If there was one question Pip feared above all others, it was the dreaded 'what are we?' When that little gem came up, it usually meant it was time to leave.

Fortunately, neither she nor Sirius asked it. Not when Sirius's hands raked through her curls or when Pip's lips trailed down his chest or when his breath hitched at her touch.

They didn't need to ask it. They were just friends who occasionally fooled around. Each others' distraction from the war raging around them.

But sneaking about Grimmauld Place with Sirius, dodging Lupin and Kreacher, was more fun than Pip'd had in a long time. Sirius was Pip's favourite drug. One she was growing worryingly reliant on. Rock music blaring, alcohol on their tongues, the two got lost in each other for hours until someone or something pulled them away.

Work was one of those things.

Pip was currently crouching under her desk at The Prophet, searching for the feathery quill she'd dropped. Trecus asked something that sent her head snapping up, banging violently into the wood above. She clambered out, wide eyed, and rubbed the lump already forming on her crown.

With a shaky laugh, she realised he'd said 'are you fucking serious' – not 'are you fucking Sirius.'

Although the answer was technically no, she was still grateful Trecus remained unaware that she was regularly snogging the most wanted wizard in the world. Neither did anyone else, thank fuck.

'Cuffe's chosen the date of the gala, June Eighteenth. Melinda and I had tickets for a show that night,' Trecus complained.

'I thought you said she loves these thing,' Pip remarked, thinking of Trecus's good-natured but busy-bodied little wife. Opposites really did attract, apparently.

He grumbled out a half-hearted response and returned to his editing, leaving Pip to shudder at the thought of the upcoming Daily Prophet Gala. An annual – and compulsory – event of frankly frightening glamour. All the reporters would be there, along with high-ranking members of the Ministry and various celebrities of the wizarding world.

A rumour was making the rounds that vampire heartthrob Lorcan d'Eath would be performing. Pip's excitement was dimmed by the fact that his hit single, 'Necks to You,' had been playing non-stop at the top of the charts for nineteen weeks straight.

It was playing again the afternoon of April Seventh as she departed the office.

The lyrics were still nibbling away at her brain when she arrived back at Grimmauld Place, so irritating that at first she didn't see the smoke billowing out of the kitchen. Pip sniffed the air, did a double take and coughed. Waving the fumes away from her already stinging eyes, she barrelled into the kitchen, wand drawn in alarm.

'Why did you put the temperature up so high!' one smoke-cloaked figure yelled.

'I thought it would bake faster!' the other cried.

With another wave, the haze cleared enough to reveal Sirius and Lupin hunched over the stove, where a charred lump of charcoal was still on fire. Pip cleared her throat and Sirius twisted around. He gave her a sheepish grin while Remus slumped against the kitchen counter in exhaustion.

'I, er, tried to make you a cake, love,' Sirius explained. 'Emphasis on "tried."'

Pip's gaze landed back on the smouldering hunk. Laughing, she levitated it onto the table and told them it suited her – one mess for another. She bent over it and with a lopsided grin, blew out the last shivering flame.

Sirius wrapped his arms around her waist, waiting until Lupin was distracted to steal a kiss. 'Happy birthday, Pip.'

Twenty-five, she thought to herself ruefully. I'm getting old.

Pip caught up with Bill and Fleur at their flat later that week. Fleur's feminine charm had transformed the place – squeaky-clean plates had usurped the position of cardboard food containers and there wasn't a morsel of dirt in sight. It was so neat it practically shone.

The flat's former resident was touched and taken aback when the scourger responsible presented her with a non-flaming cake she claimed to have baked herself. Despite the French witch's haughty disposition, she was secretly a sweetheart. Pip was starting to understand why Bill was so head-over-heels, although she could've done with less of her best mates' lovestruck mooning.

Regardless, while she chewed her second (and this time edible) birthday cake, Pip was impatient to get home. She sat there, crossing and uncrossing her legs, trying to concentrate on the conversation Bill had launched into.

