Warning!

Strong language use. I know this story is rated T but I figured since I haven't thrown this into the story yet I should warn the readers.

Just A Stupid Crush

Chapter 14

Hermione's POV

So it's been a few days since… well you know what happened. I'm not taking things well, to say the least. I just can't understand why Sirius is doing this. Why would he ignore me? I hate DADA just because I have to be there, right in front of him and he pretends like my desk is empty. It's not empty, Sirius! I'm there! Why don't you see me? I attempted to stifle the sobs that were escaping me. I curled up in a ball on my bed and held my blankets close, just crying into them.

"Sirius," I whispered through my tears, "why are you doing this to me?"

This is how things have been going lately. I'll think of Sirius for too long and then I burst into tears. I can't help it. I think of him holding me close to him or kissing me and I get the same swooping feeling in my stomach that I've always gotten, but now tears accompany these thoughts as well.

Ginny, Natalie, and even Harry have tried to be with me as much as they could, but I feel bad being all weepy around them and I'll tell them I just want to be alone. They'll give me sad looks, but allow me to leave and then I hear them whispering as I walk away. I find I don't much care. I don't really care about much at the moment.

His name runs through my mind and even this causes the tears to spring up once again. I hug my blankets tighter and cannot stop shaking as I let the tears flow. Oh, Sirius…

A long month later

Things have gotten better. Not with Sirius, but I've gotten better. I don't spontaneously burst into tears anymore and I think it's been at least a week since I've cried at all. I was very proud of myself the first time I made it through 24 hours without a single tear. It wasn't easy to get to that point, though. After doing nothing but mope for awhile, I decided I needed to do something, anything, to get my mind off things. I worked harder on my school work (if that's possible), I spent time with my friends as much as I could, and I even finished up my animagus training. That last one made me very happy. I put a lot of work into finishing that up. I sure was happy to be done and registered, but it did make me a little sad because I remember promising Sirius I would show him when I finished. He was the only one I had consulted to about my training.

I shook my head roughly. I can't get back on that train of thought again. Everything will work out just as it's supposed to be. Whether that means Sirius will come to his senses or not, I don't know. Only time will tell.

Speaking of coming to their senses, Ron still hasn't and this also makes me sad. He confronted me during my moping/weepy stage and told me that he loved me and that I should be with him and not Sirius. He apparently had not heard that Dumbledore forced Sirius and I to wait until graduation until we could be together. I had to explain this to Ron and he seemed to fail to notice how upset it made me to just simply tell him this. In fact, he was excited that I couldn't be with Sirius and insisted that he and I should be together. I slapped him and went back to my room to do what else but weep some more. Everyone's been completely ignoring Ron since then. Well, everyone meaning Harry, Ginny, and Natalie anyway. All I can say is I somewhat know how Ron feels.

NO! Stop it, Hermione. You were doing so good. Think of something happy. Er… Oh, I can change into a pretty amazing fox at will! Maybe I'll go out for a walk around the grounds in my new form. That seems like a good idea. I could use some fresh air anyway.

I left my room, praying silently to any thing that might be listening that I would not run into Sirius. My footsteps echoed quietly in the halls and everything just seemed too quiet. I made it through the front door without any problems. Not that I should have any problems. I am Head Girl after all. I was just worried about running into Sirius. I mean, if I ran into him, what would I do? Would I ignore him like he's been ignoring me? Would I get angry and yell at him? I just don't know what I would do. Still standing in the doorway so that if anyone were looking onto the grounds, they wouldn't be able to see me, I concentrated hard and changed into my animagus form. Even though I was registered, I didn't want the whole school knowing when I've only told a few select people.

I paced a few steps to get used to my form, swished my tail around for the fun of it, then set off at a run around the grounds. Had I been in my normal, human form, I know I would have been laughing like crazy. This was just too much fun. I could feel the cool air moving across my fur and my ears moved to locate every little sound. I could smell things that I had never smelled before and my eyesight was much sharper than I could have ever imagined.

I was walking around the greenhouses smelling all the different smells when I heard a noise that made my ears perk up. It was a human voice. My eyes immediately located which direction it was coming from. I listened harder, trying to identify the voice, but once I had it pinned down, I wished I had never heard anything. It was Sirius's voice. He was talking to someone, but I had never heard that other voice before that I could recall. I moved closer to where they were, glad that they would probably wouldn't realize I was there since I was in my animagus form.

I had them in my sights now and my heart was pounding heavily. I noticed they were walking very close together and he was walking with… a woman? Did he just grab her hand? What the-? My heart was beating so fiercely that I thought for sure it would break just ramming against my chest. But that wasn't what broke my heart. It was when they were giggling together and when he leaned in to kiss her that broke my heart. I had never felt such a multitude of feelings before. I was scared and I was nervous and I was sad and I was heartbroken and I was angry and I felt betrayed and it all it hit me at the same moment. Sure he was ignoring me, but now he has a girlfriend? Sirius Black just ripped my heart from my chest, threw it on the ground, spit on it, rubbed the sole of his foot on it, then took a hammer to it… multiple times. I was sure that my heart must be in so many pieces that it will never get put back together properly again.

They had gotten closer to where I was and I unconsciously let out a growl. The woman looked down, frightened, and threw herself in Sirius's arms.

