good things fall apart • sirius black

'I'm perfectly fine' is a lie

The Marauders never thought they'd see the day that Ellie Gryffin refused to acknowledge Sirius Black's presence, but here it was. After her scrap with Flora the beautiful girl refused to even be in the same room as him, and if they were forced together in lessons or on the common room sofa, she acted as if he was a stranger. He felt like one, but so did she now too. Near mute and always grumpy, there was no sight of the sunny girl who used to always be beaming.

Something in her had shattered, and the one person that would be able to piece her back together was the handsome boy she hated.

The boys were constantly treading on eggshells, for if one of them just uttered something in a funny tone, her rage was sparked and she flew of the handle. It didn't make it easy to be her friend at all - Peter avoided speaking to her at all costs and James was constantly frustrated that she'd fell into this dark place. Remus however, was the only one Ellie listened too, always the most patient. He stuck to her side like glue, afraid that if he didn't, she might find herself in bother.

And she had done on multiple occasions. Whether it was arguing with teachers or just spitting venom at anyone that so much as breathed wrong around her, there was always an issue. She was doing detention with McGonagall for her scrap with Flora, but now also detention with Professors Flitwick and Slughorn who she'd always had turbulent relationships with anyway.

    "Stop fucking picking on me to answer your stupid questions. There's a whole class of other students." She'd roared in the middle of Charms.

    "There's literally no need to take house points off me, I was five fucking minutes late." She'd argued in Potions.

McGonagall had threatened to contact Cyrus about her behaviour when she'd climbed on top of the Gryffindor table one dinner, announcing to the whole of the Great Hall that they better stop spreading rumours about her, and whilst this once would've been a threat, Ellie had merely scoffed and stormed off.

Because there really were rumours going around about her. Worse ones than those that spread about her being close to a psychotic break after Adelaide passed.

The younger years cowered away or avoided the corridors she was walking down, and the older years constantly yelled at her for acting so entitled - it was fair to say none of this went down okay. After an incident where she nearly tried to take on a meaty seventh year Hufflepuff who would've undoubtably been able to squish her with just one of his hands, Remus was finished with her behaviour and asked the girls and Jessica Arnell to make sure that they never left the common room or Library with the beautiful girl.

Whilst all this chaos was occurring though, Sirius had no idea what to do with himself, still in awe of the feisty new version of Ellie Gryffin, but worried that things between them were completely ruined. And that she wasn't okay either, for she certainly didn't appear it. Hidden behind smudged black eyeliner and cherry red lipstick, he had no idea what was going on, and cursed himself for wanting to get to know the testy girl who got his heart rate increasing. There was just something about that sharp tongue of hers.

    "Cubby, I'm not complaining..." Remus breathed against her neck as her hands swirled a curl on the back of his head. They'd been sat tangled up on his bed for a while now, chests heaving and hearts pounding, "But are you okay? You don't feel okay." He punctuated every word by trailing kisses across her jaw.

That seemed to be the only way she'd listen to him at the moment.

Ellie's lips had been greedy, desperate, more so than usual. Whilst Remus knew she was a grabber, fingers in his hair or clutching the back of his shirt, it felt like she truly wanted to keep him this time. As if her tongue wanted to taste every part of him and savour it for the rest of her life. This was nothing near the 'no emotions' vow they'd made, and Remus didn't want her slipping. He didn't want to lose her to whatever was consuming her mind.