Last night, she'd had a rather x-rated dream and now images of a shirtless Sirius kept popping up at inconvenient times. Pip decided it was time to make those dreams a reality.

Back at Grimmauld Place, Sirius didn't know what hit him. Pip locked him into a heated, hungry kiss, all but dragging him towards his bedroom. 'What's gotten into you, love?' he chuckled, though responding enthusiastically enough.

Pip kicked the bedroom door shut, not bothering to untangle herself from him, and the melody of the record Sirius had been playing in the parlour faded. She pushed him further into the room, tripping over a rug.

Sirius caught her and suddenly he was in control. The man knew what he was fucking doing.

Pip's surroundings melted away with his kiss. An atomic bomb could've exploded outside and she wouldn't have noticed. The only senses she had were the ones consumed by Sirius; his smell, his taste, his touch.

The pair stumbled backwards and Pip hit the bedpost. She barely registered it; she could only feel Sirius and his weight atop her, pressing her back into the mattress. She rolled her hips beneath him and Sirius groaned into her mouth.

Her fingers slipped to the hem of his shirt, brushing against his torso, and he broke the kiss to help her pull it off. It was only when Pip started on her own clothes that Sirius stopped. He had realised what was happening, what she wanted.

Pip's fingers slowly released the satin of her top. 'Is this okay?' she asked hesitantly.

Sirius' voice was throaty. He licked his lips, and swallowed. 'Yeah...it's – it's been a while, love.'

With a small smile, Pip lifted herself to him. She caressed his cheekbone and placed a long, lingering kiss of reassurance to his lips. Her other hand was stretched across his bare chest, his heart thundering beneath her palm. As his heartbeat steadied, she pulled him down into her own warmth.

Pip and Sirius were soon exposed in more ways than one, skin against skin.

He trailed kisses across her body, leaving each part of her tingling. She could envisage a golden path where his lips had touched. Pip's eyes fluttered shut at the sensation of his stubble brushing against the insides of her legs.

Holy fucking -

She cried out when he moved in between them. One hand wrapped in Sirius hair, the other clutching the sheets, her toes curled. It was only when Pip's cries became more desperate that he released her. She was lightheaded.

Beneath heavy lids, she saw Sirius's silver eyes trained on hers as he crept upwards. Pip captured him with swollen lips, gasping as he made them as close as two separate beings could be.

She clutched herself to him as they rocked together, pulling him in deeper with her legs, fingers digging into his skin. He moaned Pip's name into the hollow of her neck as though it were a prayer.

No, Pip's dreams didn't compare. She was drunk on Sirius.

Both finished with a song of trembling gasps. The two of them lay there, catching their breath, still entwined together. Sirius pulled Pip onto him so that she was splayed out against his chest, moving peacefully with the rise and fall of his unsteady breaths.

'That was...'

Pip shifted so she could see him. He was staring at her like she was some sort of goddess. He brushed his thumb over her lip and she smiled against it. 'I know,' she said.

Pip had fucked many people in the past. She didn't make love, she fucked. Whatever that was, though, it wasn't fucking - the word was too crass to describe it. And for some reason, that worried her.

Tonks nudged Pip's side with her elbow. 'Earth to Pip. You still with us?'

Pip startled back to reality, looking around at the brightly coloured store. 'Yeah, yeah,' she said. 'I'm a little distracted, that's all.'

'You're distracted a lot these days,' Tonks pointed out shrewdly.

Pip hummed and returned to the row of glittering, beaded dresses she'd been perusing before disappearing into another daydream – or rather memory – of certain nocturnal activities. Tonks was right, though. It was happening more than usual. But so were the nocturnal activities.

But right now she was on a mission and had to concentrate. It was one of the fashion nature, rather than the Order vein, which was why she had enlisted Fleur.

