Bad Romance
By Lily Orange
A/N: Sorry about the wait! Thank you for all the reviews, I hope you enjoy this one! Have a great week
Chapter Twenty-One
Not The Best Party Ever
The beginning of October meant one thing for Regulus Black – it was his birthday, and this year, he was going to be sixteen. It wasn't exactly his coming-of-age, but he loved birthdays and he loved the fact that they always took over the Slytherin common room every year for one night and let loose from all their cunning plans and just had fun. He had heard so many rumours of the Marauders throwing amazing post-Quidditch, birthday and just random parties, and he wanted people to know that it wasn't just them who could pull off a party and have fun.
He had already overheard Seraphina boasting to Astilbe about how amazing her dress was for Regulus' party. Not that he had invited her. She had just assumed she was going and it was difficult to say no, considering it was in the common room. Seraphina seemed to be throwing herself at him and it was particularly uncomfortable, even though she was completely gorgeous, when all he could focus on were those mesmerizing violet eyes that belonged to Emmy Piper. All the other boys in the school had been going on about her cousin Caitlin, who was admittedly pretty but for some reason Regulus was immediately attracted to Emmy, who was quirkily different.
He wanted to get to know her better, literally. He didn't know anything about her, except that she was clever and had moved at the last minute from Albania with Caitlin because of some kind of family tragedy and was now staying with the Potters. That was why she knew his brother so well – whenever he saw her around school, she was virtually always with Sirius, laughing, joking, talking... he had always had a kind of jealousy for his older brother – and now it was embodied in Emmy Piper.
And if Emmy wore the dress he had heard Seraphina describing, he knew his jaw would drop the moment he saw her.
"So... ready for the party of a lifetime?" Antonin Dolohov asked, plonking himself down on the sofa next to him, and resting his feet alarmingly close to the steaming goblet of hot chocolate Regulus had just put down.
"Party of a lifetime?" Regulus echoed in amusement.
"Well, it's a well known fact you like to party," Dolohov replied with a grin.
"Almost as much as my brother," Regulus commented.
"Yeah, but it's the only thing you have in common with him," Dolohov reminded him almost forcefully. The Slytherins didn't like Sirius, or the Marauders, or anyone that wasn't a Slytherin really.
"I s'pose," Regulus said, leaning back in his chair. "So... can I know what's going on?"
"Sort of – charmed record player, wizard music, lots of dancing and food and probably much female contact," Dolohov said with a wink. Privately Regulus thought that Dolohov would not be having much female contact as he was not the best-looking boy in the world. It would more likely be Regulus getting the attention and the contact, but he only intended it to be with one person, who he had yet to invite to his party. It would normally be exclusively Slytherins – but he thought he could quite clearly make an exception for the blonde-haired, violet-eyed Gryffindor.
"Maybe just with one girl," Regulus replied, deciding to lead into his wish to invite Emmy Piper.
"One girl? Who's this then? I had no idea you had your sights set on someone – let me guess, is it Seraphina? She's all over you like dragon pox – but I doubt you'd have such a good time with dragon pox," he said, licking his lips in an alarming manner as he glanced over at the dark-haired beauty with her exotic looks, who was gossiping with her less-attractive friend Astilbe.
"Uh, no," Regulus couldn't deny it quick enough. Yes, Seraphina had been all over him like dragon pox – and it was the equivalent of dragon pox.
"Who then? Seriously, I would be thinking about Seraphina – she clearly wants you," Dolohov advised.
"Doesn't mean I want her too," Regulus reminded him, "and she's not in our year."
"Is she in our house?" Dolohov asked, trying to recall all the girls in the years above and below that Regulus would possibly be interested in.
"No, she's not, she's one of the new girls," Regulus explained.
"Oh... you mean that dark-haired one? I always see her in the library writing, or with the Ravenclaws. She'd be an even better achievement than Seraphina, possibly. I've heard the boys in other houses talking about her in the corridors and in the toilets. What's her name, Caitlin?"
"No, I mean, yes her name is Caitlin and she is pretty, but I like her cousin, Emmy..." Regulus drifted off dreamily.
"She's a Gryffindor, and she's friends with your brother, that idiot James Potter and the mudblood Lily Evans," Dolohov stated plainly. Regulus noticed how uncomfortable he felt about the way Dolohov described Emmy's friends... it was unpleasant and he didn't like it.
"But it'd be okay for me to like her cousin?" Regulus said in incredulity.
"Well, Caitlin Piper's gorgeous, you could have a little liaison that wouldn't mean anything and then you could go back to normal," Dolohov informed him.
"Girls aren't just playthings," Regulus said, quite surprised at the compassionate words coming out of his mouth.
"Sorry, what?" Dolohov replied. "Didn't know you were into rights and all that sort of thing... what'll you be campaigning for next, the rights of house elves?" He began to laugh and Regulus grimaced.
