I am SO sorry this took me so long. I've had it done for a while, but I keep forgetting to put it up! It's short, but the next one's longer and will come faster. I think I say that a lot...well, I'm really sorry, at any rate.

I know I have a bunch of stories people are begging me to update...I'll get on it ASAP, I hope...

Lily just sat there, frozen stiff. "Uh!" she squeaked, but that didn't do anything to help her situation, just caused her lips to widen more.

Crap. If James didn't know she'd liked him before this, he sure as hell knew now. He could probably hear her heartbeat, loud and fast as it was. It was all she could hear, at least, the unsteady thumpthumpthumpthump doing absolutely nothing to calm her enough to be able to move away.

She wasn't sure how long they sat like that. She knew she should stop, but she just couldn't make herself move. Suddenly, she felt James' breath more heavily on her face, in a way that wasn't entirely unpleasant. If she'd been in her right mind she'd have noticed that the cheeky git had eaten breath mints recently. Then, she heard his deep voice. "Lily?"

"Yes, James?" she said, her voice whispered and breathy.

"You have something in your hair." She felt fingers brushing through her hair, and James pulled back, handing her a piece of paper.

Suddenly, the air around her felt colder, more lonely. It no longer smelled of James, of butterbeer and manly soap and his favourite cinnamon muffins.

"Something wrong?" he asked her.

"No, nothing at all." She noticed how far away he was now; his hand was a full meter away, at least. She longed to reach out and grab it.

"Okay…I think I've got some pretty good ideas. What do you think of these—"

Lily stopped listening after that. She nodded or gave James a brief "Yeah," whenever he looked at her, but she was still abnormally distant, lost in thoughts that really shouldn't be thought of at all.

Dear Diary,

I don't think James even noticed how close we were. I don't think the fact that I almost KISSED a boy who isn't my boyfriend, a boy who's liked me despite my obvious loathing of him for years, even registered with him.

Even worse (possibly), I think I was actually considering breaking up with Jeremy for a while after it happened. But he's SO sweet, and what am I going to do? Dump Jeremy, then beg for the affection of the very same James Potter I've been trying to push away for three years? THREE YEARS!

And I want to change my mind just like that?

Why is it that, whenever I'm around James Potter, I lose all control?

-Lily

Dear Diary,

I'm meeting Sirius in the Astronomy Tower tomorrow night. Well, tonight, I suppose, since it's past midnight. Anyway, I don't know what to do. I REALLY just want to forgive him, and hope everything goes back to normal. I just don't know if I can do it. He does seem to trust me, especially after yesterday. And I know he really didn't mean to hurt me, he's just a little spontaneous sometimes, doesn't think of the long term effects of some of the things he does. I can deal with that, I guess.

But I still can't make a decision. At least, not without seeing him first.

Love (A very confused),

Adriyana

The next morning, Remus was awoken by a loud BANG! at the foot of his bed. He rubbed his eyes and pulled open the curtains, squinting in the bright light.

"Padfoot, what are you doing awake at the ungodly hour of," he glanced at his watch. "Eight in the morning? You're never up this early."

"Couldn't sleep," Sirius muttered vaguely. "Brain wouldn't turn the hell off." Sirius was pacing frantically around the room, stopping only to glare at Peter, who was snoring very loudly in his bed.

"Same here!" an annoyed voice from James' bed called. "Can't let my guard down. Almost kissed…but she wouldn't have liked…because then…"

"James, what possessed you to think we would understand what that means? It made no discernable sense at all," Remus said. "Are you sure you're all right?'

"No. Never said I was all right in the first place."

Remus sighed, feeling a twinge of guilt of being so elated while his friends were having problems. He couldn't help it, though. For everything going wrong in one of their lives, something in his had changed for the better. Yes, things were going relatively well in the world of Remus Lupin. There was no full moon for another two and a half weeks; no prank had been pulled recently, so he wasn't constantly fretting about some teacher barging into one of his classes and locking him in the dungeon to think about what he'd done (he had no idea where THAT fear stemmed from, but now that the idea was planted in his mind, he couldn't shake it out), and all of his teachers had fallen into their typical end of the year, no-real-work-at-all routine.

