AN: There is a new writing prompt, "Shut Up, Frank", up on my Tumblr for this fic (link in bio). It takes place during this chapter and is semi-important if you wanna read that as well.

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FORTY-NINE

Over a week had passed, and Jane and Sirius had finally decided that it was time to move back into their flat, at the urging of James' parents of course (the irony of which wasn't lost on Jane). Though, she supposed it was for the best; Lily had basically moved in already, and while Jane wanted to stay and help some more, she couldn't help but feel that Mr. and Mrs. Potter were feeling a little overcrowded.

After their talk the previous week, James' attitude towards his parents did lighten a bit. He would still argue with his father every now and then, but it wasn't as often, and James was starting to come out of his room more often, so Jane took that as a good sign that things were improving. With James finally starting to act semi-normal and with Lily helping out, Jane figured that she could settle for just popping in once or twice every week.

It was their last day at the Potters; Jane had kept delaying their leaving, even though she knew it was time for them to go and that the Potters would be fine without them. She'd checked her suitcase three times, checked her room to make sure she wasn't leaving anything, checked Sirius' room to make sure he wasn't leaving anything. By the time, Sirius had convinced her that it was really time to go, Alice had shown up with some baked good, courtesy of her own mother.

"She thinks pie helps everything," Alice had said, rolling her eyes.

So, of course, Jane had to stay to talk with Alice as well. Sirius was slightly annoyed by it all, but he couldn't bring himself to drag her away; he was still feeling guilty about their latest argument just that past Saturday night.

"You wrote to Remus about me?" Sirius demanded in a loud voice. "You asked him to 'talk to me'?"

"I just thought since you work together, he could help you with your situation," Jane admitted.

"And what situation is that, Janie? So, I have a few drinks now and then. Since when is that a problem with you?"

"Since it's not 'every now and then,' Sirius; it's every day!"

"You could've come to me, is all I'm saying. You didn't have to go talk to our friends about it."

"I tried!" Jane exclaimed in an exasperated voice. "You just got angry and stormed off. We hardly ever talk anymore; I didn't know what to do."

"Oh, well, you're too busy talking to Moony apparently! You compared me to your father? When have I—"

"I did not compare you to my father," Jane interrupted.

"Well, you made mention of him at some point in your little letter, and Remus found it necessary to bring him up, so how would I know?" Sirius spat back.

"I just—I want you to be okay; I want you to talk to me," Jane said quietly, she could feel the tears pricking at her eyes.

"What the fuck is there to talk about? You're the one making problems when there aren't any!"

The face that Jane had made after he yelled those words at her had been heart breaking. He had realised he was being completely unfair. In the time that they'd been back with the Potters, Jane had been putting in the most effort out of the three of them. James had been a prat for the most part, and Sirius knew that she was right—he wasn't coping well, and they hardly talked anymore. Jane had been busy helping make meals and keeping all the people that showed up company while he and James couldn't bring themselves to really stay in their company for too long because, while it was nice that they were there, the reason they were there felt morbid. Jane had done all of it with a smile all while going to class and keeping up her schoolwork. All she had asked was for him to stop coming back from work drunk, and he'd acted like a complete arse. It had taken a couple of days, but he'd finally come around and apologised; it might have admittedly taken longer had Lily not berated him for being such a wanker. He was glad she had.

Sirius smiled slightly as he watched Jane play with the ends of her hair, inspecting the split ends as Alice talked about her Auror training, complaining about how it exhausting it all was.

"…and of course, there's not a lot of people jumping about to be Aurors these days, so this year's class is small; makes it harder to avoid Frank."

The friends collectively groaned as Alice mentioned Frank.

"You can't possibly still be on about that, can you?" Lily said, rolling her eyes up to the ceiling as she let her head rest against the couch in a dramatic way.

"It's October. That makes it three months, Alice. It's getting ridiculous," Jane added.

"Well, it's not like he's reached out to me," Alice said indignantly, folding her arms across her chest as she leaned back into her chair with a little huff.

"You rejected him, and from what I've gathered, basically berated him for wanting to marry you, so I think if anybody should do the reaching out in the situation, it should be you," James said, and there was a murmur of agreement between the friends. Alice shook her head.

"It wasn't like that," she said. "You're all insane. What I am supposed to do? Marry him? I'm eighteen."

"Marry him; don't marry him. No one cares at this point," Sirius groaned. "But for Merlin's sake, just get back together with him, so none of us have to listen to you both complain about it anymore. I've already lost the wager on when you two'd get back together like five weeks ago."

"Wager? I wasn't privy to any wager," James said, earning him a smack on the arm from Lily.

