A cold shower is excellent on the most stifling summmer days, but makes shaving your legs a considerable challenge thanks to one of the bodies more useless reactions; goosebumps. Should I perhaps have turned up the temperature to finish the task; yes. Did I? Of course not.
I towel dried my hair, whipped it out of my face, and looked disappointed into the mirror. Perhaps if I just got rid of the bags under my eyes. I'd leave the dark rings, just get rid of the puffiness. Or make my eyes just a little bit bigger. No.
I would not use my metamorphosis for vanity. It would be very easy, though.
I put on a thin black, short sleeved shirt, and a pair of brown corduroy shorts, which were my favourite because they were so soft. We had had an excellent day; James, Sirius, and I had awoken early to go fishing in the stream a small walk away from the house, and brought with us sandwiches for breakfast. When the sun became too warm, we sat down under the old apple tree in the garden and drank iced tea, and James fantasised about everything he wanted to do when he grew older. "Of course, I could always just become a quidditch player, they earn money by the bucket!" Which then led us on to play a game of quidditch, which carried us on along the afternoon and only stopped when rain began to fall hard and we heard the distant rumble of thunder. We had already dismounted our brooms when Euphemia had run outside to tell us to get out of the sky.
Someone knocked on the door, "Ollie, we're going soon!"
I sighed, unlocked and opened the door. James stood there wearing a nice printed shirt and corduroys. His hair looked wet in a way that convinced me that Euphemia had tried to make it lie flat using Fleamonts Sleekeazy hair potion. Instead of looking smart, his hair just looked wet and sticky.
James rushed into the bathroom to put his head under the sink and wash out the hair potion.
"What time do you think you'll be back?" I asked.
The Potters were going out to eat with some family friends, and after insisting all day that they could just bring us along, or even cancel on their plans (!), Sirius and I convinced them that we would manage on our own for one evening. Now, however, my stomach twirled and fluttered and every now and then my heart would pound so hard in my throat that I almost jumped. Things had been more normal since Sirius came to us that evening, but we hadn't actually been alone for longer than a few minutes at a time, and those moments were often stiff and silent.
"James!" I said indignantly, "Stop drowning yourself for a moment."
James pulled his head out from under the sink, grabbed a towel and rubbed it with the extreme vigour of a four year old and the considerable strength of the sixteen year old he was. When he pulled the towel off his head, his hair stood up in all ends, and he looked in the mirror, "fixing it".
"I reckon we'll be back before too late, but the Beltals do like their drink, so maybe around one?" He finally answered.
"Are we convening in the bathroom?" Sirius walked in, too. I was suddenly aware that my dirty pair of knickers were on the floor, and hurried to pick up all my old clothes. As I stood up, I instinctively looked towards Sirius, to check if he'd seen, and found him watching me, and small smile playing upon his lips.
"The bathroom is the most private, and the cleanest room of them all. Perhaps we should convene more in bathrooms," James thought aloud, "Hark! Henceforth, all secret meetings concerning the Marauders shall be conducted in bathrooms."
"What a great idea, Prongs," Sirius said, "Because a bunch of people going into the same bathroom at the same time isn't dreadfully suspicious, especially considering one of them is a girl going in with a bunch of boys. We don't want anyone to think our dear Ollie is a lady of the night, do we?"
"We might," I interjected, "Money can be good. Specially if you've got some tricks up your sleeves," I put on a gruff voice, "Oi mate, that chippy from last night was magic, I'd pay good money for her, mate."
The boys looked at me for a moment, then laughed.
"Alright Ollie, don't flatter yourself, magic can only do so much." James joked.
I opened my mouth in mock insult.
"James!" Euphemia called from downstairs, and we all sighed at the same time.
I put my clothes down on the chair in the bathroom, and hurried the boys out with me.
"Bernard Bental is 18 now, you know, so I might be able to convince him to order me some drinks." James said.
As we walked down that stairs, I felt a pang of pain as I saw Euphemia and Fleamont hand in hand in their fine clothes. They were talking softly to each other, smiling, laughing. I felt a hand lightly touch my back and looked back at Sirius. He probably felt some the same emotions I did; envy, happiness, grief.
