Hello lovelies!

This is probably the last time I'm going to update this year, and so I'll just wish you a Happy New Year now! I hope you all have a wonderful and safe New Year!

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Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to J.K. Rowling, and only the story line and any OC's belong to me.

For I Was BOTWP who has been here for a long time and is a constant delight with her reviews xxx

Thursday, September 2nd, 1976

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Great Hall

"I still can't believe you chopped it all off," Alice marvelled at Nancy's pixie cut, running her fingers across it and smiling at the feeling of the short strawberry blonde hair beneath her hands.

"Stop playing with Nancy's hair and eat, Alice," Kira teased lightly, guiding the conversation in a different direction, "how did everyone do in their OWLs?"

"Nine Outstandings," Lily preened proudly, brushing her curtain of hair over her shoulder before biting into a crunchy piece of bacon—everyone knew that she did Muggle Studies outside of regular class time, having convinced McGonagall of it, who had only agreed since Lily was a Muggleborn.

Hermione grinned, pausing in the buttering of her toast before saying, "I got the same, nine OWLs, all Outstanding." When she'd seen the mark beside Defense Against the Dark Arts she did a backflip—or attempted to do one, if not for Draco she probably would have had a nasty spill onto the hardwoods of their family home.

"Nine?" Kira asked in disbelief, looking between the two girls in awe. "I barely managed to get six, and one of those was an Acceptable."

"Yea, I did Muggle Studies on the side—like Lily—on a whim," Hermione shrugged, slathering on a layer of blackberry jam into her golden piece of toast.

"Never saw you in any of the classes, Mione, whenever did you find the time to study for it?" Frank asked curiously.

"Here and there," Hermione replied vaguely, placing her knife on her plate before leaning down and biting into her toast, the sweet jam melting onto her tongue.

"Nine?!" Kira repeated once more like a broken record.

"Sirius got ten," Hermione smiled, tongue darted out to lick the jam that had oozed onto the corners of her mouth.

"He got bloody what?" Lily almost shrieked, eyes wide, hand clutching her napkin tightly.

"You can ask him yourself—" Hermione said, head swivelling to find him, only to see him and Riley at the entrance of the Great Hall arguing in hushed tones.

What is going on there? Hermione wondered as she took another bite of her toast before placing it on her plate and blindly reaching for her pumpkin juice—her hand eventually closed around the smooth glass as her attention remained enraptured by the events unfolding before her.

Sirius wretched his arm from Riley's grasp, shaking his head as he marched into the Great Hall with a storm cloud shrouding him.

"Sirius Black!" Riley yelled, hands curled up against her chest as tears sprang from her eyes.

"I told you, it's over!" Sirius called over his shoulder, refusing to look back as he took the empty seat beside Hermione.

The loud, boisterous chatter that had filled the Great Hall quieted instantly, everyone watching with bated breath to see what happened next.

Riley swallowed jerkily, ducking her head before she dashed out of view.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Hermione asked, slamming her glass down on the table.

Sirius kept his gaze firmly on his plate as he piled it high with an assortment of foods.

"Sirius."

He dutifully ignored her as he began to tuck into his breakfast, hair falling forward and hiding his face from her.

Hermione growled lowly, clearly she wasn't going to get anything from him, with a disappointed look she got up and quickly exited the Great Hall, chasing after Riley—only for the petite Hufflepuff to evade her for the better part of a half hour before Hermione cornered her in a dark alcove, where she confessed everything after Hermione threw up a multitude of charms.

Soft humming danced from the pale haired girl standing beside her boyfriend's hospital bed, it'd been six days since he'd been admitted, and she'd had to prolong going back home to her parents—explaining that a friend of hers had been injured in an accident and she wanted to make sure he was alright. (She refrained from mentioning it was her boyfriend who'd been injured, and she'd been extremely vague on the details—her parents would worry relentlessly, and they wouldn't understand.)