"Sirius, get it away!" She squealed. Way to pick a winner, Sirius. I bared my teeth at them and continued to growl. Sirius just looked amused. It made me angrier. He just took the hammer to my heart again. He was holding her so close. He used to hold me that close. It wasn't that long ago. What is happening? Why is it happening?

"It's just a fox, it won't hurt you," he said comfortingly, although I could definitely sense an amused tone to his voice.

"Why's it all brown?" She asked taking a closer look at me and relaxing in his arms but still not moving away. Sirius had a strange look on his face like he was trying to recall something. Uh oh. I'd better get out of here before he puts it together. I turned tail and ran towards the forest in hopes that would throw Sirius off from realizing it was me. I made it around towards the front of the school and could no longer see or hear Sirius. I silently made my way towards the door and changed my form in the doorway again. I opened the door and went inside, running until I reached my room. I went in and collapsed on my bed, tears flowing from my eyes like a river. I thought if I stayed exactly where I was, drowning would soon be a problem.

"What the FUCK, Sirius!" I yelled into my sheets. "What could you be thinking? How could you do this to me?" My sobs continued and I thought for sure the tears would never end this time. How could you forget me so easily, Sirius? Why wasn't I able to forget you that quickly? What the fuck? Oh, why? Why? WHY? HOW COULD YOU, SIRIUS?

"How could you," I whispered. The tears weren't stopping and I wasn't even able to cry myself to sleep to end the aching in my heart. It was twice the amount of torture. I can't do this anymore. I can't. If Sirius could so easily forget about me, then I'll just forget him too. I have to. It'll be the only way to stop the aching in my heart. Maybe with time I'll be able to piece my heart back together. First step is to forget him. He's not worth it. I can't imagine why I ever liked him in the first place. Stupid, stupid Sirius. What the hell? How could he?

No, come on Hermione. This has to stop now. Stop thinking about him. C'mon, he was able to forget you. All you have to do is forget him. Do you even want to be with someone like him? Look at how much he's hurt you.

It's true. No one has ever broken my heart in such a way or magnitude as Sirius Black has done. It's time to move on. Time to move on… With these thoughts clouding my mind, I fell into a fitful sleep. Dreams of a certain tall, dark haired, handsome wizard were dreamt, but who was I to control what I dreamt? I often woke to find my face wet with tears. Sirius Black would be a difficult person to forget. But it must be done. There is no other way.

Remus's POV

How could someone so intelligent be so stupid? Sirius was telling me about his night and I cannot believe how blind he is. I sighed and attempted to emphasize certain points of his story in hopes that he would put it together.

"So you're telling me that you met this girl a few days ago and you took her for a walk around Hogwarts grounds?" I said as calmly as I could. Sirius looked at me like I was crazy.

"Yeah, that's what happened."

"And while you were walking around the grounds with her, you came across a fox?"

"Yes, Moony. Why are you repeating this to me?"

I wondered why things hadn't clicked yet. I kept trying. "You saw a fox that was all brown? It growled at you as if it was angry?"

"Moony, wh-." Bingo. I could see him piecing everything together. He suddenly looked at me with a very frightened look and said, "Holy beards of Merlin! That was Hermione wasn't it?"

"Of course I can't say for sure, but prob-"

"She looked amazing. Not a single flaw. I didn't even know she had finished. I mean, I'm not surprised that she finished so quickly but even so. Wow, I can't believe it," Sirius said completely ignoring me. He appears to have quite a talent for ignoring people. I waved my hand in front of his face to get his attention back.

"Sirius, why are you doing this to her? Do you even realize how much pain you're causing her?" He suddenly had a troubled look on his face. Collapsing into a nearby chair, he put his head in his hands.

"I don't know why I'm doing this. I thought if I ignored her that this time that we couldn't be together would go by faster. And it has to be honest. But it's so hard to keep up. I don't want to be doing this, I just… I didn't know what else to do."

"I won't lie to you and tell you that you didn't mess up. You should try to fix things, but I honestly don't know how willing she's going to be to let you fix it."

"I know, but I've got to try, haven't I? I can't lose her. I messed thing up terribly. But I have to fix it. I don't know what I would do without her. And first things first, I need to go down to the lake," he said determinedly. The lake? Why would he need to go to the lake to fix things with Hermione? I tried to ask him, but he had already gotten up and was out of the door. He may be my best friend, but I'm sure that I'll never completely understand him.

AN: I hope you had your tissues ready. I almost needed some just writing this chapter. I almost just left this chapter at the end of Hermione's POV, but I took pity in my readers and threw in Remus's POV as well. I couldn't leave the end of the chapter quite so depressing. Well, that and I was afraid that I would be murdered had I left it the way it was. So, please no killing me. You wouldn't get to hear the end of the story if you did. Speaking of which, there will be 1, yes just 1, more chapter then an epilogue. Crazy, right?

Thank you to everyone who has reviewed! I really appreciate you taking the time to.

In case you were curious, this was my longest chapter so far. Hopefully in the next week the final chapter and the epilogue will be up. My schedule will be a little crazy this week, but I think it will be getting even crazier after that so... I'll try to get it done before I'm overwhelmed with stuff to do. Thanks for reading! Please let me know what you thought!

PadfootBlack4Ever