"We called it off already; nobody was winning," Jane stated, waving her hand dismissively as Alice scoffed at her.

"You're all just terrible people. I have no clue why I'm friends with the lot of you," Alice said.

"Oh, boohoo! Poor Alice Hanson!" James exclaimed loudly. "The boy she's been in love with since—"

"Second year," Jane supplied as he stopped to think.

"—second year wants to spend the rest of his life with her. Remind me why this is an issue again?" James asked.

It was the first time Jane had seen Alice so flustered.

"Well, it's not—it isn't even about—He only wants to marry me because he thinks it's our only chance or something!"

"Well, have you considered that it very well could be?" Lily exclaimed.

The friends were silent for a while as they all stared at her. She rolled her eyes.

"What? It's what we're all thinking," she said. "I mean, we've got another Order meeting coming up next week. So far, we haven't had much to do, and that's great, but that's going to change one day. Hell, it could change next Saturday! We signed up for a war; we're not getting out of it having not fought one."

Lily was right, and they all knew it. Just three days prior, they'd received their potion refills from the Prewett twins; Jane's had come disguised as perfume. So far, its only use had been relaying dates, times and whereabouts of Order meetings. Jane rubbed her left palm, remembering the warm sensation it left behind.

"I just think it's stupid, is all," Lily continued quietly. "Frank loves you more than anything in the world, and you love him. You're meant to be together, and you're not all because you're being stubborn and trying to prove a point that no one even cares about."

Jane couldn't really get a read on the mood Alice had left in. it was hard to tell if she was angry with Lily or just reflecting on what she'd said. Alice had always been one to stick to her guns once she'd made a choice. She didn't like being told she was wrong, and certainly never admitted to it. But Lily was right; Alice and Frank were supposed to be together. They'd been together longer than any of them had. If there wasn't hope for Alice and Frank, was there any hope for the rest of them?

Walking back into their flat in London felt weird. For the three weeks that they'd been staying with the Potters, Jane and Sirius would occasionally pop in to grab something, but they had never stayed for very long. Now, they were back for good this time, and the nagging feeling that they shouldn't be there came over Jane again. Perhaps they shouldn't be leaving the Potters' quite so soon.

Jane stood in front of the door, chewing her lip as she stared into space. Sirius sighed and grabbed her suitcase from her hand, sitting it on the floor before taking her hands and pulling her further into the apartment.

"They'll be fine, Janie. Prongs and Evans have everything under control," he assured her, somehow knowing what she was thinking.

"I know," Jane said, her arms feeling limp as she followed wherever he pulled her. "But I can't stop myself from worrying."

Sirius pulled her into a hug, chuckling a bit.

"You're too stressed. What we need is a day to ourselves. You should take off from your classes tomorrow," he suggested, and Jane laughed a bit.

"I have a test on Medicinal Herbs, and I have to turn in an essay in the other class," she informed him. Sirius sighed.

"Bollocks."

"No classes on Friday," Jane offered.

"Friday it is then," Sirius said.

When Friday rolled around that week, Jane found out that Sirius really had planned an entire day for them. She wasn't sure why this shocked her so much; after all, over the years, Sirius had proven himself to be thoughtful whenever he wanted to be. Perhaps it was because that one night had been the only time they'd spoken of it; between Jane's classes and Sirius' job, they didn't seem to get as much time to themselves as they wanted. This, of course, only made the day Sirius had planned that much better.

The day started with Jane waking up to the smell of something burning. Upon realising that Sirius was not in bed beside her, she had jumped up and ran out of the room to see what exactly he was doing to their kitchen. Upon leaving the room, however, she saw no smoke or any indication at all that Sirius had set fire to their flat. Though this had calmed her nerves a bit, she was still suspicious.

Jane yawned and wrapped her arms around herself, blinking the sleep from her eyes. Sirius was standing in their kitchen, enchanting a knife to cut one of their tomatoes into even slices while a skillet on the stove moved of its own accord to flip the egg inside of it. Jane looked from the opened cookbook on the counter, entitled Simple Cooking Charms for the Overworked Witch, to Sirius with furrowed brows.

"What're you doing?"

"Morning, love," Sirius responded in a cheery voice. "We are having rashers, mushrooms, eggs over easy and grilled tomatoes."

Jane inspected the eggs and bacon, and nothing seemed burnt, which only made her more suspicious as she leaned against the counter.

"I smelt something burning."

"Ah, yes, that was on purpose," Sirius said, removing the finished egg from the skillet and cracking another one into it.

"You burnt something on purpose?" she asked, still a little dazed from having woken up so suddenly.

