I'm BACK! This chapter is in ship shape thanks to my beta, junieyes, who SQUEALED a lot, so be ready for what's coming. Okay I won't say anything else.

One side note! I haven't actually read the book this chapter is titled after, I am sorry. I usually pick books I have read but it's hard to find a specific 70s erotica tailored to your chapter titles. Pls forgive me if what June says about this book doesn't match up.


Bachelor Territory by Gloria Bevan

She tried not to look like she had been thinking of what she was going to say. She stood on the bridge, overlooking the grounds. Everything looked green now – spring had come in earnest. March was around the corner. The sun had already set – everything was looking a lot more like twilight right now.

"What's up, Williams? Remus said you wanted to talk."

June swallowed, and turned to look at him. He looked grim, a little sad. She didn't like the way he was using her name.

"I – I wanted to talk to you –"

He was expressionless.

"It's just – it's just," she took a deep breath. "Look, can you turn around for a second? I promise I won't run away, but I can't look at your eyes and do this."

He looked shocked. Resigned. Heartbroken.

"I promise, promise I'm not breaking up with you," added June. "I promise. I can't fucking break up with you in good conscience, can I? Not after I've been the worst – worst – girlfriend in the history of girlfriends – please just turn away!"

That made him smile. She was momentarily relieved, because he lifted his hands in a gesture of surrender and said, "Alright, Williams, alright."

He turned around. She turned away from him as well, and stood with her back to his.

"I just – I wanted to say that – Sirius, I'm sorry," she burst. She hid her face in her hands, despite the fact that his back was to hers. "I know I've been really bad at this, and I know I ought to just buy a few cats and call it a day – it's just that I'm so terribly nervous around you!"

She couldn't see his expression, but she felt like he seemed tense. She decided her best course of action was to soldier on. "I feel so scared that I'm doing something wrong – I've not been good with friends, or being around people or being someone's – someone's girlfriend. You sort of barged into my life when you were becoming friends with me, but I can't – just when I had the reigns to that business I wanted to kiss you, and honestly, that made me more stressed than anything else in the world. I feel like I'm not – that I'm not – I'm not good at kissing, that my skin is rough, or that my bum is flat. I don't know why I think of the last one – but it occurred to me just now – I can't compete with your experience –"

"Hey!" exclaimed Sirius, turning around. "June – come on, turn around."

"I don't want to!" said June to her hands.

"You do," he said steadily. "Come on, look at me."

June turned around reluctantly. He put a finger under her chin and forced her to look up. She'd almost forgotten how grey his eyes were – and how tall he was.

"What do you mean about you doing something wrong?" he asked. "Where did that come from?"

"That day – at breakfast." She took a breath. "Marlene said – she said for me, it was practically fucking – I –"

"Easy, Williams."

She took another breath, but it was useless. She could feel a stinging in her throat and the tears beginning to slip from the corners of her eyes. "See, this is why I didn't want you looking at me," she murmured.

He snorted. "Oh, and you would have cried in peace with your back to mine?"

"Maybe!" she, ineffectually rubbing her eyes in a poor attempt to hide her face from someone looking at her very intently.

"Come on, June," he said. He carefully wiped her eyes himself. "Why are you crying over this? There's really nothing to cry about. Your skin is as soft as they come."

"It's all a trick," she said despondently, hiding close to his chest. "I've been using facewash like no tomorrow."

"It's a good trick," he said. "Look, June."

He held both of her hands in his, cupping them gently. "You have nothing to worry about. You aren't bad at being with me. You don't have to worry about that anyway, because I like you. And most of us don't like our bums. I don't like mine."

"You don't?" she asked, shocked. "But yours is so good! Marlene rates it a ten."

"McKinnon has to rate it a ten, she went out with me," he dismissed.

"Even so –"

He bit his lip with laughter.

"Right," she murmured. "Not… the point."

"I like your bum."

"Um," she said. "I like yours. I wouldn't rate it a ten, but I like it."

"Ho, ho, ho, Williams –"

She laughed.

"I'm sorry," she said again.

"It's alright," he said. "I'm glad you just told me. I was worried you were going to break up with me."

"I know I gave that impression," she said with a flinch. "I am sorry."

They were quiet for longer. He pulled her to the railing, and they watched the world hush over the bridge. Whatever was left of twilight was fast fading into night time – the stars were muscling through the darkness. She hesitated for a minute, and then inched her hands closer and closer to his. He seemed to have gotten the hint, because he slipped his fingers into hers.

"Did I stress you out when we were becoming friends?"

June chewed her lip, trying not to look at him. "Yeah," she said honestly. "I'm not – it's just that – I've never really – look, I spent… five years in this place not being friends with anyone. Not… belonging to anyone. I don't know how to do it, not here or now, and I never really thought about what it meant for people to belong to me. At least I have some experience of friendship before Hogwarts – I don't know how to be with someone who's had all of that here. Especially not romantically. And I like you so much."

He clutched her hand tightly. This time, he avoided looking at her. "Can you be honest with me about something?"

"Yes?" she said hesitantly.

"Is it me? Specifically?"

She flinched again. "Only… only a little. Some part of me can't forget how terrifying you were to me."

