Have a little faith in me

Progress

Marlene had slowly got herself comfortable with the others and by the end of the third week she would go to all of her classes. But she always needed was someone's hand to squeeze when she felt scared, just something that grounded her. Usually the hand would be Sirius' if he wasn't available it would go to James or Remus or Peter, but of course this didn't go unnoticed by the students of Hogwarts.
'Oh has Black got himself a girlfriend'
'Holding hands with a different boy now are we'
'Slag.' The one thing that Mar couldn't take was that word, at the first mention she would make sure that who ever was with her took her back to the common room. Although it was a trigger Marlene had been getting better and was able to just stay in the common room, the other Gryffindor's had learnt to leave her to herself and make sure you announce yourself before coming close after a while Marlene seemed like her old self again being loud and bossy wanting to party but she always needed someone near by default this became Sirius Black the boy who it seemed she had been least close to at the start of the year.
'Can we go up the the astronomy tower Si' Asked a mildly tipsy Marlene. Sirius nodded and they walked out under James' cloak to the tower. It became apparent that this was a place Mar used to go to often as she had spare pillows and blankets tucked underneath the floorboards. The pair sat down on the surprisingly large pile of pillows and watched the stars.
'There's Sirius and Orion.' Pointed out Mar. Sirius was confused about how she knew the star he was named after and could point to it instantly.
'There's Cassiopeia,and the big bear.' She continued.
'How do you know so much, you dropped astronomy didn't you?' Sirius asked, his interest in this girl growing every time she spoke.
'My brothers and I would stargaze all the time it was one thing that we could do together you know a group of boys and a girl don't have two many overlapping interests so it was quidditch and stargazing I was obviously the best at quidditch..' she laughed 'but not so much at stars I guess after eleven years I just picked it up.' She looked at Sirius and hugged him for some reason she knew that he would always be there for her.

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'Wow they're not even trying to hide it now.' Sirius and Marlene woke with a start to a crowd of students that had gathered to see the infamous Black and McKinnon together. Marlene subconsciously grabbed Sirius' hand before she got up.
'I'm sorry.' She whispered into Sirius' ear before kissing him. It was a short kiss with little passion but it was enough to get a multitude of cheers form the group of students.
'So he is my boyfriend get over it' Marlene marched herself and Sirius down the stairs and to the Gryfindoor common room.
'Mar..'
'No I can't be bothered to hear whispers and shit behind my back, I'm sorry for using you but I couldn't think of anything else to do.' She looked at him gave a quick smile and went up to the girls dorm.

'Lily' she said as she walked through the door. 'Lily I think I did something stupid.' A laugh came from the bed to the right of her.
'Okay you know what, yes I did kiss Mary for a dare in fourth year, it didn't mean anything to me and I'm pretty sure it didn't mean anything to Mary, so could you maybe just give over okay, you might feel like your in the right but you weren't fucking attacked by a group of Slytherins, verbally abused, forced to nearly kiss one, then been shot at with a spell that had you in the infirmary for a fucking week, to come out and you can't even look at a guy who's basically your brother or stand to be touched by fucking anyone so if your going to drag this the fuck on I hope you know what's fucking happening to me at the same time and that I'm not just some slag that got scared, I was attacked.'
Lily looked at Marlene with a surprised expression. 'Okay what happened' she said trying to change the subject.
'I kissed Black, I mean Si, I mean I don't know but I kissed him'
'Are you okay, who started the kiss , why, where,when'
'Yes I'm okay, I started the kiss, because we had fallen asleep on the astronomy tower and people were chatting shit, like I said the astronomy tower about five-ish minutes ago'
'So you used him as a way out of a situation' Em said, Marlene glared at her ' I'm not saying that's bad but I thought that he had feelings for you'
'What' Marlene questioned never thinking that was a possibility.
'When you were in the hospital Sirius was basically never here because he would be with you' Marlene looked at her in disbelief 'When he was here all he would talk about was you and how he is going to make sure nothing happens to you ever again' Mary added.
'Lil is this true?'
'I didn't want to say anything because you were finally progressing and I didn't want you to be set back'
'Not once has he ever done anything to show me. He didn't pressure me into anything. He's just waiting for me' A smile grew on Marlene's face.

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'She kissed me' Sirius flopped onto his bed 'She kissed me and then said sorry.' The other tree guys started to laugh. 'It's not funny she doesn't know that..'
'You like her' James finished Sirius' sentence.
'No- well maybe but I'm Sirius Black I don't do girlfriends'
'That's cos your scared of..' James said
'Commitment.' The other two boys joined in laughing. Sirius got into his robes and left for class he saw Marlene sat on the sofa reading a book but decided to just leave her be.
In class there was no way of getting away from the rumours and by second period he had been asked over ten times, he knew he had to tell them that it was the truth to protect Mar but that didn't make it any less awkward for THE Sirius Black to admit he had a girlfriend.
'She's not even a very good snog' James reacted faster than Sirius.
'What did you just say'
'That the little slag isn't even a good snog' Right then they knew. This was one of the guys that attacked Marlene, the one who tried to kiss her, before anyone could get their wands out James and Sirius had rushed the Slytherin boy, if Professor McGonagall wasn't there, then who knows how bad it could of gotten. By the end of the next class everyone knew what had happened between Sirius, James and a Slytherin. Rumours spread that he had gone after one of the girlfriends of James or Sirius, people who were near to the fight told people it was because of a snog between the Slytherin and Marlene. But by the time everyone heard it the snog had turned into sex. People already knew about Sirius and Marlene now being a couple but they couldn't understand why him and James would be so worked up about a single comment about a kiss.
Sirius decided to skip his last two lessons with the approval from McGonagall to go and speak with Marlene. Sirius walked through the portrait and saw that Marlene hadn't moved except for the new book she was reading.
'It's Sirius, Sirius from Gryfindoor' She looked up at him with a grin on her face.
'You know you could change that to "Sirius your boyfriend" if you want' she said looking away from him.
'Yeah okay...Look I need to tell you something the school knows, they don't know detailes or facts but they know something happened with you and that Slytherin' He continued when he saw Mars puzzled face 'Well people know about us and he said something about you not being a good snog so we knew that it was him the one who.. well we got into a fight and people talked I don't know the story right now but I thought you should at least know so if you go out you can expect a bit of backlash...Sorry'
Marlene looked at him and said 'It's not your fault, he deserved every punch' she then motioned got him to sit next to her so she could lean on him.
That's the position everyone found them in after last period they were on the sofa Mar sprawled on top of Sirius reading a book and laughing .
The next morning when the Gryfindoors headed out to breakfast they were still in that position just now asleep.