Chapter 43: Suspendisse a tempus
Anyone that went anywhere near Hermione could see that NEWTs were drawing near. Colour-coded revision timetables were magically stuck onto any surface that had anything to do with school work or exams, so naturally everything was covered.
Hermione had tell-tale dark smudges underneath her eyes. It was like she had been in a food-fight and someone had squished blueberries underneath them. Even the ever-approaching doom of Voldemort was not enough to tear Hermione away from the love of her life: books.
Sirius and James had taken a practical approach to their study. They were revising colour-changing jinxes by charming the girls’ shampoo; and practicing tripping jinxes in the hallway on unsuspecting First- and Second-year students. Remus did not directly partake in these “lessons”, but he was nonetheless present for them, and to Hermione’s dismay he did absolutely nothing to stop them. Hermione suspected that this was their way of dealing with Wormtail’s betrayal, and so she left them for McGonagall to deal with.
James had received some comfort by the fact that Lily had agreed to go out with him, just the once, so that he would stop pestering her about it, and inevitably they would often be seen chatting amicably between classes, amongst other things.
Much to Lily’s annoyance, Hermione would remind her that during the last Quidditch match between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff, Lily had begun to cheer for James, rather loudly, when he managed to score a magnificent goal against Hufflepuff’s exceptionally talented keeper. Lily maintained that she was cheering for Gryffindor as a whole.
On top of that, Lily and James’ persistent bickering had diminished to the point of almost nothing. But there were still little explosions from time to time.
In the rare moments that Hermione was not revising for the NEWTs, she was doing anything that she could to ensure that James and Lily got together and stayed together. On top of this she had to also focus on her academic studies, her own slowly rebuilding relationship. Oh, and Voldemort.
At this point there were five months until exams and Hermione was not sacrificing her education again.
“Mione, what are you revising for... again,” smirked Sirius
“In case you hadn’t noticed, exams are five months away!”
“We still haven’t learned everything yet, how can you be revising it? You need to relax, besides, Prongsie and I have been revising.”
Hermione snorted as Sirius wrapped his arms around her waist, and planted a kiss on her cheek.
She settled herself back into his arms on the sofa they were sitting on, trying to relax, but the textbook in her hands demanded otherwise. This was Hermione’s first attempt at seventh-year and she was petrified.
“Sirius,” she said in a quiet voice, “What if I fail?”
“You won’t,” said Sirius confidently.
“How do you know? Do you have some part of you that is a Seer that you haven’t told me about?”
“I wish,” chuckled Sirius, “You’re Hermione. You’re the smartest girl in our year, if not the whole school. If you fail, then I would be worrying about the fate of the rest of us.”
“I guess you’re right,” sighed Hermione.
“I know I’m right,” said Sirius with a hint of smugness as he punctuated his words with a kiss on the top of Hermione’s head.