Chapter 48: Valentine's Day
AN: A big thanks to everyone for waiting patiently and being understanding about the extremely late update. I started a new job at the beginning of May which I love, but the change has been stressful and draining for me. Hopefully no one got too worried that I was abandoning the story. I know this is a shorter chapter, but I had to get something out there and the next chapter is going to be significantly longer and more exciting.
I Touch Myself by Divinyls
Another week of February dragged by, leaving me no closer to having any emotional closure with my pining for Sirius. By Tuesday of next week, not only was there a severe case of quidditch fever amongst the Ravenclaws and Gryffindors and within the school at large because of the match happening on Saturday, but Valentine's Day was also upon us. I could understand the frenzy around the quidditch game; the Ravenclaw and the Gryffindor teams were the best by a long shot. The frantic Valentine's Day energy, I could not.
What bothered me most about Valentine's Day were the little notes that all the students liked to send to the ones they fancied. I'd kept out of the note-sending in years past, having no one to send any valentines to. I'd never even received one from Avery, thank Merlin. But this year was different with Sirius in the picture. Everyone knew that he had been the top recipient for valentines since his fifth year, and rumour had it he'd received over one hundred last year. The mere thought of him receiving any manky notes this year had me growling in frustration.
I dreaded going to breakfast on February fourteenth. In the end, I did attend, if only because I wanted to show Emily, Tess and Lia that I was eating enough, and because I'd sent Sirius a note last night when Flitwick had distributed the blank heart-shaped pink pieces of paper last night in the Common Room. In years past, the students had formed a queue at a booth in the Great Hall to write their valentines, but that had nearly resulted in fist fights amongst the boys and hair-clawing amongst the girls, and had promptly been discontinued at Madam Pomfrey and McGonagall's urging. Now the Heads of Houses distributed them in the Common Rooms and stuck around to monitor any emotions-fuelled outbreaks of violence, magical or otherwise.
The Great Hall was much louder that morning than usual. Students from all tables were whispering, chatting, laughing and giggling to each other, eyeing their sweethearts in anxious anticipation. Tess and I kept our heads down, sliding onto the bench and trying to serve ourselves food in order to keep a low profile. Seeing that none of the Marauders were here yet, I kept an eye on the double doors as I swallowed a spoonful of porridge.
An abrupt uptick in the giggling from the female students made me look up. The Marauders had arrived. James and Sirius were in front, while Remus followed with a book hiding his face and Peter trailed his friends like a piece of toilet paper stuck to a shoe. Perhaps it was the Valentine's Day excitement getting to me, but Sirius seemed particularly handsome that morning, his dark waves tousled to perfection and a crooked grin shaping his lips, his hands in his pockets as he walked. Both of them together were attracting a ridiculous amount of attention, though neither showed any indication that they cared. They could've been walking alone at night through the hallways for all their casually confident demeanor. As the four of them found a spot at the Gryffindor table, Sirius searched the Ravenclaw table, brows furrowed. When his gaze landed on me ogling him, a brilliant grin split his face which I couldn't help but return. Satisfied, he sat down next to James still grinning.
Tess snorted with laughter. "Merlin, you two are gross."
I made a face at her and went back to my porridge.
Midway through breakfast, the owls bearing valentines flew in. Their entrance also caused an upsurge in the students' conversations. Half hoping that Sirius would send me one, I went back to eating my porridge until a heart-shaped note fell into my bowl. Grinning and pushing away my soggy breakfast, I opened the note. A poof of confetti exploded from it, dusting my head, hair and shoulders with bits of red and pink parchment. When I'd swatted away the confetti, I laughed at the note. It was a badly drawn picture of a black dog which had been charmed to move like a wizarding photograph. I watched as the drawn dog bounded around on the note before beginning to chase its tail in a dizzying circle.
I looked up towards the Gryffindor table and found Sirius already watching me, his face full of expectancy. When he saw my smile, he grinned like a lovestruck idiot until yet another owl dropped a valentine on top of his head. He scowled and crumpled up the note, tossing it over his shoulder before ridding himself of the other valentines that had been steadily piling up in his lap and on his plate of food as he'd been watching me. Laughing, I went back to my porridge, my insides full of a blossoming heat that had me grinning like a simpleton.
