Someone To Understand

Disclaimer: I own nothing except the plot and any OCs.

A month had passed, since that fateful detention when Sirius had seen the kind of abuse that Crystal had to put up with from her family, it was now nearly Halloween, and Crystal was still avoiding him. In desperation Sirius had taken to watching her every time she entered the Great Hall, looking for signs that Marius was still hurting her. Disturbingly, more often than not he found them, and wondered how he could have been so blind as to miss them before.

Crystal often came into meals with a slight limp, or bruising across her arms, sometimes Sirius even saw her grimace in pain, whilst drawing in breath, though no-one else seemed to notice it, as, most of the time she was very good at hiding her injuries from prying eyes, or healing them as best she could herself, she had clearly had a lot of practise at it.

It broke Sirius' heart to see Crystal in pain, but there was really nothing he could do. He could try and watch over her but he wasn't in her year or house, nor was he one of her favourite people at the moment, so there was a limit to how much he could do. He flattered himself, that once or twice he had managed to ward off Marius and his thugs, without, Crystal noticing, but for the most part he was helpless.

Remus and James had tried to get Sirius to explain to them, how he and Crystal had the same problem but he had refused point blank to tell them anything, he agreed with Crystal, in that they didn't need to know, and couldn't possibly understand. He knew that he was hurting their feelings by not telling them, after all, Remus had shared his biggest secret with them, about being a werewolf, and James, was by nature an open person, and therefore told the group everything, but he did not waver in his decision to keep quiet.

XXX

Crystal herself was trying to get her life back to normal, though it was proving to be difficult when Marius still blamed her for Sirius walking in on them, and was taking, every possible opportunity, to take it out on her. She tried not to think about all the times she had run into him recently.

However Crystal's biggest problem was proving to be Sirius, she now regretted being as open with him as she had been, as he had now taken to watching her from across the Great Hall at every meal, it was beginning to unnerve her, being always under his scrutiny, and she was sure that with his constant observation of her he was learning more things about her than she was comfortable with him knowing.

Sirius had also still not given up with trying to talk to her, despite her best efforts to studiously avoid him, and she could not for the life of her understand why he was not giving up chasing her as she saw him do so often with other girls. All in all she was very uncomfortable with the situation, especially with the fact that Remus, James and Peter had also been exposed to her problem and had taken to looking at her pityingly whenever they thought that she wasn't looking. She was angry with them, the last thing she needed was the pity of the Marauders, and if Marius saw it, there would be hell to pay, "Maycombs do not inspire pity", he would tell her, "they inspire fear and respect!".

XXX

The change in the Marauders did not go unnoticed by their fellow 6th years, Lily Evans saw their concern, though she didn't know what it was for exactly, towards Crystal, as a sign that they were growing up, and that perhaps they were now mature enough to be friends with her.

Rose Parker should have been thrilled with Lily's sudden change of heart, it was after all, exactly what she was after, a chance to get the two groups to be friends. However she saw Sirius' concern for Crystal as an extreme threat to her play for his heart, though her relationship with him was progressing well, she realised that he cared far too much for Crystal's welfare for her to be entirely sure of his affection for her, and she often caught him staring over at the Ravenclaw table at Crystal. It unnerved Rose to think that this beautiful, young Ravenclaw, might steal Sirius from under her nose without even trying.

XXX

More time passed and soon it was the start of the Quidditch season, a timely distraction for all parties involved, as, James, Sirius and Rose played Quidditch on the Gryffindor Quidditch team, whilst Crystal played Quidditch for Ravenclaw. The constant practise and exertion meant that none of them had much time to dwell on their thoughts, and this was most definitely a good thing for everyone.

The first Qudditch games of the season, against Hufflepuff for both Gryffindor and Ravenclaw, through some strange twist of fate, passed without much difficulty for either team, Hufflepuff were notorious for being pushovers at Quidditch, and before anyone knew it, it was nearly Christmas.

XXX

For most people Christmas was a joyous time of year, but not to Sirius Black, not this year anyway. He had been looking forward to staying at Hogwarts for Christmas, or better still staying with James for the duration of the holidays but he had unfortunately received a very unexpected letter, which had forced him to cancel any plans, that he had had for Christmas and resign himself to a miserable holiday.

Sirius had been shocked when he had seen his family owl, after dropping a letter to Regulus, continue on to his side of the Great Hall and also drop him a letter. He had been more than a little curious about what his mother could possibly have to say to him but when he had read the letter the bottom had dropped out of his stomach.

It turned out that Sirius' evil cousin Narcissa had just got engaged to a particularly nasty, pure blood called Lucius Malfoy, and to celebrate their engagement, both the bride and groom had invited their families to spend Christmas with them at Malfoy Manor. So not only would Sirius have to go back to stay with his own horrible family for Christmas, he would also be spending, the entire holiday at Malfoy Manor, getting to know another equally horrible pure blood family, and worse still there was no way out of it. If he did not return home, his mother had warned him, he would be disowned by his family, and Sirius had no intention of allowing that to happen when he had no where else to go, and no money.

Sighing exasperatedly Sirius raked a hand through his silky black hair, pulling it out of his eyes, before wearily explaining the lamentable situation to his fellow Marauders, it was going to be a long holiday...

XXX

There was only one person at the Gryffindor table happy at the news that Sirius would be going home for Christmas. Rose Parker was relieved, she had been paranoid that Sirius would end up staying at Hogwarts alone with that Ravenclaw bitch, Crystal Maycomb, but if he was at home, or more specifically away from home then there was no chance that Crystal could sink her claws into Sirius whilst Rose was off the scene. It never occurred to Rose, a muggle born, how small the pure blood wizard social circle in Britain was, or that at home Sirius was probably more likely to be forced to spend time with Crystal than at school...