"Yes," Sirius said happily, "I've burned all of our bread so that you cannot opt out of my delicious breakfast for your boring usual choice of toast and jam."

"I just bought that bread yesterday," Jane complained, but Sirius shushed her as he abandoned the stove to press a quick kiss to her lips.

"I'll buy more later," he said.

"Loads of people eat toast and jam for breakfast," she said, pouting a bit.

"Yes, but as a side item, not a main dish, Janie," he said as he returned to his cooking, and Jane rolled her eyes but let a ghost of a smile pass over her lips.

"Is this your way of telling me I need to gain weight?" she teased.

"I don't care about your weight; I just want you to eat the breakfast I made."

They ate their breakfast together, and it was infuriatingly delicious, causing Jane to doubt her own cooking skills in comparison. It really was annoying how Sirius seemed to be good at everything. Typically, Jane didn't care much for most breakfast foods, a stubborn trait developed during her childhood from one too many days of toast and jam because she didn't know how and wasn't allowed to use the stove even when her mother was locked away in her room. She made up for it with her vast knowledge of jams, jellies, marmalades and fruit butter. Sirius had known better than to get rid of her multiple jars of fruit products; she wouldn't have forgiven him for that. Now that she bought her own groceries, she had collected a vast assortment, and Sirius was silently waiting for the day that she decided to start her own fruit canning business.

The day hadn't been elaborate, but it had been one of the best days Jane had had in a while, one where she felt like a normal eighteen-year-old girl. They drove around the city on Sirius' bike. They searched through the vinyl at a record shop, finding David Bowie's album, Heroes, which had been released the previous year, but Jane hadn't found the time to go out and buy it until then. They roamed through clothing shops, trying on outfits, but never actually buying anything other than a pair of sunglasses that Sirius just had to have. They had lunch at a small diner before going back to their flat where Jane proceeded to play her Bowie album and dance around the den with Sirius to Beauty and the Beast, Heroes and Blackout, but when they flipped the album over, they both ending up, laying on the floor silently, completely enamoured as they listened to Moss Garden over and over.

"It feels ethereal," Sirius had said as they stared up at their ceiling, Jane slowly nodding in agreement.

The two ended their day by going to see the new movie, Midnight Express, and at one point, Sirius had to shove popcorn in Jane's mouth to stop her from stating, for the third time, "Well, that's just not how that happened in the book."

The day had been fun and perfectly normal, and though thoughts of the upcoming Order meeting and Mrs. Potter lingered in the back of their minds, Jane and Sirius were able to sleep that night feeling a little bit lighter. The next day, however, snapped them right back to reality as they showed up for the Order meeting, which was being held this time in an old mill house up near Bamburgh. Jane wasn't sure where they kept finding all these places.

Jane walked inside a room with a long, wooden table, her eyes scanning the room and finding that Remus and Peter were already there. She walked over and claimed the empty chair beside Remus, Sirius sitting on her other side. They were joined a few minutes later by Alice and Frank. They all stared at the two, who had entered the room together and sat beside each other.

"Does this mean you've worked out your petty issues?" Sirius asked, earning a harsh nudge from Jane's elbow. He swatted her arm away. "Keep your bony little elbows to yourself."

Jane rolled her eyes and they landed on something glimmering on Alice's hand. Jane looked back up at Alice with a smile spreading across her face. She opened her mouth to say something, but Alice cut her off.

"Don't say a word," she said, avoiding Jane's eyes.

"Oh, come on! Don't be like that! Let me see it!" Jane replied, her hands twitching as she waited for permission to grab Alice's hand and inspect her engagement ring. Alice rolled her eyes, but upon finally looking at Jane, she couldn't hold back her smile any longer. She slid her hand across the table in front of Jane, and Jane admired the gold diamond ring.

"Hold up. You're getting married?" Peter asked in a disbelieving tone.

"No, Wormtail, I'm sure that Frank just likes to spend his money on overpriced pieces of jewellery," Sirius said sarcastically, causing Peter to frown.

"Well, it's just they haven't spoken to each other in three months, and now they come in all chipper and engaged like nothing's happened. It's a fair question," he defended.

"He's got a point," Remus said, glancing over Alice's ring.

"Oh, who cares?" Jane exclaimed excitedly. "Do you have a date picked out?"

"Oh, blimey, now look at what you've gone and started, Frank," Sirius said. "Don't go getting any ideas," he told Jane. "I'm not popping the question anytime soon."

Jane waved a hand dismissively at him, still staring at the ring.

"Who says I'd say yes?" she teased back, and she didn't see the look of concern that flashed across Sirius' face at her response.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked, but Jane was too busy listening to Alice talk about colour schemes. Remus chuckled at the look on Sirius' face, but stopped abruptly at a cold glare from him.

