cOULd not for the life of me come up with a chapter title for this one. I figured I'd go with transfiguration because I think this sort of. concludes the character development between June and Sirius for this fic.
A Guide to Advanced Transfiguration by Emeric Switch III
Marlene told June later that Lily had waited for James to return from his chat with Sirius. They'd not said anything, but apparently, "the sexual tension was enough for me to fuck right off." Marlene added that she'd seen Lily glowing like a sunset, and James blushing in a most uncharacteristic way, and she hadn't been able to take it anymore.
"Fucking disgusting, if you know what I mean," Marlene glared.
"Careful," Sarah said, with a twinkle in her eye. "You don't want Macdonald hearing you."
"Yeah, like that's going to make a difference."
June bit her lip, smiling to herself. She hadn't told anyone, not even Sarah, what she had observed about Mary. That determined look on her face that everyone had missed, the way her pupils were dilating when she saw Marlene.
Sirius' detention was in the beginning of May, cutting into time which could have been used for romantic and academic purposes. June was a touch miffed, but they had, as they said, bigger things to worry about.
Marlene and Lily's long conversation had been somewhat postponed by the events of that night, and they made time again in a week's time. Because their timing was perfect, they decided to have their long conversation on the same day as Sirius' detention – time which June could have used very well in the dormitory to catch up with her exam prep. Of course, she didn't grudge them the conversation at all – it was a long time coming, and they looked kind of cute, sitting by the window, surrounded by what looked like a mountain of pillows, talking in hushed voices. She'd done her best not to interrupt by leaving, but she checked again at around ten – and they were still talking. June left, shaking her head.
And because the laws of the universe were constant and unchanging – two girls in the dormitory attempting to have a chat which didn't involve the other two clearly meant that Mary and June were meant to run into each other. At the bottom of the stairwell, she found Mary looking at her expectantly.
"Um," said June.
"They're talking, aren't they?" asked Mary, without preamble.
June, still standing on the fourth stair away from Mary, standing at the bottom, put one foot behind the other in discomfort.
"Good," said Mary firmly. "About time."
"Well… yes," June offered, very cautious.
"Oh, don't worry," said Mary, gripping the railing. "I already know where this is going."
"You… do?"
Mary's knuckles turned white. "You ever have a brilliant friend, June? Someone who's so fantastic in all ways, you're enamoured by her no matter what she does?"
June smiled, half to herself, half to Mary. "I've heard of the concept," she said.
"I couldn't even dare liking Marlene," said Mary. "She's the kind of girl who you'd fall for in a heartbeat, she just had to say the word. Your best friend, but you haven't ever told her what you like. You just know that you're a little faded compared to your two best friends."
This June could understand. She nodded vigorously.
"It's not that I never thought of her, you know." said Mary, "I admit, I was clueless, and really didn't know – but that's mostly because I'd never even dreamed that she could be interested. I'd never even considered it. I didn't even let my mind go there."
Her eyes were a little dreamy. Yikes, thought June, I hope I don't look like that.
Mary was lost somewhere, and before June could snap her out of it, they heard footsteps descending. Lily arrived.
"Oh – Mary –"
"Is she asking for me?" Mary asked, with a knowing sparkle in her eye. June suppressed a grin.
"Er – well – yes," said Lily.
"'Ta, Lily," said Mary, sliding from the side and taking to the stairs.
"Honestly," murmured Lily.
"You're having some day, aren't you?" asked June.
"Purebloods are bizarre," said Lily, ruffling her hair and hopping down the stairs. "And halfbloods. You're right, June. We're the last sane people left."
"What did she say?" asked June, curious, hopping after her.
Lily crossed the common room and fell into an armchair, while June clambered over the headrest of the sofa and jumped into place. Lily sighed, her head lolling from one side to the other.
"The usual bullshit – she didn't want to be rejected, she hated how vulnerable she'd made herself, she doubted Mary even cared –"
"Merlin and Agrippa."
"You'd think she'd remember that she didn't give Mary much of a chance to reject her."
June laughed. "You'd think they'd remember that we have exams and I left my Transfiguration book upstairs?"
Lily started laughing. June joined her. Soon enough, they couldn't stop. June clutched her side, even as she laughed and laughed. It wasn't that funny, and they had bigger problems to deal with, but they were laughing.
"You might as well call it, June. You're going to get an 'Acceptable' and then McGonagall will boot you from her class," said Lily finally.
"Oh, don't, my stomach is hurting," said June. "Fucking hell – what got Marlene to talk to Mary right after speaking to you for two hours?"
"You know her," shrugged Lily, with a hiccup. "Once she has what she wants to say in her head, she's going to barrel through."
"She should have some regard for our exams, you know," said June. "Romance and the war does not seem to stop revision for professor McGonagall."
Lily giggled. "Do you think I can use the boy's bathroom? I really need it."
"I doubt they'd mind," June said. "I think James is upstairs, but Remus is in the hospital wing."
A knowing look passed between them.
"Full moon was a few days ago, right?" asked Lily casually.
"Yeah," nodded June, not meeting Lily's eye.
"Right," said Lily. "I'll slip upstairs to use the bathroom."
It was already ten thirty, so it would be weird to disturb anyone else. June watched the clock ticking, and pulled out her Herbology textbook – cross checking her notes, scribbling in the margins, doodling her thoughts. The common room was already almost entirely empty by now, with the exception of the seventh years, who had clearly gone insane. June didn't grudge them their panic, she remembered the OWL year.
The portrait hole opened, and the person she had been waiting for finally arrived.
