The Gryffindor group of sixth years staggered back to their common rooms after the huge Hogwarts feast, pants a little tight.
"That was good." Peter concluded.
"I think that those house elves go all out on Saturday nights." Sirius said, patting his stomach.
"I'm not complaining." James said, smiling lazily.
The group walked in silence for a couple more moments before Alice said, "Where's Lily?"
"She went to go meet Korey again." Harmony replied.
"Because one whole day wasn't enough?" James muttered under his breath. Remus just patted him on the shoulder.
The group walked in an awkward silence the rest of the way to the common room, extremely aware of the whole James-loves-Lily-but-she-doesn't-feel-the-same issue. They all weren't close enough to discuss that yet.
When they got back to the common room, a blushing Alice walked over to her long time crush, Frank Longbottom. He smiled warmly when he spotted her. And of course, their conversation struck up immediately.
"That's so cute it hurts." Harmony commented to Sirius.
"A match made in Heaven!" he said dramatically. Harmony laughed.
James and Remus went up to their dorm to study, although Harmony figured that James just wanted to sulk about his Lily-flower. Becca and Liven left to go 'chit-chat about girl things' as Liven put it when questioned by James.
That left Sirius, Peter and Harmony staring into the warm fire. Harmony felt the awkwardness approach a whole new level. Not only because Peter was there and she sort of felt like she was getting in the way of Peter and Sirius, but also because Peter was getting in the way of Sirius and Harmony. Like, was she supposed to discuss the fact that they basically spent the entire day chit chatting about their lives? Or was it a one-time thing? This whole thing was confusing as fuck.
Sirius looked at Harmony.
Harmony looked at Sirius.
Peter looked at Harmony and Sirius.
It took him a couple moments to realize he wasn't exactly wanted for the conversation that was to come.
"I'll-uh, just go s-study..." Peter said, tripping over the carpet as he made his way to the stairs. Harmony laughed lightly because he was just too adorably awkward.
"So, uh," Sirius started. He looked in the fire again. "About what I told you today..."
Looks like they were going to talk about it? She felt like they were friends enough to…Harmony wasn't exactly an expert at all this stuff, clearly. "Sirius, I won't tell anyone. As you've most likely noticed, I'm not exactly a normal sixteen year old girl. I'm not really the gossiping type. Well, I like the gossip that's so ridiculous that it becomes hysterically funny." She smiled.
Sirius laughed. He got up from his squashy armchair and sat down next to Harmony on the red couch in front of the fire.
"Thanks." he said, flames casting shadows across his face; cheekbone here, eye there.
"I thought we were done with the deep stuff?" Harmony smiled again and nudged his shoulder with hers. She was sort of hoping they didn't talk about feelings anymore, because she had no idea how close they actually were. There should've just be a big chart hanging overhead of the couch they were seated on so Harmony could see where they stood in the friendship thing.
He grinned. "So Harms? Whatcha doing tonight? Anything exciting?"
Harmony turned to Sirius and considered him for a moment. "I guess I can trust you. Liven stole some firewhiskey from her parents. I think we're going to invade the stash early." Harmony grinned.
Sirius just laughed. "Rebel. I didn't know you had it in you!"
"You'd be surprised."
"Always am. I don't think I'll ever be able to go inside a broom cupboard voluntarily again. Well, not that I went in there voluntarily in the first place."
"Is ickle Sirius scared of fireworks?" Harmony grinned slyly, reaching into the upper area of her shirt and pulling out a small looking firecracker. A deadly looking firecracker.
He looked from her face to the firecracker a couple times.
Sirius leaned over and whispered, "Two galleons if you'll throw it at that fourth year."
Harmony swivelled around on the scarlet cushion and followed Sirius' gaze.
It was that fourth year.
Harmony turned and grinned wickedly. "I would have done that for free."
As Harmony was still trying to figure out how the bloody fuck this boy could bring out the rebellious side in her with one sentence, she whipped the firework in the general direction of the girl. To both Sirius and Harmony's astonishment, the firework landed right in between the girl and her friend.
