Whee! Squee! Yee!

Enough of that. I'm excited, as you can see-I actually liked how chapter eleven turned out, though I had my doubts at first and it took me quite a while to write. I actually put it up in installments, to stop myself from freaking out and deleting the whole thing (yes, I get this way when writing). But now it's up, and I'm happy with it, and hopefully my readers are happy with it, and now it CONTINUES! YAAAAAAAY!

If you'll remember, Sirius was last seen in the trial with *gasp* Umbridge, and had not had the chance to race yet. Well, I can't be done with broom racing already, so here's the next bit of it-Sirius included!

I hope you like it, I hope I like it, I hope there isn't a nuclear war so no one CAN like it, and blah blah blah. Enjoy!

PS: Don't forget to check out Winged Seraphin (once she gets something posted. . .grr. . .), the inventor of Broom Racing. She writes good HPness (well, she's in the midst of writing good HPness and WILL have it posted soon, won't you Mals?!). So read, review, and enjoy!

Chapter Twelve

Adrenaline Rush

A bell tolled somewhere in the room, its sound echoing and reverberating off the hoary walls. The bell cut off Sirius mid-sentence, and was so loud he could not speak over it. But when it finally stopped its clangor, Umbridge cut him off yet again by standing up from her chair.

"That adjourns today's meeting. I can't wait to see you back here next week!" Umbridge said cheerfully before turning and exiting the room. Snape remained behind for a moment, but Sirius couldn't wait to get out of there; he sprinted through the door and took the revolving stairs two at a time. He didn't know what time it was, but he could tell it was getting late. His first race was at one o'clock, and he simply could not be late. . .

The common room was empty when he burst into it a few minutes later, clutching his side and breathing heavily. He tossed some Floo powder into the fire and stepped into the green flames, catching his breath long enough to say "Knockturn Alley!"

A few quick revolutions later, Sirius was tumbling out of the fireplace in the Knockturn Café, the main Floo connection in the alley. He brushed soot off his clothes, a black t-shirt and jeans, all under his school robes, which were open for greatest freedom of movement. He'd borrowed James' Quidditch gauntlets and charmed them to be black temporarily; he was, in essence, his own namesake.

Sirius went straight to the registration desk to make sure he'd told them everything. The old lady at the head of his line checked his card with agonizing slowness.

"Sirius Black? Number seventeen? Broom is. . .Kagerou?" Sirius nodded impatiently, ignoring the fact that she butchered the pronunciation of the Japanese word for "dragonfly." "You'll need a nickname, Mr. Black," she said slowly. Without hesitation, he supplied his name:

"Black Phoenix. Is that all you need? My race starts in a few minutes. . ." The old woman gave him a scrutinizing look.

"Alright then, Mr. Black Phoenix. Good luck with your race." Sirius turned and ran as fast as he could through the crowd toward his starting position. He was relieved to find his broom there, brought down by the people working for FL. He grabbed it and drew his wand from his pocket, quickly removing the masking spells from the broom. The broom handle was smooth, shining black; being made of Japanese design, it was long and thin, perfectly formed and very nice to look at. The twigs were clipped and shaved down to maximum thinness. They were a dull silver in color.

Another spell was removed; a flaming phoenix decal appeared on the side of the handle. Sirius muttered something, and harmless black flames engulfed the twigs. The silver shone through the fire, giving the impression of great movement.

With a grin, Sirius put his wand away. He lightly touched the front of his broom and revealed a row of red buttons. Sirius' neighbor, a third year by the look of him, stared in awe at the transformed broom. Sirius rolled his eyes and ignored the kid.

The announcer informed them all that the race would be starting shortly. Sirius shed his robes and folded them carefully at the starting point; they'd be picked up by FL workers and put in the racer's pit once the race started. He didn't want the extra weight and wind resistance while flying. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the third year doing the same, watching Sirius all the while.

A moment later, the announcer told them to mount up. Sirius did so, listening for the extra surge from the adrenaline-pumped crowd. Quite unlike Remus, who ignored the crowd's cheering, Sirius fed off the energy. He never flew as well without an audience.

