You guys will be happy to note that there won't be long gaps between chapters anymore - over the last few months, I finished the fic. I have the next two chapters waiting around - if I get a really good response for the story - like the children clapping to revive Tinkerbell! I shall post really fast. I shall post anyway, but the response would show me you haven't forsaken the story for the dead. Anyhow.
Owning Harry Potter would be something I would dearly wish, as that way, I could create a deathstar and take over the universe. I must, however, settle for consolation prizes.
June was very happy to report, that over the next few weeks, things got much simpler for her, entirely. Sirius was increasingly patient with her, very careful in how he handled her. June found herself in a very happy position, to be sure, even though the rest of the school had taken to noting her every movement.
The thing was, June was the first girl Sirius Black had dated for so long. The mystery surrounding June was quite extraordinary, and June found herself confronted by crying fangirls every few hours a day, saying things along the lines of "Why?" and "What's so great about you anyway?"
Undeterred by these obvious obstacles in her happiness, June informed her friend Marlene. Marlene McKinnon had many flaws, but stupidity and disloyalty had never been one of them. She rose to the occasion magnificently, acquiescing June's request not to tell Mary and Lily. Lily and Mary, while perfectly lovely human beings by themselves, tended to get very angry when their friends were threatened. Lily would go into a annoyed thunder storm, and might give moral lectures to June on how the girls were idiots. Mary would take a similar route, reminding June that she was the best girl on the planet and Sirius loved her.
June didn't need to be reminded of such facts, none of the girls ever caused her too many problems anyway. She was dealing with them all by herself, when it slipped out while working on Transfiguration homework with Marlene.
"Hey June, can you give me the details of human transfiguration?"
"Erm – yeah – here."
"Thanks. Oh, what's this?" asked Marlene.
Tucked among June's papers was a note from one of the lovely girls previously courted by Sirius Black. The vicious note lashed out on June's personality, with imaginative words sprawled across the page.
"Oh. No!" exclaimed June. "Marlene, give it back!"
"Dear, dear, dear," said Marlene, shaking her head. "She doesn't mince her words, does she?"
"It's personal!" said June, snatching it out of her hands.
"Have these girls been bugging you?" asked Marlene.
"Well… the longer I keep dating Sirius, the more of these I get in a day. I expect it to die down in sometime…"
"Well, well, well…" said Marlene, taking the page again. "Can you show me the remaining pages?"
"Have you told Sirius?" asked Marlene as she looked into her bag.
"I'd rather not…" said June slowly.
Marlene nodded. This was one of the redeeming qualities of Marlene that helped June maintain the gritting friendship between the girls. Marlene understood such things in ways Mary and Lily never did. Mary and Lily would insist that June ought to tell Sirius – the idiots maintained an idealistic view of relationships which – and June could happily agree with Marlene on this point – was completely baseless.
Obviously, honesty was important in a relationship, but June shuddered to think what Sirius would do if he found out.
June ruffled in and out of her bag to remove some sheets of paper. "Why do you keep them?" asked Marlene.
"It reminds me that Sirius once dated idiots," sniffed June. "They misspell words too many times."
"That's a good spirit, of course," said Marlene thoughtfully. "But I have a better idea."
"An idea entailing what?" asked June slowly.
"Revenge is a dish best served wordless."
"Marlene…" said June suspiciously. "I am in no mood to get 'revenge' on these poor girls."
"Of course, you're not," said Marlene. "But I could be. I don't like people making fun of my friends."
"What do you propose?" sighed June.
"Ideally, castration."
"Marlene!"
"Alright, alright," said Marlene. "But I still have an idea."
"What would that be?" asked June suspiciously.
"On second thoughts, I shan't tell you," said Marlene.
"Marlene…"
"Yes, bunny face?"
"What are you doing?"
"Do me a favor, give me all of those letters of yours. And if anyone ever says anything to you about this, pluck a bit of their hair or something."
"Marlene what are you planning?"
But before June could say anything to the headstrong girl, all the letters were snatched away from her hand and whisked away from under her nose. June tried to protest against such unholy dictation of power, but June's pleas, she had long understood, were pointless. Marlene McKinnon was a brilliant girl, perfectly brilliant, but she was also never one to stand for nonsense, in her own words.
June, to her own horror, saw her in heated conference with one Annie Burns, and, taken aback, stuttered in her footsteps.
"Something wrong, June?" asked Sirius.
"Oh – um – no – nothing at all."
"You've gone all white," pointed out Sirius.
