Sunday dinners finally began feeling normal for Hermione again, now that her schedule was solidified and she hadn't had to cover for anyone at the Café.
As always, Tonks and Harry gave Sirius shit for being a pushover at work and Lily took over feeding Teddy as James and Remus tried their best to carve and serve the roast.
Luna joined them this Sunday at Ginny's request, so the two of them and Hermione broke into Lily's expensive Goblin Wine to plan Ginny's hen night.
At one point, Teddy had the bright idea to get his favorite uncle's attention by flinging a spoonful of mashed potatoes into Sirius's hair, which had been tied back at the nape with a single plum ribbon he'd found in the office.
"Seeus," Teddy screamed as the potatoes met their mark. Surprised, Sirius reached up into his hair and looked at his gravy-covered fingers in mock horror.
"Excuse you, Mr. Lupin," Sirius said, as the rest of the table hid their snickers.
Remus had had a long conversation with his family at the last Sunday dinner about laughing at Teddy's misbehavior. "It only encourages him," Remus had said, tiredly. So no one dared laugh this time, although it was quite funny.
Sirius, however, stood and walked to his small nephew, running his gravy-fingers through the boy's hair.
"Seeus, gross," the boy screamed, wiping at his hair with a napkin. Remus shot a quick glare at his friend.
"I'm sorry I didn't hear you call my name, Teds. I promise I wasn't ignoring you." He picked the boy up out of his high chair and carried him back to his own seat, just around the corner of the table from Hermione.
Teddy glared up at his uncle, pouting his lips. The rest of the table seemed to continue their own conversations.
"But you can't get attention by throwing your food. It's bad table manners and it's gonna make your mum and dad angry with you. We can't have that, can we?"
Teddy grumbled.
"Ted, apologize to your uncle," Tonks said, giving her son the mom-eye from her place by Lily.
Teddy's eyes filled with tears as he looked back at Sirius and threw his head into the man's chest.
"Sorry," he said, trying to hide from the eyes of anyone still watching the scene. Besides his parents, though, the only one looking in their direction was Ginny.
Sirius grabbed a napkin and began cleaning the potatoes out of his own fingers and then worked on cleaning the mess out of the child's hair.
As if feeling a pair of eyes on him, he looked up and met the blue eyes of the soon-to-be Potter smirking at him.
"What," he asked the witch, pulling the ribbon from his hair. Her responding smirk reminded him of cats and canaries.
"Nothing," she said innocently, eyes locking on the ribbon now laying on the table. "I'm just wondering why my bridesmaid's dress-sample was in your hair."
Hermione looked over, eyes landing on the ribbon in question, and then looking at Sirius who was using his wand to vanish the potatoes from his hair.
"I needed to pull my hair back. I saw the ribbon laying around, so I used it."
"Where did you find it," Ginny asked.
Harry sighed. "Gin, does it matter?"
She smiled at her fiancé. "I guess not. It's just that I left all the samples at Hermione's place, so I know he didn't find it here."
Sirius narrowed his eyes at the little witch looking at him so smugly. She was trying to get at something and Sirius had no interest in finding out what she was insinuating.
"I found it in my office. You know. The one I share with Hermione?"
"Yeah, I'd put them in my purse, Ginny. One must have fallen out," Hermione said, calmly. "It's really not a big deal."
Ginny hissed, and Tonks suspiciously struck up a conversation with James about the latest quidditch match against Ireland.
Hermione looked between Ginny and Sirius, much the same way Harry looked between the two. But unlike Hermione's wild curiosity, Harry looked worried.
She sent her best friend a questioning glance, to which he shook his head in reply, taking a swig of Ginny's wine and joining his father's quidditch talk.
The whole thing was weird.
That was when Lily stood up with a brand new bottle of wine and invited all the ladies to adjourn to the sitting room to properly plan Ginny's hen night.
