Obliviate {Book 1--EDITING}

18. Apologies^

Nobody slept at all that night. The castle was searched again, and we all stayed awake, huddled in little groups to hear whether he'd been caught. Outrage rippled through the common room when McGonagall returned to tell us he'd escaped again.

Through the day, tighter security measures were seen all around the castle. Flitwick was seen teaching doors to recognise pictures of Sirius Black, and Filch was spotted boarding every gap in the castle.

One positive was that the Fat Lady had returned, and even though she had a bunch of intimidating security trolls surrounding her, it was lovely to see her back.

The statue on the fifth floor remained unguarded, and it seemed as if all of my friends and I were the only ones who knew about it. It did make me wonder whether that's how he was getting in.

"We should tell somebody," I said nervously to Ron.

"We know he's not coming in through Honeyduke's," said Ron dismissively.

"We'd've heard if the shop had been broken into." Harry reassured me.

I was glad Ron and my brother both took this view. If the one-eyed witch was boarded up too, I would never be able to go into Hogsmeade again. Well unless Sirius Black was captured.

Ron of course, had become an instant celebrity. For the first time in his life, people were paying more attention to him than to Harry, and it was clear that Ron was rather enjoying the experience.

I wasn't questioned as much, but I had random people coming up to me, asking what he looked like. I'd give them a detailed description, and then say that Gennie threw herself between Sirius and me, which was true.

Ron always went into immense detail every time he was questioned. "... I was asleep, and I heard this ripping noise, and I thought it was in my dream, you know? But then there was this draft...I woke up and one side of the hangings on my bed had been pulled down...I rolled over...and I saw him standing over me...like a skeleton, with loads of filthy hair...holding this great long knife, must've been twelve inches...and he looked at me, and I looked at him, and then I yelled, and he scampered.

"Why, though?" Ron added me and Harry as the group of second year girls who had been listening to his chilling tale departed. "Why did he run?"

As I lay awake, traumatised in the night, I'd been wondering the same thing. He'd told me he was innocent, which of course proved how mad he really was. But why hadn't he silenced us? He'd killed thirteen people, why would he hesitate to kill Ron and Gennie, when we were the ones we wanted?

"He must've known he'd have a job getting back out of the castle once you'd yelled and woken people up," I said thoughtfully.

"He'd have had to kill the whole house to get back through the portrait hole...then he would've met the teachers..." Cole added, shuddering.

Neville was alienated throughout the house. McGonagall had banned him from all Hogsmeade visits, and had forbidden anybody to give him the password to get in. He was forced to wait outside almost every night until somebody (usually Cole) let him in.

The sad thing was, I hadn't seen Gennie since that night. After it was revealed Sirius had escaped again, she'd had a massive panic attack and broken down in front of everybody. She'd been admitted to the Hospital wing with exhaustion-apparently she wasn't sleeping or eating enough.

More than ever I wanted to make things right with her, but nobody was allowed to see her apart from her father. I suspected she was guilty she didn't kill Sirius on the spot, but I was just thankful that even when we were arguing, she went out of her way to protect me.