How Things Used To Be
Neasa had welcomed the distraction provided by the preparation for the OWL and NEWT exams. Ever since her breakup with Severus earlier in the week, she had taken any given opportunity to think about anything else other than the awkward love triangle she now found herself in.
Apart from a few polite words exchanged at staff meetings, she hadn't spoken to Severus since the night he stormed up to her room and berated her for sleeping with Sirius. She had, of course, then Apparated to Grimmauld Place and told off Sirius for being the one to tell Severus when it really should have been Neasa's job.
She had spoken both with Sirius and Remus in the kitchen.
"It was a genuine mistake, Róisín," Sirius had pleaded. "I'm so sorry."
"It's true," Remus said. "He really didn't mean to. We both genuinely thought you had already told Severus."
"Well, I hadn't, and now things are worse than ever between us," Neasa huffed. "I just want things to go back to normal!"
A pained look crossed Sirius' face and Remus looked at him in concern. Neasa caught her tongue: "I mean - I..."
"It's fine," Sirius said with a dismissal wave of his hand. Of course, normal meant Neasa and Severus getting back together. Sirius wanted the opposite of normal.
Remus had walked Neasa to the front door.
"Don't dwell on it," he had said to her in a soft voice, noticing the worried expression on her face. "Deep down, he wants what's best for you, even if that means you two never getting back together. He wants you to be happy more than anything."
"I feel awful," Neasa replied. "It was such a bad idea for us to sleep together - I feel like I've led him on or something."
Remus' face hardened. "I'll be honest with you, because Sirius loves you too much to say this... You need to be careful with his feelings. He's fragile. If you aren't one hundred per cent sure you want to get back together with him, then you need to tell him that. Don't let this drag on - don't let him get his hopes up for nothing."
It was hard to hear, but Neasa appreciated Remus' honesty.
Now, as she pottered around her and Umbridge's shared office, she tried to find a distraction in the exam paperwork. She had been tasked with coordinating the gathering of all of the exam questions from all of the professors. One by one, she had travelled to their classrooms that morning and collected the papers.
Beginning with Professor Binns' History of Magic class that morning, she had softly knocked on the door and a stern, but dreary, voice from inside called, "Enter!"
She opened the door softly to a warm, stuffy classroom packed with fifth year Gryffindors all looking very drowsy.
Professor Binns turned to Neasa and asked monotonously, "How may I help you, Ms Casey?"
"I'm here to collect your exam questions for the OWLs and NEWTs," she replied.
As soon as she spoke, the Gryffindors became much more alert and hushed whispers began to make their way through the room. As Professor Binns searched through his desk drawers, Neasa glanced at the students, who were all watching her closely. She spotted Harry Potter in the second row, sitting, as always, next to Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Harry and Ron both looked very drowsy when she first walked in, but were now sitting upright again, realising that a copy of their exam papers was being passed from their Professor to the secretary right in front of their eyes.
Neasa faced the same in every other class which she visited. She would normally enter the room to bored looking students, but would exit the room, exam papers in hand, to eager faces watching her closely.
Of course, word travelled rapidly around the school that the school secretary was collecting exam papers that morning, so, naturally, Neasa had been met by countless fifth and seventh year students looking to bribe her for some of the exam questions. However much she might have wanted to, the papers were kept sealed in a magical folder which would only open on the Professors' commands. Not even Neasa could open it unless she asked one of the Professors.
The hardest class to visit had, of course, been Severus'.
Neasa had tried to put it off as long as she could, but she needed to return the exam questions to Umbridge that afternoon, so she could not procrastinate any longer than midday.
She reluctantly made her way down to the dungeons, her stomach twisting itself into knots as she approached Severus' classroom door. She raised her hand to knock, then quickly lowered it again. She briefly debated whether she could ask Minerva to do it instead, but then realised that Severus would inevitably find out and think that she was avoiding him, which... Well, was true, she reasoned.