Of course, this meant less work for Amber as well, and she seemed to be free of the stress and the competitiveness she'd suffered from around March and April. Now she was back to the old, affectionate Amber, and he was perfectly content to do what she did, pretend there'd never been any rough patch between them at all, and that they'd never acted any way besides this.

It wasn't the best strategy, but the last thing Remus Lupin needed was more problems.

"Okay. I'm going to go downstairs now. Are you two—" He decided to drop it there. "Never mind."

He left the dormitory, where Sirius was still pacing back and forth, and a sound like someone's head hitting the wall was emanating from James' bed, and reached the common room.

Amber jumped up from where she was sitting on the bottom of the girls' stairs, and practically skipped over to him.

"My friends are all being useless," she pouted.

"What's wrong?" he asked, wrapping an arm around her neck.

"Well, Adriyana keeps staring at the clock, I don't know what's going on with Lily, and Alice is with Frank, 'Making the most of the little time they have left together'."

"Aah. I see," he said, nodding. "Well, I seem to have a similar problem." He kissed her cheek. "So, where to?"

Lily was unable to focus on anything all day. She wasn't even sure what had happened with James last night, or what she wanted to happen. He'd tried to kiss her at first, hadn't he? He'd even told her she was beautiful! And then, it was almost like he didn't even notice they were about to kiss at all. Just pulled that sodding piece of paper out of her hair and acted like nothing had happened!

"Lily?" Adriyana asked, walking up to where she was sitting.

"Yes?" The only upside to being lost and confused as she was, was that she had someone with her who felt the same way. She and Agie had decided to hole up in the bathtub all day, with as many pillows and blankets as they could find, twelve magazines, and two boxes of chocolate-chip cookies. At least, they'd been in the bathtub for a while, until Adriyana realized she wasn't nearly ready yet, and climbed out to fix her makeup. Apparently done now, she'd taken to standing over Lily, asking if her watch was broken or something of the like every five seconds.

"Is this watch moving backwards? I seriously think it's moving backwards!" Adriyana thrust her watch in her face.

"It's not, Agie. Your watch is fine."

Adriyana shrugged. "Guess I'm just nervous."

"So…have you decided what you're going to do yet?"

Adriyana nodded. "Yes. I think so. I really just have to see him first." She walked back into the dormitory.

Lily flipped through her magazine, there wasn't really anything interesting there. "LILY!"

Lily jumped. "Agie, is this about that watch again!?"

"No…an owl's here, with a letter for you."

Lily climbed out of the cocoon in the bathtub. "Who's it from?" she asked.

"I don't know, I can't recognise the owl, or the handwriting."

When she got into the dormitory, she saw Adriyana, nervously running her fingers through her hair. "It's almost eight though, so I'll see you around." Adriyana started walking towards the door as calmly as she could.

"Good luck," Lily said, waving as the door closed behind Adriyana.

She picked up the letter now sitting on her bed, her name untidily written on the envelope. "Why can't you be from James?" she asked the letter, because she already knew it wasn't from him. Adriyana would've recognized James' owl.

She tore along the letter's seal, letting the piece of parchment inside fall onto her mattress. She picked it up curiously:

Lily,

I feel kind of bad about how things ended between us the other night. I think I might've overreacted a little bit. I'm not typically a jealous person, I swear.

Oh, right. She'd also got into a fight with Jeremy, which she'd completely forgotten about.

I guess everything's okay between us, right? It was an accident, after all. At least, that's what you said. I was trying to talk to you about it all today, but couldn't find you anywhere. I guess I don't have time to meet you, but write back, all right?

-Jeremy

Lily smiled. "Well, that's sweet," she said aloud, then started searching for some paper to write him back with. A folded piece of parchment on the floor caught her attention, and she picked it up.

She laid the slip of parchment over a textbook on her bed and poised her quill to write. But she noticed there was already something written on it. Lily's eyes scanned over it quickly, freezing on one line for a while. Her eyes widened.

It was a letter from Sirius to Agie. A letter from Sirius saying that he loved Agie, who obviously hadn't read it yet, because she'd be acting completely different. She'd have been all over Sirius if she knew he'd said he loved her.

