Disclaimer: Sadly, I don't own any of the Harry Potter characters. Everything belongs to JK Rowling, and I'm merely allowed to play around with them. No copyright infringement is intended.
Posting this a little early because we reached over 100 followers. ^^ Thank you so much! :D I hope you will enjoy this chapter. :) Love you!
Chapter 11
-o-O-o-
"I DON'T BELIEVE IT!"
Hermione sighed. This was getting tiring. First, Mary hadn't believed it when she told her she had had a flying accident. Next, Remus didn't believe he had lost his bet and had stared at Hermione's ten straight O's O.W.L. results for hours. And now, Lily was refusing to believe James had been made Head Boy.
"I don't believe it..." she repeated, more quietly this time, and with her hands clutching her mouth. "You," she pointed at James, whose grin was threatening to go all around his face. "Head Boy?" she was turning a slight shade of green. "I'm going to throw up." she mumbled incoherently before leaving the train compartment in a hurry.
"See?" James declared, opening his arms to gesture at himself. "I'm irresistible! By the end of this year, Lily Evans will be desperately in love with me!" he said, laughing at his own plan.
"Would've taken you long enough." Sirius laughed. "It's been, what, six year you've been trying to get her to marry you?" he asked, winking. "I can do that it a week with more or less anyone." He seemed rather confident, but Hermione had noted that he avoided talking to her directly, so as to avoid any awkwardness. For this, she was grateful, as she was, more or less, doing the same thing.
Peter snorted. "Like right you can!" he added ironically. "Remember you first crush?"
Sirius paled and Hermione laughed. "What about your first crush, Sirius?" she asked him, a mischievous look on her face.
"Nothing." he said quickly, colour quickly regaining his cheeks. Seeing a disbelieving look on her face, he added, scratching the back of his head nervously: "I might have… You know, asked a girl out and be rejected… Once."
Hermione laughed again, clapping her hands.
Sirius frowned at her angrily. "Hey!" he yelled. "I was just a twelve year old boy and Mary was more into books than boys, that's all!"
"It was Mary?" she asked, laughing even louder.
Remus grinned. "It was." he confirmed. "He wouldn't stop going on about her for two weeks, which is very long for Sirius' obsessions. Then, as he wouldn't stop pestering us, we, as in James, Peter and I, talked to her and convinced her to meet Sirius in the kitchens before dinner." He started laughing, so James tried to take over.
"He was feeling so confident, because apparently being a Black made him 'irresistible'." he added, chuckling already. "So he went with his chest all puffed up and, at dinner, he arrived, his skin orange!" He laughed again. "But not normal orange, like neon orange, so much he glowed at night!"
Sirius glared at the laughing friends. "It not my fault she didn't like it when I told her I thought she had beautiful shins that I'd like to stroke with my own!" he shouted. "It sounded very romantic back then! Then she just freaked out, threw the nearest jug of pumpkin juice at me and cursed me and I couldn't get that damned spell off me for a week!"
They all continued laughing at him so he yelled: "Stop laughing!"
They stopped immediately and desperately to keep a straight face. Then, after a short pause, Peter said, leaning slightly towards Hermione: "You know what the whole school called him for months after that?"
James and Remus turned away, tears of laughter in their eyes. "No." she said, covering up a chuckle as a cough.
Sirius glared at Peter. "Don't. You. Dare." he hissed at the smaller boy.
Peter ignored him. "We called him the Glowing Star." he added, and all four of them burst out laughing again.
Hermione's belly started hurting from all the laughing. "Oh my God." she squeaked, unable to talk properly, as Sirius just crossed his arms and glared at a certain rat Animagus. "I'm going to pee!" she squeaked again and, struggling to do so, she got up and left the compartment, bent over and clutching her stomach, giggling hysterically.
When she was gone, it took the boy as couple of minutes to calm down. "Arseholes." he told them venomously.
Remus wiped a tear from his eye. "It could've been worse." he said. "We could've told her about the crush you had on her when she arrived."
Sirius paled but quickly regained his composure. "That still doesn't excuse your behaviour." he said, narrowing his eyes. "That was just an old uninteresting story."
James raised an eyebrow. "What's wrong Glowing Star?" he said, and the two others chuckled slightly. "You still desperately in love with Hermione dearest?" he asked, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.
Sirius gulped down. "No, of course not." he said defensively. "I never really did, and you know that. I just... found the novelty of her presence interesting. I'm totally over that now."
"Uh huh." James said, unimpressed by his best friend's answer. "Try that again, without the pitiful lies this time."
Sirius glared at him. "Fuck you!" he told him, uncrossing his arms and balling his hands into fists at his sides.