Someone cleared their throat behind me. "Hi, Ridgelow."
I swivelled around in my seat, looking up at the seventh-year Gryffindor who was looking down at me expectantly. Seeing the box of Honeydukes chocolates in his hands that was wrapped with a pink bow, I said coolly, "Hi."
He handed me the box, his hands shaking slightly but putting on a brave face nonetheless. "This is for you, Ridgelow. I wanted to deliver my Valentine's gift in person since you don't know me."
I took it reluctantly. "Er… No, I don't know you."
He choked out a laugh and rubbed the back of his neck. "Roger Stebbins."
"Oh," I said, wanting him to leave as soon as possible.
His gaze flashed from my face to the box of chocolates in my hands. "Aren't you going to open it?"
Tess and Emily snorted with suppressed laughter behind me.
"She was just saving them for later," Lia said quickly in an attempt to defuse the situation. "You know, so she can enjoy them without rushing."
Emily and Tess muffled more laughter.
"Er, thanks, Stebbins," I said. "I'll make sure to have these later."
He was opening his mouth to speak when a hurricane of owls flew into the Great Hall, zooming down the length of the Ravenclaw table to drop all of their notes in front of Gilderoy Lockhart. The blond idiot was laughing loudly, reaching out to catch valentines in the air, the pile in his lap and on the table in front of him growing at an alarming rate. In fact, it seemed as if the owls had finished delivering their valentines to the other students and were flying over to deliver them to only Gilderoy. A mountain of heart-shaped notes had accumulated on his lap, only making him laugh and brag more to those around him.
"Fuck!" Emily cursed. "An owl shat in my breakfast!"
"No! Mine too!" Tess wailed. I giggled, knowing how much she loved her breakfasts.
Lia swatted away a valentine that had been floating down towards her glass of pumpkin juice. "Why're there so many?"
"Dunno, just get these owl droppings off my toast!" Tess groaned.
I pushed away my bowl of porridge, which now sported a pile of owl shit right in the middle of it. "Merlin!"
Students who had been sitting nearest to Gilderoy Lockhart were fleeing, casting scourgify as they went to rid their robes of splattered owl droppings.
"Four hundred and fifty-six and counting!" Gilderoy announced to no one in particular.
"Who would send you that many sodding valentines?!" a nearby student shouted.
All throughout the hall, students were having their breakfasts ruined by droppings as the barrage of owls delivering valentines to Gilderoy Lockhart never ceased. If anything, they seemed to increase by the moment. Seeing the never-ending train of birds that were flying through the doors, students were abandoning their breakfasts and fleeing from the room, followed by professors.
McGonagall rushed to the front of the hall. "Students, go to your classes! Breakfast is cancelled!" she said before rushing off towards Gilderoy in an attempt to liberate him from the mound of valentines that was swallowing him whole, not that he minded. He seemed to be growing happier with every note, and he was announcing the new total of how many he'd received to anyone within earshot.
"Come on! Let's get out of here!" Tess said, leaping to her feet and running from the hall.
I got up, noticing that Stebbins was still watching me expectantly. I looked across the hall and saw Sirius standing at the Gryffindor table with his hands braced on the tabletop, his face twisted in a snarl as he stared Stebbins down. James had a hand wrapped around his bicep and was trying to pull him along with him as he fled the Great Hall with Remus, Peter and Lily. Stebbins took one look at the master troublemaker Sirius Black staring him down and hightailed it away from me.
I met Sirius's eyes from across the hall. He relaxed and shot me an easy grin. My heart leaping into my throat, I smiled back before fleeing with the other students from the Great Hall with its bomb-dropping owls.
