The Pureblood Princess | Sirius Black

|63| The Stupid Gryffindor

Twas the night before Christmas and Adelaide and Sirius were all alone on the floor of the Gryffindor common room. Doing what? Charming nutcrackers to dance and squeak carols by the firelight, while pigging out on unhealthy amounts of peppermint toads and hot cocoa.

"Can we just camp out down here or something? I don't like being up there by myself..." Adelaide whined through a mouth full of candy, clutching her hot cocoa closer and giving a little shiver at the thought.

"Fine with me... It's weird being up there without Peter's snoring anyway." Sirius shrugged. Adelaide let out a snort like laugh then made the nutcrackers do a little twirl with her wand.

The other third year girls, as well as the other boys, had all gone home for Christmas. James and Mary both pleaded and begged Sirius and Adelaide respectively to come to their homes over the holiday, but to no avail. Honestly, Adelaide was quite tempted to take Mary up on her offer, but was terrified that her parents, or even Riddle would find out and make her a target of some sort. So, in order to protect Mary, she opted to stay at the castle. Sirius tried to convince her to come with him to the Potters at least, but failing to change her mind, he stayed to keep her company.

"I'm going to go grab my blanket and stuff real quick..." Adelaide said, hoisting herself up.

"Can't you just magic it here?" Sirius said lazily.

Adelaide stopped for a moment, deep in thought. "I suppose I could." she said slowly. She lifted her wand, scrunched her eyes closed, then summoned the comforter and feather pillow from her dorm down to the common room... knocking Sirius over in the process.

"Excuse you! A little warning would have been nice!" he grumbled.

"How about I bring your stuff down as well?" she smirked.

Sirius merely gave her an annoyed look, as he righted himself.

With a wave of her wand a feather pillow and a deep red comforter came zooming toward them... knocking him over again. "Really Addy?!" He said in annoyance.

Adelaide gave him an innocent smile... then whacked him over the head with a pillow when he wasn't looking.

"Oh you're going to get it now!" He said, smiling and looking at her with a mischievous glint in his eyes as he slowly lifted his pillow over his head.

With a leap, he launched himself toward her, landing a big thwack right on her shoulder. Adelaide ran away squealing and swatting him with her own pillow as he chased her around the room, jumping over chairs, scurrying under tables and vaulting over the couch—toppling the mug of hot cocoa in the process.

"Aw... I was still drinking that..." she sighed with a pout, looking down at the sad spilt drink with a few feathers in her hair.

"You can have mine." Sirius said quickly.

Adelaide smiled, then turned to look at him in order to say thank you... not expecting him to be nearly as close as he was. She looked up and saw his eyes soften... just like they did that night before he went absolutely mental on her. But this time he wasn't running away to Marlene; he was looking at her with a lopsided half-smile, close enough for her to smell the peppermint and chocolate on his breath. Close enough for her to see the little scar on his lip from the time Regulus mirrored her after his mother hurt him last year.

She felt him move even closer, and noticed his eyes flicker down to her lips. Her stomach was in knots and she was having a hard time breathing.

He was much too close. 

Sirius lifted a hand to her hair and gently plucked out a feather, held it up for her to see, then swiftly moved away to clean up the spilled drink, leaving her a little woozy, frozen in place for a very long moment.