Ginny, Luna, Tonks and Hermione all made their way toward the other room when Tonks asked Hermione if she could take Teddy to Harry's old room to sleep off his food coma.
The little boy was snuggled deeply into Sirius's chest, snoring softly as his uncle rubbed circles on his back and laughed at Harry's latest quidditch opinion.
James seemed to vehemently disagree with son about Puddlemere's chances this season and was about to loudly say so when Remus reminded him of the sleeping child.
Hermione giggled at them, the three she grew up around and the fourth currently holding a sleeping child. She approached her work partner and gestured for him to give her the boy.
He stood without question and silently transferred the child into her waiting arms.
"Careful, he's getting heavy," he whispered, dropping the last bit of the boy's weight on her. She smiled.
"Nothing I can't handle," and she adjusted the boy in her arms. She shot a quick smile at Remus and gestured toward the stairs so he'd know where to find the boy at the end of the night when his wife would undoubtedly be too pissed to take care of him.
Remus nodded his acknowledgement and returned to his conversation.
Halfway up the stairs, though, she noticed she and Teddy weren't alone. She glanced behind her and saw Sirius following up the stairs.
Remaining silent, so as to not wake Teddy, she made her way to the room and lay the boy down on Harry's childhood bed, arranging the pillows around him to cage him and keep him from falling.
Sirius stood at the door, watching the boy sleep when Hermione prodded him out of the room and closed the door.
"What is it," she asked him, barely above a whisper since they were still close enough to wake the toddler.
Sirius gently took her elbow and pulled her into the next available room across the hallway, and closed the door.
The room was decorated in soft turquoise colors, except for the queen bed in the center covered in a white quilt. The pillows were a soft pink and the closet was half open revealing a small smattering of outfits left on hangers, as though the occupant may or may not come back to collect them.
Or save them for a rainy day, Hermione thought.
Sirius looked around and let out a deep chuckle, sending her an amused grin.
"So this is your room?"
"It was," she replied, sitting on the bed and leaning against the headboard.
"Come off it," he laughed, sitting opposite her and leading against the footboard. He grinned. "It's still your room."
"You had something to say, Sirius?"
He did. But upon entering the room which smelled so strongly of the girl before him, he'd lost his train of thought entirely. The whole Hermione-ness of the room caught him off guard again. Clouding his brain momentarily.
James is downstairs.
He cleared his throat and looked toward the poster on the far wall depicting a pile of rustic looking books with fancy typography spelling out something about "classics."
"Yeah, um." He started rubbing the back of his neck and stood up. "Nevermind, actually. I'll tell you at work tomorrow."
Quickly he started for the door when he felt a tug at the corner of his jacket.
"Sirius," Hermione said. Simply. Just his name. And it sounded like music. It was like laying in the library of his childhood home, in a patch of sun from the window, listening to whatever record Mr. and Mrs. Potter had sent him for Easter Holiday.
He faced her and took her hand off the leather, instead twining his fingers with hers.
"I promise I didn't look through your purse," he said.
Hermione was shocked.
That wasn't anywhere near what she'd expected him to say. Truth be told, she hadn't any idea what he was going to say, but that was definitely not it.
She had to physically shake her head to clear it of the fog she'd unintentionally created when she found herself closed up in her childhood bedroom with Sirius. A full-grown man.
A man who had been driving her crazy for the last four years, but worse yet in the last three weeks.
What was even more insane was how he was acting right now. At this moment, in her room. He was fidgeting, like he was nervous.
His hand, curiously holding her own, was sweaty. And warm. And all she could smell was the leather of his jacket and the lingering tobacco from his pre-dinner cigarette. And she was starting to become incredibly annoyed at herself for not hating that stupid tobacco scent which used to make her gag.
Instead, she found herself feeling comforted by the smell. It was around all the time. At work at the Ministry. At the Café. At the Potters'. Not at her flat, though. Never at her flat.
But now it was here, in her childhood room and she thought maybe it would linger just for a little while.