The rest of the day passed smoothly, with no hitches in any of the classes aside from an increase in stolen glances between amorous students and more whispering than usual. I tried to tune the whispering out, but my tiger hearing made that nearly impossible. Unfortunately for me, my animagus hearing also allowed me to hear the conversations between girls about Sirius in the classes that I shared with him. I wanted to turn around and tell them to keep their eyes to themselves, but I didn't have that claim over him. I wanted him all to myself, which made hearing it all the more aggravating. Most of all, it made me yearn for a definitive sign or answer from Sirius that he felt as deeply for me as I did for him, that he wanted to attempt a relationship with me. Even if he rejected me, I would still have the closure that I lacked now.
In the evening I went to dinner alone, trying to keep my head down and weave unnoticed through the gaggles of students. I'd just reached the bottom of the staircase and was heading towards the double doors when a voice made me smile and turn around.
"Oi! Kitten!"
Sirius bounded down the staircase ahead of his friends and jumped the last three steps, landing gracefully and striding towards me, a grin plastered on his face.
"Hey, you," I said, smiling up at him.
"Hey, kitten," he said, grinning and drinking me in. "Did you like the valentine I sent you?"
I laughed. "Of course. You really weren't joking when you said you chase your tail."
He chuckled and brushed a strand of hair from his cheek. "Padfoot is no joking matter."
"Oi! You two! Keep it in your trousers!"
"Piss off, Prongs!" Sirius managed to say before James walked up to his best mate and proceeded to ruffle the top of his head. "And stop messing up my hair, you sod," Sirius added, laughing and swatting away James's hands before fixing his waves.
"Survived Valentine's Day in one piece, Kersti?" Remus said, joining the circle beside James.
"Yeah, did you?" I asked with a wry smile.
"Surprisingly, yes. Ow, Wormtail. You stepped on my foot."
"Sorry, Moony." Peter gave me a bored glance before his eyes latched onto Sirius and James.
"Dunno why you're complaining about surviving Valentine's Day, Moony," Sirius said, standing beside me with his hands in his pockets. "If anyone should be complaining, it's me."
"I thought you liked the attention," Lily said mildly as she joined James.
"Not as of late," James said, winking at me.
"Excuse me, I have never enjoyed it," Sirius shot back.
"Okay, mate. Whatever you say."
"You saw me avoiding girls like the plague today. How can you even say that?" Sirius huffed.
"Can we eat? I'm starving," Peter said, shifting from one foot to the other.
"You look more like you need to take a piss," Sirius said with a bark of laughter.
Peter turned bright red and mumbled something unintelligible.
"Why don't we lay off Wormtail and go in already," Remus said, rolling his eyes.
"You know we only tease you because you're our best mate, yeah?" James said, clapping Peter on the back.
He brightened instantly. "Of course I do, Prongs."
"You idiots are so slow, hurry up," Lily said, shooing her boyfriend along.
"Ooo, Evans," Sirius teased.
She made a face at him before wiggling her eyebrows at me and Sirius falling in behind them with Remus.
"Each of us sent him a valentine pretending to be from secret admirers, so you can't say we're completely rubbish mates," Sirius said out of earshot of Peter.
"How long've you three done that?" I said, smiling at Sirius and Remus.
"I think since fourth year? Or maybe it was before then," Remus said.
"No, it was in fourth year. Remember in third year when he didn't get any?"
"Right, yeah. So it was in fourth year."
"Well, I'd never say that you three are rubbish friends," I said, nudging Sirius.
Remus smiled. "I'm assuming that you're eating dinner with us?" he asked me.
"I wouldn't let her not eat with us, Moony," Sirius said with an easy smile.
I shrugged and smiled back at him. "Guess I am."
"Of course you are, kitten."
"Tease," I said with a laugh.
Sirius flashed me a grin before we made our way to the spot that James, Lily and Peter had chosen, much to the delight of the girls near us. I tried to ignore their looks as I sat down beside Sirius and poured myself and him mugs of pumpkin juice.
"How many valentines did you get this year, Padfoot?" Peter asked in between shoving mashed potatoes into his mouth, his eyes round with adoration.
Sirius shot me a look and shrugged. "Dunno. Doesn't matter."
"Didn't you say earlier it was the most you've ever received?" Peter added.
I gripped my fork and grit my teeth.
"How d'you reckon I can say that if I didn't even count them?" Sirius grumbled.
