Chapter Three: New girl

The journey passed with no real drama; Sirius knew the route pretty well by now, and once he was out of London he could go faster, with hardly a worry of meeting any other traffic. He enjoyed seeing the countryside, even though he had only spent two weeks in the city, and was feeling happier than he had since leaving Hogwarts as he drove along the Potters' road and came into view of their house.

He was distracted, however, from the contentment of having reached his destination point, by the sight of a girl he'd never seen before, a beautiful girl, he thought – quite possibly the most beautiful girl he'd even seen. She was walking slowly down the lane towards him, trailing her hand through the long grass at the side of the road. She didn't seem to have noticed the roar of the motorbike; indeed Sirius had forgotten all about his purpose. Mesmerised, he couldn't take his eyes off her, and realised too late that he had veered off course and was about to smash into a brick wall.

Sirius woke from the dreamy spell that the girl seemed to have cast over both him and his surroundings, as he lay crumpled underneath his bike at the bottom of the garden wall. He tried to lift his head and found that he could, and apart from a general throbbing ache, he couldn't feel any extreme pain anywhere.

"Hmm, that was strange," he thought to himself. "How did I not see that wall?" Then he looked up, and remembered.

The girl was crouching next to her, alarm in her blue eyes. Close up, Sirius thought she was more stunning than he could have imagined, with light brown hair hanging in waves down to her bare shoulders, as she wore a strapless top and a floaty summer skirt.

He hadn't realised how long he'd been gazing at her until she said, in a sweet, accented voice – French, he thought - touched with concern, "Are you alright? You look like you're in a daze."

Sirius blinked and started. "I'm alright," he said, "I'm not sure quite what happened, though." He wasn't about to tell her that he'd crashed because he was too busy staring at her.

"Well, sometimes our concentration just goes," the girl said quietly, her face still close to his. "Do you need help getting up, or are you going to stay there?"

Again, Sirius was startled from the trance she seemed to put him in. He lifted the bike off of himself and got up, carefully stretching his arms and legs.

"Is everything okay?" the girl asked, rising slowly form where she was crouching. Sirius found that she was about a head shorter than him, and perfectly in proportion. "Are you sure you're alright? You have blood on you head."

"Have I?" he asked, putting a hand up to check. "Well, I feel okay," he managed to get out. "What's wrong with me?" he asked himself. "I am not fine."

After standing there for a moment, he added, "Well, I'd better get this bit of junk back on its feet," indicating the bike lying crippled on the ground.

"Oh, will you be able to fix it?" She asked in that honey voice.

"No problem," Sirius assured her as he wheeled it down to James' driveway.

"Are you going to the Potters'?" She enquired, walking beside him.

"Yeah, I come every summer, as soon as I know I can't stand my family in London for another minute." He found that if he didn't look directly at her, then his mind would stay relatively clear and he could think about what he was saying. "James is my best friend."

"James," the girl said thoughtfully, "yes, I met him when we first moved here."

"You live here?" Sirius asked, whilst thinking, "James, you lucky bastard!" to himself.

"Only for two weeks so far," she said, "since the beginning of the holidays. It's okay here, but I don't think James likes me much."

"What?" he said in amazement. "I can categorically say that he does like you."

"Really? Oh, okay." She didn't seem very interested, though. "What's wrong with your family?" she asked, turning those blue eyes on him.

Sirius had to work his mind very hard to resist falling to that trance again. "What's right with them, I think is the question," he croaked, and looked away. He cleared his throat and expanded his answer a little. "We just have vast and extreme differences of opinion, on everything. Well, here we are," he said, as by now they had reached the front door. He knocked, and turned to face the girl, or angel, as he had now come to think of her as. "Pull yourself together!" he told himself sharply, although this was easier said than done.

Just as he found himself looking into her eyes again, the door opened and Sirius whirled round to see James, black hair as untidy as ever and a big grin on his face.

It faded when he looked Sirius up and down and saw the state his friend was in. "Hey, what happened? There's blood on you, and... what happened?"

"I crashed my bike," Sirius answered sheepishly, pointing to his mangled vehicle, which he left in the driveway. "But I had help," he added brightly, stepping aside to reveal the girl to James.

James hardly looked at her. "But you're alright? How did you crash?" he asked, the grin coming back into view, "I thought you could drive?"

"He just lost concentration," the girl said quietly.

"Oh," said James, regarding her for the first time. A dawning look came into his eyes. "Oh, I see... Well, you'd better come in and get cleaned up." He started to usher Sirius into the house.

"Hang on!" Sirius put in, "aren't you going to introduce me to you new neighbour?" He was surprised by James' behaviour, and was starting to think that the girl was right when she said he didn't like her, impossible though that seemed.