"I know you didn't. No need to apologize," she said. She looked up at his face. His eyes were trained on hers.
"I just thought you'd be upset after Ginny," he breathed.
How did his face get closer?
"Ginny's drunk," she cut him off, trying to decide which stormy grey eye to focus on. The room was getting darker and darker as the sun dipped below the horizon.
"Yeah, well," he swallowed.
"They did fall out, I was in a rush on Friday. Must have left one on the ground."
The truth was Sirius had found the ribbon she'd been toying with that day. He may have picked it up off her desk when she left to the loo and hid it in his robes pocket. But she didn't need to know that.
In fact, she didn't need to be in this position at all. He'd somehow cornered her against the post of her bed, faces inappropriately near, his hand still grasping hers for dear life.
Her eyes briefly glanced down at his lips and when he felt himself lean down, the spell was broken.
Sirius released her small hand, reiterating his apology, and left, closing the door behind him.
What was that?
There was laughter in the kitchen when he came back down, but as soon as he stepped in to join his friends and godson, the laughter stopped.
Remus and James cast glances between themselves Smirking. Harry refused to look up from the table where his hands were fidgeting with a beer bottle cap.
He caught Remus looking at him with a dopey smile on his face and deflated as he realized he'd been caught.
He reached for a beer in the middle of the table and sank back in his seat as he popped off the cap.
"I'm fucked," he breathed out and took a swig in preparation for the oncoming storm.
James and Remus erupted into laughter.
"What the hell was that, Ginny," Tonks practically yelled at the redhead as they all settled onto the couches in the Potter's living room.
"Why'd you pinch me, you numpty," Ginny countered.
"What were you trying to do there? If these two are going to figure anything out, they have to do it themselves. They don't need any weird ribbon accusations from you," Tonks spat, clearly annoyed. Ginny rolled her eyes.
"Tonks. They're seeing each other. They're lying to us."
At this, Lily started laughing. Uncontrollably. She motioned for Luna to pour the wine glasses, which the blonde took to doing quite happily.
"What on Earth makes you say that, Gin," the older redhead asked, wiping the tears of laughter from her eyes. Her face was almost as red as her hair.
"I caught Hermione getting ready for a date a couple weeks ago," Ginny said, excitedly. "And she was trying to get rid of me without admitting it, but I figured it out. And then she refused to tell me who it was with."
No one watched as Luna's eyes grew round as saucers and threw back two of the glasses she'd already poured for the other girls. She shakily began pouring more.
Tonks, however, was very interested in Ginny's story.
"And what makes you think it's Sirius," the pink-haired woman asked.
"And what makes you think it's serious," Lily added, laughing at her own joke.
"Oh come on, you're going to tell me you don't see the cow eyes they make at each other when they think no one's looking?"
Lily snorted again, finally taking the wine bottle from Luna who was taking swigs straight from the long bottle neck instead of filling the now empty glasses. She gave her a slight scolding look and returned her attention to Ginny, her voice going down to a near whisper in case anyone was near enough to listen in.
"Ginny, I've known Sirius Black for longer than you've been alive. If he were in a relationship, it wouldn't be a secret," she said fondly. "And upon my expert knowledge I can guarantee that the 'cow eyes' he throws in Hermione's direction have everything to do with pining. He looks far too sad to be victorious."
Tonks nodded her head in agreement and added, "also, no way Hermione's getting laid. She's still too tightly wound. We'd know."
Lily sent a disapproving look at Tonks, which earned her a muttered apology from the other woman.
"Well if they're not seeing each other and Hermione doesn't have a secret boyfriend, why is she always so busy," Ginny whined, leaning her head on Lily's shoulder. Lily patted the girl in comfort and shrugged.
"Hermione never stops. She's a go-getter," Lily said, smiling fondly over her surrogate daughter.
The door to the sitting room opened and Hermione walked in plopping herself down next to Tonks who wrapped her arms around the brunette's waist. Luna, a little worse for wear, crawled over to Hermione and took her hand in her own.
