After two long nights filled with anything but sleep, Hermione wondered how she was ever going to be able to muster up enough energy to participate at tonight's Halloween dance.
In comparison to yesterday's overthinking, something about planning out her schedule for tonight both eased and excited Hermione. For one, her mind was taken off of whatever thoughts were running through her mind yesterday that brought her anxiety and confusion. She was more at ease with order; Hermione was much more used to performing with a concrete plan in tact. Secondly, she grew excited, more or less, because she knew tonight would be a big night. A big night for exposing Peter, so she hoped.
Thankfully, after a light brunch with her Gryffindor friends, Hermione actually got some decent sleep during her rare early-afternoon nap. And pretty soon, the time came for each of the girls to begin getting reading for the Halloween dance.
Alice was over the moon. Even though she was decked out head to toe in the most beautifully extravagant Juliet Capulet costume, she seemed more eager for Marlene's outfit, even though it was nothing more than a simple black cat costume. Regardless, spirits were high in both Alice and Marlene's department.
Lily, on the other hand, slipped into the stunning black dress that James had spotted the other day at lunch. Hermione helped her pull her hair into a tight bun, put a gorgeous sparkly hairpiece at its base, and finished it off with a large dose hairspray. Accompanied by a large faux pearl necklace and sheen black cloves, Lily easily gave Audrey Hepburn a run for her money. The only thing at gave her away was her bright red locks.
Lastly, Hermione put together her beautifully unique costume and put on some of Lily's makeup for the first time in a long time.
A stream of positivity bounced off the walls of the girls dorm, each girl heavily complimenting the rest on how stunning they looked tonight. And when they left for the dance, not a single girl felt less than gorgeous.
The boys, on the other hand, had costumes that were even more last minute than the girls'. Well, most of them at least. According to Remus, he had his costume in the works for quite a while, and was itching for the night to finally begin. Peter, like the girls, had also purchased a costume from Gladrags' Wizardwear yesterday after they all had eaten. He was quite amused with himself, have picked up a rat mask from the shelf and calling it a day.
The most ill-prepared of the group were James and Sirius, by far. They had pushed it as far back as possible, trying to throw something together on hours before the dance started. Each of them ended up wearing a fancy suit charmed to seem all bloodied up and mangled. Sirius borrowed his from James.
When asked about their current costume situation by Remus and Peter, Sirius and James pretended not to have a care in the world. But a part of them wanted to look dapper and keep up appearances, for something that each of their attractions would explain. Even though it was obvious to the rest that James couldn't get over the little black dress peaking out of Lily's bag from the day before, Sirius kept those type of thoughts to himself.
"So, Moony," Sirius started while Remus zipped up his costume, "what's the news with you and Dorcas?"
Remus firmly avoided eye contact, keeping his gaze straight forward at the dorm room mirror. Not a single word left his mouth before James could add on to Sirius' words.
"It's been well over a month since you last gave us any update on the two of you, Rem," he spoke, hand on his hip like a mother dealing with her incompetant children. And for the first time in a long time, arguably, Remus was that incompetant child.
"What if I don't wanna talk about it?" he spoke immaturely, crossing his arms over his chest after making sure his costume fit correctly.
"Rem, we're your best friends," James darted back while giving a look to both Sirius and Peter, "you'd tell us if you were back together with Dorcas, right?"
"Yeah, yeah, I guess."
"So?"
"Well, we're attending the ball together. We haven't put a lable on anything yet though."
"But," Sirius smirked, "Do you want to put a lable on it?"
"Maybe."
"So do it! Ask her to be your girlfriend tonight," Sirius nearly screamed, over the moon for his best mate. After remaining silent for the moment right after, Remus became more overwhelmed by Peter and James too, both getting even more excited for Remus' potential with Dorcas.
"Should I really?"
"If you want to, yeah," Peter added confidently. "If I can get Emma Vanity to be my girlfriend, there's no reason why you can't get Dorcas Meadowes to be yours," he smirked.
And after inserting a few of his cheeky responses into this conversation, Sirius sit back and grew happy for Remus and the happiness that came to his face when he thought of Dorcas becoming his girlfriend, for real this time. But a part of him couldn't ignore the fact that he started to feel left out. While he sat there, patiently waiting in his bloodied-up suit and tie, all of his friends sat there, happy. Remus was over the moon about his plan to ask Dorcas to be his girlfriend. Emma Vanity couldn't possibly make Peter smile any more than he currently was, which ceratinly was new. And James, despite being at odds with Lily for years, had finally had a conversation with her that didn't involve her getting upset, but did, in fact, make her smile. It was something not even Sirius had witnessed until last week. James was making progress, all of them were. All except Sirius.