The whistle was blown; as soon as it stopped, Sirius kicked off from the ground. the others rose high into the air before speeding ahead, but Sirius stayed low to the ground, saving all his momentum for forward movement. He quickly outstripped the main body of the group, catching up with the racers at the front-all of whom had Silver Arrows. They were shocked to see a Kagerou, a broom thought to have terrible acceleration, catching up with them so fast. Sirius grinned at them as he passed the one at the back.

The Silver Arrow group worked together to try and force Sirius back, where he wouldn't be a threat. But just as they'd positioned themselves for such a tactic, they all rounded the first bend-and Sirius rose high above them, escaping their trap. Before they could move up with him, he put on an impossible burst of speed and took the lead on the next straightaway.

Sirius whooped as he passed the Silver Arrows, releasing the red button as he did so. He immediately felt the broom slow down, but not enough to drop back into the group again. The flames on his tail died down to their normal height; he'd merely fed them an influx of oxygen to cause a small explosion, propelling himself forward at a speed even the Silver Arrows couldn't match. It was a legal racing tactic that most racers hadn't yet figured out.

But the foremost of the Silver Arrows was soon catching up again. The racer was a teenaged boy, probably a fourth year. Sirius caught a glimpse of his number as they became neck-and-neck at the front of the race: number fifty-two. He didn't recognize it, and figured this was probably a new racer.

His broom was incredible, though. It was much faster than Sirius' on the straightaway, though it tended to drop back a bit on the curves. It glinted silver in the sun-from what Sirius could see, it appeared to have silver in the handle and twigs. That would make it sturdier and harder to throw off course. Sirius wouldn't be able to win this race by aggression- he'd have to resort to tactics.

But another broom was catching up with them. Sirius chanced a look back and was surprised to see Remus slowly gaining on them. He silently cheered his friend on and turned back to worry about his own placing. Number fifty- two was now easily five feet ahead of Sirius; that would have to change.

At the next turn, Sirius carefully hugged the inside of the track. His broom was not as easy to steer as Remus', and he found this hard to do. He was startled and nearly went off course when he noticed Remus speeding along below him, slowly passing him and gaining on the Silver Arrow rider. Sirius grinned; he'd soon leave them both behind.

As soon as the track straightened out, Sirius pressed the second red button on his broom handle. Another burst of oxygen fed his flames and made a small explosion at the back of his broom. He jerked a bit but managed to stay pretty straight as the broom sped on, quickly outstripping Remus and the other racer. The crowd cheered loudly at this second display and Sirius let out a long whoop of adrenaline. He didn't have to turn around to know that the Silver Arrow rider was glaring at him with disgust, and perhaps some curiosity.

But his speed didn't last as long as Sirius had hoped; in no time, the Silver Arrow racer was directly behind him again. Sirius longed for his wand to toss a curse over his shoulder, but wands had been outlawed from the races two years ago when someone had been killed by a simple curse that had knocked him off his broom-just as two racers behind him collided. He was caught in the splintering mess and crushed onto the track when they all fell.

Sirius lay flat on his broom, trying for as much speed as he could muster, and rose a little higher into the air. At the next curve, he could huge the inside a little closer, as the fences didn't reach this far up and it was hard to determine whether or not he was within the limits. As long as he was careful and didn't use this tactic too often, the judges wouldn't penalize him for it.

The next curve kept him a few feet ahead of his opponent. He half expected Remus to appear again, but he didn't seem to be nearby anymore. Sirius therefore turned all his attention to the only opponent who seemed able to keep up.

On the home stretch, though, they were joined suddenly by another racer Sirius hadn't noticed before. He came out of nowhere, zooming along below them and quickly gaining speed. Sirius glanced down at this new threat; it seemed to be a girl, with wavy brown hair flowing out behind her-

Jesse? he realized with amazement. And it was almost definitely her-he vaguely heard the announcer say something about "Flicker" and recognized it as Jesse's nickname, as she'd told him the day they'd signed up.