"So are we planning a Hen party, or are we currently having a Hen party?"
"Why not both," Lily laughed and handed everyone a wine glass, except for the blonde who merely smiled at her as she struggled to remain upright.
Several bouts of laughter and glasses of wine later, Tonks and Luna were passed out on the couch as Lily, Ginny and Hermione lay sprawled out across the floor staring at the ceiling and in deep conversation.
"But I don't get it," Ginny said. "Not that I don't love James, but why did you finally give in? I mean, you were so –" but the door swung open to reveal James, Remus, Sirius and Harry all looking rather haggard.
"This party about winding down," James asked, smiling softly at the three women on the floor. Lily returned his smile before responding.
"We were having such a good time."
Remus walked over to his sleeping wife, shaking her gently.
"What time is it," Tonks groaned, sitting up slowly.
"It's 1:30," Remus whispered.
Hermione jolted upright, quickly falling back down onto her pillow as searing pain jolted through her head and she realized the room was slowly spinning.
Sirius stepped over Ginny and Lily and crouched down beside her, looking down at her face which was scrunched up tight.
"Careful there, Kitten. No sudden movements after drinking too much," he laughed. He looked up to see Harry help Ginny stand and throw a triumphant look Sirius's way. Ginny, however, was complaining that Lily had been in the middle of a story.
"Do you need me to help you floo home," Sirius asked the brunette still laying on the ground. She shook her head slowly. "We can take my bike, instead," he tried. Hermione snorted.
"You wish, Black."
"How do you want me to get you home, then," he asked her, noticing she had maneuvered her head to rest on his jean-clad lap.
"I don't want to go to that place," she all but whispered. "It's quiet and lonely." Her eyes had yet to open again.
Sirius understood immediately. The type of truths that come out after a heavy night of drinking are the ones they were typically too proud to say otherwise. And Sirius understood it so deeply.
Instead, he crouched, picking her up first by the shoulders, then by the legs. Everyone else seemed to have cleared out of the room, except for Luna who was a pile of blonde hair strewn across the whole couch. He chuckled, making a note to send the girl upstairs before he left.
Making it up the stairs he saw Lily gently closing the door to Harry's old room. When she looked up and saw him with a sleeping Hermione, opened the door to Hermione's old room.
"I'll go get extra blankets," she whispered, stepping out of his way and leaving the two alone in the room for the second time that night.
Sirius carefully set her down and turned down the bed for her to get comfortable. He looked at her face, finally relaxed almost totally asleep. The story Lily was telling the girls must have been interesting to keep this sleepy girl awake, considering how quickly she fell asleep.
He gently brushed back a curl that had fallen across her eyes, tucking it behind her ear.
"Sirius. It's been a couple years. We all know."
"What do you mean 'we all?'" He asked James, knowing full well what he meant. He was just hoping to keep a smidgen of dignity.
Harry let his head fall on the table with a loud bang, and looked up at his godfather.
"All of us," he said in exasperation. "Everyone at this table, every woman in the other room except for Hermione herself, strangely."
Sirius was about to say something else when Harry continued. "Everyone at the Ministry suspects it. Susan is absolutely furious thinking you two are actually together. Ron has known for a whole year and didn't bother to tell me thinking I'd caught on, too. Mum has been trying to orchestrate a way for you to come clean to us all but apparently, as the great emotionally mature person that you are, needed to come to terms with it first. So what is it Sirius? Are you there yet?"
James looked impressed. Remus looked proud. Sirius was flabbergasted.
Was he there? He looked at his two best friends. They were ok with this?
"You won't castrate me if I admit it?"
Suddenly earnest, James replied. "Not for admitting it, no." Sirius swallowed loudly. "Just if you royally fuck it up."
"Don't fuck it up, Sirius," Harry warned before the conversation turned to an upcoming music festival.
Here he was. Just watching her.