Sirius Black looked tired and far away, and she should have expected it – since all he had done this night was spend time in detention with Severus Snape.
He was startled to see her, but not surprised. "You didn't sleep?" he asked, coming close to the sofa.
"No," she said, yawning. "Mary and Marlene are chatting. I thought I'd wait for you."
"You shouldn't have," he said stiffly.
June frowned. "Something up?"
"No," he said, even more distant than he had been a second ago. "I'd best – I'd best sleep, June –"
Now she was alarmed. She held his hand almost instantly, and tried to make him look at her. "What did he say, Sirius?" she asked, gently.
He finally met her eyes.
"What did he say?"
"It wasn't him," he finally admitted. "Regulus was one of the prefects supervising."
She should have known. Severus Snape didn't ever get to Sirius as badly as Regulus Black did – and that was saying something, since nothing ever got to Sirius.
"Sit," she ordered.
He sat down, and she held his hand tightly. "Come on, Sirius."
He clenched his fists. "He said I was only seeing you to pretend to be better than our family. That of course he knew this was a stunt, to get my darling mother angry, dating a – a –"
"Mudblood," she finished quietly.
"Don't say that," snarled Sirius.
She didn't contest it. She was waiting for him to say something, but the disgust seemed to have pushed him away from her. He pondered the fire more than he did her.
"He said there really wasn't much difference between me and Snape," continued Sirius. "He said –"
He'd clearly said many things, and Sirius was having a very difficult time making his way through all of them. She'd best nip this in the bud as fast as she could. Out of nowhere, she remembered what Ted had said about the Black family guilt that survivors seem to carry.
"He said I'd probably be just as bad for you as Lily says he was for her," completed Sirius. "That I'd… treat you badly. That I have in the past."
And he waited for her to contradict this statement, for her to say that he wasn't as bad and never had been. But she didn't say anything. June didn't know how to navigate this conversation – no one had been that bad, but absolutely no one was without any measure of guilt, and that was something she really didn't know how she could ever explain.
June squared her shoulders. She was preparing herself for what she was about to say.
"I don't, do I?" he asked, desperate to be reassured. "I'm not as bigoted towards you as –"
"No," she said evenly. "You aren't. Despite what your brother says, you are not your family."
"But…?" he asked, and she loved him more for it.
"It's… not my job to comfort you over this," she said. "To reassure you that you aren't as bad as the others. I can only watch you do better by the people around you, Sirius – and that much I can vouch for. You were awful to me in the beginning of my time in Hogwarts, but you learned. And even if Regulus Black doesn't like it, you… listened. You were my friend long before you dated me, and you were a good friend. You've always been good at being friends – James, Remus and Peter will attest to that more than me. And I think that's… important. At least, it is to me."
He clutched her hand tighter. "I'm sorry."
"It's alright," she said lightly.
"You and I – we're good, right?"
She curled up in the crook of his neck. "Yeah, of course."
"I promise I'll be better."
"You know that already makes you a far cry from your mother?"
Sirius laughed. "No one in the world will convince me I am my mother. I have spent too much time trying to explicitly not be her."
"Congratulations," she said. "You succeeded. Oh – by the by, do you have your transfiguration book? Only I left mine upstairs."
"I do," said Sirius absently. He untangled himself from her and took his A Guide to Advanced Transfiguration out.
"Hey, wait," he said, dropping the book on the coffee table. "Shouldn't you be sleeping?"
"I told you, didn't I?" said June. "Marlene and Mary are hashing it out. I have no idea how long it is going to take. And much as Dorcas is ambivalent towards me, I seriously doubt she'd consent to sharing her bed with me."
"Oh," he frowned. "You could come to the dormy. Wait – Meadows? That Chess girl? – okay, hold up, one thing at a time. You could come to the dormy, I mean. Pete's out – he's keeping an eye on Moony in the hospital wing – because – er –"
"Exam nerves," covered June smoothly.
"Right," said Sirius, sheepish.
"You wouldn't have come with a good explanation for how Peter is keeping an eye on him, would you?" asked June. "Should I pretend I didn't hear it?"
He grinned. "You've guessed, have you?"
"Only bits," said June. Her eyes swooped to the Guide to Advanced Transfiguration. "You did a lot of planning in McGonagall's class, which ought to make me respect you if it wasn't for how careless you were with your secrets."
Sirius looked proud, but he had this other look in his eye. June knew the look, of course, and it didn't help that Marlene had told her what it meant all those months ago.
"And have you figured out what I am?" he asked.
She thought of Sirius' barking laugh. "I think so," she said.
He pressed his lips into hers, and June forgot any plans she had for transfiguration. June fell back into the sofa, and it was likely someone noticed, because one of the seventh years coughed emphatically. Sirius stopped. "Dormy?"
June stood up before he had asked. She saw Dorcas smiling to herself when they slipped upstairs, Sirius kissed her against the stairwell wall. They might have made their way to the dormitory, only, James and Lily seemed to be heading back in as well.
"Um," said James.
"We weren't –" began Lily.
"Weren't you?" Sirius smirked. June elbowed him.
"We're all trying to figure out where to spend the evening with Mary and Marlene occupying the dorms," June supplied smoothly.
"Right! Yes!" Lily cottoned on.
"Erm," said James, for lack of anything better to say.
"Of course," nodded Sirius, still smirking.
Lily blushed brilliantly red. "Oh, be quiet," she said.
"Come on, Sirius," said June, dragging him downstairs.
She was sure she heard Sirius murmuring, "We'd best have a schedule for next time, eh?" to James, whose ears were redder than Lily's hair.
