A/N: I have no idea why this hasn't been archived here already! This was written for heidi8, who purchased it for charity at "Sweet Charity". Quite some time ago, I might add. Anyway, naturally all characters etc etc belong to J.K. Rowling and all kudos goes to her.
Points Lost & A Point Made
"Headmasters have powers at their disposal with which Prime Ministers have never yet been invested."
- Winston Churchill, 1930.
Sirius tried not to twitch, but that's easier said than done when you're sitting in the Headmaster's office and said Headmaster has fixed a pair of impossibly twinkly blue eyes upon you, despite the fact that you just about killed someone. Remus always said he wanted to know how Dumbledore got them to twinkle like that. Right now, though, Sirius just wished he'd quit it. It always made him feel like the old man knew stuff about him that even Sirius himself didn't know.
"Peppermint?" inquired Professor Dumbledore, and proffered a small brown paper bag in the student's direction.
Sirius shook his head stiffly. He could feel the bruises coming up and his left eye starting to swell shut.
"Hmm, perhaps not."
Sirius darted what had to be at least his third glance in the direction of the portrait of Phineas Nigellus, who was watching him with hard, beady eyes.
"Ah," announced Dumbledore, following the boy's gaze. "Yes, indeed. Headmasters and Headmistresses, if you would be so genteel as to vacate the office for the moment?"
Most of the painting's inhabitants shrugged and, with lingering curious looks, vanished out of sight. Phineas, however, seemed merely insulted. "This impossible whelp is the offspring of my blood, Dumbledore! The last male in the esteemed line of Black and I—"
"Yes, yes," said Dumbledore placating. "But he also has a right to some privacy and I don't doubt that young Mr Black might feel that said privacy is infringed upon by the fact that your portrait also hangs in his family home, is this not the case, Mr Black?"
Sirius gave a small, almost unwilling nod. It was bad enough that his mother would probably hear about it all in the end anyway, without Phineas Nigellus blabbing it.
"So, Professor Black, if you would…?"
With a lot of ungracious muttering the man vanished off the edge of his canvas.
There was a momentary silence.
"I suppose you still don't want a peppermint? No? They're really very good. Oh well, never mind." The Headmaster put the small bag to one side and then folded his hands onto the desk before him. "So. If perhaps you would be so kind as to answer my question, Sirius. Do you, or do you not, have something resembling a justification for the fact that you beat young Mr Crabbe to a pulp? Which was, if I may add, no mean feat given the size of the lad. By the way, if you're interested, Madam Pomfrey assures me that his bones are almost all mended and he will be able to relearn how to talk."
Sirius made a grunting noise and started to wish he'd taken a bloody peppermint just because sucking it would have given him something to do.
"Hmm," said the Professor. "You do understand the serious nature of the offence you've committed, Mr Black? Hexing I could even have understood, since I'm unfortunately rather come to expect that from you and young Mr Potter in particular, however – repeated banging of a wizard's head against a stone floor will have unpleasant repercussions, you know. I do believe the boy's father is making noises about laying charges against you. Do you understand that if that happens the matter will be out of my hands? Do you understand what that means, Sirius? You may not be legally of age but I can assure you that they are likely to try you as such, since the fact that you have left home of your own volition and have chosen to reside with the Potters is, by default, a de facto declaration that you take responsibility for your own actions—" He paused. "If you could at least offer a reason…?"
"How 'bout, he's an ugly git?" snarled Sirius.
Dumbledore raised a single eyebrow.
"Oh for fuck's sake!" Sirius jumped to his feet, slamming the chair backwards with a screech of wood against wood, forgetting where he was, forgetting whom he was talking to, ire building in him, and uncontrollable rage. "He was hurting Moony, okay? Okay? He was hurting Remus! Is that what you wanted to hear?!"
Dumbledore observed him calmly. "All I wish to hear is an explanation for your actions, Sirius. Are you saying that young Mr Crabbe was hurting Remus Lupin and so you decided to give him a taste of his own medicine? Yet I have heard no complaints from Mr Lupin. He was never in the Hospital Wing for it."
Sirius turned on him, grey eyes flashing. "He wasn't hurting him physically. They never do, do they, because that would be too easy, wouldn't it? And Moony's used to pain, he just takes it. He always takes it, that's the problem, he doesn't care what they do or say and Crabbe was talking such shit―" Suddenly the boy slumped back into his chair and put his hands over his face. Belatedly, he remembered where he was and muttered, from beneath his palms, "Sorry 'bout the language, sir."