Before Sirius could say anything about Harmony's aim, Harmony got up and subtlety walked by the girls' couch, unknowing to them. She pointed her wand between the fourth years and shot a non-verbal spell at the firework. Water shot out and Harmony smiled wickedly.
As soon as the water hit the small-but-deadly firework, she ran as far away as she could from the couch, still grinning.
Sirius almost felt a little bad for the fourth year as the firework completely blew up in her face.
Almost.
Every single person that was currently relaxing in the common room whipped their heads around to see what the sudden explosion was about. Their necks snapped to the scene so fast that Sirius was sure that they had to have all experienced some kind of whiplash. Colours were whizzing, banging, blowing up, wailing, shooting and twirling through the air.
Sirius doubled over with laughter, falling on the floor while Harmony sunk down the wall, clutching her stomach as her body shook with silent laughter. The fourth year looked outraged. Her rather unattractive face had tears running down it; she was terrified and it brought Harmony nothing but joy. Harmony's satan-like tendencies decided to come out and play, apparently.
"You!" She screeched, pointing at Harmony. The culprits of the firework chaos was pretty obvious because Harmony and Sirius were literally the only two students rolling on the floor laughing. Subtle.
Sirius got up, still laughing, and went to stand beside Harmony. Immediately the fourth year girl backed off. It was truly astonishing where a pretty face could get you in this world. Harmony stood up in shock. That ninny still liked Sirius after he yelled at her this morning? Now that's a loyalty worthy of Gryffindor-status.
"Oh-did you, uh, see that, Sirius?" the fourth year asked, frantically wiping the tears off her face so she didn't look like the little sissy that she was. Harmony noticed her chipped pink nail polish.
"Yeah, it was actually my idea. Harmony here," he put an arm around Harmony's shoulders, yanking her to his side, "had the firework."
The young girl was busy patting down her hair, smoothing out the frizz. "What?" Everyone was silent for a moment. She realized that everyone was looking at her. "I'm sorry, what?"
"That's a lost cause." Harmony commented, gesturing to her hair.
"Oh shut up, fuzzhead." the fourth-year muttered, glaring at Harmony.
Harmony burst out laughing and Sirius snorted. "Okay. Alright." Harmony managed between chuckles. Fuzzhead. Yeah, this girl was definitely fourteen.
"Besides, I still like her hair better than yours." Sirius smirked at the fourth year, his nose wrinkling mock-apologetically.
"That's such a fourth-year argument, Black!" Harmony laughed. She turned to the fourth year and saw her outraged expression. "Oh- so sorry. I actually meant to say - you foul being, Sirius Black!" she smiled.
"You're such a dick, Sea." She stormed out of the common room, and Harmony called faintly, "That's more like it!" Sirius laughed.
A girl hurried out after the girl, calling, "Hey, Tianna! Wait!"
Harmony watched where the girl, Tianna, disappeared. "Well. That was a bit dramatic."
The small crowd that they attracted chuckled and they eventually all turned back to their conversations. In no time, the common room was filled with meaningless laughter and joyous shouts once again.
Sirius awkwardly removed his arm from around Harmony's waist.
"Uh, thanks. Again." Harmony said as she smiled at Sirius. "Look at all this drama I've gotten myself into already."
Sirius laughed, "She was crying!"
Harmony chuckled too. "She's even more of a sissy than you!"
He mock punched her arm.
"And I am also the proud new owner of two galleons." Harmony smirked, holding out her hand expectantly.
"Yeah yeah," Sirius dug in his pockets for a moment then produced a hand full of loose wizarding change. He plucked two shiny galleons out of the little mound of money. His hand hovered over hers for a moment, "On one condition; you spend this on something that will either light the school on fire or blow it up."
"Deal." She grinned, as he dropped the coins into her outstretched hand. "Well, I'm going to take a shower so I don't have to worry about it tomorrow."
He gave her a questioning look.
"I'm going to be so hungover." she clarified. "I usually don't even get out of bed when I'm hungover, so."
