I'm surprising myself, updating this quickly. Perhaps I'll actually finish this one in a couple of weeks.

Please review! At the time of writing, I've only gotten one review. Thank you, SeaNymph, by the way!

Please be unpredictably miserable

Sirius returned to Gryffindor Tower several minutes after Alize dashed off. He glanced around the common room, looking for a sign of her, but she wasn't there. A seductive smile directed at a pretty seventh year got her to tell him that "I haven't seen her all night. Why do you care about her anyway, when prettier girls are right here?" Sirius had brushed her off with a flirtatious smile, but he couldn't help but wonder, himself. The feeling in the pit of his stomach had worsened, and now he was feeling quite sick. He'd never experienced anything like this before, and he didn't know what to do. Peter was nowhere to be found; he'd been disappearing a lot these days and returning looking rather nervous. James was snogging with Lily in a corner. That left Sirius with one option. He sighed and trudged up the stairs—he needed to talk to Remus.

Conveniently for Sirius, Remus was lying on his bed, reading a book. Sirius walked over up and prodded him unceremoniously in the head. Remus slowly and deliberately marked the page in his book, closed it, and replaced it in his dresser before looking at Sirius. "What is it now, Padfoot?" Remus asked with a sigh.

"I need to talk to you, Moony." Remus just shook his head and moved to a sitting position, so that Sirius would have room to sit on the bed. Sirius shot him a relieved glance, before settling at the foot of the bed and leaning up against the bedpost. "Moony, I don't know what's wrong with me. Know how I was having loads of fun bothering Faustine today? Well, I was snogging some Hufflepuff—" Here Remus had to interrupt. "Don't you even know her name?" Sirius suddenly became very interested in the pattern on the blanket. Remus sighed in disappointment and let Sirius continue, knowing that a lecture would be a waste of breath.

"Anyway, I was snogging some Hufflepuff in a broom closet and Faustine comes up. Don't think she knew it was me, but anyway, she opens the door and lets us both know that Filch is coming and if we valued our skins we'd better do something. The stupid girl I was snogging just runs off, and I pull Faustine in with me to make sure she doesn't get caught because warning us was a very decent thing to do, you know? But then Filch hears us talking and bursts in and accuses us of snogging, and he takes us to McGonagall and she gives us detention. But then, and here's the weird thing, as soon as we're away from McGonagall's office, Faustine looks at me like she's about to cry, tells me that she hates me, and runs off. And now I feel like I'm going to be sick and I have absolutely no idea why. Also, just after she ran off, this voice told me that I should have stood up for her and it sounded just like you."

For some reason unknown to Sirius, Remus found this hysterically funny and couldn't stop laughing for at least a couple minutes. When he wiped the tears of laughter out of his eyes, he saw a very offended-looking Sirius in front of him. "Whoo…I'm sorry, Padfoot…But first off, that voice was your conscience. A conscience is basically a voice inside you that tells you what's right and what isn't," he added hastily, seeing Sirius' look of confusion. Remus continued. "The sick feeling is guilt. You feel bad for making her cry, and really, Padfoot, I'm glad you do. You really have treated her horribly for the longest time, and I was wondering if you'd ever feel guilty. Incidentally, did that voice ever tell you to stop when you were bullying Snape, or when you were planning a prank?" Sirius nodded emphatically, and Remus laughed again.

"Anyway, you feel guilty for making her cry, and the only way to make it go away, because I know you're going to ask that next, is to apologize." Remus rolled his eyes at the aghast look on Sirius' face. "Yes, Padfoot, apologize. You have to mean it, too. Apparently, the thought of both having to apologize to someone he disliked, and of having to actually mean it, was just too much for Sirius, who looked at Remus like he was crazy. "Why?" he said, extremely confused. Remus shook his head and threw up his hands. "Padfoot, you're hopeless. You have to apologize because you were wrong—really wrong, apparently, if it was enough to make Alize of all people cry. Secondly, you have to mean it because otherwise there'd be no point in apologizing, now would there? If you want my advice, talk to her at lunch tomorrow, because she's too irritable to listen to you at breakfast."

Sirius scowled at Remus. He looked at his watch, shocked to find that it was only 10 PM. For once, he was tired at a reasonable time. He showered quickly and went to bed, drained from the increasingly horrible sick feeling in the pit of his stomach.

Meanwhile, Alize wasn't having the time of her life either. After she'd had a good cry in the passageway, she stumbled to a loo. Unfortunately for her, she heard a great deal of wailing as soon as she'd entered, and began to curse her bad luck repeatedly. She was on the second floor, and she'd managed to enter the bathroom of Moaning Myrtle.

Myrtle drifted out, looking curiously at Alize. The two had never met before, but Alize had heard stories from other girls about the perpetually depressed and overly sensitive ghost. Alize, however, was feeling quite sympathetic to her in her current state. Myrtle looked down at Alize. "Been crying, have you? What happened to you, you look like you've been hit by the Whomping Willow." Normally, Alize would have screamed at someone who told her this, but instead Alize walked over towards the sink, talking quietly as she went. "Yeah, a great prat ruined my day."

Myrtle flew down to sit on the sink next to Alize, who was washing her face. "Tell me about it, then, and I'll tell you what's happened to me."

Another hour later, Alize was feeling much better. She and Myrtle had swapped depressing stories, and Alize had gone the longest time in her Hogwarts life without shouting at anyone. As she bid Myrtle a good night and promised to visit her soon, Alize was much less depressed and much more vengeful. Sneaking back to Gryffindor Tower proved uneventful, and when she finally returned to the common room around midnight, there wasn't a soul in there. Alize grinned to herself as she went to bed. She was going to get him, and good.

'Sure, he's ahead now, but not for long. I'll find the greatest prank ever and show him not to mess with Alize Faustine.'

I had to include Myrtle. I just had to. It was far too appropriate.

Next chapter, you can look forward to Sirius' apology! Yay.