Jesse or not, she was nearly passing Sirius and the Silver Arrow. Sirius grinned and pressed the last button on his broom handle. . .

And nothing happened. He must have forgotten to refill the oxygen canister. His stomach dropped; there was no way he could stay ahead of the Silver Arrow and this other girl on a straightaway-his broom just wasn't built for it. He lay flat on the handle, urging his broom forward with all his might. He was still barely ahead of the Silver Arrow, though the other was steadily passing him. . .and that girl below! She had now outstripped both of them and was headed for the finish line.

Sirius decided to let her go-there was simply no way he could catch up with her now. But if he could at least beat the Silver Arrow-

But that racer seemed to have some tricks up his sleeve as well. When they were only ten feet from the finish line, less than a second away from the end, he leaned forward and zoomed ahead. Apparently, he'd been keeping up with Sirius without even using his broom's full potential.

Sirius slowly spiraled downward and alighted on the track next to the racers' pit. He sighed when he looked up at the scores: third place, but only by .47 second.

He had no injuries for once, having had no reason to be aggressive with the Silver Arrow rider, so Sirius didn't even enter the racers' pit. He went straight to the stands to watch the remainder of the race. They hadn't been too far ahead of the next group of racers, but there were still racers long behind those. Most of them were trying to earn points if they couldn't place well, and were doing tricks and stunts whenever possible. It was quite entertaining to watch.

When the race was over, Sirius waited at the entrance to the racers' pit for people he knew to emerge. Whenever they did, he'd talk briefly with them about the race and let them go on their way. Finally, Remus, Jesse, and Lily came up to the track. Lily had a bandage on her arm and Remus had one around his hand, but Jesse seemed to be fine. When Sirius asked Lily how she'd done, she admitted she'd finished among the last-someone had knocked her from her broom at the very beginning, and she'd only just managed to hang on and keep from being disqualified. Once she realized she had no chance of catching up, she decided to rack up her score-which was now over seven hundred when combined with the score from the last race. Sirius realized that one of the trick-racers he'd been watching must have been Lily and complimented her on some of the stunts he remembered.

Remus, apparently, had finished twentieth. His bandage, he explained to Sirius, was from his last race, the mini-championship. He didn't bother telling him what had happened, but let Jesse talk-he didn't feel too keen on telling Sirius about that right now anyway.

Jesse had been, in fact, the brown-headed racer to finish first. She was positively beaming as she explained how she'd managed this-after a slow start, she barely managed to keep up with the second group of racers. She saw Sirius pass but stayed focused on her own problem: trying to get out of the clump she was in. She was stuck with them for most of the race until, during the final lap, she managed to break free and used her broom's incredible speed to catch up with and pass Sirius and Silverbolt.

"Silverbolt? Is that the guy who got second?" Sirius asked when she'd finished. They all nodded.

"He was in the mini-championship, too. He got first in that one," Remus explained. Jesse frowned, obviously disapproving. Sirius cocked an eyebrow at her questioningly.

"Only because he's got silver in his broom," she said defensively. Remus laughed.

"No, he's a good racer too. That was just lucky." Sirius was looking confused, so Jesse explained.

"Silverbolt's Silver Arrow is streaked through with actual silver. When he and Remus were fighting for the lead, he bumped into him a few times, and the silver did quite a bit of damage. It threw Remus off enough that Silverbolt was able to take the lead. . .but he wouldn't have been able to otherwise, I'm sure of it!" Remus smiled again but said nothing.

"So what did the silver do to you?" Sirius asked in what he hoped was a casual voice.

"Just cut up my knuckles some, where it hit."

"You get it treated yet?"

"You know I can't until we're back at school," Remus said wearily. He hoped fervently that Sirius wouldn't put up a fight about this. "I can't let them know. . ." He shrugged, and Sirius got the message.

"Okay, as long as you go straight to Pomfrey once we're back." He looked around. "Where's James?" Lily looked up at the stands, holding her hand up against the sun.

"Up in this stand somewhere. . .there, talking to that girl with the dark hair." She frowned suddenly and started walking briskly up the steps. Sirius smiled and shook his head; the girl James was talking to was Reggie Scott, and there was no chance of anything happening there. As far as James was concerned, there was no one in the world but Lily Evans.

They all followed Lily up into the stands and soon joined her sitting next to James and Reggie. Lily was sitting next to her boyfriend, a protective arm around his shoulders. He looked amused and a bit annoyed, but had his arm around her waist and seemed to understand why she was suddenly so protective.

The next race was another mini-championship. Both Jesse and Sirius were in it, having placed among the top five, so the rest stayed with James to watch their friends race.



Remus watched the race carefully, reading up on each player as he or she posed a threat to either Sirius or Jesse. James eventually got sick of loaning Remus his program and gave it to him for the remainder of the race.

When he read about Silverbolt, he remembered his injured knuckles. Now that he was focusing on them, they immediately started to throb. He shook his bandaged hand impatiently, trying to get the dull pounding to go away. They'd been bothering him every once in a while and, though they didn't hurt too badly, he was still annoyed-and vaguely worried. He didn't know what prolonged exposure to the tiny silver shards in his hand would do, and he found he didn't want to think about it. He simply put his trust in Madam Pomfrey and hoped his hand was healed by the time he next had to write something.

The aching eventually went away, and Remus focused on the race again. He found that whenever he wasn't thinking about the race or his sore knuckles, he was thinking about Jesse. It wasn't that he didn't like thinking about her-he very much did-but he found that he blushed and smiled whenever she surfaced in his mind, and he'd gotten quite a few odd looks from James.

Sirius was losing his lead as the other racers put on speed. Jesse always kept ahead on the straightaways, but generally fell behind on the curves. Her broom, the Hummingbird, was built much like the Silver Arrow in that way.

As they all rounded the last bend and started up the home stretch, Sirius did something very brave and very stupid: he was in fourth place, behind Jesse, Silverbolt, and a foreigner who called himself Verboden. He positioned himself directly behind Verboden and Silverbolt, who were neck- and-neck behind and to the right of Lily, and pressed one of the buttons on his broom. He'd been unable to use his replenished supply of oxygen due to cramped flying conditions, but now he seemed to be flying with the purpose of knocking the others from their brooms. The oxygen-filled flames exploded and his broom shot forward, slamming into the two racers ahead of him. Sirius lost nearly all his speed, but Verboden was knocked to the left. He made a sharp right turn to avoid the fence, but this caught him off balance and he fell from his broom. He was disqualified.

Silverbolt's sturdier broom had stayed almost perfectly on course, though the racer himself seemed shaken. He, too, lost a lot of speed, and both strained to regain what had been lost as Jesse approached the finish line. The racer behind them, a novice girl nicknamed Bittersweet, didn't react fast enough to take advantage of Sirius' and Silverbolt's lost speed. When they were back to normal, she fell behind again.

Sirius decided it was now or never-he pressed the second button on his broom and was kicked forward again. But Silverbolt had expected this, and as soon as he saw Sirius press the button he swerved to block him. The Silver Arrow was only barely knocked aside, but Sirius nearly lost control of his broom in the unexpected crash. He dropped a good five feet before realizing what had happened.

Silverbolt left Sirius behind, no longer worried about him catching up: his only concern now was Jesse, who was nearly at the finish line. He lay flat on his broom, urging the Silver Arrow on and willing it with all his mind to go faster. It picked up speed and was gaining on her. . .

Two feet from the finish line, Silverbolt caught up with Jesse. He didn't spare her a glance as he inched ahead of her, and still wasn't sure if he'd beaten her or not when they crossed the finish line at what seemed like the same time. He gave her a genuine smile when they'd landed and stuck out his hand, still catching his breath.

Jesse shook his hand politely, though she still felt prejudiced against him because of the silver in his broom. Silverbolt was grinning from ear to ear, and he stepped a bit closer to her so he could talk without yelling.

"That was excellent!" he said happily. "The best competition I've had in years! You're really a wonderful racer-you've got some interesting tactics I've never seen." Jesse looked at him in surprise.

"Oh. . .I suppose I learned some different things in America. . ."

"America!" he said with a laugh. "That explains the accent. . .did you come all the way here for this race?"

Jesse shook her head and explained that she was living in England now. Silverbolt stuck out his hand again.

"Well, let me welcome you to this wonderful country! I think you'll find it quite nice, though nothing like where you're from I'm sure-"

"Actually, I lived here until I was ten before my family moved to America. We've only just recently moved back," Jesse interrupted him curtly. She found she didn't quite like this boy; he seemed a bit arrogant, just in the way he held himself and talked to her, and she still felt miffed about the silver in his broom. . .

"Oh! Well, please excuse me for being overzealous! I get rather excited at the races, you see. . .my goodness!" he yelled suddenly, slapping his forehead in a rather over-dramatic way. "I've completely forgotten to tell you my name! I'm Geoffrey Williamson," he told her, sticking out his hand yet again. Jesse shook it one more time.

"Jesse Philbin," she said, just to be polite. As soon as he let her hand go, she began looking around for Sirius, who would surely have landed by now. She spotted him quickly and hailed him, relieved when he came over to talk to her. Now at least she didn't have to face this kid alone.

"This is Sirius Black," she told Geoffrey politely, placing her hand on his shoulder. "Sirius, Geoffrey Williamson has just kindly introduced himself to me." She gave him a rather tight smile, and he understood as much as he needed to.

"Why, Geoffrey Williamson!" Sirius exclaimed with a pompous accent. "I can't believe I'm meeting him at last-I've heard so much about you!" He took Geoffrey by the shoulder and steered him away from Jesse, talking randomly about various broom races where he thought he'd heard the name mentioned. Luckily for him, Geoffrey didn't seem to be listening-he kept looking over his shoulder at Jesse, who was pointedly ignoring him.

A few minutes later, Remus, James, and Lily came down to congratulate her and Sirius. They all looked rather sympathetic that she'd gotten second-by only .07 of a second-but Jesse assured them that it was good enough for her. Lily sensed she wanted to talk to Remus alone for a while and steered her boyfriend away to join Sirius and Silverbolt's discussion.

Remus turned to Jesse when the others had gone, smiling widely.

"I can't believe you nearly won!" he said happily, taking her hands in his. Jesse laughed.

"What, didn't you think I could do it?" she teased. Remus shook his head.

"You know that's not what I meant," he replied, still smiling. "You did a wonderful job, anyway. Not to sound condescending, but I'm very proud of you." Jesse smiled up at him.

"You don't sound condescending at all." She gave him a quick kiss and turned to see how the others were getting on. Staring right at them, an odd expression on his face, was Geoffrey Williamson. He seemed to have lost track of the conversation.

"I think you have an admirer," Remus said softly. Jesse couldn't tell whether his tone was teasing or annoyed.



The rest of the day passed quite well: Sirius won twelve galleons in a personal race against a Slytherin fifth-year, which put them all in a good mood; Jesse got second in another mini-championship; Remus got third in the final race of the day, which bumped him into fifteenth overall in the major race; Lily won five sickles from another girl who'd just gotten into racing and thought her Silver Arrow meant a sure win; and Geoffrey only bothered Jesse once more, after the last race.

"You really don't like him, do you?" Remus murmured when Silverbolt had walked away from a relatively stony Jesse. She shook her head curtly and turned to join the others on their way to the Portkey area. It was six o'clock already, and they were supposed to be back in their common rooms by eight. "Care to tell me why?" Remus asked, matching her brisk pace. She hesitated.

"He's arrogant."

"So's Sirius," Remus pointed out with a laugh. "What's the real reason?"

"Well. . .he hurt you," she finally admitted, blushing and feeling rather stupid. She picked up his right hand and gently ran her fingers over the gauze.

"He didn't mean to-it was part of the race. I would have done the same to him, probably." Jesse shook her head.

"No, you wouldn't have. I've seen you race-you only get aggressive when there's no other option." She chuckled softly. "You're too much of a gentleman to race." Remus looked at her, shocked and rather offended.

"I'm what?"

"A gentleman," Jesse repeated. "It's not a bad thing-I find it rather endearing." She squeezed his hand gently, careful to avoid his sore knuckles. Remus repressed a smile.

"That makes it less harsh," he admitted. "But I don't see what you mean- I'm very aggressive when I need to be."

"Okay then."

"I am!"

"I agreed with you!" Remus rolled his eyes; Jesse was laughing, and obviously didn't agree much at all.

"I'll show you-just wait until the next race."

"What if I'm in it? Or Lily, or Sirius? Would you be aggressive to us?"

"Well-of-of course not!" he stammered.

"HA! I prove my point." Remus found he didn't have anything to say to that, so he let the matter drop. He'd just have to prove it to her when he next got the chance.

They all managed to get a Portkey by seven o'clock, and were back in the common room ten minutes later. They all settled around the fire, Jesse sitting next to Remus and absently stroking his hand through the gauze. Sirius was watching this motion with a contended look on his face, but suddenly he sat up.

"Moony! You forgot to go to Madam Pomfrey!" Remus looked up from the fire; he was feeling rather groggy after such a long day.

"Oh, you're right. I'd better go do that now." He stood reluctantly, nodded to everyone, and left the common room.

"Honestly, how can he take it so lightly? Who knows what kind of treatment he'll need-" James laughed at his friend.

"Sirius, you're completely overreacting. He hasn't complained about it hurting, and it must not or he would've remembered. Just let him handle this, okay?"

Sirius nodded, grinning rather sheepishly. He did tend to overreact when it came to his friends, but he felt he had a right to-if something were to happen to them, he'd be devastated. Better safe than sorry, he always thought. Well, when it came to someone else. . .for himself, well. . .he knew what he could handle and what he couldn't.

Around eight, Sirius declared that he was falling asleep with his eyes open and opted to go to bed. Jesse and James wanted to stay up and wait for Peter, who was still cleaning up at the track, and for Remus. So Lily and Sirius went up to their rooms and the common room fell silent once again. Half an hour later, though, neither boy had returned and James was nearly asleep on the couch. Jesse shook him gently and told him he'd better go to bed if he didn't want to spend the night there. He smiled groggily at her and dragged himself upstairs without a word.

Jesse sighed and stared into the fire, not the least bit tired. The day had been long, yes, and active, but somehow she wasn't feeling the strain at all. She kept remembering the events of the day, and each time she remembered a race, adrenaline pumped through her again.

As it did when she thought of Remus. Something had changed between them that day-besides the obvious. It was like they were as close as they had been before her move, and even beyond that. She could read his expressions again, almost read his thoughts. It was as if he'd finally opened up to her.

As this thought crossed her mind, the portrait hole opened and Peter crawled through, looking thoroughly exhausted. Jesse spoke with him about the race for a few minutes, but he was obviously impatient to get to bed, so she let him go. With a sigh, she sat back against the base of the couch and waited for Remus to arrive, hoping he'd be more awake than the others.

Not ten minutes later, just as Jesse was thinking she might be a bit tired after all, the portrait hole opened again and Remus entered. He smiled to see her still sitting there and joined her on the floor, stretching his legs out and leaning one arm on the couch behind him.

"Let me see," she said immediately, taking his hand in hers to inspect it.

"Madam Pomfrey already wrapped it up," Remus told her. "I assure you, there's nothing to see-she healed it just fine."

"Then why is it wrapped?" Jesse asked suspiciously.

"To hold the ointment on. It's in the gauze." This made sense, of course, but Jesse wasn't convinced. She wanted to see the wound for herself.

"Is it okay if I take a look, as long as I wrap it up afterward?" Remus hesitated, then shrugged and nodded.

"Yeah, I suppose so. But I promise, it doesn't hurt in the least." Jesse found that this information worried more than calmed her-why would he have to tell her that? If it was truly healed, it shouldn't hurt anyway. . .

She undid the charm that was holding the gauze on and slowly unwrapped it, feeling her breath go shallow. What was she so afraid of?

The gauze finally fell away on its own and Jesse realized what she'd been fearing: the wound looked just as it had earlier, though the little glints of silver she'd seen before were now gone. She looked up at Remus, horrified.

"I thought you said it was healed!" she whispered. Remus shifted uncomfortably and avoided her gaze.

"I just didn't want you to worry. I feel as if it's healed-there's no pain at all, I promise." Jesse felt her eyes stinging with tears as she turned away.

"And what is that supposed to mean? How do I know you're not lying about that too?" Remus sighed.

"C'mon Jess-how much have I really lied to you?" She thought back to when he'd been tied to the bed, the night they'd talked and made up. He'd lied to her many times then. She voiced this memory and Remus was silent for a moment.

"How did you know I was lying?" he finally asked quietly.

"I know you quite well, believe it or not," Jesse said with a harsh little laugh. She stared down at the rug they were sitting on, tracing the patterns with her fingers.

"I only said those things to stop you from worrying, just like now. I would never lie to you for any other reason than to protect you."

"I'm not as fragile as you think." The statement was almost a whisper; Remus went silent again, considering what she'd said.

"You're right," he said after a while. "I'm sorry, you're absolutely right. I shouldn't have lied-not then, not now." He tried to catch her eye, but she was still staring at the carpet. "Do you forgive me?" Jesse looked up then, meeting his eyes.

"I suppose," she said with a small smile. "It's hard to stay mad at this face." She placed a gentle hand on his cheek. "But you have to promise me you won't lie again. I can't deal with not knowing if you're telling the truth or not." Remus nodded into her hand.

"I promise," he said, placing his own hand over hers. "Just so long as you never take your hand away." Jesse laughed softly, surprised. Remus rarely said things like that, spreading his feelings out before her so openly. She twisted her hand around to hold his and brought them both down to rest on the carpet, moving a bit closer as she did so.

"How's this instead?" she asked softly. Remus squeezed her hand.

"Just fine."

They stayed that way for a long while, just enjoying each other's company. After a while, Jesse shifted her weight and brought his hand up into the light again.

"Do you want me to wrap this up again?" she asked, looking closely at the injury. It made her hurt just to look at it, the bone and muscle showing like that and the skin so torn looking, but she found she couldn't quite look away either.

"Yeah, you probably should. I need the medicine in that gauze to counter the effect of the silver." Jesse gasped and grabbed the gauze, glaring at him while she started to wrap up his hand again.

"Why didn't you tell me that!" she hissed. Remus looked surprised.

"I though you already knew-I said it at the beginning." Jesse sighed.

"Yes, but I thought you'd been lying about that, too." She looked at him meaningfully. "Do you understand why I don't like lies?" Remus nodded, and she turned back to his hand, being careful to cover the whole wound with the medicinal gauze. "What about your face?" she asked when she'd charmed it to stick again. "That got cut a bit too, didn't it?" Remus nodded.

"Yeah, but all she did was put some of the ointment on the cuts and remove the silver. She says they'll be healed up before morning, they were so small. Even if they hadn't been treated, I would've felt a bit sick tomorrow at worst." He glanced at his freshly wrapped hand. "Thanks for this."

"Think nothing of it-I'm the one who undid the gauze." They were silent for a little while, having nothing more to say.

"Do you really hate that Williamson kid just because of this?" Remus asked finally, indicating his bandaged hand.

"Yes. Plus, he's an arrogant brat." Remus laughed, but quickly became serious again.

"It's nice to have someone who cares that much about me," he commented, staring at the carpet. Jesse shook her head.

"You have four other friends who care for you deeply," she reminded him. He smiled and looked her right in the eyes.

"Yes, but it's not quite the same," he explained softly. Jesse felt herself blush, but kept eye contact with him, not wanting to look away. His eyes flicked up and down her face briefly, and then he was leaning forward, bringing his hand up to lightly touch her cheek. Jesse closed her eyes, breathed his scent, and lost herself in his tender kiss, feeling adrenaline rush through her body once more.