Play the Game ✔️

Hearts

Their last argument had been particularly awful; an actual difference of opinion...they didn't have many of those; they always seemed to agree on everything. They had nearly everyone's attention in the Great Hall; both feeling the stares of students and staff, but that wasn't about to stop them. It ended with him throwing his hands in the air and stomping off.

"Fine! I'll pick you up at half-three! Be ready or I'll leave without you!"

She couldn't even remember what had started it exactly, probably something stupid...it was always something stupid, like starting off with the fact that he said that he didn't want to drag her out of Hogwarts that weekend because she was still fighting a cold.

Prior to leaving he went to talk to Poppy; he was relieved when she sided with him. So Poppy took a walk to the the Hufflepuff girls dorm rooms.

"You should really stay here Liesel. If not here then you should probably go to Saint Mungos. I dare say that even a muggle hospital would be able to take care of you. I believe that you've developed what's called, pneumonia. You may have heard of it?"

She nodded, as she stared at the floor.

"If you do go home with Sirius this afternoon, see to it that he gets for you, a cough elixir. That might help you to get some rest as well as quiet the cough. If I continue to hear you coughing up a lung, I will be sending you to Saint Mungos straight away, whether Mister Black is waiting for you or not. Am I making myself clear Miss Rhodes?"

Liesel could only stare at the woman. She nodded finally. "Crystal," she replied quietly.

Upon the way to his rented house, Sirius had braved the local chemist to purchase a muggle cold syrup hoping to quell her continuous while she trailed behind him. She realized that she hadn't been much fun to be around that week, as she (at his insistence) remained curled up in the corner of the sofa beneath a blanket and apologized; she only wanted to be with him. He could only shake his head and scowl as he donned his jacket again and told her that he was heading out to pick up something he could manage to prepare for supper.

After soup and sandwiches and the administering of the cough syrup, he had put her to bed, then got back out of bed and grabbed an extra blanket to go sleep on the sofa; the excessive coughing was keeping him awake and he had to be alert for the trip back the next afternoon. When she fretted, he tried to explain that normally he could sleep through anything...but he was terribly worried about her...the medicine didn't seem to be helping...

She tossed and turned in his bed beneath the duvet and extra blankets, feeling forlorn and alone; he was annoyed, she could tell. But still, weren't his final words to her, "I love you...get some sleep babe..."? Finally, she slipped out of the bed and padded into the next room as quietly as she could and heard him shift his weight on the sofa and sigh hard. The room was cold; the floor even colder. Kneeling beside him, she reached out and touched the small of his back with the tips of her fingers. Gliding her fingers up his arching back to his shoulder, she could feel the goose bumps rise on his flesh and she curled her fingers around the well-developed muscles of his arm, finally resting.

He rolled on to his back and held out his arm toward her, signalling an invitation to lay with him on the sofa...She crawled onto the sofa with him and he wrapped his arms around her and held her close beneath his blanket. Both seemed content to just be. She listened to the beating of his heart, and knew it to be her favorite lullaby and just as she had drifted off to sleep, she felt his hands wandering the back of her body, tenderly massaging the still tight muscles of her back. He finally rolled her over and kissed her deeply and soon, their bodies were tangled together, playing touch me-touch you, eventually bringing each other to climax without actually engaging in any official act of lovemaking.