"Ah. It'll be worth it though." he smiled.
"Oh, I know." she shot him a winning smile and made her way up to their dormitory, processing the last ten minutes.
"Pass it here, Liven." Becca slurred slightly.
The girls were sufficiently drunk, having gone through a full bottle and a half already. It was amazing how much firewhiskey Liven fit in her trunk, considering there were another four still sealed closed.
They were all gathered around in a circle. Lily and Alice were snoring softly in their bunks. A silencing spell had even been cast around the intoxicated group of girls so as not to wake the others up.
Surprisingly, Harmony was the most drunk because she was the quickest to grab the bottle when it wasn't clutched in someone else's unstable hands. She had no idea what day of week it was, or what the weather was like outside because everything was spinning, but thank god she could grab the bottle quick enough to drink the majority of it.
"Nuh-uh. I don't think I'm going to share," Liven grabbed for the bottle in question.
While the two girls drunkenly started tackling each other, Harmony swiped the firewhiskey from the ground next to Liven before it got knocked over, spilling out their precious alcohol.
Since she had it in her hands, Hamrony took a hearty swig. "Bloody idiots." she mumbled, attempting to turn up the music from their little wireless radio that Becca had bewitched to play, because it would have been otherwise impossible to use anything remotely electronic around Hogwarts. Such clever, sober thoughts they had before the first bottle was cracked open.
Harmony stood up, unable to spend another minute with her two best friends who were fighting again. They had a habit of brawling when they got drunk and this was around the time Harmony stumbled off to go perform some stupid shit while she couldn't process anything.
As Harmony stumbled down the stairs, bottle clutched in her hands, she heard the banging and grunting stop for a moment. "Hey...where'd it go, Beccy?" Liven slurred. It was muffled and Harmony strongly suspected that her face was shoved in Becca's armpit.
"I think it walked away, little reindeer." Becca replied, and they both burst out in uncontrollable giggles, no doubt rolling in the ground by now.
Harmony slipped and fell down the rest of the stairs into the deserted common room, somehow managing to hold onto the bottle. She yelled, "Aye!" when confirming there was still the same amount of firewhiskey as there was before she fell down. The fires were no longer roaring, the couches cold and uninviting, for once.
She stood there for a minute, holding herself up with the wall until she took another large gulp from the bottle and almost fell over again. She smiled slightly as she enjoyed the feel of firewhiskey burning her throat. It was like swallowing fire, she decided. It was fire. Harmony liked to imagine it was fire.
She decided to wander up the boys' staircase, because, well, thinking straight wasn't exactly an option at the moment. Tripping and stumbling up the stairs, she managed to keep a hold on her bottle again. This should be an olympic sport, Harmony thought.
"Sometimes...the Romans…fuck is that a spider? Oh, okay…just a little moth, guys!…they like to build arches...and the muggles..." She sang idly, unaware that she was pretty much waking up all of Gryffindor tower.
Harmony crashed into the sixth year boy's dormitory, causing a body to fall out of the bed closest to the door in shock. It was Peter.
Remus, Sirius, and James stared at her for a moment from the middle of the room (except Pete. He was on the floor). They had all heard her coming up the stairs, of course, and had woken up, thinking it was someone trying to attack them or something.
Harmony looked at them under her dark eyelashes, before she lifted the bottle slowly to her lips and took a swig, her bright eyes trained on them the whole time.
"Hey, baby cakes." she tried to say seductively to no one in particular. "There was a moth over there and damn. Those wings doin' the flutter-y thing?" she leaned forward and whispered loudly, "That's not PG."
James and Sirius burst out laughing.
"Are you drunk, Harmony?" Remus asked, peering at her through sleepy eyes.
"Nah." She lost her balance and slammed her hand on the doorframe to keep her upright.
"Are you sure about that?" Sirius asked, grinning as he crossed his arms over his bare chest.
"I'm not sure about anything right now, to be honest, Siri-poo." Harmony grinned lazily and made her way over to the centre of the room, where three shirtless marauders stood. And one Peter in a pair of footie pyjamas his mother had made him.
