Chapter twenty-three.

James held up a mirror, to see if there was anything coming around the corner.

"The coast is clear!" he hissed,

"Okay James, there's no need to be all macho G.I Joe." Ellie hissed in return,

"Andrews, we're playing Spies, you have to act like one!" he said,

"We are not playing spies, we are seventeen year olds, and we don't play games. We are spying on Emma to find out what is up with her." Ellie said.

Over the last few days, Emma had been rushing out of classes often and having weird desires for certain foods, such as grapes with peanut butter. Everyone was suspicious except Sirius, but only because he was so vague.

Emma was in the bathroom, the sound retching coming from the room. Ellie and James looked at each other.

"Eurgh," James said, pointing to his tongue, Ellie chuckled softly,

"I sort of got that," Ellie said, James rolled his eyes.

Emma walked out of the bathroom after rinsing out her mouth. She picked up a book and sat on her bed. She hadn't realised that Ellie and James were standing out the door.

Ellie was looking shocked and James was dumbfounded.

"Spill," Ellie said,

Emma gasped. "There isn't anything to spill about."

"Even I'm not that stupid. Why are you reading "Pregnancy for Dummies" if there is nothing to spill?" James asked.

Emma sighed heavily, "I'm with baby."

"Come again?" James said, Ellie laughed.

"It means she's pregnant."

Emma nodded,

"So you weren't joking a few weeks ago, and Ellie you knew about this?" James asked.

"No, don't jump to conclusions," Ellie said.

"And I only found out last week," Emma told them.

"Why didn't you tell us?" James asked, sitting down on the side of her bed.

She started to cry, "I'm not even seventeen yet and I'm pregnant? How the hell is Sirius going to take this? What if he doesn't want to be involved with me anymore? There are so many questions, and I thought you wouldn't want to help. I know it's a stupid thought, but I'm so stupid!"

Ellie hugged her and patted her gently on the back, "I have an idea, and then you can worry about Sirius."

"Hey dude," James shouted, "you hungry?" James asked Sirius randomly.

"Mate, I'm always hungry," Sirius said standing up, "kitchens?"
"Totally," James said. This was part of the plan, to get Sirius away from everyone else while Emma told them. She didn't really want to tell them when the father didn't even know, but she really needed some help, and the more the better.

"You're pregnant!" Lily shouted.

"It was meant to be a secret," Emma snapped. "Sorry," she apologized quickly.

"So, it's Sirius' baby, right?" Kat asked.

Emma burst into tears, "you think I would cheat on Sirius?" she asked angrily.

"No, that's not what I meant, I just thought, maybe . . . I'm sorry," she said, trying really hard to take it back.

"That's ok, Kat!" Emma said brightly.

"Um . . . is this one of those really strange pregnant things where you have sudden mood swings?" Remus asked.

"I've been reading about those, I guess so," she said, looking around the room. Ellie was sitting next to her for moral support.

"Wow, you really are pregnant," Peter said quietly.

"You didn't think I was pregnant?" she cried again.

That night everyone was wide awake or trying to stay awake until Ellie fell asleep.

It was her birthday on the weekend and they wanted to plan a surprise party for her, since she had been so nice to everyone when they had there problems.

"It's going to be a costume party, ok?" Lily said to everyone, the room consisted of everyone from their group except Ellie.

"I'm going to be a pirate!" Sirius exclaimed suddenly.

"That's great, Padfoot," James said, "I think I'll be a . . . hmm . . . a bumble bee, no wait, I think I'll be a fairy!" he said, jumping up and down.

"We'll work on that," Lily said quietly. "Anyway, just keep it a surprise, alright?"
"Will do," they all said and trotted off back to bed.

"Surprise!" they all shouted as Ellie walked into the Common Room with Emma on Saturday night.