In the time that she had tried to delay the inevitable, the door swung open and a Gryffindor student walked past her in the direction of the bathrooms. Through the open door, Neasa spotted Severus hovering at his desk, saying something about Salamander blood and its use in Strengthening Solutions. As he turned around to walk out from behind his desk, his head turned to the open door and his black eyes fell on Neasa. Immediately, if it was possible, his face hardened.
Neasa darted forward and politely knocked on the door.
"Sorry, Professor, I don't mean to interrupt - I need - um - the exam questions," she stammered.
Severus wordlessly motioned for her to enter the classroom. She stood in the doorframe, waiting as he rummaged through his desk. She took a moment to scan the room, searching for Harry. She found him near the back, looking very glumly into his cauldron as he stirred something around. She could not help but pity him. She had heard stories of how harsh Severus was on his students, and heard that he was especially unfriendly to Harry. Since the Occlumency lessons had broken down, she could not imagine that Severus had changed his tune much.
Speaking of, she took this rare opportunity when they were in the same room to soak him up. Today, he only wore his navy black robes without his black cloak. As always, they were tightly fitted, with only a thin line of white protruding from his collar and cuffs. His hair swept around his face, and he tucked a tuft of it behind his ear now as he continued to search his drawers. It was not like him to be so disorganised but, she reasoned, preparing exam questions was probably not high on his priority list, considering everything that had happened between them the past few days.
"Ah," Severus muttered softly, finally finding the papers. As he approached Neasa, she could not help but feel weak at the knees. Despite everything, she was still hopelessly in love with him, and she yearned for his affection and attention. This was the most time that they had spent together in the same room in days and she missed him dreadfully.
"Thank you," she breathed, taking the papers from him. He did not let go of them.
"The folder," he said simply, nodding to the enchanted folder in her hands. Of course.
Feeling flustered, she let go of the paper and handed him the folder. Wordlessly, he waved his wand over the clasp on the front of the folder and it opened for him, allowing him to tuck the exam questions inside and close the folder with a snap. He handed it back to Neasa and promptly returned to his desk. As Neasa closed the door, she cast a final glance in Harry's direction: he had been watching their awkward interaction carefully and he hastily looked back to his cauldron.
The following day, Neasa took her place at the staff table in the Great Hall for breakfast at around 8 o'clock in the morning. She had worked out that she could avoid Severus so long as she finished her breakfast before 8.30 in the morning, when he would normally arrive. At this early hour, the Great Hall was mostly empty, apart from a few Ravenclaws in the corner and a huddle of Slytherins near the fire. However, closer to the staff table, sat Harry all alone. He had a full English breakfast in front of him but he was more interested in a copy of the Daily Prophet. Was he not hungry?
She noticed that he read the paper in an unusual way. He began by skimming every page quickly, folding down the corners of certain pages, and then returning and reading the dog-eared pages carefully. One such page displayed a full-page picture of Sirius, which Harry spent a while staring at - not reading, just staring at the photo. Neasa could not begin to imagine how much Harry missed his godfather when they were separated.
Ron and Hermione soon joined Harry, and he looked significantly happier when they did. He pushed aside the newspaper and joined them in animated laughter. Hermione pushed the full English breakfast towards him and said something about "Eat up quickly, we've got to get to class!" and Harry laughed and tucked in to his meal. Soon, a Ravenclaw girl with blonde hair joined their group, followed by a fourth year Gryffindor Neasa recognised as Ginny Weasley. The group ate, chatted, and laughed together all breakfast, and Neasa's heart ached for them all. She could scarce believe that she was once as young and carefree as these kids.
But, on the other hand, she did not envy the difficult task in front of Harry. Having been branded as the Chosen One, his life would forever be tainted by his association with Voldemort and he would probably always live in the shadow of Lily's sacrifice.