Sirius shook the thought from his head for a moment before turning his attention to Frank.

"I will take it upon myself to plan the stag party."

"Don't make me do anything too embarrassing," Frank pleaded, but Sirius just let out a laugh.

"It's like you don't know who you're talking to, mate," Peter said in response to Frank's request.

"It'll be great; you'll love it," Sirius said.

Once the others arrived, and once Marlene jumped up and down over the news of their friends' engagement, the meeting began. It started the same as usual with Dumbledore announcing that there had been no news on You-Know-Who's whereabouts, and Jane always vaguely wondered, if they did ever figure out where he was, how exactly it would help them. A few people spoke to share things they'd heard, information whispered to them in secret or overheard in the corridors of their workplaces. Nothing of import seemed to emerge until Moody stood to talk.

Alastor Moody was currently one of the most revered Aurors at the Ministry, and he had been responsible for the defeat and capture of many dark wizards, Death Eaters or not. Alice and Frank talked about him as though he was the most amazing wizard alive. While he intimidated Jane, she had to admit that having him on the side of the Order made her feel a little safer.

"It has been brought to the attention of the Auror Office that, through resources I find reliable, Voldemort and his followers plan to attack the Palace of Westminster," he started.

Jane flinched at the used of Voldemort's name, and there were murmurs that broke out across the room as Moody continued.

"While Minister Minchum has been informed, the Auror Office has no resolute plan to look into the issue any further since we have no clue as to when such an attack might occur, and as I've been told, we just don't have the manpower to spare for a preventative task force right now. The Muggle Prime Minister has been informed, but realistically, Muggle guards won't stand a chance against such an attack."

Jane listened as Moody and Dumbledore drew up plans and as others around the room threw out thoughts or suggestions. Soon, a few pieces of parchment were circling around the room, and people were writing down their availabilities, and when one of the pieces came to Jane, she stared down at it in a kind of trance as she marked down the weekends and afternoons as her unoccupied time—times when she was free to do whatever it was the Order needed her to do. And she hated it with every fibre of her being because this made it real.

As plans, lists and schedules were being drawn up, the majority of the Order members were left to talk amongst themselves. While Sirius chattered with Alice and James about how they were finally going to get to do something, Jane just stared past Frank and Alice and out of the window on the wall opposite of her. Her mind was, for once, completely blank. The situation, while frightening, was just too big to focus all her thoughts on at the moment. She was quiet for while.

Under the table, Remus nudged Jane's foot with his own. She turned to look at him, eyebrows raised slightly in curiosity.

"You all right?"

Jane let a small smile find its way to her lips before nodding. Remus was quiet for a moment before saying,

"I'm having lunch with Lennox tomorrow."

Jane's smile grew wider and more sincere at his words.

"And you're telling me this without me having to ask? You must really want to cheer me up," she teased. Remus scoffed.

"I tell you things," he said, and Jane cocked a brow at him in obvious disagreement. "When I don't think you'll pester me about them," he added. She laughed a bit.

"How many lunch dates is that now?"

Remus shrugged.

"Five? Six?" he said.

"Any plans to make it official?" Jane asked, and Remus rolled his eyes, but he smiled nonetheless.

"Why ruin a good thing? Besides, Lennox is a free spirit type. I don't think—"

"I swear, Remus, you're an idiot sometimes," Jane said, laughing a bit. Remus shook his head before glancing at James, who was currently arguing about how he should be the one in charge of Frank's stag party, not Sirius.

"How's James' mum?"

Jane let out a small sigh.

"Good, I suppose. Or as good as she can get considering everything," she said. "Went by Thursday after classes and she was bossing James and his dad about the house because she'd invited some people over for dinner, so at least her social life's still in bloom."

"Heard that Lily's just about moved in now," he said, and Jane nodded.

"Practically. She mostly only goes home to grab clothes and books and to see her mum and dad. Mrs. Potter absolutely adores her, and James doesn't mind having her around; I'm sure it makes certain activities loads more convenient," Jane teased, wiggling her eyebrows suggestively, and Remus thumped her on the nose.

"You've been dating Sirius for far too long," he joked as she laughed.

Sirius, who hadn't actually heard any of their conversation until his name was mentioned, turned back towards them, suspicious of their laughter.

"What about me? What's so funny?" he asked, but before they could answer, Dumbledore addressed the room, and all other conversations came to a halt.