Harmony took another drink from the bottle. "I jus' had a couple a drinks. Like maybe four. Or nine? Becca bullied me into having seven again."
"What I want to know is how she made it up down and up two flights of stairs without dropping that bottle." Remus whispered to James, who snorted.
"That's an excellent question, Moony." James replied, his eyes still trained on Harmony, who was holding the bottle at arm's length, her eyes squinting, as she tried to read the label."
"This stuff is so good. It burns goin' down but damn it makes everything so much better in the end." Harmony turned quickly, losing her balance, and stared at the three boys. "Look at you guys, all dulled up at this hour. I should have thought of that!" Harmony pinched James' cheeks with one hand while she gestured to his Quidditch-decorated pyjamas with the other hand, bottle still clutched in it.
"Uh, Harms? I think we should take this away for now." James dodged Harmony's fingers as she went up to harass his face again and gently tried to pry the bottle from her fumbling fingers.
"No!" she snarled, holding onto it with surprising strength for someone so drunk.
"Harmony, you're really, really drunk." Remus tried to reason.
"No no no! I only had a couple of sips. Like two." Harmony replied.
She stumbled over to the nearest bed and climbed onto it. She started jumping, firewhiskey spilling everywhere.
"Oh, man. She's pissssssseedd." Sirius commented.
"Don't stop the...party...yeah..." Harmony started dancing, falling all over the place as she tried to take another drink.
"She's going to kill herself." Remus said.
James and Remus went forward, "How are we going to get her down?"
They didn't have time to come up with a plan, however, because at that moment Harmony fell off the bed, clutching the near-empty bottle of alcohol with both hands and landing badly in the outstretched arms of James. Quidditch had made his reflexes much faster, thank goodness, or she would have knocked herself out cold. Well, Harmony was already on the path to doing that as long as the bottle was clutched in her fingers.
Harmony got up drunkenly. "I have to pee like a racehorse."
They all watched as she took another drink from the bottle and sang, "I got the urination sensation, bitches! I'll be back, I have to take a quick trip to the urination station." she threw her head back, cracking up at her own joke, and fell over again. "Shit, I'm hilarious!" Harmony got up, leaving the bottle on the floor, and and made her way into the bathroom.
"Where's she going to stay? She's surely going to pass out any minute." Peter asked.
"I don't fancy riding a broom into the girl's dormitory at this hour. Just think of Lily." James shuttered.
"She'll just stay here, I guess." Sirius said as he sat down on his bed near the window.
"What's this?" came Harmony's excited voice from the washroom a minute later.
The boys looked at each other.
They heard a whirring sound and a scream.
Sirius burst out laughing and got up to go to rescue Harmony from his magical razor Mr Potter bought him for his sixteenth birthday last spring.
When he opened the door to the washroom, he doubled over in laughter again.
Harmony was hiding in the shower, the razor whirring and spinning like crazy on the counter.
He walked over and touched it, automatically it turned off.
"My knight in shining armour!" Harmony lurched forward to Sirius, tripping over the side of the bath and getting tangled in the shower curtain.
He helped her up as she sang 'Mary Had a Little Lamb' at the top of her lungs.
As soon as the shower curtain was not twisted around her feet, she threw herself in Sirius' arms. "Oh thank you my sweet!"
Sirius snorted as he half carried her back into the room, where Peter fell back asleep in his bed and Remus and James were sitting on their own beds.
"Slumber party with the famous Remi-poo and Jamesie-poo! Jamesie, Remi and Sirius poo! Oh man, I am funny!" She wiggled her hips in some sort of dance, celebrating her own wit.
Harmony detached herself from Sirius and launched herself at his bed, the only free one. "Oh, Petie-poo fell asleep! Too bad. We'll tell him all about our party in the morning. Right, boys?" she sat up and looked at the remaining marauders with wide eyes.
"Uh, yeah. Sure, Harmony." James replied.
