Lone Wolf | SIRIUS BLACK

Chapter Seven

| H O U S E   O F   M O N S T E R S  |

October, 1975

HOGSMEADE VILLAGE was bustling with activity.  Students milled all over the streets, entering shops, then exiting them, carrying bag after bag of candy from Honeydukes.

A month had passed since the incident with Rose and while I had initially had my reservations about us getting back to normal — and by that I meant I slept with one eye open, unfortunately literally, to the point my eye would now twitch crazily — nothing else with Rose had happened.  She had been normal ever since, if her giddy enthusiasm didn't count.

I didn't know how she ran on such positive energy all the time but if it was possible for me to siphon some, I definitely would. 

I needed it with the negative attention I'd been getting from particular people.  First, it was with Severus.  To establish his 'dominance' and 'I can handle myself' attitude after I had stepped into his fight, he'd chosen to trip me when I had gone into the courtyard.  Not just once. Not twice. Several times, just to really get that stupid message across of 'I don't need your help'. Of course his idiotic pureblood supremacy posse, including Malfoy and the Black sisters, laughed their heads off when he magically tied my shoelaces together so that I tripped again.  Ever since, I had stuck to wearing flats with no ties on them whatsoever.

Then there was Sirius Black.  He didn't try to humiliate me in an attempt to redeem himself, but rather, took it upon himself to stare holes into my head and body in every class we shared, which in some annoying twist of fate, was every class.  I didn't get what his problem was. 

It had been a month since I had left him — and virtually the whole population of Hogwarts — alone, as I should have done when I first arrived here. I only conversed with Lily, Constance and Rose as well as with a sweet boy in my Charms class; Frank Longbottom.  He didn't talk a ton but no one needed him to.  It was just nice having someone next to me, working on the class's assignment.  Someone who wasn't trying to burn me alive simply using their gaze.

Lily clutched my arm excitedly, snapping me out of my walking funk where I wasn't really paying attention.  Not to talking anyway. "I want to go into Madam Puddifoot's!  She always has the best tea."

Constance wrinkled her nose like 'tea' was synonymous with 'evil incarnate'.  "Who wants tea when they could have butterbeer?"

And so started the great Tea versus Butterbeer argument of 1975.  Rose and I acted as a barrier between friends turned brief enemies as the debate escalated.  Finally, Lily with her kind demeanour, conceded.

Or so I thought.  "Let's take the debate to Madam Puddifoot.  I'm sure she'll set you straight."

"Let's go see then. I'll prove you wrong."

"Mmhm," Lily hummed, "that's highly unlikely."

Constance and Lily broke off from the group then, and Rose and I were left together, as we always seemed to be. I turned to look at her awkwardly. No matter if the possession episode had only been a one time thing, and it would probably never happen again, it had changed my perception of her.

Of course, a prophecy where she told me of impending doom upon my life wasn't exactly sunshine and rainbows for me to rejoice over.