Coming Together ༄ Sirius Black

Chapter Twenty Three

Sirius stood in the doorway to the Great Hall, looking up and down the tables but she wasn't there.
He went to the library and searched the whole room but she wasn't there.
Sirius had walked down to the Black Lake and over towards the quidditch pitch and up to the Astronomy tower but she wasn't there.

It was so early the halls were practically empty and she was nowhere to be seen, but she had to be awake. He knew she'd be awake. Yesterday, whilst he had been preoccupied with a distraction of sorts, he and Asteria had made eye contact. They hadn't spoken or even so much as looked at each other over the past week. He had convinced Mary Macdonald to give their fling another go and in an attempt to please her, showed her to the Astronomy Tower late in the evening. This had originally been to distract himself from worrying about Asteria and moping about. The Astronomy Tower itself had been on his mind as it was so often a place where Asteria would go. Yet, she hadn't been there when he checked the next morning.

The only place left could be the Slytherin common room but he couldn't get in there.

"Merlin..." Sirius sighed, running his hand through his hair as he desperately made his way down to the dungeons.

As he ran down the stairs he nearly knocked over a girl, sending her flying backwards.

"Careful!" Sirius complained before his eyes landed on a very angry Lily Evans.
Her face was a burning red colour as she stomped towards him, "Where do you think you're going, Black?"
"Where's Asteria? I need to talk to her!" Sirius pleaded.

"It's a little early for you to be up, isn't it?" Lily narrowed her eyes at him.
"I need to find Asteria, she's around isn't she?" Sirius begged.

Lily sighed, unsure of what to do. "She doesn't want to talk to you."
"I know and I want to give her the space she wants but I need to explain myself. I have to try and apologise."

She didn't know what to do. Lily wanted to solve the situation for her friends but wasn't sure how to do it. She knew her friends needed someone to intervene to get them to give into their stubborn streaks and actually talk. That's why Lily and James had spent the past week discretely poking their friends, trying to get them to admit their feelings. It had meant Lily needed to spend some time speaking privately with James, which she wasn't so keen on but, it hadn't been as bad as she thought. And, by the looks of it, their plan had payed off as Sirius was finally looking for Asteria to talk.

"She's in her common room." Lily gave in, "Have fun talking to her through the door."

Asteria sat beside the fire in the common room, watching through the giant window and staring out at the view of the Black Lake. It was a far cry from the scenery of the sky and birds that she so deeply loved. Nobody had awoken in the Slytherin common room, as Asteria stood up and started pacing back and forth.

The knock on the door to the common room caused Asteria to physically jump. Slowly she neared the door and pulled it open. The boy stood in the doorway very nearly had the door slammed in his face had he not placed his foot in the way.

Sirius winced slightly as the door hit his foot, but restrained any squealing or complaint of pain.
"Asteria, please, I need to talk to you." He began desperately.

"I don't know..." Asteria replied quietly.
"Please? Just let me explain and then you can choose what you want to do from there." Sirius pleaded, holding out his hand.

"Where are we going?" Asteria asked, taking his hand and allowing herself to be led away from the common room by Sirius.

"Just-follow me." Sirius mumbled.
"You're taking me up to the Astronomy Tower? Because I don't really want to go there." Asteria admitted.
"You always want to go there."

This was true, although she didn't want to admit it.

"Stop." Asteria pulled her hand away so Sirius would finally turn to look at her.
"What? What's wrong?"

Asteria bit her bottom lip and kicked at the floor, keeping her gaze down. "What you said last week..."
"Ria... You know it wasn't true. What I said, it was out of context."

"Okay."

Sirius frowned, "You're mad, aren't you? This is one of those things girls do where they say they're fine but they mean they want a hug or something." He rambled.

"I'm not mad. Honestly. I forgave you like two seconds later." Asteria pursed her lips, "If you didn't mean what you said... Why did you say it?"
"I was scared. I thought you were going to shut me out once we were back and school and maybe if I did the same thing then it wouldn't be so depressing."

Asteria watched Sirius, planning her next words very carefully. She wanted to be honest with him but didn't know how best to go about it.

"I thought the same thing. I thought when we can back to school you'd be around your friends and all those other girls and you'd forget about me. I already knew we were both using each other but just... Hearing it out loud upset me. It shouldn't have but it did and I knew I was just a bad. What I did was bad and it made me bad. I felt terrible and then seeing you yesterday... I don't know I just felt like all my worries were confirmed and you didn't care about me anymore." Asteria spoke quickly, trying to get the words out before she changed her mind.

"Mary Macdonald is a pig. I only went to her because... I needed distracting. I didn't know what else to do but it was wrong. I'm sorry." Sirius shook his head.

"I'm sorry too." Asteria replied quietly, "And you should know that I never apologise so this is kind of a big deal."
"Here too. I think you'll find I'm always right... Apart from right this second." Sirius corrected himself.

"So we're good?" Asteria asked shyly.
"Yeah, now we both know we want to stay friends." Sirius nodded.

"So... Friends yeah?"
"Best friends?"
"What about James and Lily?"
"We won't tell them."