Remus gasped and held his hand to his mouth. "I don't believe it." he whispered. He pulled his hand away and stared at the Black boy incredulously. "You're in love with Hermione." he stated, not as if he was questioning the boy but merely acknowledging something true.
"No way!" Sirius shouted, springing up. "Sirius Black doesn't love anyone!"
James smiled teasingly. "Sirius and Hermione, sitting in a tree…" he sang.
"Shut up!" Sirius yelled, grabbing his head forcefully and pulling at his hair in frustration.
"Come on Sirius." Peter piped in. "It's not so bad. I mean, she's a nice girl, plain but not ugly…"
"You don't get it!" he yelled again. "I didn't want this! I didn't ask for any of this! You think I enjoy feeling dominated?! I left my home to feel free and now I'm chained again!"
"Hey, hey, hey." James said, raising his hands to calm his friends down. "Love doesn't make you lose your freedom. Look at me, I'm free. And I'm in love. Happily so."
Sirius suddenly looked exhausted. He slumped back into his seat, propping his head up on his hands and his elbows on his knees. "I just don't know what to do. I don't love her but… I feel like we have a connection. And I didn't choose to have it. I just… I feel hopeless."
Remus placed a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Why don't you try asking her on a date?" he asked.
He, turned to glare at him, probably going to answer something bitingly, but he had to swallow it as Lily walked back in just then. She froze at the door, taking in the scene before her. "Have I missed something?" she asked.
James smiled, pretending they didn't just have a very grave conversation. "I'm afraid you have, Lily, dearest. We brought up the Glowing Star again and Hermione laughed so hard she had to go pee. Sirius' ego is in a very bad shape." he told her, gesturing to his friend being comforted by the werewolf.
Lily had only retained part of the sentence, though. "Lily dearest?" she asked, surprised at the pet name.
"Why, yes of course!" James said, as if it was the most obvious thing on earth. "You are the dearest thing to me, after all." While Lily froze there, obviously stunned, James stood up and declared: "Well, I don't know about you, but I've got rounds to do. I'm Head Boy, you see." He winked at their general direction. "See you, people." And with that, he left the train compartment and a still unmoving Lily.
After a few minutes, she did move, though. She gaped like a goldfish a little before asking: "Is he actually taking his duties seriously?" she asked.
Remus shrugged. "Apparently." he said, seemingly not surprised by the matter, which only made Lily's eyes widen further. She gulped and nodded, before leaving off to her rounds. Peter spoke up: "What are you talking about, Moony? James never takes his duties seriously…"
He shook her head. "No, he didn't. But I figured James would need some help to get Lily before school ends." he explained.
Sirius scoffed. "And once he does get her, he'll get rid of her after only a couple of months."
Remus glared. "Not everyone is like you, Pads." he reproached him. "We don't all go through eight girls a week. Although…" he seemed to add with a small smile. "It's been two or three months now that you've been obsessing after Hermione."
Sirius shot him a murderous stare. "If they ever have a kid," he said, ignoring Remus' previous remark. "His name will be James Sirius, I'm sure of it."
Remus laughed. "I doubt that. Lily isn't the James junior type of girl… Although James will probably beg her to let him name it." he added as a second thought, pulling away from his friend and crossing his arms behind his head and extending his long lanky legs in front of himself.
There was a pause before Peter said: "That's okay Sirius, you can name your own kid James Sirius. If you get Hermione to agree of course."
Sirius scrambled up, muttering a string of insults as Peter jumped up and slipped out of the compartment, giggling insanely. Sirius stomped after the smaller boy, leaving Remus, alone in the compartment, laughing quietly to himself.
-o-O-o-
"Goodness me." Hermione muttered to herself, exiting the girls' lavatory, smiling. "He truly doesn't know the meaning of tact."
A smooth, cool voice came from her left. "As much as I like it when you insult my brother, if you continue speaking to yourself, you'll end up at Saint Mungo's."
Hermione turned her head and sighed. "Good afternoon to you too, Regulus. I hope you had a nice summer." she said.
Regulus pushed away from a wall and stepped out of the shadows. Does that guy always have to be lurking somewhere dark? she asked herself. "Nice, no. Eventful, yes." he smirked. "Learn the difference." he added, sneering.
She rolled her eyes. This condescendence didn't affect her anymore. She was very much used to it by now. He was neatly shaved, as always, although shadows formed under his eyes, indicating lack of sleep. His clothes were impeccable, too, and his eyebrow was arched delicately, in a way that made him seem above all others. Through his straight dark hair, she could see that his grey eyes betrayed feelings, though, which were properly hidden behind his mask of a face.
