I will say this once so I don't have to paste it on all chapters: I don't own Harry Potter and get 0 financial gain from writing this.
This story takes place at the beggining of the school year in 1976 when most of the characters are in their 6th year.
For reference, these are my faceclaims:
- Grace Kelly as Natalia Yaxley
- Ben Barnes (duh) as Sirius Black
- TimotheeChalamet as Regulus Black
- Mia Wasikowska as Jane Abbott
- Aaron Taylor-Johnson as James Potter.
Hope you guys enjoy this! Let me know if you do.
September, 1976
Natalia blew a strand of golden hair off her face and watched sceptically as James Potter swerved into a dive that didn't seem completely right, but then again, nothing that had to do with Quidditch seemed right to her. Then, she returned her attention back to the essay due for the next day, her handwriting getting bigger as she went on, just as it usually did whenever she was supposed to write something in which her interest was not set upon.
She hated Quidditch, especially Gryffindor's, among many other things. World cups were just as bad, but at least then she could set her eye on one or other cute player and make up scenarios in her head; and when Slytherin played, she would at least make the effort to cheer if they scored a goal although her mind was miles away. The only reason why she was near the Quidditch fields that morning, and the few other that preceded that, was because she knew that was likely the last place people who knew her would come looking for her. Not that she didn't enjoy the attention and company of loved ones, but there were good reasons to avoid her brother lately.
Besides, it was rather a nice day; they had been let off early from their class, it was sunny and quite warm for late September – perhaps the warmest it would be in the whole day, and it would be a shame to ruin such a rarity in Scotland with her brother's presence.
"Natalia, I've been looking everywhere for you!" a quite short out of breath voice said, managing to make the other girl jump on her spot, eyes going wide.
When Natalia looked up from the parchment she found her best friend standing with both hands over her hips and her chest slightly forwards, trying to recover from all the running she had just done with her milky skin tainted with red over her cheeks and her usual sleek straight hair looking a bit chaotic. Not much of a sport aficionada either, the hilly grounds surrounding the Quidditch's field wasn't her favourite spot either.
Jane Abbott was the tallest witch in their year, which made her also the skinniest and boniest; both her legs probably making one whole of Natalia's. She had tiny coffee brown eyes which she often complained about - too boring, she'd say; a chestnut blonde bob which she believed was alright; milky skin a and tiny face that had nothing out of the ordinary. Natalia believed she was pretty and told her so often, but Jane tended to disagree. The only non-ordinary thing about her face was that little beauty mark on top of her lip, on the right side.
Before the shorter witch could do or say anything at all, Jane's voice was heard again, as she frowned with squinted eyes: "Is that my Charms essay?"
Natalia definitely wasn't planning on getting caught when copying off from the paper, but honestly, could anyone blame her? Jane just left it over her bed while she had gone to the library to do some studying and the thing was due to the next day; would anyone have acted differently than she had? On top of all that, she knew very well Natalia hadn't even started hers, so the right thing to do was to let her copy off hers, it was basically written on the rules of friendships.
"Sorry" the smallest witch sang, not a glimpse of remorse on her voice "Charms is too difficult and I've been so stressed, Janie! You simply wouldn't believe me if I told you how much" she was now aiming at her friends' eyes, succeeding at locking her baby blue ones with the other witch's darkest ones.
Jane was about to disagree, looking for the right words to tell her she had indeed heard all about her problems already without offending the witch, but Natalia hurriedly added, leaving her with no time to say anything: "But don't worry! I swear I'm changing most of the words. Flitwick won't even notice I didn't think of this all by myself."
Jane Abbott drawled her lower lip between her teeth, debating on whereas to say anything and then giving up on it, sitting down next to her friend, still annoyed by the action. It had taken her a whole week of class notes and various hours of reading at the library to make that essay.
"You could have asked, you know?"
The shortest witch looked heavenward, already getting tired of their conversation. Why did people find so much pleasure from telling her off? It seemed to be everyone's favourite hobby during those few months, she'd come to find. Good thing she didn't let critique get to her, if not, her self-esteem would be on dangerous levels.
