Author's Note

Hi guys! Here's Chapter 29, I hope you like it! Thanks so much for reading my story, I appreciate it more than you could ever know!

Also, reviews make me the happiest person in the world. Please don't hesitate to let me know what you think! It inspires me to keep writing :) On that note...

Read, enjoy, review :)

29. Celebration

A week later, Lily and I came down to breakfast in the Great Hall, sitting down across the table from an uncharacteristically grim-looking James, with Sirius beside him, cheerfully shoveling pancakes into his mouth.

It was one of the biggest quidditch days of the year: Gryffindor would be facing off against Slytherin to decide who went on to the final match of the year against Ravenclaw. And from the looks of things, Gryffindor was the underdog.

"Morning, ladies," said James, sounding pained, as Lily and I poured ourselves some juice, her grabbing a scone while I began spooning some oatmeal into a bowl. As captain of the team, James took his job very seriously.

"James," greeted Lily, regarding him with an amused expression on her face. Sirius grinned at me from across the table, his eyes lighting up immediately.

"Morning, love," he said to me after swallowing a bite of food and greeting Lily, eyebrows raised flirtatiously, leaning forward slightly. "You coming to watch us crush some Slytherins?"

"Wouldn't miss it for the world." I told him, smiling too. Lily made a gagging noise beside me and James turned to his best friend, looking reproachful.

"Let's not get overconfident, Padfoot," he said, frowning in a most un-James-like way. "Slytherins won by more points than us in almost all their matches this year. I—"

"Oh, bugger off," said Sirius good-naturedly. "We can't go into the match thinking we've already lost!"

James was about to respond to this remark when an owl swooped down, dropping a letter onto the plate in front of Sirius, landing with a smack in a pool of syrup.

Sirius lifted up the piece of parchment curiously, nodding to Lily in thanks as she reached over with her wand and cleaned the sugary substance off the paper with a little flick.

After reading the return label, he smiled slightly and stuck the piece of mail in one of his robe pockets. "My cousin Andromeda," he explained, looking up to find us all watching him interestedly. Sirius hardly ever got mail.

"Bellatrix's sister?" asked Lily skeptically, eyebrows raised.

"Yeah," said Sirius a little defensively, as he and James both rose to head down to the field and get changed into their quidditch robes. "She's cool, don't worry Lils."

He swooped down, leaning over the table to kiss my forehead, flashing me a cute smile and a wave before jogging after James, who was walking determinedly down the hall, Gryffindor students wishing him luck as he passed.

An hour later Lily and I were bundled up in Gryffindor scarves and hats to combat the chilly, early spring temperature, and were seated high up in the Gryffindor stands, waiting for the match to start. Remus sat next to Lily with Peter on his other side, the two boys chatting amiably while Lily and I scanned the field for our respective love interests, sitting close together for warmth.

"He's not my boyfriend," Lily was saying now, inspecting her nails. "Not officially anyway."

"Right," I said, unconvinced. "You just hold hands and kiss and spend entire days together doing God knows what—"

"Adeline Villori!" Lily reprimanded, although she was clearly blushing. "You do that with Sirius, too!"

"Yeah," I said, rolling my eyes. "Sirius. My boyfriend."

Lily dismissed this fact with a wave of her hand. "We're getting there. We're just… taking it slow. He probably thinks I'm going to wake up one morning and realize I've gone off the deep end, giving him a chance. I'm not so sure that won't happen."

"Fat chance," I said, snorting.

"How are you and Sirius anyway?" she asked, blatantly changing the subject and lowering her voice. "That fight you two had the other night was…" she frowned, remembering.

"One of the low points of my life?" I suggested helpfully. I shook my head at her concerned expression. "We were both just…" I shrugged. "tired and upset. He apologized, I apologized… And we're good now. Great, actually."

I smiled to myself. This was true.

"Well, you love each other." said Lily natter-of-factly, her gaze trained on the tiny figures of the opposing teams as they made their way onto the pitch. "and love always finds a way."

I looked at her, eyes wide. "How…?"

"How do I know? Oh please," she said, grinning at just the sight of James, leaning forward to stiffly shake the Slytherin captain's hand. "The way you look at each other says it all. I've never seen two people so… passionate, I guess, is the right word."

I mulled this over in my head as the game began, the players rising high on their brooms, becoming blurs as they sped up and down the pitch. I caught sight of Sirius, bat raised high in anticipation of a bludger that was making its way towards him at a remarkable speed, wide shoulders braced for impact.

"I would just like to say," said James, grinning widely, words slightly slurred, as he stood, arms locked with Sirius, on a table in the middle of the Gryffindor common room. "That I had the utmost faith in our team today. Not a moment went by where I was not 100% certain that we would come out on top." he pumped a fist into the air victoriously. "We are the kings!"

This little speech was greeted by raucous cheers and the raising of beverages in salute towards the two tall, dark-haired boys, who bowed to their admirers somewhat unsteadily before hopping off their make-shift podium. Lily and I watched this performance with amusement, both sipping our glasses of firewhiskey. "This popularity is really going to go to their heads," Lily commented, rolling her eyes good naturedly and watching James receive hearty congratulations from his admirers.

"They worked hard," I said congenially, savoring the warming sensation in my belly as I swallowed some more of my drink. "They earned it."

Just then I felt a strong hand on my shoulder and turned to find Sirius grinning at me, his own much larger refreshment held firmly in the other hand. "Fantastic party, right?" he said enthusiastically. "Victory never tasted so sweet."

I laughed, sinking down into a nearby couch with Sirius next to me and Lily on my other side, James and Remus joining us a few seconds later. "It's a great party." I told my boyfriend, knowing that he was instrumental in its success: I suspected that he and James had been the main force behind the acquisition of such copious amounts of firewhiskey and butterbeer.