"You're staring, Granger." he warned, and she averted his eyes immediately.
"If you were polite at all," she retorted, trying not to look put out by his remark. "You'd have asked me how my vacations have been."
"There is no need to. I know exactly how your vacations went." he told her unashamed. "You revised and passed you O.W.L.'s, you worked at that pathetic excuse for a bar, the Three Broomsticks, you had fun with your friends near the end and now here you are." he finished. She stared again.
"How would you know?" she asked.
He smirked. "Rumours fly, my dear, rumours fly." She looked at him suspiciously, and he laughed. "No, I'm just kidding. I just got your last letter."
She frowned. "The one where I told you my work was hell?" she asked. "And about all my plans for the rest of the summer?"
"The very same." he admitted.
She gasped and hit his arm slightly. "You jerk!" she yelled. "Why the hell didn't you answer?"
He was slightly surprised at her choice of language, but remained calm nevertheless. Besides, he wasn't going to tell her the real reason, which was that he'd been writhing in pain as he got branded with the Dark Mark. "I just couldn't be bothered." he answered, shrugging.
Bingo. he thought as he saw her face become red with anger. Two birds with one stone. I get to hide the truth, and I make her mad. I am a genius.
"You utter bastard!" she burst out. "I can't believe I spent my time writing to you and you just probably laid down in bed and thought 'Oh, fuck, it's the Mudblood again, I'm not answering this time, I'll just not answer and make her believe I got captured by Death Eaters and died.'!"
He froze. "That's what you thought?" he asked softly.
She blushed. She had thought that. After all, Harry had mentioned, when he told her about Regulus' presence on the Black family tree, that he had dies at a very young age, maybe sixteen or seventeen. So, of course she had been worried. Worried that she might be missing out on the first murder she couldn't change.
Instead of telling him that, though, she just stared at her feet. "Granger," he said softly. "Why are you so worried about me?" When she didn't answer, he continued. "Why do you care about what I become when I've been nothing but an arse to you from the first time we met? I mean, I haven't exactly been nice to you or anything…"
She sighed and looked up. He looked really troubled. "I don't know." she said. "I have no bloody clue why I care so much, or why I care at all! I hate you, and yet…" she stared in his eyes. "And yet…"
She was at loss for words, but thankfully, he finished her sentence for her. "And yet you can't get me out of your mind. It's not exactly me, just that nagging voice that sounds like me and scares you to death."
She looked up at him. How did he know? During the whole summer, she had thought about his words 'It might just be your last.' Had he said them on purpose just to annoy her? Yet when she stared inside his light grey eyes, she knew he hadn't. He had been sincere. And that scared her even more.
"I guess," he finally said. "We can now both be officially called insane." he smiled slightly. Not his usual smirk, but a real, tempting smile that reflected the inside of his soul.
And there and then, in the Hogwarts Express, she realised that Regulus Arcturus Black wasn't evil. No, he was just alone. He needed somebody. A friend. Someone to confide in. To keep all his secrets.
He needed her.
"Yeah," she laughed breathily, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear nervously. "We've both gone totally bonkers."
"You more than me, of course." he added, cheekiness shining brightly in his eyes. "Mudblood." he added after a while. He didn't say it as an insult, more like a joke.
"Pure-blooded snob." she retorted.
"Bushy hair."
"Star-obsessed freak."
"Nerdy bookworm."
"Mummy's boy."
He smirked. "Touché."
They stayed there for a few minutes, neither of them saying anything, before she asked. "So… Truce?"
He nodded, trying to seem reluctant. "Truce… Hermione." he held out his hand.
She shook it. His fingers were unusually warm, for someone with such a pale face. "Truce it is, then… Regulus." She smiled.
He smiled back. "Yes, I know, I rather like my name too." he added cockily to disperse the seriousness of their declarations.
She laughed. But, just as she did so, Peter ran through the corridor and in between Regulus and her, giggling and they heard footsteps get closer to them. They turned their heads just in time to see Sirius running after Peter, a murderous look on his face. But, as he saw the two people in the corridor, he skidded to a stop and the emotions on his face flickered from surprise, to loathing as his gaze lingered over Regulus, then to worry as he glanced at Hermione, before settling on defensiveness. He walked over to Hermione, stood next to her but slightly in front of her, clearly trying to be protective. "What do you want from her?" he spat at his brother.
Regulus raised an eyebrow, clearly not impressed by his bulky sibling. "Why, Hermione and I were just having a friendly conversation." he said nastily. "Wasn't it obvious?"
Sirius growled. "No, it wasn't. It looked more like you were harassing her." he said. "Now, I will ask again, what do you want from her?"