"Yes, James," the girl said, smiling and putting her hand on Sirius' arm. "You never mentioned that you had such a handsome friend."

"Well, it would have taken the focus off me, wouldn't it?" James replied, managing a smile, while Sirius beamed at the compliment and her touch on his arm. "His name is Sirius Black," James continued, eyeing her prolonged hold of the arm in question, "and this," he looked at Sirius' expectant face, "is Adriana."

"Adriana," Sirius breathed, looking once again into her endless blue eyes. Then he seemed to snap out of it. "Happy to meet you," he said with a smile.

"Likewise," Adriana whispered, running her fingers up and down his muscular arm.

"Okay!" James broke the moment as he grabbed Sirius' other arm and yanked him into the house. "Lovely to see you again, Adriana, but Sirius has to come in now, see you later, bye bye now, bye bye!" And with that he closed the door on Sirius' view of her beautiful face.

James finally released his grip on Sirius' arm. "You sure you're alright, mate?" he asked as he went into the kitchen.

"I am now," Sirius answered, half to himself, still looking at the door with a silly grin on his face. Then he went after James angrily. "What was that about, eh? You were so rude to her! She said you didn't like her!"

"She was right," James said grimly as he put the kettle on.

Sirius was lost for words, but only for a second. "What could you possibly dislike about that girl?" he demanded.

"Look, you don't know her," James said, looking up at Sirius. "I was like you when I first saw her, first talked to her. Tea or coffee?"

"What d'you mean, like me?" Sirius asked.

"Oh, come on," James said in exasperation, "all giddy and loved-up – it's the effect she has on everyone," he added loudly over Sirius' outraged sounds.

"Oh," said Sirius, "so you're saying she's like a Veela or something?"

"Yeah," said James, "yeah, maybe. Anyway, you need to wash, you've got blood and dirt all over you."

"Okay," Sirius said distractedly, and sat down at the kitchen table. He felt a little disappointed; he'd thought that Adriana had liked him – what was all the arm rubbing about, then? "Hey, where are your parents?" he asked.

"Out in the garden, doing stuff," James answered vaguely. "They'll be in soon, it's nearly lunchtime."

"Be-auty," Sirius said, looking forward to food.

As James sat down with two mugs of coffee, Sirius couldn't stop himself from asking, "So why don't you like her?"

James wished the conversation could move on to something else. "She's so... clingy, I guess. I hardly ever go out in the road any more, because I know she'll be there." He put on a high voice, nothing like Adriana's, " 'Oh, hello, Jamie, how are you?' 'You're really good on your bike, Jamie, I bet you're brilliant at Quidditch,' all this sort of stuff, always fluttering her eyelashes and giving out false compliments. And where does she get off calling me Jamie?" He made a face expressing his dislike.

"Well, I have to say I'm impressed," Sirius said, and seeing James' misunderstanding, he added, "you seem to have shed yourself of a truckload of arrogance in the two weeks since school finished. Back then you'd have fallen for her in less than a second. What happened?"

"It's just a feeling I have about her," James mused, "like she's bad news or something. And anyway, I'm trying to 'improve myself' for Lily."

"Of course," Sirius said, rolling his eyes.

"Don't you roll your eyes after your recent display out there!"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Sirius said guiltily.

"'Oh Adriana, what a beautiful name, so pleased to meet you, can I be your lap dog and lick your shoes clean please...'"

"Alright, alright! Fine, but how do I stop myself from going into her trance?" Sirius asked.

"There's no trance, mate," James told him, still laughing, "it's just willpower, you have to force yourself to stay awake."

"That sounds hard," Sirius said thoughtfully, "maybe I'll just stay out of her way... that sounds hard, too, though. She doesn't wear shoes."

"What?" said James, caught off guard.

"You said, 'can I lick your shoes clean?' but she wasn't wearing shoes, she was barefoot."

"Ugh, I bet her feet are filthy," James said, looking disgusted. "That's what you have to do, you see – focus on the bad points, or the things that make her seem more human."

"Okay," said Sirius, and just then James' parents came in through the back door.

"Oh, Sirius!" cried Mrs Potter, dusting off her muddy hands. "How are you dear?" James rolled his eyes at what he thought was obvious favouritism.

"Fine, thank you," Sirius replied politely, standing up to shake Mr Potter's hand. "I'm sorry if I'm an inconvenience."

"Oh, don't be silly," Mrs Potter said, bustling about the kitchen as she got some lunch ready.

"We look forward to seeing you, eh, James?" Mr Potter added.

Sirius grinned at James, and was met with amusingly narrowed eyes.