"No... but I want to invite her to my party, and seeing as it's my party, and I like her, I think I will, and I don't need your permission to do so," Regulus growled, before picking up his goblet of hot chocolate and stalking up to his room. Tomorrow he would see her when she was on her way to Potions – tomorrow would be when he would ask her to his party.
Wednesday morning started quite peacefully for the Gryffindor sixth year girls. They all woke up after a nice, long sleep, and were lying in silence before Aretha saw the time on the clock by her bed.
"Merlin! It's nearly half eight!" she exclaimed, and all the girls sat bolt upright. They normally got up at seven, had showers, did their hair, got dressed, chatted, met the boys in the common room and then went to breakfast. But breakfast ended at precisely half eight and lessons commenced at a quarter to nine – so the girls literally had twenty minutes before their first lesson started – for all three, this meant Potions. Lily had been dreading this class since waking up on Monday morning, for, after all, it was the class she was partnered with James in, so there was no way she could avoid him. Aretha was looking forward to jinxing Mulciber in some way that meant she could do the potion by herself (last time she had given him a spontaneous outburst of boils). Emmy was looking forward to spending the lesson chatting to Sirius, who had quickly become a very close friend. Mary had already gone to meet Claude, just as she always did.
However... their normal routine had to be forgone if they had twenty minutes. Aretha quickly started casting straightening spells on her bobbed hair, which, no matter how hard she tried, always looked frightfully interesting whenever she woke up; this morning her fringe resembled an Elvis Presley quiff and the back of her hair looked like a birds' nest. Lily grabbed her clothes and decided to change in the cupboard and Emmy pushed her long, wavy hair back with a headband and shut herself in the bathroom to change out of her red pyjamas and into her school uniform.
Breakfast was long over by the time they came down to the common room, their books weighing their bags down as they ran towards the portrait hole, the boys nowhere to be seen. They faithfully waited them every morning, but once it got to eight, they went down to eat their breakfasts – though James and Sirius tended to eat the equivalent of four or five peoples' breakfasts every morning, much to the bemusement of the others.
"Five minutes till Potions starts – I have to say, I think fifteen minutes is probably our record for getting ready," Aretha grinned as they waited for the staircase to change and make their way down to the dungeons.
"Yeah, but you're not the one with flyaway hair," Lily grumbled, attempting to smooth her hair down.
"It looks fine Lil," Aretha reassured her as she jumped the last two steps and led them through a stone corridor which seemed to wind round most of the school before ending in a spiral staircase, which went down to the dungeons. They descended the steps, and slowed to a more leisurely pace as they realised only a few people were queuing up outside their classroom.
Emmy leaned up against the wall, setting her heavy bag on the floor, realising that her shoulder was really sore after carrying that leather satchel around everywhere. Aretha and Lily were stood in the queue in front of her, chatting about the Astronomy trip. Emmy couldn't wait – she loved being outdoors, and, even better, because it was mid-way through October that they were going so she couldn't get sunburnt! It was going to be so good – wandering around during the day, gazing at the stars at night, messing around with the Marauders, probably sneaking out somewhere if they were involved... just having fun.
Although there was a lot of schoolwork involved, Emmy felt like she'd had virtually non-stop fun ever since she'd arrived in England. Caitlin was okay – she was still writing to Tom two or three times a day, but had made some Ravenclaw friends that seemed nice.
But for Emmy – Gryffindor now seemed part of her family. Lily and Aretha had quickly become close friends, as had the Marauders – especially James and Sirius. They were practically her brothers, and whenever she was with them, she felt good and had an amazing time.
"Em, you coming?" Lily nudged her as Professor Slughorn began to admit people into the classroom. Emmy picked up her bag and trudged along, but before she could even make it through the door, she felt someone tap her on the shoulder. She turned and found herself looking up into the face of Regulus Black, who was smiling coyly at her. She didn't know what to make of it – she hadn't forgotten what Sirius had told her. It was ingrained in her memory – how could she forget it?
"Hi, Emmy," he began.
"Hi Regulus – what is it?" she replied, not wanting to be rude, but also wanting to get into the Potions class and sit down with Sirius. She felt confused by Regulus – he seemed so sweet and lovely to her but then his behaviour in Hogsmeade was an utter contradiction of that. He was some kind of enigma, and Emmy didn't think she wanted to stick around to crack the code.
"Well, I'm having a party in the Slytherin common room for my birthday at the end of the week and well, I wondered if you wanted to come?" he stuttered, hating how nervous she made him.
For Emmy, her reply was as instinctive as talking. "I'm really sorry, Regulus, but I can't, I'm busy this week," she replied.
Regulus wasn't used to people saying no. "You surely can't be busy all this week, it'd only be a couple of hours..."
"No, I'm sorry," she said, turning away to walk into the classroom. Regulus put a hand on her shoulder to stop her.
"But why? I thought we were friends," he frowned, his icy blue eyes confused about why the previously vibrant and friendly girl was being so cold towards him.
"So did I, up until I saw that little performance in Hogsmeade with the first years," she answered, pulling herself out of his grip and wandering into the classroom.
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