Three years ago, if someone had told Jane that she'd be on a security detail for the Palace of Westminster, she wouldn't have believed them. As it so happened, that was exactly what her first job was to be. Everyone had their own times and stations around the building; Jane's was the roof terraces on Monday and Wednesday afternoons and Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights. A lot of the younger members were assigned partners, and Jane's was Kevin Fawley. According to the schedule, the palace couldn't be covered at all times—they would have needed more people for that—but Jane supposed they did the best with what they had. After all, it was better than nothing.

Posts started the next day, which Jane was thankful for because she wasn't sure if she was mentally ready to hang out on the top of the Palace of Westminster with Kevin Fawley all night waiting for a theoretical Death Eater attack. She had hoped she'd at least be stationed with one of her friends, if not Sirius, but she supposed she couldn't complain too much. At least she knew Kevin Fawley and hadn't been paired with a stranger.

Sirius' shift at the White Wyvern started not long after they'd gotten back home from the meeting, so that left Jane by herself. She busied herself so that she could never be left to think about the world and its deteriorating state for too long. She put on her Bowie album and took to cleaning up the flat by hand instead of spelling things to tidy themselves up as she and Sirius normally did. After that was finished, she popped over to the Potters, where she found Mrs. Potter all in a fuss about the state of her garden, angry that she had neglected it for so long now. So, Jane had an excellent excuse to busy herself with de-gnoming the garden, which took quite a while due to the size of the garden and the quantity of the little, ugly creatures. Jane felt sure when she left that there were probably still one or two hiding somewhere in the garden.

Upon arriving back home, she read from her Medicinal Herbs textbook until it was late enough to qualify as an appropriate time to get ready for bed. When Sirius got home, Jane was laying awake in their bed, staring into the dark with the second side of her Bowie album playing; the instrumentals helped her not to think so much. Sirius got ready for bed and switched off the record player before climbing under the covers next to Jane.

"A Knut for your thoughts," he said as she turned on her side to face him.

"I don't know what to think," she replied truthfully.

Sirius nodded and was quiet for a while, but there was something in the back of his mind that had been nagging him for the better part of the day.

"Hey, Janie?"

"Mm?"

"What you said before the Order meeting today, did you mean it?"

"Gonna have to be a bit more specific."

Sirius sighed, feeling like a complete idiot for even asking, but he couldn't just let it go now, not when he couldn't stop hearing her teasing response in his head.

"When you said you wouldn't say yes if I asked you to marry me."

Jane's eyes widened at the turn of the conversation. Whatever she'd been expecting, it hadn't been that. She had to let out a small laugh because she didn't know what else to do.

"What are you on about?" she asked in a light tone, and Sirius' regret at bringing up the conversation swelled, and he sighed.

"Forget it, just pretend I didn't say anything."

"Hang on," Jane said, her tone turning more serious now. "Where's all this coming from? Are you—Are you asking me to marry you?"

"No! No. Merlin, no," Sirius responded immediately. He was far from ready for any of that; he was just—curious. "It's just—well, we've never really talked about it before—our future."

Jane let out a breath she didn't know she was holding in. She, like Sirius, was no where near ready for marriage, especially not with everything that was going on around them. She relaxed back into her pillow.

"Well, you know, I just assumed that one day—far in the future—that when we were ready…" She trailed off, hoping he'd just get what she was inferring at. When she heard him sigh in a relieved way from beside her, she smiled.

"So, you want to marry me, do you?"

Sirius could hear the teasing in her voice, and he groaned.

"Oh, Merlin, what've I done?" he asked himself aloud, causing Jane to laugh.

"Stop ignoring my question," she said, poking him in the side repeatedly. He grabbed her hand and rolled his eyes.

"Yes, all right?"

"Yes, what?" she pressed, her smile growing painfully wide at this point.

"Are you really going to make me say it?" he complained.

"Obviously," she said.

"Fine," he grumbled.

Suddenly, he moved, pushing himself up to hover over her, her hand still in his grasp because he didn't quite trust her to stop poking him. By this point, his eyes had adjusted to the dark, and he could see the shit-eating grin she had on her face, and for a moment, it annoyed him that he loved her so much. How dare she do this to him?

"I'm going to marry you one day if you'll have me," he said.

"Should we go ahead and name our future children while we're at it?" she couldn't help but tease. He was in rare form tonight, and she loved it.

"Never mind; I'm breaking up with you right now," he said, falling back to his side of the bed and facing away from her, a small smile forming on his own lips when she pressed herself against his back and wrapped an arm around him. He could feel her chest moving as she laughed her way through an apology.

"I love you, Sirius," she said after having gotten control of herself, nuzzling her face into his back.

Sirius grabbed the arm of hers that was wrapped around him and brought her hand up to his lips, gently kissing it before saying,

"I love you too, Janie."