They all had different costumes on. James went as a fairy, just like he said he would, Sirius as a pirate, Lily as a princess, Peter was a mouse, which he found funny as he was an Animagi rat and Remus was the wolf from little red riding hood, Kat as a ladybug and Emma, who had just ran upstairs had planned the perfect costume. She was going to stuff a pillow up her t-shirt and 'pretend' that she was pregnant.

"You trying to hint something to me, Em?" Sirius asked jokingly.

Emma stared back at him, unable to speak.

"Well, I'm going to get something to drink, you want something?" he asked her.

She shook her head. Pregnant women weren't meant to drink.

"You don't want to drink?" he said, shocked. "But it's a party, come on!"
Kat came to the rescue, "Emma had something last night and has a terrible hang over, she can't drink more or it will be worse," she said.

Emma nodded, "yeah, so painful."

Sirius nodded understandingly, "ok, I'll get you some water, ok?"

"Thanks," she smiled at him. When he was gone she sighed, "oh my gosh, thanks Kat, you saved me!"
"Anytime."

James and Lily sat down together, cuddling in the corner of the couch in the middle of the room. Kat had brought Ellie a little red riding hood costume which she had put on after the surprise.

James and Lily watched Remus and Ellie dance together and Emma change her costume with a flick of her wand to a mermaid. Peter was looking at the present's table trying to remember which one he gave her. Sirius walked over to Emma and gave her a drink and they just started to talk. The weird thing about them was that Emma could understand him when he was drunk, so they were having a perfectly normal conversation.

Lily grinned at James, "do you think it will be like this forever?"
"You mean all of us together with the same couples?" James asked, looking over at where Kat and Daniel were dancing together away from every one else.

"Yeah," Lily answered, casting her eyes over to Ellie and Remus again, who were getting drinks together.

"I have no idea, it's always a possibility. I'll put it this way . . . I hope so," James said. Lily kissed him gently.

"I definitely hope so."

"Ahoy lass!" Sirius shouted at Lily, frightening her.

"Hi Sirius, why are you talking like a pirate all of a sudden?" she asked him, getting herself a plate of food.

"I be talkin' like a pirate?" he asked her.

"What?"

"I say: I be talkin' like a pirate!" he shouted at her.

"Sure," she said, not very sure herself.

"I be talkin' to some other of me hearties now," he said, meaning he was going to look for someone else.

Lily didn't even answer; she had no idea what he was talking about.

Emma walked over to Sirius, "can I talk to you for a second?" she asked him.

"Anything for my favourite lass," he told her, sitting down.

"I'm just going to get straight to the point. I'm pregnant," she said suddenly after a couple minutes silence.

"Aye, the laws of science be a harsh mistress," he said stupidly. He didn't understand that she was being serious.

Emma nodded, "you're right, I shouldn't have done this now. I'll talk to you in the morning ok?"

"Give your favourite pirate a kiss before you go," he told her.

She laughed, a swooped down to give him a kiss. "There you got your loot, now I'm going to bed."

"Thank you so much for throwing me that party guys, I think it's one of the nicest things a person has ever done to me," Ellie said in the morning.

"Well you deserve it," Remus said brightly.

"Yeah, that was another reason why we gave it to you, you've been really helpful to us lately with all our problems," James continued.

"So we should be saying thank you to you," Lily said, giving her a hug.

Ellie smiled, "no, really guys, thank you."

Sirius was talking to James about last night. "I don't remember, she was saying something really serious and I said some stupid pirate joke."
James swallowed, "like what?" he asked.

"I don't know, it was something really serious, like she wanted to talk to me and have a long discussion," he thought out loud.

James stayed silent. Sirius didn't notice and kept on thinking out loud.

"Maybe she was going to break up with me. I bet that's it," he said, "she wants to dump me! What did I do though?" he jumped to a very quick conclusion.

James didn't want to say anything that might hint that he knew, so he said that he had to go back to the Common Room and that he would meet him in class.

Sirius just waved absent mindedly, "sure thing."