"I'm not asleep, you pervert," came her sweet voice, amusing him greatly. She grabbed his jacket again and pulled him down beside her in the bed, eyes still closed. "If you're going to stay, you may as well sleep."
It had been too easy, he thought, to let himself fall into bed beside her. It would be just as easy to reach out and pull her into him, to fall asleep like that.
But tonight wasn't the night, and he knew it. So he sat up and swung his legs over the side to stand.
"You aren't staying, then?"
"No Kitten. You don't really want me to."
"Yes I do." Her eyes were open now, peering straight into his. "You smell nice."
A corner of his mouth ticked up. "How about I leave the jacket?" He easily slipped the leather off his shoulders and laid it across her. He watched as she snuggled into it and sighed, making his own heart jump up into his chest.
Don't fuck it up, Sirius.
"Don't worry about coming in tomorrow. You deserve a day off," he told her, closing the door behind him.
When Hermione woke the next morning, it was to the feeling of an arm wrapped tightly around her waist and a face buried deeply into her back. Looking down, she caught the sight of small, slender and pale arms. She turned her head to see long blonde hair strewn over the opposite side of the bed.
But her head was pounding. Looking at the bedside table she noticed two bottles of sober-up potion with name labels written in Lily's beautiful script. Hermione, one said. The other said Luna.
She sat up slowly and winced as she felt something peel off of her face. Looking down she saw black leather scrunched up against her pillow; she'd been hugging the jacket to her like a Teddy bear throughout the night.
Suddenly Luna stirred, and Hermione shoved the jacket beneath her pillow. Luna pulled herself up and sat against the headboard, rubbing her eyes dramatically.
"You got wasted," the small blonde told her friend.
"You got wasted first," Hermione pointed out, handing the sober-up to the blonde who plucked it out of her hand and threw it back like a shot.
"You were actually very quiet last night, Luna," Hermione continued, prying.
Luna looked her dead in the eye and whispered, "I hate lying."
"They were talking about me again, weren't they," she asked. Luna simply nodded.
"Ginny thought you were secretly seeing Sirius," Luna giggled. "It took strength not to say 'not yet.'"
"Not yet, Luna Lovegood," Hermione scolded. "What is that supposed to mean?" Luna just grinned, and shot a glance at the corner of leather peeking out from below Hermione's pillow. She giggled as Hermione shoved the blanket over the traitorous material.
"You know that's not what this is, right," Hermione asked. "I'm just used to him. And he's him."
Luna patted her friend's knee and spoke, "I know. I don't think anyone can really define it. You're both just you."
The way she said it made Hermione stop.
She'd only barely considered them friends, rather than distant acquaintances. And he was always there. She expected him to be there. But did that mean anything?
Sure, she was attracted to him. But he was an infuriating flirt. He didn't mean anything by anything. He was never going to kiss her last night, she'd just been tipsy. And she definitely wasn't upset by it.
"Do you remember how we got to bed," Luna asked. Hermione thought for a minute. She didn't.
The last thing she remembered was laying on the floor listening to Lily, and suddenly the scent of leather and stale tobacco.
"Thanks for not saying anything about the Café last night."
Luna snorted. "It's my secret, too. My dad would never forgive me for hiding something so campy from him."
When the girls reached the kitchen, it was to the smell of greasy bacon and spicy peppered eggs, Lily's specialty hangover breakfast. Ginny was picking apart a piece of toast at the breakfast table.
"Welcome to the land of the living," Lily joked as they sat by Ginny and began digging into the toast. "Doesn't it feel great to be having a girls brunch on a Monday morning instead of working?"
All three young women agreed wholeheartedly before Ginny turned to her soon-to-be mother in law.
"You never finished your story."
Lily grinned and began dishing up their plates and sat at the end of the table.
"What do you want to know?"
"Well, you said you never agreed to go out with him almost the whole time you were at school," Ginny started, spearing her eggs with her fork.
