Chapter 5

The great hall was filled with gossip and conversation about the night before. People were trying to figure out how in the world Sirius black got in the castle and why no one had noticed him leaving. The Halloween spirit was nowhere to be found. Except for a group of students in the middle of the Gryffindor table.

"Happy Birthday!" It was as if they had practiced to make the words come out in exactly the same moment. Amelia casually put another bite of the chocolate pudding in her mouth, pretending like she hadn't heard them. She had another bite halfway to her mouth, when George grabbed the spoon from her hand, making the pudding drop onto the table. Angelina vanished it with a wave of her wand and a smile, as Amelia was protesting and trying to take her spoon back from George's hands.

"First your presents, Lia." He said with a grin, before handing her a package packed in simple brown packing paper. Amelia sighed and gave up the fight, knowing that she wouldn't be able to wrestle the spoon away from him anyway. Damn those muscles formed by his beater training. She carefully unwrapped the package, remembering what had happened last year. Thankfully he had not put any pranks on the present this year, instead she found a special muggle card deck, designed to play tricks on people. Fred's gift got the same treatment as George's, being opened carefully, to reveal her favorite candy from honeyduke's and a packet of her favorite cookies (probably made by Mrs. Weasley). She thanked both of the grinning boys and moved on to the present she had gotten from Angelina and Alicia. It was wrapped in a bright pink wrapping paper, little silver hearts all over blinding her when the light fell into them. When the paper was carefully removed, a little black basket filled with different muggle candies and an old muggle book were revealed. She knew the name of the book, having heard Hermione Granger talk about it last year. She had borrowed the book from her then and had taken quite a liking to it. Next was Lee's gift, a nice, soft blanket in their house colours. It was quite sweet of him, knowing that she was always cold when they sat in the common room at night. Katie gave her a nice, warm sweater that they had seen a while back in a muggle clothing store and her favorite perfume. And then it was Oliver's turn. Amelia expected to get something quidditch related from him, so she was a little shocked when she saw the earrings that he had gotten her. They were beautiful little studs, a round, blush pink stone, surrounded by little clear stones. Along with the earrings he had gotten her a book on casting a patronus charm. She smiled as she looked up at him, not noticing that he had pulled her a little closer to his side and that he was now moving in closer. Her eyes shot open when she figured out what he was doing and she felt a little panic rise up inside her. He was kissing her in front of their friends! What would they think?! She remembered that they would have to tell them eventually and perhaps Oliver thought this was the best way. So she let him kiss her, right there in the great hall, surrounded by their friends. She tried not to listen to the gasps and the murmuring sounds that slowly grew louder as the rumours, that would soon be heard through the whole castle, were born. When he let go of her, she felt her face turning red and tried to avoid looking at her friends, as Oliver's arm wrapped around her waist, holding her against him. Before their friends could start asking questions, she noticed professor Lupin motioning for her to come to him.

"Sorry guys, Lupin wants to see me." She grabbed her presents, giving Oliver's arm a light squeeze and made her way to the teachers' table.

X- Harry Potter –X

They were in Lupin's office, him seated across from her, a cup of tea in front of both of them. They had been talking about her ability to almost cast a patronus, which he was surprised about this early in their lessons, and the subject they were going to approach in the lessons next week. When they finished talking about those things however, he changed the subject to what had happened in the great hall.

"I noticed what happened earlier." He said. "You were a little uncomfortable, right?" Amelia did not know how to react to a teacher noticing her love life, so she stammered, her face turning red again. He smiled his friendly smile. "Don't worry. I'm not watching you or anything. I just noticed it when I was keeping an eye on Draco Malfoy. I saw your reaction and it reminded me of your mother." This piqued Amelia's interest.

"Y- you knew my mother?" Lupin smiled again.

"Yes, I did."

"No one knows much about my mother. My aunt won't even tell me anything about her. I only know I look like her." Lupin looked at her, deep in thought about something.

"Your aunt Cassandra? Yes, well I understand. You see, your mother was a good friend of mine. Her brother was actually one of my best friends."

"Brother?" Lupin's eyes darkened a shade.

"You don't know anything about your family?" Amelia shook her head.

"Cass doesn't like to talk about them. She says she can't tell me without bringing back memories." Lupin nodded and excused himself for a moment, walking into another room. She could hear him cast a patronus charm and tried to figure out why he'd need to do that. Before she could come to any conclusion, he reappeared, sitting back in his seat again.

"I'm going to tell you about your parents. If you'd like, that is." She didn't need to be asked twice. A quick nod was all the answer she could muster. "Okay, but you have to promise not to interrupt me."

"I promise." With those words he started talking.

X- Harry Potter –X

When she entered the common room two hours later, she was uncharacteristically quiet. She sat down next to Oliver on the couch, moving against him and into his arms, not caring about who saw. She was way too confused and overwhelmed to care who saw these signs of their affection. She did not hear any of her friends' questions about where she'd been or what was wrong with her. She just stayed quiet for the rest of the night. The only person who could get a reaction out of her was Oliver, and that was only when he told her he was going to get her the blanket she had gotten for her birthday. She curled up under the blanket, her head on Katie's lap and her feet on Oliver's. Not even taking five minutes to fall asleep. Her friends stayed quiet for a few more minutes, before they started to speculate.

"She seemed really off. Do you think something bad happened?" Katie asked.

"If we know anything about our Lia, it's that she's bound to get angry when bad things happen." Fred said, frowning lightly.

"Do you think it's because I kissed her at the feast?" Oliver turned to Katie while asking this. Katie shook her head.

"If that was it, then she wouldn't have been leaning on you all night. She'd probably have walked straight to our dorm when she entered."