Neasa thought fondly back to Lily and to the first time they had met in that club in London Sirius had taken her and the other trainee Aurors to. Lily had already been pregnant at that time and had refused all the alcoholic drinks which were offered to her, preferring to sit and chat with Neasa. Then James had arrived, looking frazzled from chasing some dark wizard or another, and had joined the girls by the bar, his eyes forever set on Lily. They were such a gorgeous couple and it was truly tragic that they had missed the chance to see their son grow up into the kind, compassionate boy Neasa had heard so much about. She thought sadly of how many times James, Lily, Sirius, and Remus must have sat together at these very tables, eating their breakfast and laughing together, completely unaware of what fate had in store for them. It broke her heart to dwell on it.
Neasa glanced over at Umbridge, sitting in the Headmaster's golden chair and happily munching on jam and toast, making sure to dab her thin lips after each bite. She was utterly insufferable and Neasa resented her for disbanding Dumbledore's Army, among so many other things. That was specifically at the top of her list because of how the students were now not being given any kind of formal defense training, leaving them unable to help themselves in the case of attack. Of course, Harry had tried to fill that gap with the DA, but Umbridge had gone and taken that simple pleasure from the kids too. Neasa hated the woman so much it made her feel sick. She wished that she could do something to try help the DA but she knew that it was not worth the risk of losing her 'secretarial' job.
She looked back to Harry and realised that he was alone again, his friends having left him a few moments prior. Once again, he looked terribly lonely, skimming through his newspaper with a depressed expression. Neasa could not begin to imagine how lonely the poor boy must have been feeling in that moment, surrounded by students who didn't believe him or Dumbledore about Voldemort's return and not being able to communicate with his only remaining family member, who was on the run from the law.
Speaking of, Neasa remembered that she had promised Sirius she would visit with updates about Harry. She approached Umbridge, gave the older woman an excuse about not feeling good and needing the day off work, and then left the castle grounds to Apparate to Grimmauld Place.
Sirius let her in, showing her into the kitchen in silence to not wake the portrait. Once in the kitchen, he closed the door behind them.
"Hi," he breathed, with a wide grin. Today he wore a outfit of dark greens and velvet blacks, which suited him well.
"Hi," Neasa replied, smiling too. He approached her and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. She inhaled deeply, breathing in Sirius' sweet honey and earthy smell, adoring the warm feeling of his lips against her forehead. When he withdrew, he looked down at her and met her eyes, the edges of his own creasing softly.
Once they were both sat down at the table with two hot cups of tea, Neasa began telling him about Harry.
"He seems alright, just regular," she said. "I mean, he does look a little... Sad? When he's alone, he looks so lonely."
"That's relatable," Sirius sighed.
"Yes, there's definitely something off, all right. He looks fine when he's with his friends - just like any other normal kid, really. But it's as if a big, black cloud hangs over him."
"He's too young to be suffering like this," Sirius said darkly.
Neasa nodded in agreement. "Sometimes... I still can't believe how much he looks like James."
"I know," said Sirius, "it's uncanny. I just can't believe how much things have changed. I don't know how we got here."
"What do you mean?"
"It feels like yesterday that myself and James were in Hogwarts together, not a care in the world... Now James is dead and his teenage son is the Chosen One and needs to fight off one of the darkest wizards to ever exist... I can't believe it's all come to this."
"Do you ever wish you could go back?" Neasa asked.
"All the time," Sirius said. "I would steal all the Time Turners in the Department of Mysteries if it meant I could go back."
"No, I mean to Hogwarts. Do you want to go back?"
"I wish I could, but I'm under strict house arrest orders from Dumbledore," Sirius sighed.
"Well... He doesn't need to know, and we don't need to go into the castle."
Sirius frowned, not understanding. "Are you... Are you serious?"
Neasa smiled with a nod. "If you want. Offer's on the table. You could change into Padfoot and I could Apparate us there. We don't need to go anywhere near the castle - we could just look at it from across the Great Lake."
"Yeah, alright," Sirius replied, a wide grin suddenly spreading across his cheeks. "Are you sure we won't be caught?"
"I'll put up a shielding charm which will hide us from any passers by," Neasa said. She reached out across the table, taking Sirius' hand in hers and softly squeezing it. "Come on, Padfoot."