He felt stuck in the friend zone. Stuck in the friendship that comes from being someone's Astronomy partner. Although he loved the stars, he didn't want to talk about the just stars with Harper for another second. He wanted something deeper, something more meaningful. He wanted to know about her family, about her past, her fears, dreams, everything. He wanted every reason to believe that he could trust her, that she was good.
And as much as he wanted to believe that, he had only known Harper for two months. He had only scratched the surface.
The question was, what was stopping him from trying to become more than friends with Harper?
He had never been afraid of rejection before, so why did he feel afraid now? Of course, a part of him felt embrassed about his history with other girls, something about his life that Harper had been told loud and clear. And his growing anxiety around Harper certainly didn't help; it's like he was walking on eggshells. So was it anxiety? Or embrassament, or rejection? Or all three?
Every time he looked at her, he got queasy. Wait, no, that sounds misleading. Every time he looked at her, a sense of nervous came over him that he didn't know was humanly possibly. That's better.
It was a gut-wrenching feeling, something he had never experienced before. There was no way of properly describing it. It was a feeling that couldn't be put into words. Certainly nothing like what he had felt with the eight girls that he had snogged in the past. If he even felt anything for them, it was miniscule at best.
"Sirius," spoke Peter, getting the attention of the distracted boy, "let's go."
It was time for the party. An even bigger sense of nervousness rushed into the veins of Sirius, as he gave himself one last look in the mirror and straightened his tie before joining the rest of the boys in the Gyrffindor common room. Although nearly any girl in the school would think Sirius looked dapper as ever, he felt like he could barely tell what was going on in Harper's mind. Her head very well might never be turned by Sirius, and that very thought sent him down a rare tunnel of self-consiouness and doubt.
Remus had said something about meeting the girls there. Soon, Sirius' thoughts shifted back to Harper, and his mind wandered. At this point, it was almost unusual for Sirius to not think about Harper as much as he did. She stayed in his thoughts as the boys all walked from Hogwarts to the Quidditch Pitch; he didn't even realize his shoes getting wet from the grass' dew.
Once the Quidditch Pitch came into view, dimly-lit pumpkin lanterns floating at all different levels could be seen along the borders of the grassy bottom, mimicking the ceiling of the Great Hall during the annual Halloween Feast.
Tables were set up, occupied with legal drinks and an assortment of appetizers and snacks for all of the seventh-years. Students could be seen wearing an assortment of costumes. Ever though some students went all out, and some didn't give much effort to their costume, the spirits of each student were high regardless of what they were wearing.
Sirius stopped dead in his tracks when he laid eyes on the girl he couldn't get off of his mind.
She was covered in black in gold. Her dress was layered with cascading tiers of glistening fringe that shook from side to side to the rhythm of the music as she danced. It was as if she had just stepped out of the Roaring Twenties themselves. Harper looked no less than beautiful as a flapper, and Sirius was in awe.
As was James, for Lily, of course. At this point, it was common knowledge than he fancied Lily to about the entire class, expect for maybe Lily herself, and she had only started taking a hint a day ago. Even Sirius would agree that the little black dress suited her well.
The group of nine Gryffindors, plus Emma, soon came together to enjoy the party as one. Spirits were high, and even James and Lily were getting on well. Emma and Peter nearly took over the dance floor, while Remus and Dorcas drifted away from the party together.
It all came together in Sirius' mind. Many of his closest friends were in relationships now, and they had to start somewhere. If he wanted be with Harper, to know her dreams, her fears, her pet-peeves, her everything, he couldn't just shove it under the rug.
If you really think about it, everything I'm worried about is temporary.
So why not make an effort?
In his head, all was well. He would plan to ask Harper to dance as the night carried on, it was as simple as that. That is, until Mary MacDonald got in the way of both of them.
A/N: thanks for 540+ views and all the votes! it truly means the world to me <3
A/N (8/27/20): sorryyy i planned to publish this 4 days ago and never did. hopefully i'll keep a weekly streak and crank these chapters out on more a schedule, because once school starts (on 8/8) i won't have too much free time. anyways, hope you liked this chapter! thanks for 139k. - callahan