He didn't respond, but a weight left June. She felt inexplicably like she had confessed to murder, like it had weighed on her that her feelings for Sirius had always had this half of them that had never ever ever believed that he'd like her, because he made her so nervous.

"You're not doing anything wrong, you know," he said. "We're not… bad together. I like being around you. And you really don't have to compete with everyone else who has been with me, or with the fact that I know my way around… belonging more."

She wished she could believe it in that much.

"Okay," he said slowly. "We're not two people who are… together. We're just going on a date. Is that alright?"

She turned to him. He was looking at her very earnestly.

"I know I barged through this a little in the beginning," he said. "But I promise – I promise, this is just two people going out."

"O… kay," she said, tentative.

He smiled mischievously. "With maybe some kissing."

She blanched again, and his grin widened.

"June. Seriously," he said. "It's impossible for you to be bad at kissing."

"You don't know that," she moaned. "And I hardly have practice. I'm going to muck it up on our date by using too much of my tongue. Sarah said that Daw – er – someone she kissed does that."

"Marlene McKinnon and Sarah Freegood are making my life increasingly difficult," sighed Sirius. "Alright, Williams. Time for a practice session."

"What?" squeaked June.

"You heard me," he said, making her face him. "You were afraid of mucking it up on our date, weren't you? Practice session. I won't judge you by this one. Get all your weird tongue tendencies out of your system."

She swallowed. "You promise you won't judge me by this one?"

"I promise."

"Alright."

She focussed, waiting for him to kiss her.

"You initiate, Williams," he said with a laugh.

"Well, how?" she demanded. "You aren't teaching me anything."

"Oy," he murmured. He ran a hand through his hair. "I only know the boy version."

"Well, what do you do?"

His hands travelled to her waist. "I hold her. Girls like being held."

"Okay," she said, her heart in her throat.

"Put your arms around me, too."

She snaked her arms around his neck. "Like this?"

"Yeah," he breathed. "You lean forward while I lean down. This is only because you are so freakishly short, Williams –"-she shoved at him ineffectually, but he laughed and kissed her on the neck, which effectively surprised her. "Try to fit to me," he said. "Match my rhythm."

She nodded, but she knew she felt terrified.

"I won't eat you," he said. "Well, only a little."

She swallowed.

She felt her heart thumping out of her throat when he leaned down and kissed her. He started slow, and she focussed. She was practicing, wasn't she? So she concentrated – she matched his rhythm, pressed into him further. Like a flash of inspiration, she remembered reading about a heroine in a bodice ripper who put her fingers near the hero's jaw, and she did the same. She traced his jawbone, felt his teeth on her bottom lip, and tried to close whatever gap was left between them.

He paused for a breath, and she searched his eyes for half a second before kissing him again, on his cheek. Her teeth scraped against his cheek a little, and she felt him gasp. Another flash of inspiration – and she bit his earlobe a little. Another gasp.

He pulled back. He was surprised, and she liked that. "What are you doing, Williams?"

"Um," she said. "Taking a risk."

She must have said the right thing, because he kissed her again. She squeaked momentarily, quickly gained her foothold again. She tried to match him again, but he seemed to be trying to make this harder for her, by being that much faster. His fingers were on her cheek, too. She forgot, for a moment that she was supposed to be practicing – but once she remembered, she dug through whatever she had read of kissing to again match him.

He stopped for a moment. "Where did you learn that?"

She bit her lip. "Full disclosure? You won't judge me?"

He looked at her with some amusement.

"I read bodice rippers," she said. "All of those fancy books I kept sending you? I secretly read erotica. And harlequins. With questionable consent."

He kept watching her for a moment, before bursting into laughter. "You really are a fucking delight."

"Thank you," she said with a grimace. "So – do you have somewhere to be, because I feel like I need more pract-mmf!"


June was happy to report that things did get easier from that point forward. When she returned Sarah's copy of Bachelor Territory to her, with a dreamy, "It's pretty accurate at the kissing part," she was able to actually tell her about what happened between them at the bridge. She still blushed sharply when she was teased, but she was able to handle it better.

She was no longer being assaulted for information, what with her bodyguards following her around – but it also gave her little to no time by herself. She didn't mind so much, because she knew the fanclub was on the warpath. It still felt like if she wasn't dealing with the fanclub, she did have to deal with her own friends – all of whom wanted more and more details. And this was before her coming date.

Some part of her was still nervous – this was territory she had only ever read about. And no matter what, the books hadn't warned her that kissing Sirius Black would feel as involving as it did. They hadn't warned her of her feelings, of what everything might end up feeling like. It blindsided her a little, made her more anxious than she ought to be feeling.

But all of that – all of that was negotiable. Her friends getting excited for her, planning out what she would wear. The fanclub. The lack of information. The nerves. Now that things were easier – now that she could imagine herself slipping her hand in his, walking through Hogsmeade and picking out things to do – everything else was negotiable. The date, her friends, what she would wear. Everything was simpler, and none of it was nearly as important as the thing itself – that he liked her, and she liked him.


YOUR HONOUR I ADORE THE PRACTICE KISSING TROPE NO I WILL NOT APOLOGISE FOR MYSELF

Anyway pls review I love it :D