'What about zis one?' Fleur suggested, holding up a fluffy peach gown.

'Are you trying to sabotage me?' Pip questioned, only half-joking.

Fleur pursed her lips, muttering something in French, and returned the gown to its rack.

This was the third robe store the trio had ventured into and Pip was beginning to give up hope she would find something less-than-hideous to wear to the bloody Prophet gala. The whole thing was more trouble than it was worth. It might be salvaged if there was an open bar, though.

Success came with store number four. Fleur looked ready to throttle Pip by the time they finished.

Afterwards (when she was safely out of range from Fleur's hands), Pip trudged to her room and tossed the gown into her closet where it landed in a heap. She strolled over to the window, lit a cigarette and basked in the warm sunlight. Summer was coming with a vengeance.

With an astonished laugh, Pip realised it'd almost been a year since this had all started. Since Bill had plucked her from the grimy streets of New York and deposited her into the equally grimy walls of Grimmauld Place. A year since she had become a rebel in the literal sense.

A year since she had met the man leaning in the threshold of her bedroom door. 'What are you thinking about?' Sirius murmured.

Pip stubbed out her cigarette on the windowsill. 'Time, I guess. It's funny isn't it?'

'Funny,' Sirius concurred, coming to a standstill behind her. She leaned into him unconsciously, gaze still trained out the window.

A young family wandered down the street. Two children, a boy and a girl, skipped ahead of their parents, each holding fluorescent balloons that caught the sunlight. The sound of their laughter carried up to the window and Pip was hit with a pang of sorrow she wasn't expecting.

'Tell me about my parents, Sirius,' she requested, surprising herself. 'Do you remember them?'

If Sirius was caught off-guard, he didn't show it. He wrapped his arms around Pip and thought for a moment. 'Your dad had a dry sense of humour, and I mean really dry. He was clever. Quick-witted, really quick-witted...I think the only one who could keep up with him was your mum,' Sirius chuckled. 'She kept him in place, sort of like the heart to his head...You know, I was really a child myself when I met them,' he said. 'Joined the Order straight out of Hogwarts; one of the first meetings I went to was at your house. You were there.'

'Really?' Pip asked, brow creased.

'You snuck downstairs with your sisters,' Sirius smiled. 'Your mum gave you a proper earbashing for it.'

A memory stole into Pip's mind. Scraped knees against the floor, ear pressed to a door, her lips were twisted in determination to hear what the adults were talking about. She was about seven years old. Flanking her were a five year old Imogen, the middle child who followed Pip around like she was paid for it, and a three year old Cordelia, the baby.

Pip teetered off balance as the door gave way. Her mother was glowering down at her. 'Ophelia! What do you think you're doing!'

'Mum! Can't I stay?' Pip whined, craning her neck to see around her mother's form.

Pip smiled as the memory dissolved. She had been such a pain as a child.

Which explained the unanimous shock she was met with upon growing into a docile teenager. At Hogwarts, she'd studied hard, followed rules and did anything she could think of to make her dead family proud. It was only in her last year that the pointlessness of such an undertaking had dawned on her and the seeds of hedonism were planted.

Merlin knew they had been thoroughly reaped since.

Pip and Sirius stood in silence, reminiscing. After a while, he asked if she fancied a drink and she consented with a kiss. Both froze at the sound of a tinkling crash.

Lupin was rooted outside the door, staring at them as though they'd both grown second heads. At his feet lay the fragments of a teacup, milky brown liquid trickling out of it.

A few traumatically long seconds passed. 'Harry's in the fireplace downstairs,' Lupin finally said, tone a little strangled. Pip didn't think he'd blinked once. 'Says he wants to ask you about something.'

Sirius wove past them, apparently indifferent to Lupin's shell-shock. Lupin followed but not without one last, stunned glance at Pip.

Caught in flagrante...there went discretion. Bugger.

AN: I feel like Ms Perky from 10 Things I Hate About You.