Regulus chuckled evilly. "I see you have found out my true intentions." he said ironically. "I wanted to torture her for being a filthy little Mudblood of course. Now if you'll excuse us, we were busy." Regulus made a move to walk towards Hermione, who was paralysed by the whole scene, but Sirius stood in his way.
"Hell no!" he shouted. "If you want to get to her you'll have to get through me!"
"Have you no decorum?" Regulus sneered. "Oh, forgive me, I often forget that you got blasted off the tapestry, you are no longer a Black. You're not even a Potter. What do you even do over there? Are you there lapdog?" he asked.
Sirius was fuming. "Whatever you say about can't hurt me anymore." he said quietly. "I don't care about what you think. Not anymore. You can't touch me."
"Oh, are you better than me now?" Regulus scoffed. "To high up for me to see you?"
Sirius smiled, but it was a sad smile, one that looked out of place in his furious posture. "Quite the opposite." he said. "I'm too low for you to even notice my presence. You can't bring me any lower." This display of humility shocked Regulus so he didn't retort anything, which Sirius used to continue. "I really couldn't care less about the image I give out anymore." He squeezed his eyes shut and dipped his head, his fists still clenched. "I know I'm a piece of shit. I know I'm worthless. I know I have a bad temper, I act rashly, I also tend to hate people for no reason… I know it's not okay."
"I…" Regulus tried to answer, but didn't know what to say. He couldn't very well act evil if was unprovoked now, could he?
"Just shut up." Sirius told, but he didn't snap at him. "I don't need you to remind me of what I've done. I know what I've done."
Regulus gulped.
Sirius' head snapped up and he glared at Regulus with a new fire lighting up in his eyes. "I know what I've done!" he yelled. "I'm guilty! I've broken hearts, I've broken egos! I've broken dreams! I'm not a good person! I get it! I'm not worthy enough to be a Gryffindor! I don't have good blood like you do! Mother always liked you best because of that anyway!"
"Blood doesn't matter." Regulus finally said.
Sirius stared at his brother's eyes. He had put back a blank mask but through his eyes, Sirius knew his feelings. They had the same eyes after all. Regulus was tormented.
"You think I didn't notice?" Regulus asked quietly. "I saw it too. Ruby red, that Muggle blood." Sirius looked surprised but Regulus continued. "I just wasn't brave like you. I didn't stand up to Mother and Father like you did, even though I knew they were wrong. You may not be perfect, but I'm a hypocrite. You are a true Gryffindor, and I'm a true Slytherin. Survival instinct is what comes first. And right now, it's telling me to leave."
Regulus turned, his robed flapping behind him, and started back down the corridor. "Reg, wait!" Sirius shouted on instinct.
Regulus stopped but didn't turn around. "Let's just pretend today never happened." he said.
Sirius nodded. "Just know… Know that I'm sorry." he said. "For leaving you alone. I know we said 'forever' and… And it's all my fault."
Regulus' back stiffened. "It's too late now." he hissed. "Neither of us can turn back. We'll have to live with everything we've done." Like murder. he thought, but didn't voice it out loud, for fear that someone was listening in. And with that he left, leaving Sirius and a very shocked Hermione behind.
Said girl gulped down and asked: "What was that all about?"
Sirius sighed and turned towards her. Cautiously, he tucked the hair on the left side of her face behind her ear with his right hand. "One day," he whispered. "I'll explain. I promise. But please," he begged, moving his hand to her cheek and taking a step towards her. "Please promise me you'll be safe in return."
"Regulus won't hurt me." she said, her voice firm.
"I wasn't necessarily talking about him." he said, stroking her cheek with his thumb.
"Then who-" she started to ask but he cut her off.
"Promise me." he insisted. "I maybe won't always be there to keep you safe."
She knew it was useless to argue. "I promise." she told him.
He smiled and pulled her towards him. She gasped but this time she didn't pull away. They were so close, she could see the impossibly light grey his eyes were. Like molten silver. Warm and fiery, full of energy. But she only saw them for a second before they fluttered shut and he pressed his lips to hers.
-o-O-o-
I know, I know. ^^ You hate me right now. :p But the next chapter is already written so you should get your weekly update, while I try to stick to my schedule for once. ^^ A weekly Saturday update sounds reasonable to me, does it seem okay to you? :) Let me know your thoughts in a review! :)
Thanks to all the people who read, favorite, follow and review this story! Shoutout to last week's reviewers: Alessandra.12 (Thank you for the compliment! :D) and stormywolfrunner (Thank you for wishing me a happy birthday! :D) I love you all!