Although Sirius couldn't see it, the twinkle was back in his Headmaster's eyes. "I believe I may have been struck by temporary deafness a number of times in the last few minutes, my dear boy."
There was silence for a moment, then, until Sirius let his hands crop back into his lap.
"They're always at him, sir. Snivellus – I mean – Snape – I think he knows what Remus – you know – about his illness – but he has no proof and so he's constantly egging the others on, the hideous little grease ball, and, and Remus is too nice, you know, I reckon they'd pick on him anyway. It's okay if me or James are around, they leave him alone then, but the moment I turn my back – and he never defends himself, sir, but I just can't stand listening to it, I can't, and this time I just saw red when I walked up and heard—" He paused, then added defiantly, "I'm not sorry. You can expel me if you want, because I'm not sorry. I'd beat the shi– I mean – people can't go around insulting Remus in my hearing, Professor."
"So I've noticed, Sirius," commented the Headmaster dryly. A piece of parchment appeared on his desk between them. "This is a list of all the times that you, Mr Potter, Mr Pettigrew, and Mr Lupin have lost Gryffindor House Points this term."
Sirius glanced at it and blanched slightly beneath his spreading bruises. Merlin, that often? It was only mid-October.
"And it occurs to me," observed Dumbledore, whilst hiding a smile, "that almost every time you personally have lost points, the complaint appears connect to the fact that you believed someone was in some way maltreating Mr Lupin."
Sirius squirmed and made a non-committal noise.
"In fact," continued Dumbledore calmly, "it is remarkable to notice the similarity between your misdemeanours and young Mr Potter's, in that almost all of his seem to involve hexing people he believes have in some way tarnished the naturally impeccable honour of young Miss Evans."
Sirius went an odd colour. "Well," he said, on the defensive, "that's different, isn't it? He's crazy in love with her, he is. Can't think straight any more. Fuc– I mean, right nuisance it is too. Sometimes I wish they'd just get together so he can go back to being a rational human and we can all have some peace and quiet. I mean, half the time he hexes people who haven't really even done anything." The boy shrugged.
"Mmm," said Dumbledore with those ridiculously twinkling eyes and a knowing smile. "Yes, well. Love does inexplicable things to the best of us. You know, I wasn't much older than you are when the dreaded disease struck me as well. Disaster really, oh, a marvellous one of course, nothing beats the sweet calamity of love, but you have no idea what a disaster…"
Sirius stared at his Headmaster, trying to work out which was weirder: the image of Dumbledore having ever been as young as him, or the fact that he was discussing having been in love once, or the fact that he was discussing it with Sirius of all people.
"Yeah?" the younger man improvised, since the conversation seemed to require that he say something.
"Yes, 'yeah'," confirmed the old man with an oddly bitter yet nostalgic smile. "Brilliant mind. I never could resist a brilliant mind. Of course, beautiful too. Oh yes, he was beautiful."
For a second Sirius was seized by the insane urge to poke his little fingers in his ears and give them a clean out. He must have misheard. "He?" he managed to repeat, stuttering slightly.
Dumbledore was gazing past him at the phoenix, or perhaps away into another time and space. "Indeed… I'd never met anyone like him, he was splendid. And you know," he continued quietly, and now the Headmaster did look at Sirius and those blue eyes seemed to pierce right into him. "I dare say that if someone had insulted him on a repeated basis in those days even scholarly, proper, well-behaved me might have been tempted by the urge to toss my wand aside and smack their head against some stonework."
Sirius's mouth had gone dry as a desert and he could feel the red rising up from his neck into his face. He made his best attempt to say something, but whatever it was it made no sense even to him; it was like he'd forgotten how to talk coherently.
Dumbledore relaxed against the back of his large chair. "Let us come to an agreement, Mr Black," he suggested smoothly. "I'll see to it that this mess is dealt with if you'll be so kind as to follow your own admirable advice offered so wisely to Mr Potter and Miss Evans…. Tell Remus Lupin that you're in love with him and let the rest of us have a bit of peace and quiet. Do we have a deal?"
Sirius made a somewhat flailing motion that was intended as a nod even if it didn't even remotely resemble one.
"Marvellous." The Headmaster reached for the small paper bag. "Now, are you sure you don't want a peppermint?"
Another inarticulate noise escaped Sirius as he took a sweet in the hope that if he gave his hands something to do, they'd stop shaking. He fled the office.