Beauty and Sirius Black Chapter 9: Long Goodbyes and Hard Lessons, a harry potter fanfic

Don't own anything recognisable from JK Rowling's Harry Potter books.

Chapter 9

Long Goodbyes and Hard Lessons.

Sirius had successfully avoided Pat for a week.

This was not surprising since Pat had also been avoiding him.

She had been everywhere in the Academy, trying to discover who could attempt to kill Harry. Harry had been no help to Pat at all though. As soon as he'd heard about Sirius shunning Pat he had done the same. Pat however was undeterred.

Lunar had stayed and helped for a while, but the tension in the air had been too much for her, and she decided to leave.

The fact that she believed that Pat and Sirius were made for each other, and told both of them at every opportunity had annoyed them to say the least.

Pat was going to say goodbye to her in her room before she left. She didn't want to see Sirius at the door as she left.

"Lunar?" Pat called through the open door. "May I come in?"

"Uhhhh… Yeah!" Lunar called out.

If Pat was surprised to see Remus Lupin in the room she didn't show it. "Hiya Remus. Come to help her pack?"

Remus looked more than a little uncomfortable. "No… no I just came to say goodbye." He nodded in Lunar's direction and left quickly, his feet making no noise as he shuffled through the door.

Lunar looked straight at Pat. "Is there any way I can convince you that my pigheaded brother and your stubborn self belong together?"

"No. There may have been something, but it was just a passing infatuation on both sides." Pat said firmly, knowing any possible sign of weakness would be noted and passed on to Sirius as love.

"Ahhh, well. It was worth a try!" Lunar said, knowing full well she still had a couple of cards still up her sleeve, and some eager volunteers to help get the Auror and the beast together.

"It wasn't, it really wasn't." Pat said stubbornly, determinedly ignoring the tightening of her stomach, and the disappointment she felt. "Anyway, I just came to say goodbye. If at any point you want … anything, don't hesitate okay?"

Lunar stood up and hugged Pat. "You both had better come to your senses soon. I always wanted another sister!"

Pat felt like crying, she had never heard anything so beautiful in her life. "Nothing is going to happen between myself and Sirius. That doesn't mean we can't be sisters, or friends."

Pat couldn't deal with anymore, Lunar had become a good friend to her, she also had become the person Pat turned to especially with the trouble recently. Harry had persuaded all the students he knew not to talk to her, and to turn their backs as she approached, Sirius was ignoring her, and now a good friend was leaving her in the midst of trouble. She ran from the room tears running down her face straight into.

"Hey! Watch where you're going!"

It was too late for Pat to hide the tears and pain from Sirius, but not too late for her to run back to her room.

~ ~ ~ ~ * ~ ~ ~ ~

"Hey! Watch where you're going!"

Sirius had decided to see if his sister had wanted any help. Anything to take his mind off of the betrayal he had felt since reading the letter.

"Pat?" He stared with wonderment and loss at the space where she had been stood, crying. All that remained was her small notebook that she wrote everything in, and…

"A red book?" Sirius picked them both up. He would get Albus to return them to her later.

"Lunar?" He stuck his head through the open door Pat had just left. "What the…?"

Lunar was sat on her bed, crying.

"What is it about women today? Is it Lets Cry Day?" He said gently, picking up a box of tissues and sitting next to her hugging her gently. "What's the matter honey?"

She sniffed and looked at him. "Pat, she… Well I'm upset for her."

"Don't worry about Pat." Sirius said and pulled her tighter. "I'm sure she can look after herself. After all, she can't be hurt by the fact that I'm not speaking to her!"

Lunar looked up at him. "You don't know, do you? You don't know that Harry has been getting people to ignore her? That, and this above all is upsetting her, that you, the one she trusts most, is ignoring her."

Sirius stiffened in shock, he had not known about any of this. He had been too wrapped up in his own feelings of betrayal and despair, that he had ignored the world around him.

~ ~ ~ ~ * ~ ~ ~ ~

"What do you think you're doing?" Sirius frowned at Harry. Harry shifted from one foot to another.

"Ummm… What do you mean?" He asked guiltily.

"I was told something about you. I was told you had convinced everyone not to talk to Pa... Miss Carver. When they told me I thought. 'That can't be Harry. Harry wouldn't do anything like that.'"

Harry shifted, going red under Sirius' piercing gaze.

"I.. I haven't, umm.."

"How could you? After living with the Dursleys! You know exactly how she feels, because you used to feel like that before you came here!"