"Seemed like an awful lot," James added, more focused on Lily and his food than the conversation.
"I counted them for you and there were one hundred and—"
"If you care so much you can have all of those bloody annoying notes," Sirius snapped, making a girl who'd been walking up to him flinch and flee.
"I was just—"
"Leave it alone, Wormtail," Remus said calmly, returning to his dinner.
I sighed in frustration and loosened my grip on my fork.
Sirius glanced at me, his brows furrowing when he saw my empty plate. Quickly piling food onto it, he slid it back in front of me with an expectant grin.
I smiled and met his eyes. "Thanks."
"If you don't eat it, I'll have to spoon feed you," he said with mock-sternness.
"Alright, alright, I'm eating," I said with a laugh, pulling my plate closer.
Shooting me a last smile, Sirius laid his hand on my thigh under the table and went back to his heaping dinner plate, oblivious to the staring and ogling directed at him from the girls in the vicinity.
"How many valentines did you receive, James?" I asked.
He looked up at me and shrugged. "Dunno. Only one that mattered was the one I got from Lily."
Lily laughed. "But you outdid me and sent me twenty, James."
He feigned innocence and ruffled his hair. "I have no idea what you're talking about. You said they were all signed, 'Your most adoring secret admirer.'"
She snorted. "I know you wrote them. I recognize your handwriting."
Remus laughed. "Prongs has never been subtle."
"Neither has Padfoot," James said with a grin, tossing a stray Bertie Bott's bean at Sirius.
Sirius ducked and laughed. "At least I was smart enough not to eat any of those spiked chocolates someone sent me."
I nearly spat out my mouthful of pumpkin juice. "Spiked chocolates?"
He grimaced. "Spiked with Amortentia."
"I would've eaten them either way," Peter mumbled, making James, Remus and Sirius burst out laughing.
James clapped Peter on the back. "That's our Wormtail."
"Were some average chocolates worth being irrevocably attracted to a stranger until the potion wore off?" Remus pointed out. "I don't even think we recognized the girl's name. What was her name, Padfoot?"
Sirius met my gaze and shrugged, never breaking eye contact. "Dunno. I never even read it."
I couldn't help the satisfied smile that curled my lips. I looked up at Remus. "Speaking of chocolate, do you want this box of Honeydukes chocolates that I got?"
Remus smiled. "Sure, as long as you don't want them."
"Were those the ones that arsehole Stebbins gave you?" Sirius growled.
"Yeah."
"Well, in that case she has to give them to Moony," James said with a laugh. "Right, Padfoot?"
Lily smiled and pushed her food around her plate. "I completely agree."
"No one's obligated to give me their chocolates," Remus said quickly.
"In this case, she's obligated, mate," James said, wiggling his eyebrows at Sirius.
Sirius rolled his eyes good-naturedly and went back to his dinner. I slid the Honeydukes box across the table to Remus whose eyes lit up as he tucked the chocolate away for later. But my smile was replaced with a scowl as I saw a pair of girls giggling and making their way towards us, their gazes locked onto Sirius.
"Easy, Stripes," James said at my growl. "Keep the claws sheathed, yeah?"
I rolled my eyes at his comment and tore my gaze from the girls when they fled in the wake of my snarl. "Don't the Prefects and Head Boy and Girl have double-duty tonight to prevent couples from snogging in the hallways?"
"Unfortunately, yes," Remus sighed.
"Don't envy you, mate," Sirius added with a crooked grin.
"We also have to station two outside the entrance to the Prefects' Bath, since there seems to be an increase in students sneaking in on Valentine's Day," Lily added, pushing her plate away.
James grinned. "Can't say I blame them for trying to sneak in. It's a brilliant bath."
"That must be why you're always in there with Evans, Prongs," Sirius said.
"Spying on me with the Map, Padfoot?"
Sirius scoffed and protested as James started in on teasing him, much to the amusement of me, Lily and Remus. Thankfully no other girls tried to approach Sirius during dinner, allowing me to relax and bask in the glow of his presence.
After dinner as the six of us were leaving the Great Hall, Sirius paused and said, "Kersti, can I talk to you for a second?"
