fatal love

Chapter 62

The 2nd of September was a Tuesday, which meant they were thrown straight into lessons. It became blindingly obvious that with James' returned infatuation with Evans came his returned awkwardness, possibly at a scale even worse than Third Year.

Naturally, James was friendly, charming and confident, but all these traits seemed to disappear in her presence. His voice got too loud, so he was basically yelling at her when he tried to start a conversation, and he either couldn't get a word out, or spoke over her in long monologues. It was quite horrifying to watch, and it normally ended with Evans just giving up and walking away, leaving James staring after her, lovesick.

At least classes weren't too taxing, giving Sirius plenty of time and opportunity to laugh at his friend's misfortune. Every single lesson followed the same pattern; the professor walked in, and promptly delivered a twenty minute lecture on how this year was critical, it was their OWL year, they had to work harder than ever or they'd get straight Ts. It had lost its impact by lunchtime, but that didn't stop Slughorn giving them a long speech in their last lesson of the day, complete with anecdotes of various celebrities he knew and how hard they had worked for their OWLs.

Sirius and Remus smirked at each other. Remus had taught him a muggle game, bingo, just for this. They had each chosen twenty public figures, and the first person who could cross of all twenty after Slughorn had 'dropped their name into conversation' got to pick a dare for the other one.

By the time they were packing up, Sirius was in the lead, having eliminated two names, while Remus had only gotten one.

"Shut up," Remus glared.

"I didn't say anything!" Sirius protested, grinning.

"You were about to."

"I was just thinking, it's funny, I've never played bingo before, but I must be an expert in it."

"It's luck!" Remus exclaimed. "It's impossible to be an expert!"

"Such a sore loser," Sirius tutted gleefully.

"Twat," Remus cursed, and it only made Sirius grin harder.

Sadly, he couldn't joke with Remus forever. With lessons over, Sirius visited Dumbledore. He knew he had to, or Dumbledore would seek him out, even though he didn't have any information for him, now Walburga didn't trust him, and couldn't Imperio him.

When Sirius entered his office, Dumbledore was sat behind his desk like he always was, wearing deep purple robes. He looked tired, and older than he did last year, with more wrinkles on his face, and his hair a couple of shades whiter.

"Mr Black," he smiled graciously, looking up to meet Sirius' eyes. "Why don't you take a seat? How was your summer?"

Sirius sat down opposite the old wizard, twisting the Black ring on his finger subconsciously. "It was fine. I didn't hear anything useful though, sorry," he said, getting straight to the point. He didn't want this to take longer than it had to. "Walburga didn't let me join in with any of the galas or dinners or anything."

"Oh? Why is that? Does she suspect something?"

"I dunno. She knows I don't like Voldemort, but there's no way she could know I speak to you. I think she's more concerned that I'll embarrass her, to be honest."

"Embarrass her?"

"Well, she can't Imperio me anymore."

Dumbledore leaned forward, adjusting his glasses to look at Sirius more intently. "You resisted her curse? That's very impressive, Mr Black."

Sirius shrugged. "I probably only managed it cause she did it so often. If she'd picked her times more carefully, I don't think I would have learned how to. Anyway, now I don't really know what's going on with the Sacred 28, and all those families. Don't think I'm very useful anymore."