This charming man
Marlene noticed two things when she woke up. The first was the throbbing pain in her temple. The second was the complete and total silence around her. When she fell asleep she could still hear the party raging on below but now all was silent. The room was pitch black and if she strained her ears she could hear the faint snoring coming from one of the other beds in the room. Sirius was lying beside her on the opposite end of the bed, his chest rising and falling in a continuous loop.
Marlene pulled open the curtains that surrounded Sirius' bed slowly as to avoid making any noise. The worst thing that could happen right now is that one of them woke up. She hesitantly stood up and began to stumbled through the darkness. She could only make out vague black shapes in the room. At one point she stumbled on a shoe that was left in the middle of the floor. She inwardly cursed the shoes owner. She looked around the room to ensure that no one had heard her trip up. And that’s when she noticed that someone's curtains were drawn and that no one was in the bed. Her heart dropped. They must have gone to some girl's room or perhaps they were still in the common room, she hoped. The second thought filled her with even more dread at the thought of people being in the common room and seeing her leave the boys dormitories.
"Marlene?"
She whipped around and standing there in the light of the bathroom was Remus John Lupin, "Fuck," Marlene said. She noticed his eyes wandering to Sirius' bed where she had forgotten to close the curtains. "Where you in Sirius' bed?".
"Uh-"
Rustling came from Sirius' bed and Marlene thanked Merlin when she heard his feet touching the ground.
"I'm sure Sirius' will explain it all to you," Marlene laughed awkwardly, and ran from the room as fast as her feet would carry her.
~~~
Thankfully, Marlene had been able to gotten into bed without any further issues and even managed to fall asleep after a few hours of tossing and turning. Now however, Lily was shaking her awake.
"Marlene!"
Marlene was fully considering hitting her with her pillow but she settled for a somewhat disgruntled noise.
"Breakfast," Lily said.
She slowly dragged herself out of bed and rubbed her eye. The residue from her eyeliner from last night rubbed off onto her hand. She groaned and wearily began to get ready for the day. She cursed Remus for having to have his birthday on a weekday. She sluggishly threw on her uniform and quickly brushed her teeth. She knew she looked like shit but she just couldn't bring herself to care. Her tie hung loosely around her neck and her shirt wasn't fully tucked into her skirt and was nowhere close to being buttoned correctly. A bird could have made quite the cosy home in her hair if it wanted to. The whole time she was getting ready she moaned to Mary and Lily who kept exchanging silent looks across the room. When they were all ready they headed down for breakfast. Of course, Marlene complained about the length of the walk to the great hall.
"By the way Marls, where were you last night? You never came back from getting a cigarette from Sirius, Lily had to drink the firewhisky James brought for you," Mary asked.
"Oh uh, me and Sirius were just talking and we both fell asleep."
Mary made it incredibly obvious that she didn’t believe her but dropped the topic for the time being as they had just arrived in the great hall. As soon as they sat down, Marlene began to pile her plate with everything she could get her hands on. Whenever Marlene was hung over she found the quickest remedy for her was to get as much greasy food into her as possible. Bacon and sausages were her main victims today. As she began to tuck into her breakfast, an arm slid around her waist. Marlene turned around in confusion, ready to slap the arms owner, to see Sirius Black grinning back at her. A look of mutual understanding passed through her eyes and Marlene decided to lean into it. She kissed him on the cheek, "Good morning, honeybuns," she said. Sirius kissed her cheek so no one would see the laugh he was trying very hard to conceal, "Morning, Sweetie'' he replied.
"I thought you two were just talking?" Lily raised her eyebrow.
"I never said what we were talking about."
"You dirty dog, Marlene!,” Lily cackled.
Marlene wrapped her arms around Sirius' waist and put a loving look on her face as she gazed up at him. Sirius winked at her and she had to bite her lip to conceal the laugh that threatened to escape her mouth. Remus, who had also arrived along with James and Peter, grumbled something about them getting a room. "Do you have an issue, Lupin?" Marlene asked. "I have an issue with public PDA," he said.
“What's up your arse?”
“He's upset that I missed his party,” Sirius answered. Remus glared at him with a look so heated Marlene was surprised Sirius didn't burst into flames right on the spot.
“Shut up, Sirius,” Remus grunted.
“I said I was sorry mate, I fell asleep.”
“And I said it was fine,” he snapped. He got up and stormed off. He didn't even touch his food.
“Must be that time of the month, huh,” Mary joked.
“No, I don't think so,” said Sirius a look of confusion written on his face.
~~~
The day continued smoothly after that. She didn't see Sirius once outside of lessons and he didn’t go near her during them. She heard all the usual words muttered between friends and got all the usual sympathetic looks from her friends. She couldn't wait until she no longer had to hear, “look there's that lesbian I was telling you about,” whispered wherever she went.
By the time that dinner had rolled around, she was starving. She barely had time to have lunch since she had to catch up on the homework she missed by going to the party instead. She was one of the first to arrive in the great hall along with Mary and lily. She noticed the marauders were already there so they made their way over to them. Marlene sat beside Sirius and greeted him with a big kiss on the cheek. “Hey Siri,” she smiled.
James stared at her in disgust, “Siri? Seriously.”
“I think it’s cute, don’t you think, Siri,” Marlene said in the sickly sweet voice. Sirius nodded “And my name’s actually Sirius, not seriously,” he added.
James rolled his eyes. Sirius sure knew how to beat a dead horse. Suddenly, lights were flashing up into the air above. At first they were just bright white, however they gradually turned into reds, and yellows, and oranges, and pinks. They were exploding all around her. Words started being formed, first an M, then an A, an R, an L. Marlene’s heart stopped. Marlene. It was spelling Marlene. She turned to Sirius and glared at him. ‘Marlene, I love you -Sirius’. All Marlene could do was gape at the sky.