Sirius leaned back, resting his head against the leather. I smiled, checking my watch. 10:30.

We sat around the fire for a while, James and Lily alternating between bickering and flirting while Sirius described the match to me in great detail, including a reenactment of his blow to the bludger that had sent it hurtling towards the Slytherin captain, effectively making him scream like a little girl. Remus stared into the fire for a long time, looking thoughtful, before heading upstairs.

By 11:30, the party was still going strong, and Lily and James rose, headed over to the makeshift dance floor created on one side of the room.

I got up and dashed upstairs to use the loo, finding upon my return that Sirius had moved over to a smaller couch in a more secluded corner of the room.

I raised my eyebrows as I made my way over, sitting beside him and letting my legs stretch across his lap. He sighed contentedly as I moved closer. "Going for the bad-boy loner image?" I asked, amused, noting our more private location.

He chuckled, running a hand through his hair and setting his now empty glass on a table beside us. "It's loud over there," he said airily, gesturing to "over there", which constituted the rest of the common room. "This is better."

I smirked as he drew me even closer, his thumb now making tiny circles on my waist. I was now all but sitting on his lap, and reached over, running a hand through his hair just as he had done, pushing the short, black strands away from his eyes.

He sighed contentedly, eyes shut, leaning in slightly to my touch. "Keep doing that," he muttered, the corner of his mouth twitching up into a smile as I laughed.

I did as I was asked, continuing to play with his hair. "I love your hair short," I told him, using my nails to very lightly scratch his scalp. He groaned, relaxing considerably under my touch. "You should keep it that way."

"As my lady commands," he said, opening his eyes, the color of which never failed to leave me momentarily speechless. "Now," he said, his thumb once again tracing small circles on my hips, his other hand tucking a piece of my own hair behind an ear. "I might be slightly drunk."

I giggled despite myself. "I noticed," I told him, grinning. "What's your point?"

He smiled flirtatiously at me, that crooked smile he knew I loved. "My point is…" he said, voice lower than usual. "I'm entirely incapacitated. I'm completely at your mercy, for you to do with me what you please."

I pretended to consider this, as my hand traveled from his hair down to trace one perfectly arched eyebrow, then down further to the stubble on his jaw. "In the middle of the common room?" I teased, "Sirius, that's improper."

"Nonsense," he said, peering around my shoulder briefly before smirking up at me. "No one's paying us the least bit of attention, trust me."

Not trusting him, I looked for myself, to find that he was right: we were being completely ignored.

I turned around, another cheeky remark on the tip of my tongue. Before I could say anything, though, Sirius stretched up, capturing my lips with his.

He was gentle, but I could feel his passion, and I could taste the firewhiskey on his tongue and smell the grass of the Quidditch pitch and the fresh spring air clinging to his skin. And his tongue was doing some pretty great things.

We broke apart after a few minutes, foreheads resting together, both of us breathing a little hard. I blushed, realizing that I was making out with my boyfriend in front of… well, pretty much everyone.

That thought disappeared from my mind as he bent to kiss my neck, lingering on a place just above my collarbone that made me, to my embarrassment, let out a little breathy moan.

He grinned up at me like a Cheshire cat, and I rolled my eyes at him affectionately, still blushing. I leaned over, my lips brushing his ear. "I thought I was supposed to be in charge here." I whispered.

He shivered slightly, which for whatever reason made me feel incredibly proud of myself. "You are," he said, his hands brushing up and down my sides, his touch feather-light. "I'm just offering my encouragement."

I laughed at this, then bent down, ever so slowly, kissing him below his jaw on a spot I knew he liked, lingering for a moment. He made a little sound low in his throat that I took to be approval, his hands tightening imperceptibly on my waist.

And as much as I wanted to continue, the truth was that—secluded though we were in our little corner of the common room—we were still surrounded by people, a fact I was all too aware of.

Sirius pouted as I slid off his lap and onto the couch beside him. "I'm not snogging you in a room full of our classmates!" I told him, shaking my head admonishingly, though I was grinning as I did so.

"You just did," he pointed out, fixing me with those hypnotizing eyes.

I shrugged. "Well, I hope you enjoyed it while it lasted then," I said, waving my hand dismissively.

"Oh," he said, smirking at me, his voice low. "I did."

I was both embarrassed and pleased by this remark, and searched my mind frantically for a distracting subject before I ended up throwing myself at him, audience be damned.

"What did Andromeda say in her letter?" I finally asked, cheeks still tinged with pink. I vaguely remembered having met Sirius's cousin once or twice before, but that had been years ago. And quite frankly, I couldn't remember Walburga and Orion ever mentioning her. Although, I mused, that wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

"I actually wanted to talk to you about that," said Sirius, turning to me, eyes bright, the alcohol seeming to have little effect now. "It was a wedding invitation."

"Oh," I said, eyebrows raised. "Wow." I was doing math in my head… she couldn't be more than twenty…

"She's marrying a muggle-born bloke named Ted Tonks," Sirius told me, and as if reading my thoughts, went on, smiling fondly. "I've never met the guy, but Andy is absolutely crazy about him. They've been dating for years. She's only twenty, of course, but people are getting married young these days… with the war and all." His smile faltered slightly, but he continued, looking at me, a questioning look in his eye. "Anyway, the wedding is next weekend, in some little wizarding village near France that Andy's visited a few times. She's already got things arranged with Dumbledore. A portkey is going to be set up, we'll pop over there Saturday morning and be back later that night."

"We?" I asked, eyebrows raised. Sirius looked a little sheepish, but nodded.

"I was hoping you'd be my plus one?" he looked so adorable, staring at me with an uncertain expression on his face. I couldn't help but lean forward, giving him a light peck on the lips.

"I'd love to."