Lily dropped the note on Adriyana's bed, wondering if the fact that she hadn't read it would affect what happened between her and Sirius at all.

Sirius sat against the stone of the Astronomy tower, trying to create a barrier against the cool, night-time breeze. Where was Adriyana?

He checked his watch. 8:03. Well, it's not like she was late, but he really wanted to get the hell out of there. Sure, he REALLY wanted this to go right, but this whole argument just seemed really dumb to him, and why the hell did she have to pick here, of all places? He just hoped this would end as fast as possible so that things could go back to normal.

That's why he'd sent that letter; he'd said a lot of stuff beforehand, and hopefully things would go faster. He was still a little worried about what she'd say about some of the stuff in it, though…

He heard the tower's door open. "Hello?" he turned around.

"Hi, Sirius." Adriyana shivered. "I didn't know it would be this cold up here."

"Mostly the wind, I think." Why are we talking about the weather? "Why'd you want us to meet here, anyways?"

She sat down next to him. "I don't know, exactly. First thing that came to my head. When I think 'snogging,' the first thing that pops up is 'Astronomy Tower,' I guess."

Sirius raised one eyebrow. "You were thinking 'snogging,' then?"

Adriyana blushed. "I…maybe a little, kind of."

Sirius smiled, and another gust of wind blew around the tower. That was the only sound there was for a while, as each of them sat in awkward silence and waited for the other to say something.

Adriyana took a deep breath, and Sirius turned to look at her. "I'm really, REALLY sorry, Sirius. Whatever happened…oh, it's so confusing now, but I shouldn't have acted like that. I know I overreacted, and I would have done this earlier, the apologising bit. I just thought that if I came running back to you right away, you'd think I was a doormat or something, that I couldn't stand up for myself. But I really do regret it, just so you know, and I guess you think I'm a bit psychotic and mad, and I guess I'd understand if you didn't forgive me." She looked at her feet.

"But…I already told you I forgave you, remember? What, you didn't believe I meant all that stuff? Because I did." He sighed. "I really do love you."

Adriyana's eyes widened. "When was this?"

"In that letter," Sirius said simply. Adriyana still looked confused.

Adriyana kept staring at Sirius. Her inside bits were torn between "What letter?" and, "He said he loves me!" She wasn't sure which one to go with, so she settled for saying, "I don't know what you're talking about, I don't remember any letter."

"But I sent it this morning. How could you not have read it?"

"It's not that I didn't read it, it's that I never got it…maybe your owl just couldn't find me." I was, after all, hiding in the bathtub.

"That's kind of odd. At least you know what I said in it, now," he said. Adriyana smiled, and there was another long silence, though it wasn't awkward like the last one.

"So, what do we do now?" Sirius asked.

"I'd really, really like to pretend the last few weeks never happened, but I'm not sure it's the smartest thing to do." Adriyana said.

"Since when are you so rational?" Sirius asked, smiling slightly.

She shrugged. "I don't know, it just doesn't seem—" Oh, I can't do this for much longer. She tried again: "Well, there were a couple of things that happened these past weeks that I don't want to take back."

"Such as?"

"You told me you loved me." She moved closer. "I don't know exactly how long I've been wanting to hear that, but it's been a while." Closer. "I guess I just want us to be…" Closer still. Adriyana watched as Sirius' pupils dilated slightly. "Like this…" The last of the space between them closed.

The kiss was soft and hesitant, tinted with something strange, new, mysterious…Adriyana supposed this must be love.

She wasn't sure how long it was before the kiss broke, but lack of oxygen was becoming more of an issue. "Sirius?" she asked, still running her fingers through his hair.

"Yeah?" he asked, breathing slightly erratic. The tiny smile on his face reassured her that it was finally okay to trust Sirius, okay to let her resolve crumble, and okay to take what she really wanted.

"Love you, too." She rested her head on his shoulder. He picked up her hand, and twined his fingers between hers. She looked up, and watched the smile on his face widen. She smiled back, the bight, enigmatic smile she hadn't used in weeks finally showing through.

And then, finally, everything was just...perfect.

A/N: Oh God, such fluff.

Next chapter, I'm taking a break from this fluff/angst (flangst?) business. I've already started it. It'll make you crack up for sure.