Harmony suddenly looked heartbroken. "I want a hug. Can I have a hug?" She stood up unstably.
She stumbled over to Remus' bed and tackled the poor guy in a bear hug. He stood up, one arm around her waist and the other sending inappropriate hand gestures to the boys, who were shaking on the ground with silent laughter and hip thrusting to the thin air only to crack up even harder.
Harmony started twirling around. "Let's dance, Luuuuuupin!"
"Oh, man. I want to preserve this moment forever." Sirius choked out.
Remus blushed furiously as Harmony planted a kiss on the side of his mouth.
"Let us tango!" she cried as she grabbed for Remus' free hand. He let her guide him around the room for a minute or two.
James grabbed her as she tripped over her own feet once again. "Oh James. Everyone is saving me tonight!" she paused and peered at his face. "Why do you have two heads? Oh - nope. Never mind. You have one! Where's my bottle?" she grinned and stumbled over to Sirius so she could harass him next.
After a little while of singing, laughing and saying things she probably would have never said if she was sober, Harmony's eyelids started to droop and she yawned loudly. "I'm just...so tired...all of the sudden."
She swayed and Sirius caught her before she could bang her head on the dresser.
"You good, Padfoot?" James asked as he gestured to his own bed tiredly. It was now three am, an hour after she stumbled through the door of the marauder's dorm room.
"Yeah, she's gonna pass out. You guys go back to bed." Sirius replied, carrying Harmony by the waist to his bed as Remus as James pulled their covers over themselves.
"Sirius?" she mumbled as she was put gently down on the mattress.
"Yeah, Harms?" Sirius pulled the covers over her body.
"Thanks," she whispered.
He pulled a pillow off of Peter's bed and retrieved a blanket out of the dresser drawer. "No problem, Harms."
It was quiet for a couple of minutes, the sound of peaceful snoring and crickets outside filling the room.
"Sirius?"
"Mm?"
Harmony pulled herself out of bed with a pillow and a blanket and stumbled over to Sirius on the floor.
He opened his eyes as he watched her approach.
He sat up. "What're you doing?" he asked sleepily.
"I don't want to be alone." she slurred before crashing to the floor, falling into a deep, dreamless sleep almost immediately. Her breathing slowed down to soft huffs of warm air.
"Goodnight, Sea." he chuckled before falling into a deep sleep too.
Harmony opened her eyes the next morning, only to shut them quickly again. She became extremely aware of the pounding in her head and the blinding light streaming through the window. She also became aware of another warm body pressed against hers from behind.
She froze.
What the hell?
Where was she?
Was she on the ground?
What happened last night?
She scrambled to get out of the blankets twisted around her body, waking the person up behind her and giving them a face full of curly brown hair.
"What the-" came a deep, male voice.
She jumped up faster than the speed of light. Blinking stupidly at Sirius for a moment, she realized that he had no shirt on. "Shit-" she started before looking down at herself, making sure that she was fully clothed.
"What happened? Did we-" she started, gesturing between her and Sirius in a panic.
"No, no. You 'didn't want to be alone'." Sirius stood up and stretched widely.
"Why the hell am I in here? What did I do?" Harmony demanded, trying too ignore her splitting headache. She sat down on the edge of a bed and put her fingers to her temples, eyes closed. Shit, she was going to puke.
"What do you remember?" Sirius pulled open a drawer and threw a shirt on.
"Erm - falling down the stairs with a bottle...no idea who's stairs they were. And...a razor, I think..." Harmony shook her head and stared desperately at Sirius. The movement made her stomach churn again.
"It's okay, you just fell a couple of times...forced Remus to dance with you...got tangled in a shower curtain...sang a couple of songs...which I'm pretty sure you made up the majority of them. You're a pretty hilarious drunk, by the way." Sirius grinned.
"Shit." she blushed furiously. "I'm so sorry."
"Hey, it's fine. You were pretty pissed, though. I'm proud, Sea." Sirius rummaged through the drawer next to the bed Harmony was sitting on. She assumed it must have been Sirius' because it smelled like him and he had his name engraved in the wood on his bedpost.
