good things fall apart • sirius black

James Potter and his ducklings

Despite not having the deep copper tinge to her hair that the rest of her Gryffin ancestors had, Ellie's hair was just as untameable as theirs.

It wasn't an utter mess, for really it fell in soft waves on a good day. But nothing could be done with it, bar scrape it back into a loose ponytail. You could try your hardest, but inevitably it wouldn't cooperate that well. The beautiful girl often despaired with it; Adelaide despaired with it; even Marlene despaired with it. Them all believing that leaving it in its natural state, did nothing to enhance Ellie's features. However, Cyrus found his daughter's hair trouble quite amusing, saying that 'she wouldn't be a proper Gryffin without a lion's main'. Adelaide would then always remind him that he had to keep his hair short because he wasn't able to do anything other with it. Cyrus would say his beard compensated, but that didn't really help Ellie in anyway.

Instead, she was left with masses of wavy chocolate locks that would have nothing done to them.

As a result of this, it was always a battle in the morning between Ellie and her hairbrush, something that caused lots of frustration for the usually half-asleep girl. And it was no different this morning.

There was a subtle pounding in the back of her head and her eyes felt fuzzy, so having to tug her hairbrush through tangles wasn't a particularly enjoyable task. It wasn't even her hairbrush either, it was Sirius', and far too small to even attempt to attack how much hair was sprouting from her head. She cursed it, and she cursed her parents for giving her the hair genes she got, and then she cursed her lack of knowledge on any spell that would help too. Adelaide always did her hair at home; it was something they both enjoyed. But now, Ellie was gritting her teeth and trying not to scream from fury.

Staying up so late and drinking all of that wine was definitely not a good idea.

James had risen with the break of dawn, firmly following his 'seize the day' motto, and as always, and he'd woken Remus up in the process. Peter was sitting up in bed looking very blurry eyed, but well rested all the same, and as soon as there was a mention of them going down to breakfast, he'd be raring to go. Much like Ellie, Sirius was nursing a slight headache and definitely a case of over-tiredness, still lying flat on his stomach with his pillow firmly over his head. The handsome boy was always groggy in the morning though, so it wasn't much different.

Usually, the group would be down for breakfast at a reasonable time, not liking to be rushed before lessons. But today, they already seemed like two men down.

Ellie finally cracked, launching the hairbrush across the room so it made a loud crash by the side of Peter's bed - that seemed to wake him up a lot more. She huffed and stomped her foot like a petulant child, making Sirius groan in annoyance, before she marched out of the door and back to her dormitory.

Having watched the beautiful girl's dramatic exit, Remus shook his head with a chuckle and James just rolled his eyes, attempting to get the other black-haired boy out of bed. Sirius waved an arm around haphazardly, trying to deter whoever was stirring him, dislodging James' glasses in the process. The messy haired boy took that as a challenge, shoving his glasses back up his nose and shaking his best friend with even more force. It was a dangerous game, getting on the wrong side of Sirius Black before ten in the morning, but James was willing to risk the consequences.

A string of curses fell out of Sirius' mouth lazily as he rolled over, grabbing his pillow off of his head and whacking James with it. When he heard the person disturbing him grumble, he finally opened his eyes, slightly satisfied with himself. James looked bewildered and dishevelled, his glasses on crooked once again and his hair now messier than usual. The first thing Sirius did was snort.