Footnotes

Entry #8: October 31st, Halloween

Ah yes, Halloween a kiddies delight for thrills and chills but for the rest of us, it's an average day. Emma still wasn't talking to me and it had been almost two months since the whole 'thing', as I now referred to it, happened. I tried to make simple conversation for the pure sake of chatter, but she ignored me and so I had resorted to acting as if this ignoring thing didn't bother me. Too bad it really did. That morning was boring as usual and as I tired to remember what I forgot to do for that Potions essay and James read the Daily Prophet.

"It says that the attacks are getting more frequent and closer and closer to Hogwarts," He said. Emma didn't really say anything she was focused completely on her porridge. Remus gave James a funny look.

"Since when did you read the paper?"

"Since the war started," James replied. I held in a laugh, which came out as a loud snort. I began 'sneezing' to cover it up. A small smile collected at the edges of Emma's lips. When she noticed that I saw it, she frowned again. James hit me with the rolled up newspaper for laughing at him.

"What was that for?!" I cried. He rolled his eyes at me and grumbled. I began to complain about Halloween to help change the subject.

"Ugh, I hate Halloween, it's so pointless…." I grumbled. Nearly Headless Nick floated by and overheard my complaint and adamantly put in his two cents on what he thought of Halloween. After we listened to him briefly rant we watched him float away angrily.

"See? Even Nick agrees with me! Halloween is a dumb holiday," I embellished. I'm pretty sure Peter said "you're mom is a dumb holiday," but I ignored him. Nobody else was listening. James was trying to copy off of Remus and Emma was reading mail and gripping about her father. Lily was writing something down….

"Oh, I wish you men knew how to do things on our own!!" Emma cried angrily stealing the quill James was using and scribbled a quick and furious reply to her father.

"Hey, I'm capable of MANY things thank you very much!"

"Oh good job James, you can tie your shoes, feed your self and go to the bathroom by your self. What else can you do, because last time I checked you couldn't even get out of bed with help from Remus or Sirius!" Emma snipped back at him. James gave her the evil eye and then turned to Remus for more help; but Remus was too busy laughing to notice, which caused James to get even more frustrated. He snatched his quill back from his sister, and almost spilled his ink all over his bacon. With an agitated sigh he packed up his things and went to class a couple of minutes early. Lily went with him. Emma and I got up and began our silent walk to Divinations class where we would spend a pointless period gazing at crystal balls.

"Like I said, today is pointless!" I hissed, right as the old teabag came up behind me and asked me what I saw in the crystal ball. I decided to be a smartass and entertain myself.

"Well…it depends on the angle…see from down here; all I can see are the pores on Emma's forehead oh and from up here, I can see that she missed a spot when she did her eyeliner. But…when I look from up here I can see right down Emma's…"

"That is enough out of you Mr. Black! If you won't take this seriously then I have no choice but to send you to see the Headmaster!"

"Really?! You're really gonna send me out of this hell hole? That's the nicest thing anyone has done for me…"

"GO!" She snapped. I picked up my book bag and left, but had no intention of visiting Albus today. He wouldn't mind, considering I was in a peculiar mood and I'd most likely be visiting again later today. I walked up and down the stair case, minding my own business when I caught sight of movement out of the corner of my eye. I recognized that white blonde head of hair any day…so I followed him. Making sure Lucius didn't see me I tailed him to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. Once inside I hid and listened.

"Okay, let's go over the plan for tonight one more time, this has to go as smoothly as it possibly can. We have to create a distraction in the Great Hall so they can get in and out without being seen. I need you to be the fake Emma so that we get the real Sirius out of the way. The last thing we need is for there to be two Sirius Blacks running about. Of course I'll be the fake Sirius, and I'll maybe fight with Emma in the Great Hall and get everyone involved. I've already got the hairs; we just have to wait until tonight to pull it all off. Meet back here right before the feast," Lucius said. I kept hidden and watched as he and his goonies left with him. Then, I too left, before Myrtle saw me. I went to the rest of my classes and waited until lunch to talk to Remus and James about what I had overheard. Once I had explained it to them we decided we need to make a plan.

"I'll follow Lucius and cut him and his friends off at the bathroom. There are only two of them, so I can handle it. You guys make sure that Emma, the real Emma stays safe and away from Lucius," I whispered. They nodded and we went to afternoon classes.

"What are you and my brother scheming up this time?" Emma asked me as we walked to Muggle Studies, which is our only afternoon class together. I smiled, but I refused to tell her the truth.

"It was nothing."

"Yeah, I'm sure it was," She replied. We took our seats and opened our books as Emma began to guess what we were plotting. Of course she was always off.

"It's a prank I know it is!" And all the way through class she wouldn't drop it, she just had to know what it was.

"Just leave it be Em, it's nothing important," I told her leaving her to go to my only class with Remus, Astronomy. The whole period we didn't listen, we just discussed what we were going to do.

"Should we tell the Headmaster and warn him?"

"So he can what? Assemble and army and march out onto the grounds and have a parade? We know Lucius is planning a distraction, but we don't know what for."

"They want into the dungeons for something…"

"But we don't know what that something is! For all we know they want to clear it out and dance about naked. We can't tell anyone what's going on," Remus said to me. Reluctantly I nodded. We'd just have to wait it out.