“What the hell.”
The entirety of the great hall was staring at the two of them. Shock was written on each and every face she looked at. Sirius got up and kneeled down on one knee. Marlene found herself getting more and more concerned, especially when he pulled a little velvet box from his pocket.
“Sirius, stop, what the hell are you doing, get up,” she hissed.
“I love you too,” he said, far louder than was necessary. He opened the box. Inside was a dainty ring with a tear shaped red stone on it. As much as Marlene loved it, she hated it. “Take this ring as a promise from me to love you for as long as I live.” Marlene could have punched him.
But there was only one thing she could do.
“Oh my god. Sirius!” She got up and flung herself into his arms and hugged him tight. She braced herself. Then she kissed him. Right on the mouth. She felt herself cringe. Yeah, she thought, I’m definitely gay.
As they pulled away Sirius slipped the ring on her finger. She forced a smile on her mouth and they both sat back down hand in hand. Marlene continued with her food and didn’t look up from her plate. She genuinely didn’t know if she would be able to face her friends ever again after whatever that was.
Slowly the great hall recovered from their confusion and got back to the conversations they were having before the fireworks had started. As soon as she finished eating, Marlene pulled Sirius up by the hand and dragged him out of the great hall.
“Hey, I wasn’t done eating!”
“Don’t care.”
She pulled him into an empty classroom and shut the door. “What was that,” she demanded.
“It was our grand premier as a couple,” he grinned.
“Sirius, you basically proposed.” She didn’t understand how he thought that that was a good idea. She felt her rage building up. “I wanted to take it slow. It might be cool for you, Sirius, if you take things quick, but it’s different for me. It’s not much of an improvement to go from being the school's lesbian to the school's slag.”
“No one is going to think you’re a slag.”
Marlene rolled her eyes, “What about when we break up, Sirius, everyone will think I’m easy to get. They probably all already think that as we started going out yesterday!”
“You’re thinking far too much into this and who says we’ll break up, we could just stay together and be a real couple. I believe I could make myself love you, Marlene.”
“Sirius. I’m not going over this again.”
She turned away and stormed out the room. She knew she was probably being dramatic and would most likely have to apologise to Sirius in the morning but it was all becoming too much. They’d been together less than a day and she felt like she was coming apart at the seams.
~~~
She knew that she wasn’t in the right headspace to answer the question Mary and Lily would have bombard her with as soon as she stepped foot in the common room, so she took herself outside and headed straight to the quidditch pitch. Whenever she was stressed or upset her go to place was the quidditch pitch. Being high above the clouds allowed her to put all her problems into perspective and helped her to relax.
Her plans were thwarted. Someone was already there. Flying high above in the sky was a girl. Marlene could make out the green in the inside lining of her cloak. A Slytherin. Marlene needed solitude. She wasn’t in the mood to deal with anyone at the moment let alone a Slytherin. She turned to go.
“Hey wait! You don’t have to go, I'm leaving now anyway!” The girl screamed down at her.
Marlene turned back around, at the same time that she landed on the ground, Marlene McKinnon realised that she was one of the most beautiful girls she’d ever seen. She had dark skin and long braids. Her nose was pierced with a septum and she wore an obscene amount of rings on her fingers. Marlene also thought she was the coolest girl she’d ever seen.
“Marlene McKinnon? Right?” She asked.
Marlene could barely nod her head. She felt her face go red and it only went redder over the fact that it was going red in the first place. She had probably noticed her form Sirius’ dumb stunt. She wanted the ground to open up and swallow her.
She held out her hand. “Dorcas. Dorcas Meadows,” she said. Marlene reached out and shook the offered hand.
“Anyway, I’ll leave you to it.”
And just like that she was gone. Marlene turned around and watched her leave, her mouth agape. Marlene hadn’t even said a word to her but she knew that she was infatuated.
~~~
Marlene flew around for hours. Her mind was occupied with so many thoughts that she didn’t notice as the minutes flew by. Dorcas was the main focus point of her thoughts. She had already heard about Dorcas from Sirius but had never before had a face to match the name. All she knew was that she was friends with his brother, Regulus. Apart from that she knew nothing.
She noticed the sun had set long ago. She landed on the ground, put away the broom she borrowed, and began to walk to the common room on autopilot. The whole time her mind went over the short interaction she had had with Dorcas. She didn’t even notice that she had entered the common room until Mary and Lily jumped up and walked over to her. They grabbed her, pulling her from her thoughts, and dragged her upstairs. As soon as the door had closed behind them and they had pushed her down onto one of the beds they began their interrogation.
“Tell us everything,” Lily started.
“There’s not much to tell, last night when we were talking, we found out how much we had in common, then he leaned in and kissed me. I have never felt like this over a boy.” The lies flowed out of her so easily it scared her. “I had no clue he was going to do what he did today though.”
Mary picked her hand up and examined the ring, “Pretty ring. He better treat you right or god help him.”
Marlene laughed, “God, I love you Mary.”
Mary smiled and hugged her, “I love you too.” Lily cleared her throat. “I love you too, Lily,” said Marlene fake exasperation in her voice. Lily joined in on the hug. Guilt began to eat her alive. She was lying to her best friends. They had always told each other everything since they had become friends in first year. Well nearly everything. It wasn't like she hadn't lied about crushes before. I mean they both thought she was in love with Marlon Brando for crying out loud. However, it felt different this time, especially since only yesterday Mary was trying to go out with Sirius, even if it seemed like she didn’t care about losing Sirius. She pulled away from the hug.
“I should probably get some sleep, I barely got any last night.”
“I wonder why,” Mary laughed.