He was going to have to talk to her, change her mind about her wanting to break up with him. If only he could remember if she said why she was doing it.

"I bought you some flowers," Sirius said, shoving some roses into Emma's face.

"Thank you," she said quietly, "why the flowers?"
"I don't want you to break up with me," he said straightforwardly.

"I'm not going to break up with you. Do you want to break up with me?"

"No, that's why I gave you flowers. I thought that's what you said last night to me, something really serious and all I could think of was us breaking up. That would be the worst thing that could happen to me," he rambled on.

"Sirius, we weren't talking about breaking up, but do you want to know what we were talking about?" she asked, taking her time to work up the courage to tell him.

"Shoot," he said as they both sat down.

"I'm going to get straight to the point, and tell you that I am pregnant and you can be involved as you want, but it is definitely your child."

Remus walked up to Lily and shook his head, "I can't find him," he said to her.

"Well I wish he would just come back and make up his bloody mind, have you seen the state of Emma?" she said worriedly.

"I'm not sure I want to," he said as a joke. Lily frowned,

"Ellie and Kat are telling her about "Something Blue", a book we all read about a single mum with two boys and how she made it in the world. I think it's working because she really likes the character in the book," Lily explained.

"Peter and James are still out looking for him and we've rounded up some other people like Frank Longbottom, but we didn't tell him why he went off, and some other randoms."

"Good work, except make it faster!" she shouted. "We're making good progress on our patient, what happened to yours?"
Remus ran out of the room so he didn't get shouted at anymore. On the way out he bumped into someone.

"SIIRIUS BLACK!" Remus shouted.

Lily ran to the door, "Sirius! Would you like to explain yourself?"
He shook his head, "I know it was stupid, but I needed some time to think," he said sadly.

James and Peter ran into the room.

"Sirius! I knew you'd be alive," he said happily and then muttered to Peter, "shut up Peter, I'll give you your ten galleons later."

"I'm going to speak to her alone, ok?" he said trudging upstairs.

"I don't want to talk about it," Emma moaned.

"Come on, Em. Tell us what he said to you," Ellie pleaded. "I won't tell anyone."

"He doesn't want to be apart of the child's life and he said we should break up," she said sobbing.

"I bet he didn't mean it," Kat tried to comfort her.

"I bet he did, just like James really bet Peter that Sirius had killed himself," Lily said. "I can't believe he did that!"

"I can't believe you did that!" Remus said.

"Put yourself in my shoes, it's a lot easier this way," he said.

James usually stuck up for Sirius, but he couldn't bring himself to do it this time. "Sirius, it's not easier this way. It might be easier some days for you, but you'll always have a nagging that you haven't met your own child. And what about Emma, it's never going to be easier for her to not have you around. She's going to have to work and raise a child now, even when it's really little."

Sirius lay on his bed, thinking over what a brilliant say it had been. First he thought she was going to break up with, then he had got stung by a bee when picking her the roses, now he was going to have a child.

The others went down stairs and left him alone, just like the girls had done to Emma.

It had been four days since Sirius had said he wanted nothing to do with Emma and it was taking it's toll on all of them. It was hard for all of them to have a good time and hang out together when all this was happening.

Emma cried herself to sleep at night. She was worried that all the stress on her was going to give her a miscarriage and that only gave her another reason to freak out. She acted normally in class and her morning sickness was now regularly at night. She hadn't started to "show" yet so people started making rumors about why they had split up.

Sirius and James were angry at each other and every one could tell, yet they spoke to each other in a polite manner, not to stress Emma even more but making her worry that she had broken up one of the closest friendships.

"We have to do something," Kat was telling Ellie on the fourth night while Emma was locked in the bathroom. Lily was downstairs talking to James.

"So after an hour nearly of talking, this is practically all we've said the whole time," Ellie pointed out.

"Well I don't see you giving us any ideas!" Kat exclaimed defensively.