Sirius groggily roused from his medically induced sleep, blearily looking up at her, and softly he sighed when he figured out who it was. "I told you I'm no good for you—" Sirius said feebly, but was stopped by the finger that Riley pressed against his lips.

"You need to stop with that, 'you're not good enough for me' bullshite," Riley rolled her eyes.

"But—"

"But nothing, Sirius Orion Black. I'm not fucking going anywhere and you need to accept that," Riley said, her hands trembling as she brushed the hair off of his forehead—he leaned into her touch and stared at her with a war of emotions tumbling over themselves in his eyes.

"You'll be in danger if you're still dating me, Riles," Sirius settled for.

"I don't care—"

"I do. I couldn't bear it if you got hurt because of me, Riley," Sirius said seriously, attempting to sit up, but Riley placed a hand on his shoulder, holding him in place. Sirius groaned loudly, which drew a smile onto Riley's face as she proceeded to gently help him into a sitting position.

Riley slipped her hand into his uninjured one, grasping it as her eyes tried to silently reason with his pigheadedness.

"Riley, all this proved is Voldemort—" Sirius paused to gauge her reaction to the name, but she unflinchingly stared at him, resolute in her decision, "—is growing stronger, and he's getting more brazen…and that he's recruiting wix our age—"

"I don't care, the best place for me is right by your side, Sirius Black, and nothing you say can dissuade me on this matter. Nothing."

"Bloody hell, witch," Sirius said with a clenched jaw. "People can't know that we're together, there will be a constant target on your back."

"Fine, then I guess we'll just have to break up then," Riley said easily, patting his cheek lovingly.

"But—"

"Don't worry my brave lion, I have a plan," Riley murmured before she leaned forward and pressed her lips to his gently.

As the day wore into conclusion: the artificial light through the faux window faded away quietly, and two lovers concocted their plan.

"Morning, Evans," James said quietly as he settled into his seat at the Potions workbench directly behind the fierce lioness—her back stiffened, but aside from that there was no indication that she'd even heard him.

"I wonder what we're going to learn today," Lily murmured to Hermione, resuming her process of neatly laying out her parchment, and her brand new Advanced Potion-Making textbook by Libatius Borage; she was just unstoppering her inkpot when Sirius brightly roared his greetings at Lily.

Lily shot Hermione a droll look before she shot Sirius an amused look over her shoulder, "morning, Black."

"Morning, Lilypad," Draco smiled lightly, putting a hand up in greeting at the same time, and a genuine smile tugged at Lily's lips in kind.

"Morning, Draco," Lily said, sticking her tongue out at him playfully before facing forwards once more, muttering to herself as she retrieved her quills from her book bag.

Hermione peeked over at her brother—her high ponytail flipping over her shoulder as she did—and she sent him a sympathetic smile just as Slughorn ambled into the classroom, greeting them in a jolly tone, "Good Afternoon, Sixth Years! How wondrous it is to see all of your faces again!"

A low snort came from the back on the opposite side of the classroom, and Hermione's head swivelled to the source—a grim-faced Severus Snape, whose dark eyes were already staring at her with hatred, hatred as thick as sludge and as deep as the darkest depths of the ocean.

She stared back impassively, a shiver slipping down her spine, bumping along her bones and eventually she broke their gaze, giving her full attention to Horace Slughorn as he joyously rambled on.

Hermione could still feel the depth of Snape's hatred: she could still feel herself sinking into it, fighting to keep her head above it, but alas, it had swallowed her whole.

Saturday, September 11th, 1976

Legs pumping, faster and faster, lungs burning, his glasses sliding around haphazardly on the bridge of his nose from all the sweat streaming down his face.

James made a sharp turn down the path, clenching his fists as he sped up, putting all his frustration into every movement.

He'd started going for runs in the Forbidden Forest on mornings when he wasn't conducting drills on the Quidditch Pitch—sometimes Sirius and his siblings joined him for early morning drills before classes, sometimes it was just him, burning off as much of his built up energy as he could.