"Oh James, you're still dripping." Euphemia said, pulling out her wand and drying his hair with a tap. "Now, Sirius, dear, and Ollie, darling. I've made some chicken for you, it's on the stove, and there's lots to eat in kitchen, just have a good look through all the cupboards, anything you want, my dears. And again, any movies you want to watch, games you want to play, you're welcome to do whatever, ok?"
"Thank you, Euphemia. You're too kind." I said, and meant it. I had a suspicion that her and Fleamont may have wanted several children, but that it never had worked out.
"Yeah, thanks, really. I'll take good care of Ollie here, make sure she doesn't go rampaging around the house or anything of the sort, you know what she's like." Sirius said, casually resting his arm on my head to showcase that I am, in fact, smaller than him.
"Oh and if you want to play a game of pool," Fleamont said.
"Don't." James, Sirius, Euphemia and I eachoed. He was incredibly fond of his pool table, and we'd heard it all before.
Fleamont smiled, then went on, "Let me finish. If you want to play a game of pool, you best make sure it looks like you haven't."
"Spick and spam, Mr Potter, spick and spam." Sirius guaranteed with his customary charming smile.
Moments later, the three Potters hurried out into the rain, and shut the door after them. The temperature had cooled down considerably with the rain, and I regretted not putting on any socks before leaving the bathroom. The stone hallway floor was cold on my bare feet and my damp hair, though still mildly pleasant, was half a step away from becoming cold.
"Cold?" Sirius asked.
"No." I lied.
Sirius looked at me, sceptically. "Come on you cold goof, let's have some dinner."
He lead the way into the kitchen, and found out two plates, forks, knives and glasses which he laid out on the small kitchen table we sometimes ate breakfast. Usually we ate dinner in the dining room or outside, it would be too crowded in the kitchen.
I switched on the wizarding wireless, and Sirius put the pot of chicken on the table.
I looked in the fridge. "Do you think they'll mind if we split a cider?"
They usually let us drink as much as we wanted of wine, cider and mead, but no matter how much James begged they wouldn't let us anywhere near the fire whisky.
"Can't imagine they would," He answered and sat down on one of the stools by the table.
I took a tall can out of the fridge, and made to crack it open. My nails were longer than they usually were though, and I struggled to find the right amount of pressure to crack it open without cracking my nail.
"Do you need help?" Sirius asked.
I looked at him with furrowed brows. "If I need help, I'll ask for it, Black."
I tried for another minute and let out a moan of frustration.
"Look, the chicken's going to get cold and the cider's going to be warm by the time you manage that."
"Fine!" I handed him the can and he opened it at once with ease.
"Stupid fucking can." I muttered, as I sat down opposite him and started helping myself to some chicken. It smelt amazing, and I was far hungrier than I had thought.
"It's really good of Fleamont and Euphemia to let us stay here." Sirius said.
"Yeah, they really are extraodinarily kind."
It was quiet but for the music from the radio.
After a while, Sirius said, "I heard your father died."
I looked at him.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to say it like that."
"It's ok, it's what happened."
"It's just we've never really had the opportunity to talk about it. You left before saying anything, and when you came back everything was so fucked up, and I was just being an asshole. I just- What I'm trying to say is that if you want to talk about it, you can."
I sat for a moment, then finished up the last of the food on my plate. I hadn't really spoken to anyone about it, and hadn't thought I'd wanted to.
"Are you done?" I asked, "With your food?"
Sirius nodded.
I took his and my plate over to the sink and washed them, and then handed them to him to dry them.
"I don't know," I said, "It's just- it's just-"
My eyes were suddenly overflowing with tears and my throat tightened up. My breath came out shuddering and uneven and I was suddenly shaking. I sat down on the floor and held my head, trying to calm down, to pull myself together.
"It's ok, just let it out." Sirius said, moving down beside me.
I let out a wail I didn't know I was capable, snot and tears were snailing down my face in impressive volume and I thought I'd never be able to catch my breath properly again before- I hadn't noticed Sirius had got up to open the window before I felt the cool breeze on my face and I drew a deep breath, feeling it calm down my entire body. I felt wretched, and turned away from Sirius so he couldn't see me. Instead of turning me around again, he pulled me into him and put his arms around me and rocked us slowly forwards and backwards. We continued like this for a while, every time I thought I'd managed to calm down a new wave of hiccuping sobs erupted from my throat. At long last, I'd managed to stay calm for a few minutes and though I was completely exhausted, I felt so much lighter.
