Hiding Bruises

Hiding Bruises- Chapter 16- Relax

We’d been working on the decorations for quite a while and to be honest it was pretty awkward. Lily was running round the place telling everyone what to do, taking any chance possible to insult the way we were hanging ribbons or the colours we had put near each other, but apart from that it was silent.

Sirius seemed to be doing anything he could to get away from me and eventually he just sat down on the sofa and glared at everyone. After a while James went over to him and whispered something in Sirius’s ear, Sirius didn’t reply.

Suddenly there was a load crash, the lights that James had been attaching to the ceiling had fallen down.

“JAMES!” screeched Lily, James winced. “What just happened?” she asked, coming closer to him.

“Uh, the lights just fell down,” he said.

“Yeah, they did” she said slowly, “and remind me James, who was meant to be putting the lights up?” Lily’s eyes were wide and she was talking very slowly, pronouncing every word perfectly; as if she were talking to a very small child.

James looked terrified, his eyes were also wide and he seemed to have shrunk back into himself, he looked insanely helpless and young, “I was.” He said quietly.

“What? I didn’t hear that” said Lily.

“Me” answered James, his voice high and whining.

“Yes, You! So, whose fault is that they fell down?” When James didn’t answer, Lily screamed, “Yours! So why aren’t you doing it?”

“I don’t know,” spluttered James, completely taken aback by Lily’s intensity.

“Why are you sitting there then? Put them back up you lazy, dumb, idiot!” screamed Lily, before turning away.

“Are you OK Lily?” asked Emmeline quietly as Lily walked away.

Lily nodded quickly, her eyes still scarily wide, “I’m fine.”

“You sure Lil?” I asked.

“Yes!” she screamed, “I’m great, with a capital fucking G, ok? Now shut up.”

I backed away from her, shocked and surprised. I heard a quiet chuckle from the end of the hall: I spun round to see Sirius, still on the couch laughing to himself.

“What’s so funny Sirius?” Lily had turned too; she spat the question at him.

“You,” said Sirius, his eyes daring her to react.

“And what exactly, may I ask, is it about me that you find soo humorous?” asked Lily, the strain of not shouting showed in her voice and she looked furious.

“It’s just that, well, you’re so cute looking” said Sirius, “but you’re actually a crazy bitch.”

Lily looked stumped for a second, it was obvious that Sirius was trying to pick a fight with her and that she was unsure whether or not she about to bite of more then she could chew.

Sirius laughed at her, “so, I take it you’ve finished mouthing of at everyone for no reason?”

“I wasn’t doing that at all” Lily said, I slight pout starting to appear on her lips.

Sirius just raised his eyebrows at her, “well then, are you done with your little breakdown?”

“It wasn’t-“ Lily started, but he cut her off.

“It’s just that I thought I might go get some food for us all and order some more for the party,” he said.

“That sounds like a good idea,” said Lily, slightly grudgingly. He stood up but stayed still, laughter playing at his lips, which I realised with acute embarrassment; I was staring at. I turned away from watching their semi-argument or whatever it was that was going on.

“Go on then,” I heard Lily say, “off you trot.”

“I might need a bit of help,” Sirius said to the room at large.

“Well, I’m not going,” said Lily and walked over to examine James work with the lights.

“Tina,” said Sirius, from the centre of the large room, “you wanna come along and help me?”

James turned to look over at me, but Lily snapped something at him and he quickly turned away.

“I don’t think I’d be very good at helping carry stuff, take James,” I said, then thinking better of that I added, “or Remus.”

Remus was standing by Emmeline helping her with putting out the table’s for the food. “He’s busy,” said Sirius simply.

“I’m really weak, I’ll drop all the food,” I said desperately, not wanting to be alone with him when he was in such a weird mood.

Sirius chuckled at me, “use your wand.”

“Oh,” I said, I’d run out of excuses now.

“Besides,” he said, picking something up from the couch, “you’ll be able to fit under this.”

“What is it?” I asked, intrigued by the shimmery material in his hand. He put his finger to his lips and beckoned me over to see. I stepped closer to him warily, he grabbed my arm and pulled me out the door, despite my weak protests.

“This,” he said proudly, pulling what I now realised was a kind of cloak of the two of us, “is an invisibility cloak.”

I lifted up my hand under the cloak so it was in front of my face, I couldn’t see a thing; “wow” I said. I mean I’d heard of them, but none were ever of a very good standard from what I’d heard; you could usually see a faint shimmering outline or something. I looked over at Sirius and he grinned at me (I could see him because we were both under the cloak, but to anyone else there would be nothing right were the two of us were standing.)

It made everything seem more personal; anything we did only the other could see it and, I realised with a blush, we had to stand quite close together to ensure that the cloak covered both of us completely.

“So, how do we get to the kitchens?” I asked him, feeling heat rising in my cheeks.

“This way,” he said, starting to walk towards the stairs. I followed him down the stairs to the basement. As we were about to enter a smallish corridor of to the left, we heard footsteps coming.

Sirius quickly pushed me into a little alcove behind an elaborate painting of some finely dressed ladies enjoying biscuits and tea. We stood there silently for a minute or two, waiting for the footsteps to pass us.

“What was the point of that?” I whispered, once the close was clear.

Sirius raised his eyebrows questioningly at me, “do you really think that would have stopped a Slytherin dreaming something up to get us in trouble?”

“They couldn’t see us anyway,” I said, feeling stupid for some reason, even though this was a perfectly reasonable thing to say.

“It’s a small corridor, they would have walked into us,” he said.

“Well, they’re gone now, so shall we make a move?” I asked, trying to make my voice seem relaxed, but I was pretty sure it was shaking.

“Hmm,” he said, as though he was thinking very deeply about what I had said, “I’m not sure, think I kind of like it.” He said, a cheeky light starting to burn in his eyes, “it’s kinda…” he looked me up and down, “cosy, don’t you think?” I became insanely aware of how tight our bodies were packed, the cold wall pressing into my back and his warmth radiating through my body.

I had to concentrate hard to keep my breathing even, “bit cramped,” I managed to say, staring at his chest rather then up into his bewitching eyes.

He put his head on one side, “hmm,” he said again. I carried on staring at his chest, my hands clenching and unclenching at my sides. I felt another pair of larger, warmer hands close around them, stopping the movement. “You’re so tense,” he said, placing his hands on my shoulders, massaging them slowly, I felt my muscles relax under his touch.

“Well, I am pressed against a cold, hard, stone wall, it is kind of hard to relax completely, you know? It’s not very comfortable, you see?” I was babbling now, which I tend to do when I’m nervous, and all of my sentences seemed to end with a question, a trait that had started to show itself more and more recently. “I think we need to get going, really, if we want to get this food up to everyone. Lily gets a bit cranky when she’s hungry, maybe you noticed before?”

He chuckled, “I noticed,” he said quietly, lifting his hand up to my chin and pushing it up softly, so I was looking directly into his eyes.

“Yeah, well, she might get worse if we don’t hurry up-“

All of what I was going to say was forgotten when she shushed me quietly, she started to run his fingers around my lips. I made an unintelligible high-pitched sort of oh-ing sound.

He smiled as he leaned down, keeping his eyes locked on mine as I stared into them, grey, flecked with colour, gorgeous. He closed his eyes and I watched his mouth come closer for a second, until it came into contact with mine and I too closed my eyes.