It didn't take long before his thoughts were consumed with an extraordinarily gifted witch: before…before she would treat him with playful disdain—she would smile and joke around with him on occasion, and whenever he went too far she would scowl, and send a light, well-deserved hex his way as punishment.

That was always their dynamic, and it was something he understood, he was okay with it, but now, their dynamic had shifted entirely.

After that one fateful afternoon…the emotion radiating off of Lily whenever she caught sight of him was much deeper and darker: she refused to talk to him, much less acknowledge his existence.

Is this what it feels like to be hated? James wondered, allowing himself to sink into a morbid state for a fleeting moment before he shook his head, forcefully pulling himself out of it, and his legs pumped even faster.

He'd downright given up after the first week of school—if Lily Evans was ever going to speak to him again, humbugging her certainly wasn't the way to go about it.

Sweat was pouring profusely from his pores, and he swiped absently at his forehead as he rounded another bend, "blimey!" James exclaimed, barely catching sight of the witch—just in time to manoeuvre around her—honey blonde hair and piercing blue eyes directly in his line of sight.

James stopped abruptly a few feet away: his muscles groaned loudly in protest, and he placed his hands on his hips whilst trying to keep as straight as possible—desperately gulping in air.

I definitely pushed it this morning, I should probably skip tomorrow's run, he decided mentally, wake up early on Monday and convince Draco to join me.

"Morning, Marlene," James panted out, one of his eyes wedging itself closed.

The witch was eyeing him warily, one hand on her chest and the other on her lower abdomen—her heart racing unevenly, "Potter."

"What—What are you doing out here?" James exhaled, tilting his head up at the sky—which was surprisingly a vibrant blue, though the dark and hefty clouds spoke a different story, threatening to spit angrily down on them at any given moment.

A leaf fluttered to the ground in between them, and James shifted, several other leaves crunching underneath his feet, exuberant yellow leaves beginning to dust the forest floor.

"I needed some time to myself," Marlene said with narrowed eyes.

"Hmm," James hummed, cocking his head to the side and examining the Slytherin: she'd cropped off most of her hair and it barely brushed her earlobes, there was a slight glow to her skin as if she'd been in the sun a lot this summer, and for the first time James noticed that there was a small mole on the side of her neck.

She wiped her hands across her black robes, and it was then that he realised she'd been studying him as well, "you should talk to Mary—she needs to know that you're okay with her breaking up with you. She's convinced herself that you hate her."

James's eyes widened in surprise, but his expression soon melted into a bright smile, "I could never hate her. I loved her, and I finally get why she doesn't want to be with me anymore. No one wants to date someone who is in love with someone else."

Marlene pursed her lips and folded her arms across her chest, her robes rustling around her, but she didn't respond.

"You know, you should talk to Draco, he still needs you. You may not be together—" James caught the dark aura that enveloped the girl and quickly continued, "—for whatever reason, but he trusts you. He opens up to you about how he's feeling."

Marlene's expression only grew darker at that, and James inhaled deeply, throwing his hands up, "he does. He doesn't do that very often so you should treasure that."

Raging, dark seas were crashing and thrashing violently in her blue orbs, and she pressed her lips together, "he doesn't tell me anything."

"You'd be surprised," James murmured.

"Try me," Marlene muttered.

"I still have no idea why Hermione and Draco were in Dumbledore's office last year, but I have a feeling he at least let you know how he felt about the whole debacle," James said, taking a step toward her.

Marlene's brow furrowed, "I guess."

"Either way, he does love you," James said, tapping his foot against the ground.

"I know," Marlene sighed, cowing her head.

James closed the rest of the distance between them, resting his hand on her shoulder for a brief moment—she tensed heavily, she didn't like just anyone touching her after all, "see you around, Marlene. I'll be sure to talk to Mary as soon as I can."

With that he removed his hand, drawing in a substantial breath before he took off running once more, quickly disappearing down the path, obscured by the thick foliage and dense forest.

"I know," Marlene repeated sadly, just not the way I love him, she added to herself. She sighed as she slowly headed back in the general vicinity of the Castle.