XXX

Meanwhile Sirius was not the only on to receive unexpected mail that day, as, a similar letter was, almost, simultaneously delivered to Crystal from her mother, explaining to her that she would still be coming home for Christmas, not that that was unusual.

Crystal's family forced her to come home for Christmas every year anyway, in order to show her off at ministry parties, as, as much as they hated the fact that Crystal was in Ravenclaw, it did wonders for the family's credibility of being 'good' wizards, in certain circles, if people believed that her family still supported her despite her being put in the 'wrong' house.

However this year, for Christmas, Crystal discovered that she was going to be going to Malfoy Manor with the rest of her family to celebrate the engagement of her mother's obnoxious nephew, and therefore her cousin, Lucius Malfoy to Narcissa Black. She was not looking forward to it, social gatherings with her family were always formal occasions filled with numerous, unfriendly, closed-minded bigots, who in Crystal's opinion did not deserve to know about magic. "It's going to be a long holiday!", she mused sadly.

XXX

As usually happens when you don't want something to happen, the days flew by for Crystal and Sirius, until the day of the train journey home for Christmas arrived. Both wished that the train journey would last forever, and neither party was looking forward to seeing their parents again. They were so distracted with their own problems, that, for the first time in nearly three months, each forgot about the other.

XXX

When the train finally arrived in London, Sirius was thoroughly depressed, this would surely be the worst Christmas holiday ever.

He had already changed into some hideous, in his opinion, black and silver dress robes of his mother's choosing, at her express instruction and was feeling hugely out of place amongst the casually dressed other students. The other Marauders especially had had a good laugh at his expense. This was not a good start to the holiday.

To his extreme consternation, when he reached his parents, he discovered that, even more alarmingly, he and his parents were to portkey straight to Malfoy Manor from the station, the nightmare was going to begin even earlier than he had expected!

After a quick warning from his mother about 'upholding the noble name of Black', he and Regulus, who was grinning like an idiot after watching Sirius get told off after barely 30 seconds of interaction with their parents, were instructed to grasp hold of a grand old umbrella that their mother was holding, whilst remembering to keep a firm hold on their trunks.

In mere seconds Sirius found himself, his parents and his brother to be standing in the grand entrance hall of a fine old country manor in front of a cowering house elf, who, quaking with fear, explained that its Masters' were currently out but that he had been informed of their arrival and, with their permission, he would stow away their luggage for them and show them to their rooms.

Sirius' mother grudgingly agreed to the creature's suggestions, and so with a click of its stubby fingers, the little creature quickly stowed their belongings' into their rooms' before bowing as lowly as possible and leading them towards their rooms'. Sirius himself was secretly relieved at the house elf's news that its masters' were out, he hated his cousin Narcissa and was not looking forward to seeing her again.

The only cousin, or family member in general, that he could stand was his cousin Andromeda, who had been disowned by the family some years before for marrying a muggle born. "It's typical," Sirius thought, "the one time my family produced someone halfway decent she was disowned, whilst idiots like Narcissa are welcomed with open arms.", it proved his point entirely about what idiots his family were.

The house elf quickly showed the family to their respective rooms, and Sirius was very relieved to see, that he would not be sharing a room with Regulus, if he had been forced to, he was quite sure that he would have killed his brother long before the end of the holiday.

Thanking the house elf, and flopping down on the luxurious four-poster bed, Sirius scrunched up his face and sighed, he really did not want to be in this house! He rolled over onto his stomach and buried his face into the pillow. The house elf had informed him that the gathering would begin at five and he had hours to kill till them, so he just lay on the bed, letting his helplessness overcome him.

At ten minutes to five Sirius got off the bed, and re adjusted his slightly crumpled dress robes, it was time to face the music, and his mother would skin him alive if he went downstairs looking like a crumpled mess. Sighing exasperatedly he checked his reflection in the mirror, and running a hand through his longish black hair, he stormed out of the room and down the grand marble staircase, back into the grand entrance hall, before turning, as instructed, to his left and finding a grand drawing room filled with a large amount of people.

Sirius entered the room as discreetly as possible, hoping, for once in his life, to remain unnoticed. It was however, not to be, his mother soon spotted him and forced him to make polite conversation with Lucius and Narcissa for a few torturous minutes, the conversation was however, long enough for Sirius to see that Narcissa and Lucius deserved each other, they were both, after all, vain, arrogant and cold. Leaving Narcissa and Lucius to it as quickly as he could afford to, with his mother breathing down his neck, Sirius hurried over to the far side of the room where he settled himself in an armchair, hoping to be allowed to merely observe the action without having to take part in any forced polite conversation with a room full of people who, were almost certainly, all Death Eaters, or if not Death Eaters, they at least shared their ideals.

Huffing in irritation at the situation Sirius began scanning the room for anything of interest, and it did not take him long for his eyes to land on a girl, probably his age, or a little younger with long curly black hair, wearing short sapphire blue, silky looking dress robes. She was undoubtedly one of Lucius' relatives' as he did not have any female relatives her age, and she, like him seemed slightly uncomfortable with the situation, as, instead of conversing with people she was staring absently into the fire.

Sirius could not explain why, but he was captivated by this girl and could not tear his gaze away from her. As if sensing his gaze the girl turned and Sirius gasped, as he suddenly found himself staring straight into the fierce ocean blue eyes of Crystal Maycomb...

Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed, it means a lot to me to find out what people actually think of this story!

Thanks and please take the time to review and tell me what you think!  XXX