Ellie laughed, "yeah I know. Maybe we could make them sit down and talk to each other about it," Ellie suggested.

"I don't think that's going to be good. I think that can only end in tears," Kat said. "I was maybe thinking we could make them realise how much they used to mean to each other. How much they've been though to make them both realise that they need each other and they've both been through so much," Kat said quickly, trying to speak as fast as her brain was thinking.

"Well if you must know the truth, Kat, we were all thinking the same thing, we just need to know how," Ellie explained.

Kat blushed, "right. How?" she repeated.

"That's the question isn't it?" Ellie said, "how?"
"Don't ask me how. Maybe we should do that whole thing we did with James and Lily where they didn't know they were on a fixed date together," Kat said happy with the idea.

"I don't think Emma is really looking for a guy at the moment, she's more worried about the baby," Ellie told her. Kat slumped onto the bed.

"I think we have to go back to our first idea," Ellie said.

"Get off me!" Emma and Sirius screamed in unison.

Ellie and Kat's first idea was to lock them in a room together and make them talk to each other in private.

"I'm trying but they pushed me onto you," Emma said.

"Well you weight a ton," he said coldly pushing her off. She gasped, clutching where he had pushed her, right where the baby was.

"Sorry," he muttered. "Maybe we should do what they tell us," he suggested.

"Alright," she said coldly, "you start first."

"The reason I don't want the baby is because it's too much pressure on me –" he was interrupted.

"So when you said you loved me that was nothing? You don't say that to someone if you don't think you might have a future with them," she said softly.

"I did think there was a future with you, but starting a family this young –"

"I didn't want to start a family this young either but it happened like that, ok? I know you don't have to be apart of the child's life that much but please be in it somehow," she pleaded. "I don't want my child to not know it's wonderful father and how he used to be the best boyfriend I had ever had and how I was so pleased to hear I was pregnant because I thought he would understand and be supportive of me and how if he grows up to be anything like his father he will do just fine in this . . ." she stopped, Sirius edged nearer to her.

"I'm sorry," he said to her.

"I understand," she said quietly and stared at the floor.

Sirius laughed, "no, I mean I'm sorry for making your life hell over the past few days. Is it still ok if I'm the baby's father?"

Emma looked up and smiled at him, "of course," she said, then stomped on his foot hard, "but first you have to agree on something," she said.

"Anything."

"You have to be my slave for the whole of my very long pregnancy," she said happily.

"Ok, but you have to do something for me," he said grinning.

"Hmm, ok, fine, what is it?"
"You have to marry me," he said softly.

She laughed, "I just thought you said 'marry me', sorry, what was it you really said?"

It was his turn to laugh. "That's what I did say."

"Are you serious!" she screamed a huge grin spreading across her face.

"Black," he said.

"What?" she asked confused.

"Well, you said am I serious, and I thought 'yeah, I'm Sirius, so I said Black, like my last name?"

"Oh, I get it now. Of course I'll marry you!" she jumped up and down excitedly.

"Fantastic, sorry there isn't a ring though, I didn't expect that I would be engaged a couple of hours ago," he said.

"You have to buy me the best ring," she told him, "for putting me through all that, you stupid git."

"Fine, the one you have always wanted, the diamond ring with the sapphires around the edges is for you," he said and he gave her a kiss.

"I love you," she said.

"Me too."

"Riley," Ellie suggested. "For a boy."

"I like George," Emma said.

"What about Albert?" said Kat, bouncing on the couch.

"How about Ryan," Sirius said, Emma told him that if it was a boy it was not going to be named after him, and he had agreed, only on the condition that he got to choose his side of the bridal party.

"I like Alexandra for a girl," Lily said, "I think it's pretty."

"I love it," Emma exclaimed.

"You know you still have seven and a half months to figure out the perfect name," James said.

"You know you still owe me ten galleons," Peter said to James.

"What for?" Sirius asked.