Disclaimer: I do not own or have any rights to Harry Potter or my chapter titles 11 onwards.
Also the funny part between James and Sirius at the end I heard something similar a few years ago so the idea not solely mine, I just thought it would fit in nicely.
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Chapter 18. Misunderstood
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Hermione hadn't felt this elated in a long time, she felt like she was walking on air. Presently she was walking down the corridor towards the Great Hall, hand in hand with Hogwarts most eligible, uhh ex most eligible bachelor. Obviously her house know about the union, they knew the likelihood even before Hermione, in fact within the mass flood of Valentines Sirius had received the previous day, not one was from a Gryffindor female, or male for that matter.
The group entered the hall and moved to their normal spot. A few people raised their heads and noticed the new couple, they quickly turned to their neighbours and before the group had sat down most of the hall had heard the news. Sirius black was no longer single.
As Hermione contently ate her toast she glanced around and was shocked at what she saw, presently from the Ravenclaw table she was receiving numerous death glares, one in particular from a certain blonde. She felt Sirius squeeze her hand and she turned to face him, he gave her his smile he reserved specifically for her and leaned over to whisper in her ear.
"Don't worry about them," he said. "Their just jealous of your good looks."
Hermione laughed. "Somehow I don't believe that's the cause of their glares."
Sirius chuckled and squeezed her hand again. "You worry to much," he chided.
"I'm not worried about anything," she replied. "I just don't particularly like being on the receiving end of death glares."
Sirius turned towards Natasha, who, presently, looked rather constipated due to her incessant glaring.
"Hey Natasha," Sirius called. The blonde turned to face him and instantly her expression sweetened and she battered her eyelashes at him.
Hermione rolled her eyes and waited to see what Sirius was going to say, the others also curious stopped present conversation to face him.
"If you glare too much like that it might remain permanent, and we wouldn't want that now would we?"
Natasha smiled, completely misinterpreting Sirius' statement and Hermione felt her eyes rolling again 'this girl was supposed to be in Ravenclaw?'
"But Sirius, I'm finding it difficult to swallow that you've attached yourself to…her," she said gesturing to Hermione.
Sirius expression immediately hardened as he defended Hermione. "First of all its Hermione not 'her', second of all I don't see where it's written that you have a valid opinion on whom I date, or is it written in your 'Sirius black fan club' encyclopaedia?"
Natasha's smile wavered at the hostility she was receiving from the object of her affection, five heads turned from Sirius to the blonde in unison to hear her reply.
"I..I…hmph," she said and got up and stormed off, but not before sending Hermione an additional look of hate.
"Well," said James. "That was interesting."
"Hmph," replied Sirius as he returned to his food, his good mood from the morning fading slightly. He hoped Natasha wasn't going to be a re-occurring problem.
The group looked up when Professor Dumbledore walked up to them, "Mister Potter, Miss Evans, I would like you to join me for a meeting in my office this evening."
The head boy and girl nodded, and the headmaster turned and exited the Great Hall.
"I wonder what that's for," mused James as they got up and headed for class.
"You have to know everything don't you James?" Lily asked smirking at the boy falling in step next to her.
"I do," he confessed sighing. "I think I need to join I.H.T.K.A.E.A."
The group looked puzzled, all except for Sirius who knew his friend too well, "I Have To Know Absolutely Everything Anonymous," he clarified for the others, earning himself and James a variety of groans and chuckles as they headed for potions.
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During the rest of the day Hermione avidly avoided any confrontations with Sirius' groupies, she didn't have any qualms about it, she just wished they would get over it. That evening the group was talking in front of the fire waiting for Lily and James to return from their meeting.
Hermione was snuggled up against Sirius and rested her head on his shoulder, Sirius had one arm around her and was presently occupying that hand by playing with a strand of her hair between his fingers.
"Sirius?" Hermione asked.
"Yeah?"
"Can you teach me to defend myself, you and the others?" she queried.
She felt Sirius chuckle before he answered. "You're the best in the class, you're even ahead of Moony here," he reasoned.
Hermione shook her head. "No, not defend myself with a wand, defend myself without my wand."
"Oh," Sirius said, catching onto her meaning, not wanting another Malfoy incident he agreed. "Sure, Moony?" he asked the werewolf who was currently helping himself to Sirius' numerous boxes of chocolates.
"I'm in, under one condition," he said addressing Hermione who raised an eyebrow in question. "We can teach you physical self defence if you teach us how to move like you do in Defence against the Dark Arts."
Hermione nodded. "Deal," she said reaching over to shake Remus' hand.
Just then the portrait opened to reveal James and Lily who both looked questioningly at the hand shake.
"Prongs," Sirius started. "We fine gentlemen are going to teach Hermione some self defence, without a wand."