"Hey, where're the others? And what time is it?" he paused and looked over at the clock that read one o'clock. "Shit, we slept in pretty late." Sirius commented and continued his digging through the drawer.
She smiled. "Drunk on the first Saturday night back at school. That's a little out of character for me."
Finally Sirius extracted a small vile that was full of light purple liquid. Sirius handed Harmony the little glass number and looked up at Sirius questioningly.
"Relax, it's hangover potion." Sirius gently nudged it into her hands.
She took the potion before she puked. "It tastes like horse shit."
Sirius raised his eyebrows. "You know what that tastes like?"
"No!" She swatted him as the potion kicked in immediately; the searing pain in her head turned into more like a dull ache and the churning in her stomach disappeared completely. Suddenly, noises didn't seem to loud; the lights weren't so bright.
"Thanks for the potion, Sirius." She rubbed her eyes as he nodded.
They were quiet for a minute.
"Oh my gosh! Lily! What's she going to say? Shit, shit, shit, shit!" Harmony suddenly jumped up, gripping a handful of hair in her hands.
"It's okay. I'm sure Remus will let her know you're fine."
"She's going to kill me! I got drunk and slept in close proximity of someone of the male gender!" She put a hand over her eyes.
"Harmony," Sirius yawned. "You're going to be fine. It's a Sunday."
He had a really attractive morning voice, Harmony noticed. It didn't help her in the current situation, whatsoever, though.
"What time did you say it was?" Harmony demanded.
"One. Everyone will be at lunch now so you can go change or whatever. I'll wait for you in the common room, if you want."
"Yes, please. I could really use a coffee from the kitchens right now." The thought of food made her stomach churn again; the hangover potion taking the pain away along with the desire to eat.
She jumped up and said, "Thanks so much, Sirius." she kissed him on the cheek swiftly as she dashed down the stairs.
When Harmony burst in her dorm, Lily was there alone reading a book.
"Lily!" Harmony yelped, eyes wide.
"Harmony. What were you thinking?" Lily asked exasperated as she dog-eared the corner of her page, running the tip of her green-nail-polish-clad finger along the crease.
"Listen, I'm sorry. It was one drink, then two, then three. I have no memory of how I got in the boys' dorm but I didn't do anything. Seriously." Harmony said in one breath.
"I know, I know. Remus informed me at breakfast." Lily laughed at the look on Harmony's face.
Harmony sighed in relief. "Okay, now that I know I'm going to live, I think I'm ready to face the world." Lily smiled at this comment. "Hey, why aren't you at lunch?"
"Honestly? It's Korey. He's driving me slightly mad. I really like him and all, but he's too clingy. I already spent Saturday with him, I want some time to myself!" Lily replied, putting her book on the side table of her bed and turning her body towards Harmony.
"Oh? Or is someone else catching your eye? Maybe a certain black-haired-hazel-eyed boy who holds open doors and compliments you on a daily basis?" Harmony dodged the pillow thrown at her by Lily.
"No!" She turned bright red despite her protest. Typical Lily.
The girls chit-chatted while Harmony got changed and washed up.
"I'll be back in a little bit, Lils. I'm going to run down to the kitchens with Black." Harmony called as she grabbed her wand and left the dorm.
"See you!" Lily called back idly as she opened her book and started reading again.
Harmony got to the bottom of the staircase and smiled at Sirius waiting on the couch. "Lily was up there."
Sirius raised his eyebrows.
"She didn't kill me. Remus told her that I was alive and well this morning."
"You'd better thank him. After all, he's the one who you pretty much molested last night. And you made him do the tango. That was hilarious." Sirius commented as they made their way down to the kitchens by Harmony's request. Sirius proceeded to poke fun at her drunk state as she blushed furiously.
It was an odd pairing, the mostly-overlooked bookworm and Sirius Black, famous for a number of things - girls, Quidditch, pranks. It worked, though, somehow.
A/N- Thanks for the followers, favouriters and reviewers!