Five
Sometime between five and six in the morning, Erin woke up feeling startled. She hadn't had a nightmare or anything like that, but once she woke up she wasn't able to fall sleep again. It was very early but it was so hot that the sheets were stuck to her. She pushed her hair back from her face and stood up to go to the bathroom. She would go back to bed later again because she had spent the night contacting Kingsley after the meeting and she felt exhausted.
The house was in total silence. Erin moved slowly to the door next to her room, which was the bathroom, yawning. Her hands were already on the doorknob and she was about to enter when, to her surprise, the door opened from the other side. She almost collided with who she thought was Sirius, until she saw that he had shorter hair and was certainly shorter and younger than him. It could not be Sirius, as far as Erin had seen, there was a bathroom on each floor.
"Harry?" She asked hesitantly.
The boy leaned back when he saw Erin, looking scared. His hair was uncombed and he was not wearing his glasses.
"Merlin, Erin." He wrinkled his nose a little, as if he could not see her properly. "I almost forgot that you were here."
"I didn't know you had stayed either." She defended herself.
"I had to talk to Sirius and in the end I was quite late."
Erin nodded a little. Harry still hadn't moved from the door.
"Oh." He said when he saw that Erin was not moving either. "You were going to the bathroom, of course."
The two blushed, it was a somewhat embarrassing situation although it was not the first time they had both seen each other in their pajamas. Not after all the nights they had spent at the Burrow.
"See you for your birthday, Harry." Erin said. "Don't get into trouble."
Harry smiled a little as he walked down the hall. It was ironic that someone who was only a few years older than him was telling him that, but Harry liked Erin.
"Trouble usually finds me."
After that fortuitous encounter, the first week for Erin in the Black mansion passed in the blink of an eye. She spent most of her time reading the reports she had brought about the most dangerous Death Eaters, or potential ones. Setting patterns about their movements was essential to stop them even though she would've liked to do this more directly than dealing with paperwork.
She was almost all the time in her room and only saw Sirius while eating or once in a while in the stairs going from one floor to another. In one of those moments, without thinking it through, she dared to ask if she could change the decoration of the room. It didn't bother her a lot but she was going to spend so much time there ... She had thought his answer would have been bad but Sirius had laughed and told her that he hated that bloody house and that she could do anything she wanted. Literally.
By the end of the week she was done with it. While looking at the final result, she thought about calling Sirius. It had been a few days since they had had a real conversation and she didn't want to look at more reports that day. She had no idea what he could be doing at the time, if he could be busy or not but she remembered what he had mentioned once and decided to just scream and see if it worked.
"Sirius!"
She didn't have to repeat it or shout louder because she immediately heard him climbing the stairs. When he reached the door of the room, he didn't even have to ask why she had called him.
The walls were painted in a light blue tone, the bed no longer had that bulky canopy and there were no dark-coloured carpets on the floor either. The space seemed much bigger and brighter. There was more life.
Sirius walked around the room looking at the shelves until he reached the window and the small seat in front of it. He extended his arm to touch some plants that Erin had put hanging over the window; they had white and blue flowers.
"Do you like it?" Erin asked behind him.
"I think I should reform everything." Sirius started to say. "And I'd let you do it."
Erin smiled although he couldn't see her. A comforting feeling grew in her chest as she listened to his words. Then, Sirius turned around.
"Any suggestions?"
"A couple of plants in the living room?"
Sirius sat down by the window, still looking at everything.
"Reasonable, coming from you." He replied as he remembered that Erin's parents had a store dedicated to herbology . "I've had some, but they always die."
"A cactus, then. You don't really have to water them."
Erin had also sat on the edge of her bed, facing Sirius.
"So what's so interesting about having plants if you don't have to water them?"
She tilted her head a little, he was right.
"I don't know. I don't like them too much."
Erin preferred roses or just nice-looking flowers, anything that was colourful and smelled good.
Sirius stared at the stack of papers Erin had on the desk and pointed at it.
"Is that what you've been doing?"
"Yes." Erin sighed. "I won't to touch them again in a long time."
Sirius looked at her throwing her head back as she sighed. Erin had big dark circles under her eyes too. She looked tired.
"If you want something more appealing to read, you can go to the library."
"Of course you have a library." She said, making Sirius smile a little.
Erin followed him downstairs after Sirius got up. They went down to the first floor, passed the living room door and turned left. She had hardly seen anything of the house, but Erin was already impressed by how big it was. She suspected that she would still see more things that would surprise her.
The library had at least four rows of shelves on each side of the room with chairs in the middle and a table. There were shelves that almost reached the ceiling of the room. Now it was Erin who was impressed, as Sirius had been before.
"There are Muggle books on this side." Sirius said, pointing to the first row in front. "The rest are all about magic."
Erin went to the shelf that were Muggle books and thought it was like being in heaven.
"Oh." Sirius remembered something. "I haven't been able to get rid of all the books about black magic. I wouldn't look too much into the shelves at the back If I were you."
Erin muttered a yes while thinking that she would never do. She hadn't dared to enter the forbidden area of the library at Hogwarts, so there was no way she would look at its equivalent in that house. She turned around and thanked Sirius. She had something to do for the rest of the day: find a book she liked.
"Can I ask you a favour?" Sirius asked.
"Sure."
She had answered with no hesitation.
"I'm having dinner with Remus tonight. Can I trust you to take care of the house?"
Sirius's tone of voice had sounded more like the one he had used the first day they had met. He was more serious but he also seemed to be hesitating. Of course he was not referring to the house at all, it was more a hint that shouted, can you be trusted at all?
"Yes." Erin answered. She knew her responsabilities very well.
In fact, that was the reason why she was there: stay in the house, take her notes ... Sirius had already spent plenty of time locked up there and someone had to stay as a precaution, in case Snape revealed that place to someone else.
Remus had invited Sirius to his house couple of days ago but Sirius had been thinking about it. His instinct told him that Erin could be trusted. She was quiet, polite; she seemed extremely hardworking and loyal. He had been told so but he had seen it too. However, a part of his mind told him that Peter Pettigrew had also been quiet, polite and loyal.
It seemed foolish not to trust Erin after those first days in which he had get to know her. He decided to shut that part of his mind as quickly as possible. Someone had betrayed him once, but it didn't mean it would happen to him all again and again.
When Sirius returned home, late at night, he saw a light on coming from the third floor, from Erin's room. He leaned out a little at the door and saw her with a book in her hands, curled up in the armchair. She hadn't seen him but Sirius smiled anyway as he went down the stairs. The house had not exploded nor was it full of Death Eaters.
Erin Hardy was nothing like Peter Pettigrew.