"I am not!" said June. "I mean, I'm perfectly fine. Why's Annie speaking to Marlene?"
"They're friends, maybe?" said Sirius.
"Yes, but the pair of them together only spells trouble!" hissed June.
Sirius mock gasped. "You don't think they're part of The Auror Intiative?"
"What on earth is the Auror Initiative?"
"It's an initiative by aurors to do auror-y stuff, I'm sure," said Sirius sagely, his eyes fluttering to the sky of the Great Hall. "They have spies everywhere."
"Oh, do be serious!" said June, squinting to see what they were doing.
"I am Sirius. Sirius is my name."
She glared at him.
"What's got you in a hassle anyway?" asked Sirius. "Want a snog in the broom cupboard?"
"Is that all you ever think about?" asked Lily, coming from behind.
"Lily!" said June. "Marlene and Annie are talking," she pointed.
"I can see that," said Lily amusedly. "That's a problem because…?"
"Because –" began June. Unable to find anything to say, she sputtered. "Because – because it's weird!"
"Control your woman, Padfoot," said James listening in.
"Excuse me?" asked June.
"How am I supposed to calm hysterical creatures?" asked Sirius.
"I am not hysterical!"
"Good point," said James thoughtfully. "Oye! Marlene!"
Marlene tossed her head. "What?" she called.
"Leto's getting upset because you're talking to Burns. Could you refrain from the activity? She's being hysterical and destroying pancakes with blueberry sauce," said James.
Marlene rolled her eyes and Annie started laughing. "On my way," said Marlene.
Over the next few days, June couldn't help but notice the number of odd things happening to random girls in the school. They seemed to be losing their hair all at once, or would erupt a number of boils, or even bring out colds of all shapes and sizes. June once passed by a group of girls who promptly broke out into laughter which they couldn't seem to be able to stop for nearly two hours.
Sirius, of course, was oblivious to it all. He turned a blind eye where girls were concerned these days. Unfortunately, June and Sirius had exams coming and June liked spending every waking moment studying.
"Oh come on, Leto," said Sirius. "You already know everything anyway!"
"I do not!" she said feverishly. "I am yet to know all the dates of the Troll wars – and I haven't even made my notes on bowtruckles and their relation to wands!"
"June, the exams are in a week, and you'll be fine," said Sirius.
"Maybe you will be!" she said hysterically. "I can't seem to get anything in my head."
"Come on, let's take a break," said Sirius. When June showed reluctance at the idea, he said, "you're not going to be able to cram it all in anyway. Take a break, there's a good girl."
They wandered the halls of Hogwarts in the day time and seemed to have slipped into the old balcony. "Aha!" said Sirius. "Here's the spot for pleasant memories!"
June smiled. "I feel like I have outgrown it a bit," she admitted.
Sirius sat down, leaning against the wall. "What do you mean?" he asked.
June lay down on his lap. "I used to spend time here because it was nice and lonely. It's still nice and lonely… but I don't think I'm very lonely anymore."
"Hmm," said Sirius, stroking her hair. "That's a good thing, right?"
"I think so," she said. "Myself around a year back, wasn't someone I would have liked to know."
"That's not true," chided Sirius.
"Yes, it is," she said. "Suffering in silence is all well and good and everything – but I didn't have the backbone to stand up to my bullies. I liked hiding in the shadows – they suited me."
"In a way, you still hide in the shadows," said Sirius.
June got up to face him. "What do you mean?" she asked.
"Well, there's a very reserved part of you, June," said Sirius somberly. "I have only ever caught it in glimpses – you never show it to anyone else. It's this part of you that you keep in the shadows because it belongs there. Maybe someday I shall see it fully."
June was silent. "I suppose, in a way, we don't ever actually lose what we had when we grow up. I may have grown out of this balcony – but I think that part of me is there in the shadows – the one you are talking about," she said finally.
"Come here," said Sirius. He kissed her hard on the lips. "You're a beautiful person, you know," he whispered against her lips.
June pressed him closer. Her hands clutched the creases of his shirt. His hands instinctively wrapped around her waist. "It's bad form to talk while kissing," she said in a whisper.
"Yes Ma'am," he said and kissed her a little more.
June had stopped breathing.
No seriously, she had stopped breathing.
Sirius stopped.
"What?" asked June consciously. "Why'd you stop?"
"As much as I love snogging you June, you were just about to pass out from lack of oxygen," Sirius grinned.
"Hmph," said June, wrinkling her nose. "It's not my fault you're so demanding!"
"I could do it very, very slowly, and we'd be in the same situation."