"That's great," said Lily sitting next to Hermione on the sofa. "Can I join too?"
Sirius grinned. "The more the merrier, hey Wormtail, you could do come too."
Peter looked up and shook his head. "I don't think its really my thing."
"All the more reason for you to come," argued James.
"Its ok, I've got a lot of homework to catch up on anyway."
The others just shrugged and dropped it.
"So, Prongs," Sirius started. "What was the meeting about?"
"New uniform regulations," replied James, not missing a beat. "One of them being a restriction on the length the boys can grown their hair."
The blood drained from Sirius' face. "You have got to be kidding."
James, doing an expert job at keeping a straight face shook his head. Beside him Lily couldn't look Sirius in the eye in case she burst out laughing.
"There is absolutely no way in Merlin that they are going to cut off my hair!" Sirius protested "It's an outrage, is sexist, it's….it's just wrong! I've had my hair like this for seven years; they are not going to make me cut it off with only a few months till I graduate…"
The others were trying to hold in their laughter as it was obvious to everyone, apart from Sirius that his best friend was pulling his leg.
"Imagine what my graduation pictures will look like…Oh Merlin .I'd look like Prongs…"
"Hey!"
"They cannot do this," Sirius repeated and stood up and started to pace. "Although it will get rid of Snivellus' greasy hair," he pondered to himself. "But my hair is a different story, it's just my hair, and they can't cut off my hair…"
"Sirius," said James.
"It's an outcry, it's outrageous, what happened to freedom of choice?" Sirius continued, ignoring his best friend, and began to play with the ends of his hair.
"Sirius!" James tried again. The others were now all chuckling quietly to themselves.
"You guys have power," he said to Lily and James, hope flickering in his eyes. "You can do something…..!"
"SIRIUS," James shouted to stop Sirius mid-rant.
"What?"
"They are not going to cut your hair, now sit down and I'll tell you what the meeting was really about."
"Oh," Sirius said sagging with relief. "I can't believe you just did that, what were you trying to do, give your brother a heart attack?"
James laughed. "It's not my fault you have an affair with your hair, it's so easy to tease you about."
Sirius just glared at his friend and settled back down next to Hermione who was laughing.
"Oh you think that was funny do you?" he asked playfully, the laughter still evident in her eyes confirmed this. Sirius grinned mischievously and reached around to place his hands on her sides and leaned over to her ear. "I'll give you funny," he whispered menacingly.
And with that he started to tickle her, being the ticklish little fiend Hermione was she withered under his torture.
"No…." she gasped giggling. "Sirius…." She continued to laugh as the others looked on at the couple in amusement.
"Hey Pads," James said, trying to save Hermione from his best friend.
"Yeah?" Sirius asked continuing to tickle the girl who had now fallen to the floor in a vain attempt to get away from Sirius' fingers.
"Do you want to know what the meeting was about or not?" he asked.
"Oh right," Sirius said, halting his tickling and offering Hermione a hand up. She accepted and sent a glare in his direction, to which she just received a flashing smile.
The others shook their heads as the couple re-positioned themselves on the couch.
"We had a meeting with the head boy from the school of witchcraft and wizardry of China." Lily started.
"Really?" asked and interested Remus. "How'd it go?"
"It went well, they basically have the same curriculum except their Divination classes are taught slightly different," Lily answered.
"What was his name?" asked Sirius.
"Hu," answered James.
"The Chinese head boy," said Sirius.
"Yes, what about him?"
"His name."
"Hu."
"The Chinese guy," Sirius growled obviously getting frustrated.
"His names Hu," James said equally frustrated.
"That's what I'm asking you, why the hell are you asking me!"
The others were suppressing laughter at the mis-communication between two boys who can usually read each other like a book.
"I'm not I already told you his name was Hu," James shot back
"Look just there you asked me who he was"
"Sirius," Lily interrupted.
"What?" he said turning frustrated from James.
"The Chinese head boys name is Hu, spelt H.U."
"Oooohhh," James and Sirius said in unison, both picking up on their mistake, before erupting into peels of laughter.
The others shook their heads.
"So," James said. "When do we start our training, and where?"
Hermione shrugged. "Might as well do it a couple of times a week, we need a space big enough for spells to be tossed around in as well." She knew the Room of Requirement would be the perfect place but hadn't been there since before she was sent back in time, so waited to see if the Marauders suggested it.
Sirius was the first to speak up. "I know where we can go, how about we all go tomorrow after class."
"No can do Pads," said Remus. "Moony's paying us a visit tomorrow."
"Shit, I forgot, umm, ok then we'll start when Remus has recovered from his transformation and we've caught up on some sleep."
"Why would you need to catch up on your sleep?" Lily asked narrowing her eyes at the other Marauders.