"Mmm, those are the entertaining stories," Hermione said dreamily, smiling at her toast before taking a bite. Lily chuckled.
"Yes. James and the boys were very creative in their horrible pranks. And no, I wouldn't go out with James because he really was a bit of a bully."
Hermione continued, "but he changed. In seventh year he grew up."
"That's right, but I was wary. You can't blame me. I thought it was all an act."
"So what happened? Why did you finally give in," Luna asked, also only somewhat familiar with the story.
Lily stared into her coffee as though deciding if the girls were finally ready for the real story. She shot a glance quickly at Hermione and then at Ginny and made her choice.
"Sirius."
The three girls all stared at Lily waiting for an explanation.
"It was Sirius who finally managed to convince me, in the end. He is quite the romantic, you know."
All three broke out into laughter.
"What," she asked them.
Ginny seemed unable to breathe. "Sirius Black, a romantic?"
"Well it makes sense," Hermione interjected. "Comes in handy for the Hogwarts Heartbreaker,"
"Yeah, Mr. Use 'em and lose 'em," finished Luna.
Lily was looking at them as though they'd grown an extra head each.
"Where on Earth did you hear any of that?"
Simultaneously they answered, "Harry said that-"
But Lily cut them off with a slow nod of her head. "Girls. Harry idolized Sirius as a child. Especially after he was hurt. My son may have… embellished."
"So you're telling us Sirius wasn't smooth with the ladies," Ginny asked, skeptically.
"No, he definitely had charm, but he was nowhere near 'Hogwarts Heartbreaker' status," she clarified. "He's always been a nice looking boy, and obviously girls liked to look at him and of course he was aware they were looking. But Sirius never toyed with them. He may have given out a few smiles and thrown out a few winks, but as far as I know, he was a perfectly normal teenage boy far too interested in making the Slytherins' lives miserable than flaunting around with girls."
"You're actually defending a teenaged Sirius," Luna asked, intrigued. Lily laughed.
"While he and my husband were most certainly arrogant bullies as children who deserved to be in detention every waking moment, Sirius was absolutely not the sex-crazed cad you girls have painted him as, and definitely does not deserve to be treated as such," She said primly.
"But Harry always told me Sirius never had a serious girlfriend," Hermione said, confused.
"So he didn't," Lily said. "He tried to have a relationship with one of my friends after Hogwarts, but it really didn't work out."
"So we guessed he just had… multiple," Luna confessed.
"Hermione. Luna, did either of you have a serious boyfriend in school?"
Hermione went to a few dances with a couple boys and a couple Hogsmeade dates and kisses that didn't amount to anything. She knew saying she'd had a boyfriend would have been a bold-faced lie. Ron was the only serious relationship she'd ever had.
Luna shook her head, looking down in shame. Hermione didn't feel much better.
"I'm sorry, Lily," Hermione mumbled, humbled. "I guess, we just didn't - I don't actually know that much about him outside of stories." Lily nodded, finishing up her coffee. Ginny looked on the verge of embarrassed tears.
"I've been so horrible to him," the younger redhead said. Lily chuckled.
"At least it all makes sense now to me," the older woman mused. "Now I understand why the two of you," she pointed at Hermione and Ginny, "have always been a little harsh on him." She chuckled into her coffee.
"Do you want to hear the story or not?"
The girls all listened intently as Lily told how Sirius convinced her to go out with James.
"Like I said, he's quite the romantic, and he's always had such a passionate love of music - sometimes I wondered if maybe that's how he really communicated. James always knew exactly what mood Sirius was in based on what he was humming or what he'd been listening to. Back then it was always either Jethro Tull or Linda Ronstadt, later it morphed to Def Leppard or even Bon Jovi, you name it, really. But one day he came right up to me, it must have been early Spring. He looked me dead in the eye and without saying a word handed me a portable radio. And then he left. That night, I silenced my bed curtains and listened to the track list he'd picked and charmed onto the device. Every song told our story, up to the very end."