The hours that ticked by till the feast were slow, but they finally came, and it was time to jump into action. I watched as Lucius and his group snuck up to Moaning Myrtle's but someone ran into me on the stairs and I lost track of them. I rushed up to the bathroom and caught the other one on the way out. He had already taken the Polyjuice Potion, which wasn't a good sign. That meant that Lucius could have taken it already too. I stunned the fake Emma and threw him in to the bathroom and checked to see if Lucius was still in there. He wasn't. So there was another Sirius Black out and about looking to make some trouble. Great. I began walking down toward the Great Hall, keeping my eyes open for the other me. I didn't see him until I got to the feast. There in the middle of the Hall was Emma, and she was arguing with Lucius, disguised as me. I frantically looked for James and Remus for help and saw that they both were on opposite sides of the Hall, fighting off Slytherins. I sucked in all my breath as I stared at the complete chaos around me. Closing my eyes I tried to think of a plan, but I was interrupted with a small gasp by a Gryffindor first year, who had noticed the two Sirius's. Lucius hadn't noticed yet. I snapped out of my dazed state and ran toward Emma, acting as quick as I could.

"Emma, stay away from him!" I shouted but she didn't hear me. She was to busy arguing with the Lucius-me.

"You don't know anything about being a man Sirius Black!" She yelled beating on his chest. I walked closer, pushing people out of my way. Lucius glanced sideways at me and I instantly saw the panic on his…er…my face. I never knew that my eyes really could give it all away.

"Oh really? Do real men know how to do this?" He asked roughly grabbing Emma and pulling her into a kiss. Furious I lunged at him, hardly giving her time to react, and punched him in the side of the face, breaking the kiss apart. I caught a glance of her face, and the pure shock on it.

"What is going on?!?!"

"This Sirius is an imposter!" I shouted pointing at him. Now all the Gryffindors were o their feet watching. I noticed that Remus and James were still fighting.

"How do I tell which one is the real Sirius?"

"Ask me a question," I said, shoving Lucius-me back behind me. Emma gave the Lucius me a suspicious glance as he gave him a nasty look. I couldn't believe that we had to go through with this, he didn't even sound like me! She nodded and cleared her throat.

"When did my mother die?" The Lucius-me spat out a lucky guess. I was forced to embellish on his answer when she turned to me.

"It was June 10th and when you and James got the letter we were all spending the day at the river down by Remmy's house," I replied. She nodded but didn't say anything. Lily came up and helped. James and Remus were still fighting.

"How many years have you liked Emma?" Lily asked looking at me. I blushed a little and looked away, so did Emma. So much for keeping that secret. Lucius kept his head held high.

"Six years," He said. I shook my head no.

"Four," I cut in. Lily nodded. Emma was still unconvinced as to who was who. She decided to ask two more questions.

"What happened at my party?"

"I kissed you."

"And…?"

"Er….it was good…?"

"He's right, we did kiss; but our lips barely touched before Remus caught us," I said as Lucius began to panic a bit more. Lily jumped in with the killer question.

"That day we talked, you know the one, I asked you a question, and you gave me the most beautiful answer. What was said?"

"You asked me why I liked Emma and told me to give you a good reason. My answer was: I never believed in true love, or love at first sight until I met Emma. She captivated me, memorized me from the start, not just with her beauty, but with her charm and her compassion for others. I knew right then and there she was the woman I wanted to wake up too every morning and the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. And ever since I met the Potter twins my favorite color has always been blue, like her eyes, because those blue eyes are what get me through my day, and they're always smiling, which makes me smile. But a mere smile doesn't do justice to how I feel," I replied. Emma went scarlet. Lucius was next to me in my body almost shitting bricks.

"I told you my life story, and how hard it was till I met Emma. I explained that just her friendship alone has gotten me through so much that I longed to be able to have more and to have a better life, with her by my side."

"You're wrong," Lily said to Lucius-me. He flipped out his wand and pulled Emma to him, his wand pressed to her neck like the tip of a knife. I could see that he was pressing so hard it hurt, the skin was white and pulled taught, and she winced. My shaggy black hair was slowly growing back into that sleek blonde hair of his and my grey eyes turning into those cold blue ones. Emma began to squirm as Lucius changed back fully into his self. James had broken free of his captor and gone to help Remus. I longed to help, but I had to save Emma. I sent Lily to go help; this was between Lucius and I.

"Lucius, let her go…"

"So you can whisk her away?" He laughed. "I don't think so."

"I swear if you don't let her go I'll…"

"You'll what Black? Cry like a little girl?" He taunted. Emma was panicking and I could see tears welling in her eyes. The wand was now digging into her neck, and she'd be bruised for weeks at this rate. I knew what I had to do…I looked at Emma and mouthed "I'm sorry".

I went to stun them both to keep Emma as safe as possible, but Lucius saw it coming and ducked so that I hit a Slytherin kid in the back of the head. I cursed loudly. I had a plan B, but I really really didn't want to do it. Oh man….it was looking like I had no other option…I closed my eyes and used the Imperious Curse on Emma. She went blank, no emotions on her face, and then I told her to kiss Lucius. She quickly spun around and laid one on him, throwing him off guard. As I watched I could see her fighting it with all her might and I let the spell go. Lucius was so stunned it didn't mater anymore. Emma pulled away as she broke the last of the curse and I stunned Lucius before he had a chance to recover from what just happened. He fell to the floor and Emma picked up his wand and gave me a glare before helping Remus. I stood there as Albus and the other teachers rushed in to help clear the chaos. They had gotten a ministry tip off of the dungeons but had no idea there would be such a fight in the Great Hall. Once everything was cleared up we were sent to our common rooms and I was sent to see Albus because of my outburst in Divinations this morning. I went back to the common with a date for detention tomorrow night to clean crystal balls.

"Yeah, Halloween just sucks."