I ignored James vigorously wiggling his eyebrows at us, along with the smile that Lily was trying to hide. "Sure," I said, my heart thundering in my chest and my stomach leaping into my throat.
Sirius shot me a smile and shoved his hands into his pockets as we waited just before the staircase. When we were alone, he faced me, swallowing once before he pushed a dark curl from his face. He shifted on his feet and ran a hand through his hair, sighing.
I clenched my hands together to stop them from shaking. "What is it, Sirius?"
He managed a half-smile before he met my eyes. "I've been thinking a lot about it, kitten, and…" He swallowed thickly.
My heart sank to my feet, fearing the worst. Was he about to reject me? "About what?" I said hoarsely.
He cleared his throat and met my eyes. "About what'll happen after we graduate and leave Hogwarts. And… I dunno, I was thinking you could, er… come live with me at my flat?"
My eyes went wide. "Really?" I whispered.
He added quickly, "It doesn't have to be permanent or anything. I reckon you might want to stay with someone you know and trust while you're getting settled? Someone who'll look out for you? You can have the guest room and I won't bother you too much and I just thought…" He trailed off but kept his eyes glued to my face, his brows furrowed as he studied my expression.
"But… don't you like living by yourself?" I said, my voice quavering.
Sirius took one step back, a scowl marring his features. "Nevermind, just forget I even said anything."
"Sirius, wait!" I grabbed his hand as he turned to leave. "Can't you just hear me out for one moment instead of assuming that I'm going to reject you?"
He turned back to face me, barely managing a quirk of his lips.
I let go of his hand but held his gaze. "I was only asking because I know how much you like your flat and I don't want to intrude or make you feel burdened. The last thing I'd want is for you to feel smothered by me, to feel like I'm a nuisance. If you promise that me living with you in your flat won't make you detest me, then of course I'd love to stay with you while I get settled and figure out what I'm going to do." I smiled, my worries easing when he returned the gesture. "Sirius, I'd love to."
"Alright, kitten."
"Why're you so quick to assume I'm going to hurt and reject you, even after how close we've grown?" I whispered.
He exhaled slowly. "Because I've never had a new person in my life who's gotten so close to me, not since Prongs, Moony and Wormtail, and they became my best mates before it got bad with my parents, before I ran away." His grey eyes never left my face. "Just be patient with me, kitten. It's a knee-jerk reaction for me to close myself off."
"To protect yourself?"
He hummed in agreement, reaching out to entwine his fingers with mine. "And I reckon you were too stubborn to ask for help sorting out your life after we graduate, so I wanted to offer for you to live with me. I've been like that before, thinking I had to take on the whole world and fight everyone, never allowing myself to rely on anyone. It's not fun, kitten. And I reckon it'll be better for you and for me living together."
"What do you mean?"
He grinned. "You'll miss me too much if you're not around me all the time."
I laughed and swatted at him with my free hand. "You're a tease, Sirius."
Laughing, he said, "You know you like it, Kersti."
I laughed and then sighed, looking up at the boy I cared for so deeply. "Thank you for helping me."
He smiled and squeezed my hand. "Anything for you."
I leaned in and kissed him once slowly, showing him how I felt with the tender press of my lips against his, before we broke apart and made our way up the flight of stairs.
After we turned a corner and started up another flight, Sirius asked, "Fancy coming to watch the quidditch match this Saturday?"
I grinned. "I'll be there."
"You'll be conflicted, having to decide to watch from either the Gryffindor or Ravenclaw stands."
I poked him in the sides and laughed when he squirmed. "Of course I'll watch from the Gryffindor stands since it means so much to you."
He laid a hand on his heart and gave me a cheeky smile. "Aww, kitten. You'd do that for me?"
"If you keep laying it on thick like that, I'll change my mind, you silly dog," I said, making a very serious face.
He laughed and snuck in a sloppy kiss on my cheek. "I'll see you later, kitten."
We were both grinning as we parted ways, and my happy mood remained with me long after I'd said goodbye to him. Such was the joy of having Sirius in my life in the present and after we would graduate.