"Forget about it, Jane. Morgana, you can be annoying sometimes"
"I'm the annoying one...?" Jane opened her mouth in outrage "How does that work?" she narrowed her eyes.
Natalia rolled her eyes and decided to stop writing, sitting up and getting herself more comfortable next to her best friend. Homework could wait and be done in bed with the comfort of chocolates and her cat, right then, she needed to talk to her best friend or else she'd go mad.
"Did I mention how stressed I am?" Natalia asked while raising a perfect, big, golden eyebrow, while one of her lips formed into a pout, knowing exactly she had indeed mentioned but looking as if that wasn't the case. Despite the pain those unhealthy amount of stress gave her, she smiled after letting out a short sigh – rather liking the feeling of sitting on the grass, her thick stockings providing her with safety from the itching, something that seemed to be bothering Jane.
The Abbott girl, who was too busy trying to get a bite on an apple she had been carrying, didn't answer; instead she just raised her eyebrows. She had been told many times about the matter that was keeping her friend upset, but many years of friendship had taught her to endure moments like that one, because if there was something the Yaxley heiress loved was repeating stories over and over. And to be fair, Jane hadn't heard that much about this problem in particular, being so recent and all.
"Simon wants to set me up for tutoring with Evan Rosier. How disturbing is that?" she complained while hand-brushing her own hair without care.
Both friends frowned. If there was something Jane Abbott wouldn't want for herself or anyone else she cared about, it was spending time with Evan Rosier, him being the pig he was. She imagined however that her friend might have had it much worse than anyone else in the castle would, since the Slytherin boy seemed to… fancy Natalia, to put it on simple terms, reasons unknown. He seemed to be the only one to think of Natalia that way, and it wasn't as if she gave her many reasons to like her.
"Is it because of the Transfiguration thingy?" she asked while giving a big bite to her fruit, getting some juice running through her chin which she quickly cleaned with the back of her hand but the stickiness of it stuck on her, leaving an uncomfortable feeling she'd just have to tolerate.
"Yes" she sighed with a roll of eyes, her voice filled with bitterness "Mother has been unbearable during the whole summer holidays, as you know. She didn't like the letter of concern she received from McGonagall. Who even says things like that about other people's children? 'Your daughter barely passed her OWLS because she's too out of focus'" she mimicked, , exaggerating her gestures "How ridiculous is that?"
"Well…" Jane said slowly, trying once again, to find the right words to break it to Natalia "You do talk a lot… And you only got an acceptable last year because your father went to school with-
The killer gaze she received made her realize perhaps she should've kept quiet, like she had done last week when Natalia had told her about it for the third time, so she zipped her mouth from then on. She loved her friend tremendously, but there were days when it wasn't convenient for one to cross Natalia.
"I'm just saying, Jane, that the only reason why I'm still in her class is because mother told me to. And the whole thing it's plain stupid! I don't even have to follow a career after next year's finished! I'll be happily married and those transfigurations classes will be of no avail when that happens."
"I'm aware of that. But hey, at least you keep me company. Doesn't that make you feel better?" She smiled charmingly, giving a final bite to her apple, evaporating the core of it with a simple wand shake and poof.
Natalia let some air out of her lungs and shrugged, while lying on the grass again, this time with her face facing the blue skies, her eyes matching its colour.
"Not really" she replied while adjusting her view to the clouds, hands on her stomach and her voice suddenly soft and honest "I guess she just wants me to be the best version of myself. And I am. I just don't understand why she has to make Simon my babysitter. He's barely older"
"Yes, I know, and he's been more intense about the matter lately"
"That's because my last grade wasn't exactly... well, you know about it, you saw it yourself"
And Jane nodded, remembering how sad and… irritable Natalia had been a few days ago when they got their first grade for the year back, a simple thing testing what they remembered from fifth year. There was nothing else she could say to make her friend feel better, so she lied on the grass as well next to her, offering her company. She really didn't want to get involved on a Yaxley family kind of discussion, because she knew how those all ended; they were a complex family, if anything. Besides, she was sure it really wasn't that much of a big deal; as Natalia had voiced out herself, she wasn't even going to follow a career and the worse that could happen to her from failing again was having her brother up her arse for another semester.