"Oh, shut up," said June. She groaned. "Let's get back and study," she said. "I can't fail."
Sirius laughed. "Alright," he said.
They wandered back to the common room where all their books were spread. Lily and Marlene had also begun studying, while James was practicing incantations near the fireplace. Sirius slid onto the sofa and picked on June's notes.
"June, what's this?" he asked. June blanched. It was one of the anonymous messages.
Sirius' face became visibly more and more angry as he read it. June shot a look at Marlene.
Marlene snatched it from Sirius. "Didn't anyone tell you not to read other people's mail, Black?"
"June, who sent that to you?" asked Sirius, furious.
"It matters little, I shall take care of it," said Marlene tucking it in her bag.
"What's going on?" asked Lily.
"June's been getting anonymous hate mail from one of my admirers," said Sirius.
"One?" scoffed Marlene. "There must have been dozens of these letters I cursed."
"Wait, you cursed those girls?" asked June.
"What, did you think the great Saint Peter did?"
"Wait, you went to Marlene?" asked Lily.
"What's happened?" asked James.
"June's been getting anonymous hate mail from Sirius' admirers and she went to Marlene who cursed them all via a collective curse, I should say," said Lily.
"She took the letters from me!" said June, exasperated.
"I did," nodded Marlene.
"And she cursed the girls," said James, skeptically.
"I did!" said Marlene, pleased that everyone was catching on.
"And she's the reason why a bunch of girls seem to lose hair everyday?" asked Lily.
"Yes. I did!"
Sirius still looked furious. June was nervous. "Why didn't you tell me?" he asked.
"Because I knew you'd be angry – like you are right now."
Sirius fumed.
"Lighten up, Black," said Marlene. "She didn't want you to do stupid things. She wanted a subtle revenge on the twisted little bitches."
"Actually, I was perfectly content in how I was, until you decided to take matters in your own hands," said June.
James laughed. "I get no credit, whatsoever," sniffed Marlene.
The rest of the evening was passed in Marlene despairing over the exams and Lily cursing the very idea of transfiguration. James, happy to oblige, taught Lily some incantations which allowed him the chance to stand really close to her. June passed the night with headaches over the History of Magic dates. Peter managed to wander in sometime or the other, slamming his face in a Charms book. And Mary acted very oddly by waltzing in and proclaiming that she didn't plan to study. She was going to fail everything anyway.
The exams passed in a haze of summer and warmth which was enviable, since they had to sit inside and write sheets and sheets of paper. June managed to do her Transfiguration final rather well, she felt, even though she had a feeling she had missed a point in one of the questions. Sirius came out of the hall as merry as ever, happy at being a genius. Peter scribbled throughout his papers and James and Remus seemed to have managed just fine. Lily was fretful, but she was always like that and she always came first, so no one paid any attention anyway.
Marlene seemed to be okay with what had happened in the hours of the paper, even though she came out swearing. Mary was content and Dorcas was annoyed.
The Transfiguration practical was a little difficult, but June felt like she had done alright. However, she managed to transform her mouse into a rather elaborate snuffbox which seemed to have been made of gold.
The Charms final went well for everyone except maybe James, because he said that "charms are simply not anything I enjoy." The practical went like clockwork, for June, and she did almost everything perfectly.
Defense Against the Dark Arts was difficult and taxing, but enjoyably so. She didn't have a problem with the incantations.
History of Magic was very enjoyable. She loved writing about all those wizards and witches, and she wrote many in depth analysis of the wars. She had a feeling Sirius was to be thanked for her memory of the dates. He helped her even when he didn't have the subject anymore.
Astronomy was uneventful. June almost slept through the paper.
Care of Magical Creatures was exhausting. She was practically worn out, battling firecrabs and bowtruckles.
Herbology went alright – for everyone, obviously. There was a small incident of the Venomous Tentacula biting someone, but aside that, Herbology went alright.
June was the only one in her house taking Ancient Runes – it went desirably well – after which Sirius took her out for ice cream, because she was done with her exams.
"What now?" asked Sirius, ice cream cone in hand.
"Now we eat," said June.
"Not that," said Sirius. "Where do you go for the summer?" he asked.
June thought about it.
"I suppose I go home."
"June, you don't intend to take the bastard's shit, do you?"
"I don't know, Sirius…"
"Please, don't," he said. "Don't do that to yourself."
Before June could answer, however, Lily came running up to them.
"June – quickly," said Lily. "It's your father. Apparently, he's sent a letter to Dumbledore."