One Step Ahead part I | Sirius Black

Chapter 40

Gwen, for the first time in months, is avidly seeking out black hair and grey eyes.

She chews nervously on her lower lip, watching the rain come down from the large windows in the Ravenclaw common room. She could see the quidditch pitch from here, and while Gryffindor's practice had ended hours ago, Sirius was still out flying in the rain.

She'd felt guilty earlier, her weeks of avoiding him finally catching up to her. Now she was plain irritated. She wonders if he knows that she's finally looking for him and that's why he's staying out so long.

She sighs and stomps out of the common room, grumbling to herself as she trudges down the staircases of the castle and out into the rain. It's cold, but she's too mad to notice. And she can't even put her finger on why.

She's soaked to the bone by the time she gets to the quidditch pitch, her shoes water logged and her ponytailed hair sticking to the back of her neck.

She stares up from the bottom of the goal posts, unable to deny that he was an impressive flyer. She'd never liked brooms, found them to be absolutely terrifying. She can't fight the tiny smile that appears as he bobs and weaves, completely oblivious to her and the rain. It was staring to get dark now. She holds her wand to her throat and clears it, her voice amplified as she says,

"Sirius Black, to the Headmaster's office please."

He looks down, peering through the twilight and rain to see familiar blonde hair. Gwen. He feels a rush of excitement, his lips twitching up to smile. But then he realizes that he's mad. Furious.

He wants to tell her to piss off, but he knows she won't get out of the rain until she speaks to him. Reluctantly, he flies lower and hovers a few feet in front of her.

She cranes her neck to look up at him, asking, "Can you come down from there?"

"Oh," Sirius mocks. "You're finished ignoring me and now you're telling me what to do."

"To be fair, I'm asking. Not telling." He wants to pinch her for her smart mouth, fighting the urge to roll his eyes at her blank face. He feels a prick of surprise when her eyes soften and she says quietly, "Please?"

"Fuck me," He mutters to himself in disbelief, finally landing on the ground and marching in the direction of the tents. Gwen scurries after him, wincing when she sees lighting and darker clouds. She frowns when he lets the canvas swish closed right in front of her face, sighing to herself before she lifts it open and slips inside.

His back is stiff, shoulders squared. He won't face her, not until she wonders quietly,

"Why didn't you tell me it was so bad?"

His chest grows tight and he whirls around, grinding out between his clenched teeth, "It's not like I exactly had an opportunity, Whitlock. You've been acting as if I'm a ghost."

She furrows her brows and says simply, "I quite like the ghosts—"

"Fucking hell!" He cries exasperatedly. She made everything so simple and so difficult at the same time, both blasé and excited. She was utterly impossible for him to comprehend. "I meant you've been treating me as if I don't exist! Gone from your life!"

"Well, I didn't—"

"I thought we were friends," He accuses, pointing his finger at her. She's growing frustrated, with him and his interrupting. And definitely with the finger he has pointed her way. She swats at his hand, huffing,

"We are, I just—"

"You just what?!" He growls lowly, running his hands through his hair, his skin tingling where she'd barely made contact with him. That's all it took, the tiniest bit of skin to skin touch. And the feeling of longing hit him like a tidal wave, a feeling he'd been trying to repress since seeing her hold hands with Fabian Prewett.

"It's beside the sodding point! I'm here because of Regulus."

He freezes, his voice growing dangerously quiet as he spits out, "Do not talk about him to me."

"Merlin, you're so dramatic!" Gwen cries. "He's worried about you, he asked me to talk to you."

"So you'll only talk to me when my brother asks you too?" He's hurt, the implication like a punch to the gut. She'd sit and chat with his brother, his brother that insisted on staying with their horrible family, but she wouldn't even spare him a glance.

"Fuck you," He finally says flatly, feeling triumph when she rears back like she's been slapped. Her eyes are like chips of ice, sharp and dangerous and cold as she says cuttingly,

"You should have told me. You should have told me how bad it was."

The horrors she'd heard from regulus, guilty confessions that Sirius had suffered far more than he had at the hands of his parents. It tore her insides apart. She wanted to go back in time, force him to talk about it more when they were at the beach. But she wasn't one to talk. She was only an open book on the surface, the details of her life locked down and available to few.

"Why?! So you can feel better about it? They were abusive awful people and I'm not there anymore!" He growls, anger and sadness making his throat raw. He didn't want to talk about them. The wounds were still fresh.

"And why the fuck are you talking about it with my brother? He worships that sodding dark wizard, Gwen! He'd rather see you dead than alive! Do you know what my parents would say if they found out that I knew you? Or if their precious Slytherin son spent time with you?!"

Gwen yells back, finally her rage having boiled over the brink of tolerance, "I don't give a rats ass what they think about me! I don't care! Why do you even care?!"

Sirius pulls at his hair, trying to keep his hands busy. He had half a mind to run past her or to kick over one of the fucking benches. But his hands were itching for her, itching to grab her and pull her close.

His heart and his hands win over his mind, because even though he's angry, he cares so much it hurts.

"How can you think I don't care?" He mutters hoarsely, his fingers reaching out and wiping away the rain from her forehead.

Her breathing catches in her throat. He cares. Maybe she'd been blind to it. Or maybe they were both coming to the realization now. That they were drawn to each other.

His fingers slide to her cheek, and she can't help it. She leans into his touch, resting her face in the palm of his hand. Sirius feels his heart warm slowly, the chill he'd had from the rain and her blue eyes disappearing. She looks tired, angry still. And so beautiful it fucking hurt.

Their eyes both flicker to each other's lips, Gwen's heart roaring in her ears. And then she's making a snap judgement, pulling the infuriating boy down to her quickly before she can second guess herself.