Instead, her gaze fixated on the sky, smiling when she caught sight of a red shirt and brown hair.
"Isn't James Potter looking good today?"
Natalia's features twisted on a playful manner, while bursting into laughs.
"Ugh, you are so disgusting!"
Jane giggled a little too, her eyes almost completely closed due to the sunlight.
"Even you can't say James Potter isn't a sweetheart"
"Yeah, and he's chasing after a mudblood half of the time. How attractive. Definitely husband material! And those glasses he has! Melting for!" her voice mocked, filled with sarcasm and amusement as her fists joined together, resting them over her heart to make her whole act a bit more dramatic.
Jane groaned, holding onto just one sentence of all the ones the other witch had let out: "Don't even tell me about it. Lily this, Lily that. Can't he see she's basically a muggle?" her question was demanding for an answer. She really didn't understand it.
Natalia let out a deep breath, knowing Jane had just drained all the fun from the topic. Some people weren't all there, it wasn't that difficult to understand – every once and then there'd be one person who would come up with the most disgusting, pathetic and simply unexplainable fixations, like liking vampires, werewolves and muggles (and muggleborns, but those were the same thing, really). One truly couldn't understand them but it was of common knowledge those people should be avoided.
"Jane, you're giving me a headache, really. I thought you were getting over this; we hadn't talk about him like this since last year; I was starting to think you made progress. James Potter is almost a blood traitor. As I already told you, if I were you I would start looking for someone who is really worth your time and not obsessed with a mudblood. Try Tristan Nott or my own bloody brother if you feel like it for all I care"
Jane let out a small groan filled with frustration while shaking her hands up and down and looking expectantly at Natalia. She had a look on her face that almost made the other girl feel sorry for her, but they were talking about James Potter, a delusional boy with ideas of greatness who one was rather better off avoiding than being friends with. She knew whatever hopes her best friend had with him, had to die soon for her own sake.
She thought of Jane to be just like her and saw the same future for the two of them: handsome husbands, cute kids and a nice house or two around England. Crazy ideas like James Potter weren't part of that future.
"Is not that easy, you know? I have fancied him since I was like seven" she explained, crossing her arms over her chest and allowing her eyes to wonder off over to where the boy in question was, up in the air, laughing and looking absolutely gorgeous despite the sweat – or so she thought.
"I am aware"
"And I would never date your brother; he'd drive me crazy on the first week"
Natalia Yaxley let out a snort – why was making fun of brother's such a fun thing to do? Especially when it was truth – Simon could be an unsympathetic jerk and his lack of serious relationships over the years did nothing but to prove that.
She closed her eyes and enjoyed the sun rays against her skin, Merlin knew those were the last dozes of it she'd be getting for the rest of the year and that soon her skin would return to that pinkish colour, as it did every winter.
Just as she was falling asleep, a bludger flew awfully close to the spot where they were hidden and the relaxing moment was over. Natalia's eyes were filled with annoyance and she let out a long and loud sigh. Thank you a lot, Quidditch.
"Ugh, let's get out of here. "
Sirius Black frowned at the bubbling cauldron in front of him.
James Potter cheerfully chopped up some strange herbs neither him nor Sirius knew the name of but they were sure had seen at least once before on a book back in fifth year. He added them to their cauldron and it hissed. Both boys frowned, knowing something was probably wrong, like most things were those days.
"You know we're going to fail, don't you?" Sirius claimed on a defeated tone, his eyes bored.
The prospect of flailing didn't upset him nearly as much as it should have.
James clicked his tongue playfully and smirked.
"Now, don't be so negative, Padfoot. We can't fail; we need this class to be aurors, as you know. Besides, we always manage"
"That if I don't die out of boredom. Or poisoned by this" he said, suddenly coughing, an expression of displeasure on his face "What's even in there, mate?"
James shrugged
"I have no idea. Maybe we should ask Lily; bet she'll know"
Sirius laughed.
"You're truly hilarious, you knew that?" James didn't respond, rolling his eyes instead "Seriously, that girl hates your guts"
"No, no, she doesn't. She just... doesn't know me that well just yet. But as soon as she does, she'll fall for me just like that, man" and soon a cocky smile appeared on his face.
Sirius rolled his eyes with amusement and then went silent for a little bit only to open his mouth again two minutes later, with risen brows and a small smile on his lips; he had just discovered something: "No wonder you're smiling all the time; here in your seat, just in front of Evan's, the only pretty chick around. You didn't think of my necessities when you made me take this class, did you?"
This time, James denied with his head, treating the whole sentence as just absurd.
"Come on, Sirius. There are plenty of hot girls in here. Like... Sam Nicks!" he claimed while with his head pointing at the light haired brunette who was wearing the Gryffindor colours on her tie and just like most people unlike the two of them, working on her potion.
Sirius squinted his eyes shut.
"You know she's crazy, mate; that takes any hotness out of the sentence. If you don't recall, she threw a frog at me? Alive!"
James laughed off at the memory, his eyes lighting up immediately. The common room had been in shock for days and he and the rest of their mates had teased Sirius about it for even longer than that. A very putting on a show kind of girl, Samantha Nicks.
"Well, you saw it coming. You snogged her a couple times and next thing she sees you doing the same to Marlene for the 100th time on the same day you two were supposed to go on a date"
The black haired boy shrugged, taking importance off the matter.
"You know Marlene. She has that something"
Both friends laughed.
"But seriously, mate. There are pretty girls in this class, other than Lily and Samantha, or even Marnie"
A sharp and abrupt laugh coming from Sirius made some people turn to look at them, not that they minded the attention. No one seemed bothered by it, except of course…
"If you suggest any of the Slytherin chicks, I'll smack you."
James shrugged.
"Nott's a bit creepy, so… no"
"Which leaves us with the worst of the lot" Sirius said bitterly
"Jane's actually really nice. She makes the nicest presents for Yule" he said, smiling at the memories of the holidays, when his parents and Jane's, who had been friends for longer than he cared to remembered, got together for the holidays "You should see her brother play Quidditch– one of the best chasers out there, I swear. He played for Gryffindor a few years ago, back at when we were first years, 'member?"
"Pete Abbott. Cool guy. Wonder why his sister ended up in Slytherin"
James raised his shoulders, being incapable of giving his friend an answer. He had wondered that too once or twice and so had his father. Then again, Sirius' brother was also a Slytherin.
"She is actually really pretty too. Her hair looks nice" he said while observing her "Not as nice as Lily's but..." he added quickly
Sirius just rolled his eyes. Of course James was going to bring Lily to the conversation... as he usually did. He really didn't get what the big fuss about Evans was. Sure, she was very pretty and smart, but she was also a stuck up pain in the arse and was always yelling at them, not to mention she befriended one of the worst snakes there was: Snape.
He found there were many other attractive girls that would love for James to pay attention to them, but it was really useless, ever since first year the boy had been a goner for the redheaded. Meanwhile, the less James cared about other girls, the best for him, he guessed, since they all seemed to settle for him just the same.
"And Natalia Yaxley-
"Don't!" Sirius growled, his face twitching in disgust "My arse still hurts from the amount of hexing her brother and friends did to us"
The boy with the glasses chucked and flinched at the same time, if that was possible as he remembered how back in third year they had decided to pay the girl a little prank after Sirius said it what fun of a target she would be, only to have it backfire on them when the revenge of her gigantic brother and equally fit friends hit on them. They had waited for them late at night by the Quidditch fields after practice and had hexed the hell out of both James and Sirius; however, Peter had gotten it way worse, since he was caught by himself on a corridor – up to the date, the little guy still refused to admit what the Slytherins had done to him.
"Well, looking back, we kind of got it coming"
"She should have done her revenge herself if it affected her so much. Going to your brother for protection is a baby move"
"Yeah… but… she's a girl. They like overreacting"
"I guess" the boy shrugged, knowing that had it been anyone else but the Slytherin girl who they were talking about, he'd have agreed "What's worse is that I have to see her during every, single, break." He pronounced those words each with just as much emphasis as the other. "Would it kill my parents to befriend normal people? Yes, of course it would… it'd take them not to be creeps themselves" he muttered, clearly talking to himself now, wondering once again why had him been cursed with such a family as the one he had.
"Are they really that bad? Her older brother, the one who graduated, he seemed normal to me" he said casually, mentioning the one time he had run into the eldest Yaxley child back when he was shopping for books at Diagon Alley and the older boy had helped handing him a copy of Quidditch through the ages which happened to be far too high for a twelve year old James to reach, mentioning how he had read the book himself and found it extremely helpful.
The look he got from Sirius, however, showed him how much he disagreed with the idea he implied of the Yaxleys being nice.
"They are the worst blood supremacist you could ever meet. The mother alone is worse than my whole bloody family; seriously, my mother adores that woman; that should tell you something"
James nodded understandingly. Yes, being liked by Walburga Black often meant no good thing; he should know that – he was never invited over to Grimauld Place, after all.
"Right, and then there's her brother, Slytherin's keeper who beat our-
"Simon Yaxley, a douche. My mother used to make me play with him when I was younger but he was too much of an arsehole for me to like. But I guess he's still better than his sister"
James arched an eye while moving his glasses up with his nose, something typical of James when he was curious. He leaned over, trying to get closer to where she was sitting, not that it helped much his vision.
" I guess she's kind of a brat but I understand where it may be coming from, after the whole Travels thing… but…"
Sirius snorted but it somehow sounded like a barf
"She's the worst, I'm telling you. Fire's lit but the cauldron's empty; has the brain of a troll and the only things she ever thinks about are clothes and all those pureblood rubbish. At least you can get some smart sentences from Nott or Rowle every once in a while. Only reason she got her OWLs was because of her family's connections"
"Sounds a lot like most Slytherin girls" James laughed, and soon Sirius joined. That was a well-known fact through Hogwarts.
The bell rang, announcing the end of class, and James hurried to pour their faulty potion into a vial. They had just gotten enough time to finish it, but a quick glance at Lily Evans's perfect potion told him that they'd clearly gone wrong, somewhere.
While James went up to Slughorn's desk to submit the vial, Sirius leaned back casually in his seat and observed Natalia Yaxley, something he hadn't done in a long time.
They'd met when they were very young, before Hogwarts. Sirius remembered her well: a small chubby girl, funny looking nose, big blue eyes and long golden hair which was always braided in styles which names he could not remember, a few baby curls sticking out here and there. She'd always been noisy, and the few days that he spent at her house with his family consisted of fighting with Sirius and their siblings, Simon and Regulus. He admitted to himself that she was quite fun back then; always up to anything he wanted to do, but that was way before she started thinking just as their parents.
While now older, she still looked really similar to that child he had met many years ago. He could always hear her nasal voice, no matter how far away their desks were from each other's. While she had grown in age she still stood very short, he supposed she was one of the shortest of their year; had lost most of her baby fat everywhere but her face, her nose was still a little weird and her hair reached her waist, big curls all over it; Sirius thought that it made her look ridiculous, who needed that much hair?
As they grew up, both of them realized that there was no chance of ever being okay with each other's presence again. Sirius had spoken to her once or twice during their first year, simply because she was a familiar face among many unknown ones. Natalia had seemed eager to offer him her friendship until she realized he was hanging out with Remus and Peter, whom she casually said were not people worthy of his time, their last names almost unheard of. After that, neither of them had even glanced at the other's direction. They were different people, leading different lives, connected only by the fact that their parents were good friends.
Then, third year came by and he decided to play that prank on her after he heard her call Mary McDonalds, a Gryffindor witch from their year, a detestable slur as she walked with her friend after Charms class. Long story short, after he and the rest of the marauders pulled the prank she ran up crying to her troll of a brother and he took care of the situation for her. Ever since then Sirius had pretended she was invisible since it was easier than trying to tolerate her or keep on trying to make her life miserable. Sure, his soul had initially wanted to keep pulling pranks on her after what happened, but it really wasn't worth his time, he had enough with Snivellus and at least with the oily haired boy he didn't have to look after his arse to prevent it from being beaten by Simon Yaxley and the rest of the Slytherin Quidditch team.
To be honest, he didn't truly believe she was the worse snake in the castle, although she probably was the most spoilt and annoying one. The fact that she always got everything she wanted and her way to get out of difficult situations after getting herself into them on the first place, infuriated him, but there was not much he could do apart from ignoring her. Sure… he got out of situations with his charm as well, but that was different, he wasn't a purist.
It was his friend's voice what got him out of his thoughts. He seemed pretty horrified about the fact that he had spent that much time thinking of a Slytherin, but quickly shove it off his mind and promised himself never to do that again – a promise he had little trouble keeping for the rest of the week.
"Oi, Sirius! Come on, don't want to miss lunch!" James yelled at him. Sirius nodded, quickly gathering his things and rushing out of the Potions classroom.
Regulus Black entered the Great Hall still in his Quidditch robes after a disappointing morning. They had lost their practice time because of those stupid Gryffindor's and all the special treatment they got from Dumbledore. Furious, he sat down harshly besides their chaser, Parkinson, who was still complaining about it.
Regulus ate quietly with a gloom look in his eyes, but the rest of the team seemed to have forgotten about the matter quite quickly, after all, they had spent the whole day complaining about already.
He wouldn't have cared so much if that one hadn't been his first practice as an official member of the team. He had been trying to get in since second year, but it wasn't until fifth that he made it in, thanks to Zacharias Doelley, a fourth year who couldn't keep his grades high enough for him to continue a part of the team. Two weeks had passed since the beginning of the school year and today they were supposed to have their first practice with Regulus as a member, but since dear old Dumbledore was a great fan of both Gryffindor and Quidditch, he gave their day to the lions' team without informing them sooner – from then on, as a regard for winning the previous year cup, the lions would have both, Wednesdays and Thursdays to practice, while Slytherin would be moved to Mondays. It had only been decided recently.
A high pitched laugh came from the other side of the table, so loud that Regulus heard it clearly from his seat and had to keep his face from flinching. The only thing that he needed that night was a headache from such an obnoxious sound. He only had to look up once to know that the loud person was Natalia Yaxley, along with her friend, the Abbott girl.
He really didn't know Natalia Yaxley that well. She was one year ahead of him and both tended to ignore each other, but since their parents were friends he knew her well enough to say that the witch was a pain in the arse. She was loud, dumb and a spoiled brat, all things he despised. He supposed it wasn't really her fault, but Mr. Yaxley's by encouraging her behavior from such an early age and seeing no wrong in his daughter. From what he heard from other members of the house, the witch was an absolute empty cauldron head but pretty and rich enough to find a good husband once the time came; Regulus felt sorry for the poor bastard who was unlucky enough to marry someone like her; in fact, he felt even more sorry for her, having to exist with such a limited and narrow mind. She was completely immature, and exactly the kind of person he wished never to be associated with.
That was probably the only thing he had in common with his brother–despite them not knowing about it: both Blacks despised Natalia Yaxley and her noisy mouth with a passion. The difference laid on the fact that if wanted to, Sirius could be a royal jerk to her and that would make no difference to anyone while Regulus had to stop himself from speaking out his mind about her, since she was his Quidditch team captain's little sister. So, Natalia Yaxley was indeed a silly girl both Black brothers just loved to ignore.