"Maybe it was her talk with Lupin. You know talking serious business with teachers always tires her out." George piped up.

"That might be it." Angelina nodded, along with Alicia and Lee. Oliver and Katie looked at each other, before glancing down at the sleeping girl in their laps. Katie absentmindedly stroked her best friend's hair. The rest of the group went back to their previous conversations, leaving Katie and Oliver sharing worried looks over Amelia, not noticing one other person finding it difficult to keep his eyes away from the sleeping girl.

X- Harry Potter –X

Over the next few days everything seemed to go quite smoothly. Amelia managed to cast an actual patronus charm and had managed to wrap her head around the stories about her parents. As the weather turned stormy and grey, the quidditch team started to get anxious about the upcoming match. Rain was never a good thing with quidditch matches, it meant sore muscles, head colds and a seeker who was unable to see the snitch. With the storm came other things that didn't go well. Lupin's classes were temporarily taken over by none other than the greasy bat, who seemed to think they needed to go back to the third year lessons, going on and on about werewolves. And then there was the dreaded quidditch match. Not only were Oliver's game plans not worth anything, because they suddenly were up to Hufflepuff instead of Slytherin, but apparantly the dementors went rogue, causing Harry to faint and fall from his broom, which was blown into the whomping willow. After Amelia had helped collecting all the remaining pieces of the broom, she followed the team to the hospital wing. When Harry woke up and got over the initial shock of losing his beloved broom, he asked about Oliver. It was only then that Amelia noticed that he wasn't there.

"He's still in the showers." George said, with a look at his brother.

"We think he's trying to drown himself." The whole team turned towards Amelia.

"What?" She asked, not realizing what they were getting at.

"Well, he's your boyfriend. Maybe you should go and talk to him." Angelina said, looking at her sympathetically.

"But-" Amelia sighed. They were right. She was the one who knew Oliver best. She knew that if no one talked to him, he would keep over thinking everything. So she stood and started walking out of the hospital wing.

"Lia wait!" She stopped and waited for the read head to catch up with her. "I'll walk with you." Side by side they made their way out of the castle and across the grounds. They were about halfway, when Amelia broke the silence that surrounded them.

"What did you want to talk about?" She had known the twins for years, every little quirk and mannerism they had. She knew Fred hated walking further than he had to, and only did it to either clear his mind or, if he walked with someone else, to get information. He stayed quiet for a few moments, before clearing his throat.

"I just wondered... When did this thing with Oliver happen? I didn't know you had feelings for him. Neither did George or anyone else." Amelia felt the corner of her mouth twitch.

"Neither did I." He stopped walking.

"What?"

"I said, neither did I. It took me a while to figure out that I had feelings for him." He raised his eyebrows.

"But how do you know? That you have feelings, I mean." Amelia thought about it. How did she know?

"I guess... I don't know." She resumed walking, but was stopped by his hand on her arm. "Fred?" She looked at him with confusion in her eyes. His blue eyes bored into hers.

"Just make sure you're happy, okay?" She smiled, touched by his words and nodded silently. He gave a little nod back, before they started walking again, a comfortable silence hanging between them. After another five minutes of walking, they reached the locker rooms.

"I'll leave you alone then." He turned and started his walk back to the castle, leaving her to deal with Oliver. She carefully pushed open the door, praying that Oliver was at least decent by now. She was in luck, as he was sitting down on one of the benches, wearing a pair of muggle jeans and a dark blue t-shirt. She bit her lip, trying to decide how to start. Oliver beat her to it.

"I told him to get the snitch or die trying... I'm a terrible person." His head fell into his hands.

"No you're not. Harry knows you didn't mean it. He's okay, by the way."

"Good. And the broom?" Amelia's shoulders slumped.

"Unfixable. It landed in the whomping willow. But it'll be fine. Harry's got enough money to buy a new one."

"I should apologize."

"Maybe. But First I want to know how you are doing." She sat down next to him and was surprised to find him pulling her close, looking for some support. She wrapped her arms around him, telling him everything would be okay, without using her words.

"I'll never get our team the quidditch cup."

"There's still a chance you will. You just need to man up, and train your team, like you've never trained them before." This brought a little smile to his face. "You'll be okay, Ollie. I promise."

X- Harry Potter –X

The weeks passed quickly, Christmas coming and going. Before Amelia knew it, she was back at Hogwarts, after spending her break at home. She had been visiting Oliver and his family for a few days, happy that his family was already aware of her new status of 'girlfriend'. Her days at his home had been filled with running and rolling around in the snow with Oliver's twin nieces that were staying over, playing quidditch and warming up with hot cocoa by the fire. Presents had been exchanged and unpacked, leaving Amelia with new quidditch books and a broom polishing kit along with a lot of other presents. Even though the vacation had been fun, she was happy to be back at school with all of her friends. The days spent with aunt Cass had been quiet and tense. They had avoided the subject of Amelia's parents altogether, focusing instead on how school was going and if she needed anything before they'd have to get back to school. Jennifer had been going on and on about her new crush, Roger Davies and how he had defended her against some slimy slytherins, lead by Marcus Flint. Normally Amelia would've escaped the house and went to the Burrow, but since the Weasleys had stayed at school and Molly and Arthur were god knows where, that had not been a possibility. The first few days of school were pretty quiet and ordinary, until at one point Lupin asked her to assist him in teaching another student the Patronus charm. The teacher had taken quite a liking to her, asking her to assist in more of his classes. It had made her realize that she might want to teach when she finished school. Knowing the school's track record, there would probably be an opening by the time she graduated. She was surprised (or maybe not that surprised) to find out that it was Harry Potter himself that needed help learning the spell. When Lupin entered the classroom a few seconds behind her, they exchanged a little smile, that only they knew the meaning of.