"I'm sorry." Harry mumbled into his sweater.

"Oh no! It's not me you should be saying sorry to! You are going to stop this. And I mean it! What do you have now?"

"Herbology." No one but Sirius could hear Harry, he was speaking so quietly and timidly.

"Right, you are going to come with me now and apologise to Pat." Harry turned his face up beseechingly at Sirius. "You wont be getting out of this one Harry. I'll give you a note for Professor Sprout. Now come!"

~ ~ ~ ~ * ~ ~ ~ ~

A while later Sirius was back in his classroom marking essays on. "The Rise and Fall of the Muggle/Wizard Relationship". Or at least that's what he should have been doing. He remembered Pat's reaction to Harry's apology. It was politely received, but Sirius could still see the signs of the tears he had seen earlier. After Harry had made a hasty getaway to Herbology he wanted to ask for forgiveness himself, but the words couldn't rise further than his heart. Azkaban had taught him to be suspicious of everyone, and he couldn't forget that lesson.

He looked at the notebook and the red hardback book he had forgotten to return to her.

"Why do things have to be so difficult?" He asked the room in general, pushing himself off the chair and striding around the room.

Then as if to try and lighten his mood he roared. "1 million house points to the person who can answer that!" He paused, as if awaiting a reply.

"No-one?"

He sat down again. Gazing at the books, the only things he had that belonged to her.

"Cleopatra…"

~ ~ ~ ~ * ~ ~ ~ ~

Pat was getting nowhere fast. After the particularly disturbing sight of Harry apologising she had stared at Sirius, willing herself to talk to him.

But the words wouldn't come, and he had left without a word.

She decided to go to the library and look to find the golden bowl, the only suspicious thing she had heard of so far.

She had had no luck at all, and was just about to get the seventh heavy dusty book that was bigger than her head and contained "Enchanted Objects" when Professor Snape came along.

Well… if came along meant glaring so hard at two students giggling in the different direction to where he was going and banging into the ladder Pat was on so hard that she landed on the floor with a hefty bump. She looked at Severus, furious at him, just in time to see the book she had been holding make a satisfying thud as it hit his head.

"Why weren't you watching where you were going? Idiot!!!" Pat yelled at him, forgetting they were in the library.

The 'Be Considerate! Be Quiet!' people on the posters glared at them both as an angry tirade of insults and blame began.

"You shouldn't be looking on that shelf!"

"Well if you had been looking where you were going!"

"If you hadn't propped the ladder at such a ridiculous angle!"

"Well if you weren't such a pigheaded fool!"

"You…! Why I ought to…!"

Dumbledore chose that moment to intervene. He had been looking in the animals' section for another book on Phoenixes, as Fawkes tail had inexplicably turned blue, when he had heard the banging and shouting.

"Now now, what's going on? Anyone hurt?" He asked as he surveyed the scene. Snape merely glared in Pat's direction and stalked off. Pat stood up and smoothed her clothes down, muttering "Insufferable prat!" under her breath and smiling at Dumbledore. "I'm fine, thank you Albus."

Dumbledore picked up the book that had collided with Severus' head. "Enchanted Objects?" He asked.

"Yes…" Pat went on to explain what Gangly had told her about the bowl. "… Have you heard of anything like that?"

Dumbledore reached into his vast pockets where he kept a Lemon drop for occasions when he was out of his office, looking at it, he peeled away the blue fuzz it had collected from his robe, he whispered a few magical words and – much to Pat's disgust, popped it in his mouth. "Come and see me in my office this evening, after dinner. I should have something else then."

Before Pat could thank him and go back to her room, he continued. "I know this isn't a Ministry Matter, but… Well Fawkes' tail keeps turning blue. I wash him, and it comes off, but a couple of hours later it's back." He looked seriously at Pat. "Could you see if you can find anything?"

~ ~ ~ ~ * ~ ~ ~ ~

"Cleopatra…" Sirius stroked the red book remembering the way she had felt when he held her, the way her skin had tasted, the way she had responded to his every move. A small sharp electrical shock startled him out of his reverie. He instinctively removed his hand from the book in shock, staring at the book in horror. "What the…?" He said, shocked as the book flipped open. The pages started to turn with such ferocity that he couldn't read it. Suddenly it stopped, and emitted a short sharp beep.

He looked at the pages and saw the neatly printed words.

'Sirius and I… well. We made love for the first time, I hope its not the last.'

"Her diary." Sirius murmured to himself. He knew he shouldn't read it. He knew it was her private thoughts, but something inside him couldn't resist.

He was enthralled with her description of him. It was so graphic in parts that he felt himself blushing deeply. He gaped with astonishment at the book when he found words like 'Adonis' and 'Love-god' describing himself.

"Going to have to take another cold shower before the next lesson." He told himself, running his finger around the collar of his shirt to release the steam. He read on.

'Received a letter form the ministry. They think Sirius is the villain in this case. They've ordered me to keep a close eye on him, although I don't think they mean as close as this! In my heart I know Sirius isn't the one after Harry here, and I've told him this, but I have to obey orders, and if they want a detailed report on Sirius, then that's what they're going to get. A statement saying firmly that the ministry have no basis in their idea that Sirius is a Death Eater.'

He could read no more. He regretted ever thinking that Pat would betray him.

"Oh, Cleopatra…" He sighed. The book abruptly shut almost taking his hand with it.

He stared at it for a while, then realising that Cleopatra was the password to the book he pushed it to one corner of the desk, affirming to himself that he would return it with a grovelling apology.

But first, he decided watching his students file in the room, he would have to teach a class sitting down so he wouldn't embarrass himself. He forced a smile to his face, hoping that his skin was not still red.

~ ~ ~ ~ * ~ ~ ~ ~

"Professor Binns said it sounds like the bowl of Gniweiv." Albus confided in Pat later.

"Gniweiv?" Pat asked puzzled.

They were sat in Dumbledore's office. Dumbledore was stood beside a sink full of bubbles, vigorously washing at Fawkes tail, which was dipped in the water.

"Yes," Albus replied. "Gniweiv. It is some sort of enchanted item from the late 15th century. A great wizard called…" He scratched his head in puzzlement causing most of his hair to be covered in blue soapy bubbles. "... I can't remember. Anyway, the wizard didn't trust his Muggle wife and decided to keep an eye on her. He enchanted the bowl. All you have to do is say the person's name, and say "Mehtweiv". The bowl should show you exactly where they are and what they are doing without their knowledge. All in Dolby surround sound, and glorious Technicolor!"

He had said the last part majestically, waving his arms about and covering most of the portraits of old headmasters in blue foam. They wiped themselves down huffily.

Pat looked at him curiously. Her mouth twitching at the sight of the blue headmasters.

"In glorious Technicolor?" She asked hesitantly.

"Yes." Dumbledore gave her a large grin. "I heard it when I was last in the Muggle world. I've been itching to get it into a conversation somewhere!"

She grinned back, careful not to hurt Albus' feelings, then realisation set in about what he had said about the bowl.

A sinking feeling appeared in her stomach. "If Gangly saw it here then… they could know where everyone is at any one point. They know when Harry is alone!"

She stood up from her chair so quickly that it almost tipped over. "Where's Harry now?" she asked Albus on the way out of the door.

"History of Magic class with Sirius…" She heard him call through the door before it shut behind her.

A/N

Mrs Grim. I really didn't want Sirius to do something so incredibly stupid after the letter (Although I suppose reading somebody's diary is a stupid thing to do!!) Needless to say, I think I've tortured them enough!! The next chapter will prove this! I hope I did okay with Harry and Sirius' relationship. I think Harry would be kinda protective over Sirius, hence he ignores Pat.

Siriuslyinlove. I hope Lunar And Remus don't get together before Pat and Sirius!!!! I would confuse the hell out of me!! I've been playing with a few ideas, but I won't be posting them before I finish with this story. (Plus I have to post the Severus story I've been writing as well!!!)

D.S. Moony. Thanks for reading!! If you do think of any suggestions then don't hesitate to post them!!!

Jest017. I'm thinking of a number between 1 and 10…………………………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..………………………………………………………..

If you think its 6 then you're psychic. If not then you have excellent timing!!!!! Sirius is coming back to her any day now!!!

Starlight. Thanks for reading the story. (Although you probably won't get this until you catch up with the rest of us!!!)

I'm glad I've confirmed your suspicions that Elvis wasn't dead!!! I do love his songs, and I had an idea involving one of his songs that will turn up in a couple of chapters time!!!!!

I hope you get some sleep soon!! (And that your little girl isn't suffering too much with her teeth!!! (I know what pain in the teeth feels like!!! I had a brace for a couple of years, and I've only just finished with my wisdom teeth!!! (Why don't they all come at once?? And painlessly?!?!)))

Anyway, enough of my chatter!!
Thanks for reading!!!

Love Krusty.

xxx