Chapter Nineteen: I Don't Mean As Friends

It's been twelve days since he kissed Emmeline, and Sirius is going to light himself on fire. They haven't done it again, they haven't talked about it, and he hasn't told anyone else about it. Considering that he still feels guilty as all hell every time he thinks about it, you'd think Sirius would be grateful that he and Em are both basically proceeding as if it never happened—but as it turns out, avoiding saying or doing stuff about something is very much not the same as avoiding thinking about the thing; the more you try to run away from it, the more anxious you're going to end up.

Nobody has called him out on acting oddly around her, which is shocking to Sirius, given how off kilter he feels every time she's in the room. Like now, for instance—her birthday was yesterday, his birthday is Monday, and all the Gryffindor third years are celebrating both of them in The Three Broomsticks during today's Hogsmeade visit. She's sitting next to him at one of the two tables they've pushed together to make room for everyone, and in order to fit in enough chairs, everybody has squeezed close together—meaning that Em's hips is brushing his hip and her thigh is rubbing against his own. Her leg's not trembling this time—not like it was in the library—but he keeps having to force himself not to bounce his own leg up and down anxiously, because Em would be able to feel that, and if she knew how much this is throwing him—

He never wants Emmeline to figure out how he feels about what they did. He never wants to acknowledge to her what happened ever again.

And yet—is that really what Sirius wants? Because another part of him, an equally big part, can't get the idea of kissing her again out of his head.

He's replayed it so many times in his mind that the details are starting to fade. It's counterintuitive—you'd think that constantly dwelling on it would mean that it would be crystal-clear in his head all the time—but you know how sometimes you get a flash of a memory and it shocks you how many little details are in it? Yeah. Turns out, when this one thing is all you think about, you lose that effect. He's spending all this time trying to recapture the exact way it felt when her bottom lip slipped into his mouth—the precise sound she made when she moaned for him—and every time he tries, he loses just a little bit of clarity.

The part of him that wants it—if that part can't have a memory distinct as the moment it happened, then it wants to make more memories. He doesn't want to have to grapple to remember something faded: he wants to kiss her all the time.

But he doesn't think that's going to happen, because Em isn't talking to him about it, and Sirius sure as hell isn't going to talk to her about it. He's stuck with one shining moment in time that he can't seem to cling to, and more than that—he's stuck with his guilt.

If he's going to obsess over this, he wishes he could at least enjoy reliving it without feeling a little sick to his stomach, but apparently, that's not possible. God, what is wrong with him? He's a Marauder, for god's sake: he and James rule this castle. He's got no reason to be so bloody insecure.

And yet—he's not going to tell James what's going on, but if he did, he's pretty sure James would understand. After all, James can be really damn anxious himself behind closed doors.

Sirius considers doing the same thing with James that he did with Mary—bringing up the thing he wants to talk to him about without, well, bringing up the thing he wants to talk to him about—but, well. James is Sirius's best mate in the world, and he knows he can tell James anything, but he also—

There's a part of Sirius that just—is afraid to do anything that might color the way James sees him. It's like with Snape. Sirius is a terrible enough person that he thinks abusing the bloke is funny as hell, and he does think Snape deserves some of it, with his obsessions with Dark Magic and with blood purity—but whenever guilt about how they treat Snape starts to nag at him, Sirius pushes it down because James has never given any indication that he's got any doubts about the bullying. Or, when all that drama went down with Evans a couple of months ago, Sirius was quick to frame his reservations in a way that didn't get to the heart of the matter—that didn't call James out on being inappropriate or cruel.

He adores James—he trusts James—but he also wants his approval. He wants it bad, and he's a little terrified that if he talks to James, James will take it as an accusation that he's insecure, and he's going to be offended.

So Sirius does the next best thing: he gets Moony alone. He's probably not going to understand—he doesn't have the same split personality thing that James and Sirius have going on—and it's going to be even harder for Sirius to convey what he wants to talk about without coming right out and admitting what's happening with Emmeline. But Moony absolutely knows what it's like to have a secret you can't tell people, even your closest friends—after all, they had to figure out on their own that he's a werewolf—and he's not a particularly confident person himself, even if he doesn't cover it up by acting cocky the way James does.

They're doing Animagi research in the library again when Sirius brings it up. "Hey, I wanted to… to talk to you about something," he says. His voice sounds a little too stilted to be totally casual, and Moony seems to notice this and frowns.

"Yeah—anything you want. What's up?"

"Do you ever, um…" God, why is this so hard? He should have planned out what he wants to say: now that he's here, and Moony is looking at him expectantly, Sirius hasn't got a clue what he can ask Moony without making it blatantly obvious that he's keeping a secret.

And suddenly, Sirius is overcome by the desire to just… not keep the secret. But—

"Sirius?"

"Do you ever like anybody, Moony?"

He's pretty sure Moony knows what he's talking about because Moony immediately blushes and looks down—but he seems to think he can play dumb without Sirius catching on because he mumbles, "Sure I do. I like you and Peter and James, and the girls are—"

"I don't mean like that. I don't mean as friends."

"Where is this coming from?"

"So you do like someone?"

"God, I don't like anyone, okay?" He's talking very quietly and very fast, and he almost sounds like the color in his cheeks is coming from anger instead of embarrassment—almost.

"But—you're fourteen, and you're a bloke. Surely by now you've thought about… stuff… with people."

"'Stuff with people?'" Moony asks, and a little bit of humor comes back into his voice.

"Shut up and answer the question. It's Alice, isn't it? I bet it's Alice."

"It's not Alice!"

"Then what girl—"

"There is no girl. I'm—a freak, okay? I just don't think about them like that. I…"

Moony looks legitimately really upset about this, meeting Sirius's gaze now with a panicked look in his eyes, and Sirius immediately feels guilty (as if he hasn't had enough of that in the last couple weeks). "Hey, it's okay. I guess you're just—a late bloomer. That happens to some people, right? I don't know who else doesn't like anybody yet at fourteen, but—"

Moony is watching Sirius say all this in silence, his face totally unreadable, until he abruptly starts to look—relieved, probably. The lines in his forehead relax. "Shut the hell up," he sighs, and if Sirius didn't know better, he'd think Moony sounded happy about this. "Why are you asking, anyway? Do you fancy someone?"

"I—no," he says before he can stop himself.

"Really, Sirius? You ambush me out of nowhere about whether I fancy any girls—about how everybody likes somebody by age fourteen—and you turn around and expect me to believe that?"

"It… fine. Let's say I have a crush. Let's say—"

"Vance, right? Or is it Evans? Because the two of you have been acting really weird around each other for months now—"

"For the billionth bloody time, I'm not interested in Evans like that!"

"Macdonald, then? Did something happen over Easter that you never told us about? You tosser—don't you know she has a boyfriend?"

"It's not like that, either!"

Raising his eyebrows, Moony says, "Well, it's not McKinnon or Abbott, so—"

"I'm beginning to regret bringing this up at all," Sirius snaps, drumming his fingertips on the table.

"Well, why bring it up if you don't actually want to tell me anything?"

He has to admit, Moony has a point. It's not like Sirius has explained where he's coming from, although he doesn't think that his confused thoughts about how much he's willing to give away would make much sense to anybody else if he tried. "Well, there's no point talking about it if you don't know what it's like, but I was just going to ask you—if girls ever make you feel stupid."

"Stupid?"

"Yeah. It's just—dumb. I mean, we're the popular kids, right? We could probably get any birds we wanted."

"Speak for yourself, dude. It's not that easy for me and Peter."

He rolls his eyes. "Okay, fine—James and I could probably get any girls we wanted. I mean, I already know… it's not like…" Careful, Sirius, he tells himself. "But I still feel like—a mess."

"So you like somebody, but you're not sure she likes you back?"

"…I mean, I think she does. I'm sure she does. But…"

Moony starts ticking off his fingers on his opposite palm. "If it's Vance, you're probably right, but you're on your own if it's Macdonald. I don't know what the hell to tell you about Evans. Unless, of course, you're secretly in love with somebody in Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw, which would be—"

"Moony?"

"Yeah?"

"Not helping."

He smiles sheepishly. "Right. Look, what's the worst that could happen? You ask someone out, she says no, and—you move on with your life. Sure, it might be awkward for a while, but I think the girls all like you enough that you'd work it out and stay friends after, and if it's not one of our girls, well—it's not like you're particularly close to any others, are you? There's not much you'd be sacrificing if it got weird."

"Gee, thanks."

"I just mean… yeah, you're popular, but that doesn't mean you're—popular. Like—like—popularity isn't about having a lot of friends; it's is a lot about acting exclusionary and impressing people—getting people to want your admiration."

Sirius pictures James again before shoving this thought aside.

"But—I mean, Sirius, people do want your admiration. I'm sure most girls in this school would go for you."

"It's not that I think she wouldn't go for me," he admits. "It's… I don't know if I'm…"

Moony waits patiently.

"I don't know if I could handle it—having a girlfriend, I mean. It's like—I want her. I do. But every time I think about kissing her, I feel…"

"I'm sorry; I don't know what you mean."

Well, he's gone there, apparently, and it feels kind of good in a humiliating way, and it's not like he has to tell Moony that it's Em or that they really have kissed already. "I think it's just ingrained in me that I'm not supposed to go there with anybody. You know how my parents are—they still think I'm marrying Greengrass."

"Wait, back up. What?"

"Oh, yeah—I'm supposed to be betrothed to Raleigh Greengrass, you know, the Slytherin? Second year? Our parents set it up when I was, like, two. It's not like I'm planning on staying a Black long enough to go through with it, but Mum and Dad say I can't date anybody because I have to marry her, and it's kind of like—my emotions didn't get the memo. I still feel guilty, Moony."

Moony takes his hand and squeezes. Moony's hand is all hot and sweaty, even though it's bloody freezing in the library tonight. "I don't know what it's like to have had a fiancé since the age of two, but I know what it's like to feel guilty about—"

He stops in mid-sentence suddenly, and his eyes look alarmed again. Sirius rolls his eyes. "Mate, relax. I already know about your furry little problem, and I can't imagine you feel very good about it with the way everybody sees…"

"Rabbit owners," Moony supplies, relaxing again. "Yeah."

"So what do you do about it? How do you make yourself stop feeling so bad?"

Shrugging, he says, "I'll get back to you when I figure that out. In the meantime, I think we have to just—keep reminding ourselves what's… real."

It's not a very reassuring answer, but Sirius feels a little better having gotten some of what's troubling him off of his chest, anyway. He punches Moony in the shoulder and says, "Well, we'll just have to keep each other accountable, won't we? For example, I know that you're the best person I know, werewolf or not."

Moony's blushing again. "It's okay, Sirius. You don't have to say—"

"No, seriously, I mean it. You're clever, okay? You're, like, freakishly clever."

"But Abbott gets better marks than—"

"I don't care what kind of marks Abbott gets. I love her, but she's uptight and emotionally distant. You, on the other hand, are laidback and funny and trustworthy, and you're a really good listener, and—"

"You think I'm funny?"

"Will you shut up and let me compliment you? Jesus."

"Well, you're…"

And then Moony doesn't say anything more. Sirius smirks. "It's a good thing I already like myself, man, because you're not doing a very good job of instilling confidence in me here."

"Sorry. I just… I just really love you, Sirius."

He punches Moony in the shoulder. "It's okay, buddy. I know."

"No, I mean it. I… love you. I'd do anything for you, okay? I really would."

Softening, Sirius stretches so he can lean his head on Moony's short shoulder. "I would, too, Moony—and I will as soon as we find some damn information about how to become Animagi. We should start looking in the Restricted Section. We're obviously not getting anywhere with the kiddie books, and it's not like Dumbledore would just leave instructions like that lying around for anyone to find, don't you think?"

xx

The weirdest part is how normal Emmeline is acting toward him. By now, exams are only two weeks away, and since she's Sirius's partner in a good half of his classes, they start spending extra time studying together after hours, too. It's her idea, and she's totally straight-faced when she suggests it, and she keeps her cool when she's with him in a way Sirius could only dream of.

He almost starts to think what happened between them was just a fluke, that Em's decided she's not into it and everything's going to go back to normal. But then he realizes—

Every time they hang out, it's around other Gryffindors in classes or the common room, or else they're surrounded by people out on the grounds, where they take to studying just like everybody else as the days get longer and warmer. They haven't been back in the library unless somebody else has joined them, and they haven't gone on any walks in deserted corridors at night or taken any excursions to Hogsmeade down the secret passageways. In fact, Sirius doesn't think he's been in a room alone with Em since he kissed her.

She acts so unflappable, but finally, he's got a shred of evidence that what happened is affecting her in some way—even if he doesn't know exactly whether that effect is good or bad. But she remembers—she cares—she feels something, and maybe she's avoiding him for all the same reasons as he's feeling uncomfortable around her. Maybe she gets it. Maybe…

He has to get her alone, he realizes. If he gets her alone, they can face it together. If he just pins her down and talks to her about it—

But it's harder than he expects, trying to isolate Em, because she's always got an excuse for why she can't go off alone with Sirius: either she's got plans with the girls, or she needs to buckle down and concentrate on exam prep alone, or she's feeling sick or tired or otherwise antisocial. Finally, the Friday before exams are set to start, he casts a quick Muffliato at the beginning of Potions, where she's stuck with him at his cauldron and can't get away from the conversation. Evans obviously knows where the sudden ringing in her ears is coming from—she's the one he overheard the spell from first, after all—and Sirius takes a second to appreciate the look on her face one desk over before he turns to Em, who for the first time in all this is looking apprehensive.

"Sirius—"

"You already know what this is about, don't you?"

"I… yes."

"Em, we have to talk about it."

"I… yeah. Yes, I know."

But she doesn't say anything more about it, and Sirius kind of doesn't want to have this conversation here, anyway. The professors might not have caught onto how Muffliato works yet, but Slughorn could still come by their cauldron and interrupt them any second. Besides, even if nobody's going to be able to hear the words they're saying, it feels invasive for so many people to be surrounding them when they have this discussion.

"Tonight, okay?" he tells her. "Can you come with me after classes? We'll go to the passage on the fourth floor behind the mirror—it's roomy enough that we can talk in there."

Dinner is still seven hours away, and they drag on and on as Sirius waits for the evening to roll around. Em is his deskmate in all three of his Friday classes, and he gets goosebumps just from sitting next to her throughout the rest of Potions and Muggle Studies after it. They split up at lunch—he goes off with the boys, while she sits with the girls—but by the time Transfiguration picks up afterward, Sirius feels like he never had any respite, like he's still crawling out of his skin.

Finally, the last class of the day is over—well, their last class, anyway, since neither of them is taking Arithmancy and that's what's right after. At first, the walk to the fourth floor is fine, but by the time they're halfway there, they seem to have run out of things they can say to avoid the thing they're really there to talk about. Sirius's heart is racing like it hasn't since the last time he talked to Regulus.

Behind the mirror, everything both speeds up and slows down at the same time, and it reminds him so much of that day in the library. He decides to just jump straight into it, even if he sounds stupid stating the obvious. "I kissed you."

"Well, technically, the second time, I kissed you."

"We kissed each other, then—and we have to talk about it."

"I know."

"We should… we should do that now. Talk about it."

"Yeah, we should."

They stare at each other. "I know this whole talking thing was my idea," says Sirius, "but I kind of just want to—"

"Do it again?"

