiled at herself in the bathroom mirror before running out, and to the place where she was scheduled to meet Sirius – by a large window looking out onto the Quidditch pitch. The stars were twinkling, and she gazed out into the sky as she waited – though not very long.

"Hey beautiful," Sirius said as he walked up the corridor – without his usual cocky swagger. This was something Isabel had noticed – he treated her, as Amanda, like she was the only girl in the world, like she was the most special thing ever. He gave her his undivided attention – and Isabel had noticed that, minus the occasional kissing and the greeting of "Hey beautiful" and the romantic locations, that was exactly how he treated her, Isabel.

"Hi," she whispered, and stood on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek. Surprisingly – he blushed.

"Would you like to go for a drink in Hogsmeade?" Sirius asked. Amanda's eyes lit up – but then she remembered her time restriction of an hour, which they were already five minutes into.

"Yes please – but I have to be back in fifty minutes," she said regretfully.

"That's fine – I know plenty of shortcuts," he grinned, taking her hand gently.

As Sirius took her through mazes of passageways, behind tapestries, statues and portraits, Isabel wondered why, really, she had cancelled her date – a coveted date that she had wanted since bumping into him on that jog – with Jonas to pretend to be a girl to make Sirius fall in love. It seemed stupid. It seemed that Isabel was losing all her moral principles this year – firstly, not to mess with people's feelings as it only leads to hurt and anger. Wasn't she just messing with Sirius' heart doing this – and she was supposed to be his best friend. In reality, she wasn't talking to him because of something he said to her when she was pretending to be Amanda. In reality, it was all too petty. But Isabel couldn't bring herself to stop. She didn't know why, but there was something stopping her from telling the truth and just leaving it, something magnetic that drew her towards the Polyjuice potion. Secondly, wasn't this classed as cheating on Jonas? That was another moral principle Isabel was seeming to go against. Though she comforted herself with the thought that technically, it wasn't, as she was being two people. She knew what Lily would say if she told her – that she had some kind of crazy split-personality disorder – but she wasn't crazy. Or a victim of a split-personality disorder. She was a very smart, independent, though sometimes thoroughly misguided, young woman.

She was worried, though. Worried how everything would turn out. What if Sirius got too, pardon the pun, serious about Amanda? At some point, she would have to confess, it couldn't be avoided. Alternatively she could leave the country. But Isabel wasn't put in Gryffindor for nothing – she could deal with truth-telling, mischief-making, studying, friendship problems and being hurt.

What she didn't realise was, by doing this, she wasn't only hurting Sirius, but badly bruising her own heart in the process.

I hope you don't hate Isabel too much in this chapter - I know she is basically cheating on Jonas but she doesn't quite see it that way yet as she has conflicted feelings and doesn't understand why she feels so compelled to spend time with Sirius as Amanda but also to spend time with Jonas. She is rather confused... Please review! If I get enough reviews I'll post again tonight! Thanks for reading, I hope you have a brilliant holiday :)

Ooh, also, before I forget, please check out my new story The Complete Misadventures of the Marauders - it's actually entitled The Complete Misadventures of Sirius Black and James Potter but the title was too long and otherwise it would have been called "The Complete Misadventures of Sirius Black and Jam" ;) please drop a review and tell me what you think!

:) x Lily Orange x (: