It was now mid-October and I had started to see the slight changes the war was bringing to the castle. The group of seventh-year Slytherins, along with a few others, were now outwardly praising the name of Voldemort. It was almost surprising how blatant they were as they traversed around the castle spouting their nonsense about pureblood supremacy. Although James, Sirius and I also fell under the classification of pureblood, we were now considered blood traitors since we rejected the ideas of blood having anything to do with magical ability. So, it wasn't uncommon now for any of my friends or I to be shouted at or insulted if we ever crossed paths with them.

I was walking to Divination one afternoon with Elodie when I seemingly tripped over my own feet only to look up and see Bellatrix Black and Roldulphus Lestrange heading towards us.

"Little Potty hasn't learned how to tie her shoes," Bellatrix taunted as if she were talking to a child.

Elodie looked slightly nervous beside me but I watched as she took out her wand nonetheless and pointed it at the two of them since we both knew Bellatrix had jinxed me.

"Pathetic half-blood thinks she can stand up to me," Bellatrix spat as she regarded Elodie.

Despite watching her flinch, Elodie remained firm as she kept her wand ready. During the interaction I swiftly got up, after having undone the binding jinx, and held my wand at Sirius' cousin.

"You don't scare us with your childish jinxes and superiority complex," I answered coolly as I locked eyes with Bellatrix.

Her smirk turned to irritation as I knew most others never talked back to her and just ran away.

"Let's go Bella," I heard Rodulphus sigh, standing off to the side.

Even though I knew him to be a bully towards the younger students, he was never as direct or boastful as Bellatrix was; she lavished in toying with her prey.

"I say when I've had enough!" she shot back in disgust without taking her eyes off me.

She had her wand held towards my chest while I matched her stance. Elodie still stood beside me with her wand drawn in a similar fashion.

"Better run off little Potty, don't want to get hurt playing with the big kids," Bellatrix continued in her squeaky tone.

Moment later she surprisingly put her wand down and brushed past us as she roughly bumped my shoulder with her own. Rodulphus followed without provocation and fell into step a pace behind her. Once they were around the corner we put our own wands away with hesitation. It wasn't like Bellatrix to walk away without a fight. However, seconds later, we saw Professor Slughorn walk by which explained why Bellatrix had given up so easily.

"And those two are dating?" Elodie whispered reproachfully as we both walked towards our class.

"Well they're both horrible and both rotten to the core, so yea I see it," I answered.

"But she just bosses him around and he follows like a lap dog," Elodie continued.

"Well I don't think either of them deserve anything better," I replied to which Elodie agreed.

We entered Divination a couple minutes later and took our usual seats in the back. Max was already there as we settled in for a tedious lecture. Divination was a seemingly useless branch of magic, but it beat having to take ancient runes. We were the only three out of our group who had decided to take Divination and would spend the class competing for who could come up with the most ridiculous predictions. What was even more ridiculous however was that the professor typically agreed with our predictions and praised us for being skilled. At one point he had even claimed that Max probably had a Seer in his family; this had almost brought us to tears with laughter.

"So, what's going to happen today?" I asked after the professor had given his lecture and we were set to read each other's palms.

"Why don't we see who you're going to date Addie?" Elodie offered innocently while I returned her suggestion with a glare.

"Oo, I bet it's going to be Amycus Carrow. I bet him throwing that bat at your head was his declaration of love," Max laughed while I hit him on the shoulder.

"Yea, well what about you and Narcissa Black?" I countered. "I'm sure you could get her to smile with all your hilarious jokes."

Max stopped laughing and looked at me in disgust.

"That gargoyle wouldn't know how to have a good time if she read it in a book."

Elodie piped up. "What about you and Sirius, Addie?"

"Why would you even suggest that?" I asked disbelievingly.

I saw Max's look of disgust turn to one of glee. It obviously pleased him that Elodie had taken me by surprise. However, this was only because we never included our friends in any of our predictions.

"Sirius is worse that Amycus?" she countered.

"Well, no, of course not. But he's my brother's best mate."

"And..." Elodie said as if she expected me to come up with a better reason.

"There is no 'and'. You two just suck at match-maker and I am not dating any children of Death Eaters or my friends," I answered as I crossed my arms over my chest.

"Come on Addie, we have to look at your palms," Max said with a smirk.

I sighed before unfolding my arms and showing them each a hand.

"Yup," Max said confidently after a few minutes of staring intently at my hand.

"It's official," Elodie added with a mischievous grin. "You are going to fall desperately in love with Sirius Black and have his children."

Both were howling with laughter as they wrote their supposed findings down. I quickly refolded my arms and glared menacingly at both of them for the rest of class.

"You both are the absolute worst."

XXX

Unfortunately for me, Max and Elodie were still talking about my supposed impending nuptials with Sirius as we sat down for dinner.

"What are you two laughing about that has Addie so pissed?" Blythe asked as the rest of the fourth years sat down and joined us.

"We read her palms today and decided that she is to be married to Sirius by the time she turns nineteen," Elodie answered which started another round of incessant laughter.

"That can't be true!" Zelene exclaimed since she was the only one who apparently did not find this highly amusing besides me.

"Of course, it's not true!" I huffed before grumpily turning to look at my plate.

"What's not true?" James asked as he sat down beside me, followed by the other three boys.

"Nothing," I said through gritted teeth while I turned to give death glares to my friends.

We were not expanding to include Sirius in this nonsensical premonition.

"They're just giving Addie a hard time for failing a Divination quiz," Zelene stepped in.

I wasn't too thrilled about her choice in subject change, but it worked nonetheless.

However, all throughout dinner I couldn't help but look at Sirius as if contemplating him as anything other than James' best friend. I had known Sirius for five years and figured at this point I knew him fairly well. Each summer he had come to stay with us more and more at the manor which had brought some much needed reprieve to the quiet and emptiness it usually bore with the absence of our parents. But even though Sirius came to hang out with James, the two boys always included me in their games and pranks. It was almost like the three of us had grown up together. I also knew him well enough to notice that when we were at school Sirius always acted a little different. He was more boastful and was always getting into trouble with James, whereas at home both of them were more reserved around our parents; even if the word reserved was probably too liberal. I even knew the more intimate things, such as his feelings towards his family and his dream to join the Auror Department with James once they graduated.

But then there were the girls. It was no secret to anyone at Hogwarts that both Sirius and James sought out the attention of the girls who regarded them as prize boyfriend material. They were both handsome, popular, and loved to lavish their attention on any girl they were with. The only problem was their attention never seemed to last very long as neither one of them was ever with the same girl for more than a month, and those were the longer relationships.

Addie on the other hand had never considered anyone to be her boyfriend, least of all the boy who played such a huge part in her life. It seemed odd that this subject seemed to be coming up more and more and it always led back to Sirius.

Plus, there was the whole Zelene situation, who had been harbouring her own crush for several months now. Wasn't it against some sort of friendship ethics code not to date anyone who your friend fancies?

XXX

That night we all sat in the common room as it was a rare night none of us had any impending homework due the next day.

"Where are they off to?" Fern asked as she looked up and watched the fifth-year boys running down the staircase only to leave the common room through the portrait hole.

"It's a bit late to be leaving isn't it?" Elodie asked while I shrugged.

"It's not like they're much for the rules, and I think Remus is in the hospital wing again," I answered.

It was common knowledge by now that Remus spent at least once a month in the hospital wing for his feeble health. I felt bad for the guy who somehow seemed to have enough energy to keep up with Sirius and James on his good days but ended up in the hospital wing on the bad. Maybe Sirius and James should take it easy if Remus was going to keep up with them.

"That's almost every night this week they've went out though, even when Remus wasn't in the hospital," Fern added.

I shrugged again. I knew James and the others were probably up to something, but I always liked to know very little about their post-curfew activities, so I could play innocent in front of mum and dad.

"I think I'm going to head to the kitchens, anyone want to come along?" I asked as I stood from the comfy armchair I had been sitting in.

Everyone shook their head except for Zelene who decided to come along. Fern gave us a pointed look since she had just commented on the late hour, but we decided to go anyways.

We walked in an amicable silence as we went down the stairs towards the basement until Zelene decided to break it.

"So, what's this I hear about you and Sirius getting hitched?" Zelene asked slyly once we had almost made it to the portrait of fruit.

"Bloody hell, Max and Elodie just can't keep their traps shut. Sirius almost heard at dinner," I replied in annoyance. "They came up with a stupid fortune in Divination today, it's completely bogus," I explained, knowing how Zelene felt about Sirius.

"Well, I actually wanted to say that I think you and Sirius would work well together," Zelene said plainly.

"You can't be serious," I exclaimed in shock. "There is no way I am ever going out with him! He's my friend…. and you're my friend… it's never going to happen," I stuttered until Zelene put her hand up to cut me off.

"Addie, I don't really like Sirius in a way to fight over him with you. After watching you two dance the other day after the match, you compliment each other well," she continued.

"But I don't want to date him, or anyone for that matter," I tried to explain since no one seemed to be getting this important detail.

Why wasn't this getting through to her, or any of my other friends?

"Addie, you're going to start to notice boys sooner than you think and when you do you're going to be able to have whoever you want," she said confidently which made my face go scarlet.

"You can already have anyone you want Zel," I replied, trying to take the attention off me.

"True," she said smugly. "But I just wanted to help you realize that you are one of the most popular girls in school, you're beautiful, talented, and always work to get what you want. When you discover that you want Sirius, or anyone else, they won't stand a chance," Zelene finished.

I was speechless for one of the few times in my life. Zelene had been my friend since our first year and I had always found her to be the most obvious kind of beautiful. She was also extremely smart, confident and driven; she could get anything or anyone she wanted. Why was she telling me this, especially since I had no interest in dating anyone, least of all Sirius.

"So, who does this mean you're going after now?" I asked, wanting to try again to take the attention off my non-existent dating life.

"Well, I would go after your brother, but my last name isn't Evans," she said.

I breathed a sigh of relief. I did not want to hear her plans on how to ensnare my brother.

"So, I don't know. No one seems to be challenging enough. They're all the same Addie. They think I'm this beautiful girl they can woo after flexing their muscles or snogging a few times. In the end it's just disappointing," she explained.

I was surprised to hear this since I had thought Zelene enjoyed dating, but it seemed she was just looking for someone who could be her match.

"Well, you are exclusive to just dating Gryffindors and we are known for our big egos and smaller brains," I teased as I repeated the Gryffindor stereotype.

Zelene laughed and shook her head.

She didn't add anything else since we had arrived at the kitchens by this point and headed inside for our midnight snack. This new aspect of growing up seemed to be more confusing than I had initially thought; by comparison, the war seemed to be more straight forward. I would rather face down Bellatrix in the hallway any day than try and figure out the complexity of dating. By what Zelene was saying, it seemed fairly difficult with not a lot of satisfactory results. James was also another example since he had been chasing Lily for years and she still looked at him as if he were a toad. It seemed completely pointless to date and there were plenty of other things that were more important to focus on such as quidditch, friends, passing classes, and preparing for the war. So the sooner she got her friends to focus on something other than her dating, the faster she could forget about all of this.