"I—was going to say walk away."

"Oh." Emmeline looks away, rubbing her hands down her face. "Sorry. I thought—"

He lunges forward then, and it feels so good to kiss her again that he could cry—but he won't. They seem to both have thought about technique enough in the last month that it goes even better than the last time did; Sirius knows he's been thinking nonstop about it, anyway, and Emmeline catches on to what he's doing fast enough that he'd be surprised if it hasn't been on her mind, too. They push and pull, and this time, he immediately gets both his hands—his whole hands, too, not just the tips of his fingers—on both of Emmeline's cheeks. At first, she just covers them with her own hands, but then her touch wanders to Sirius's chest, and just the feel of that light pressure on him through his robes has him—

"Wait, wait, wait—Sirius—what are we doing?"

He shrugs one shoulder. "Snogging?"

"Yeah, but—it's not like you want anything from me, do you? If you did, you would have said something by now. You wouldn't have—"

"I could say the same for you. I—thought it didn't mean anything to you. I thought that was why you didn't bring it up again."

"You thought it didn't mean anything to me? Sirius, if it didn't mean anything, I wouldn't keep…"

"Then why didn't you…?"

"Well, it's just that we've always been…" She clears her throat. "Us Gryffindors, I mean—you haven't noticed it?"

"Noticed what?"

"We can be kind of—I just didn't want to be the subject of a bunch of gossip. I'm—not allowed to date yet, and if Jacqueline heard anything about us and told our parents—but why didn't you say anything?"

"It—was stupid on my part to do it. Not that I think the idea of us kissing is stupid!" he says quickly when her face falls. "It's just—if you think your parents would flip if they heard about you dating someone, mine would…"

"I thought you didn't care what they think—while you're up at Hogwarts, anyway."

"I don't—at least, I didn't think I did—but they could legitimately disown me for this, and while I'm more than okay with that happening eventually, I didn't think it would be smart to provoke it while I'm still dependent on them over the summers. I'm not—available, Em."

"Because I'm a half-blood?"

"Well, that, and because I'm—kind of—engaged."

Her eyes go huge and round. "What do you mean, you're—?"

"It's an arranged marriage. The old pureblood families still do it. Look, I shouldn't have dragged you into my mess, and I'm sorry, okay? I've probably ruined your whole summer vacation, and—"

"Why would this ruin my summer?"

"Well, we're basically not going to see each other because of my parents, right? I just don't want either of us to spend the whole summer worrying that it's going to be weird when we come back—that I've made everything complicated."

"I can handle complicated."

"Yeah, but—maybe I can't. I wouldn't have done it if I'd realized I was going to have an issue, but I didn't know. I just—didn't know."

"So you don't want…?"

"I do. I do want. That's the whole problem."

Emmeline's backed herself against the wall and is leaning against it like it's propping her upright. "Let's just take a breath, okay? The summer's going to be fine. We'll write each other every week, yeah? September is going to be fine. We're still friends, and that's never going away."

"But—Em, I really like you. I've fancied you ever since I—laid eyes on you, I think. I don't know how to just go back to being…"

"Hey, hey, hey, hey." She steps forward and kisses him again, on the forehead this time. "We don't have to 'go back' to… this doesn't have to be forever. I'm not going anywhere, and I'm still going to…"

"But you can't promise that," he insists, "and I can't ask you to wait for me until seventh year, after my last summer with Mum and Dad."

"Yeah, actually, I can promise that. I don't see the way I feel about you changing, and I don't see myself suddenly developing an attraction to anybody else in this castle who I haven't already, and—if you're willing to promise—"

And he needs to tell her that it's not just about Mum and Dad—that it's about the crippling guilt he's been walking around with for the last month. Between now and seventh year is a long time to figure things out, but Sirius is such a mess that—can he guarantee that he'll have worked out his shit enough to be with her by then? He doesn't know. He doesn't think he should.

But—

"I'm willing," he says, like a moron. "I promise, Em. I promise."