"Could I have a glass of water?" I asked, my voice was slight.
"Of course," He whispered, stood up, poured me a glass of water, and sat in front of me.
I downed the whole glass of water, and he poured me another. And another.
Finally, I let out a long breath, and looked at him.
"I must look a mess." I said, trying to turn away again.
He took ahold of me with one arm, and lifted some tissue paper in the other, drying my tears, and at last holding it to my nose.
"Now blow." He said, his face was straight but his eyes were gleaming.
"What!? No! I'm not a baby."
"Blow." He repeated.
I started laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation, "No! Sirius, don't."
"We're not going anywhere until you've blown your nose, young missus."
"Sirius, it's embarrassing."
Sirius smiled, tilted his head slightly to the side, but didn't move his hand.
"UGH fine!" I exclaimed, braced myself, then blew my nose into the tissue paper he was holding.
"Good girl." He said, and smiled, "Snotty girl."
"Siriuus." I whined, knowing my face was red, but he just smiled.
I washed my face in the sink, and dried it, then looked back at Sirius, who had his hand held out, as if he intended for me to take it. I did.
He led us into the wintergarden and sat us down in the sofa, drawing a blanket over us. The rain patted relentlesy down on the glass walls and ceiling.
I took a deep breath, then told him everything from McGonagall telling me my father was dead, to the funeral, and to me now being under McGonagall's care. It went quite smoothly, as I was all cried out, and he sat listening, watching.
It was a great relief.
"I'm sorry I wasn't there for you." He finally said.
I hesitated. "It's ok. You had your own shit to deal with."
"Yeah," He agreed, "But I didn't have to be such an asshole."
"Perhaps not. But can't we just put it behind us?" I asked. I deperately wanted to. I didn't want the weird stiffness that had been between us, I wanted it to feel as natural and easy as it did now. As safe.
Sirius smiled and nodded. "Yeah, I'd like that. I really am sorry, though."
I smiled, too. "Whatever."
After that, we sat down in the living room, still sharing a sofa, and watched Rosemary's baby. I had watched it before, which was lucky because I was increasingly distracted by how close we were sitting. One of his arms were around me, our legs were touching. I leaned my head tentatively on his shoulder, and he pulled me closer to him, letting his other hand rest on my leg, both of his thumbs softly tracing circles into my skin. I hope he didn't hear the slight shudder in my breath. I hoped he couldn't feel my heart pounding. My head, stomach and heart all seemed to be fluttering, my skin was tingling and I just wanted to get closer to him. He moved his head so his chin was resting lightly on top of mine, and breathed slowly in. Was he smelling my head? At that moment, there was no doubt in my mind: I wanted him. Did he feel it, too?
The movie ended, and I looked up at him, wanting to say something, but not quite knowing what.
"I-" Sirius started.
At that moment however, the front doors opened and James called out, "I'm hooome, honey!"
"I think he got those drinks." Sirius finished.
Feeling frustrated, annoyed, and incredibly reluctant to leave Sirius' side, we both got up and walked out into the hallway, where all three Potters were giggling and struggling to take their shoes off.
"Off to bed, children!" Fleamont cried merrily, and him and his wife giggled and went to the kitchen, holding onto each other for support.
Sirius and I helped James up the stairs as he slurrily told us all about his night. I wasn't listening. I couldn't even take my eyes off Sirius. Sirius, however, joined in with James' joviality, and when we came up to the room we all still shared, he offered to help James get cleaned up before bed.
"So Paddy, what did you and Ollie get up to?" James asked. The bathroom door was slightly open.
"Mm, we ate dinner, talked for a while and watched a movie." Sirius answered.
"Oo, wh- what movie would that be?" James' slur had become worse and he was hiccuping.
"Rosemary's baby."
"Any good?"
"I honestly couldn't tell you. Wasn't really paying attention to it." Sirius answered.
He came out of the bathroom, and caught me staring. His eyes were dark, and he smiled.