At the beginning, just a little information what happened when Harry and the others tried to rescue Sirius at the end of 'The Order of the Phoenix' and what's different from the book. And please, if you spot a mistake or if you've problems to understand something, be so kind and just tell me.

Nobody of the Order got the hint that Harry, Ron, Ginny, Hermione, Luna and Neville were in the Ministry of Magic fighting Voldemort and the Death Eaters. Dumbledore was the only one who came to help Harry and the others. Nobody got hurt or died, with the exception of Neville, who had bad luck and got his nose broken. Dumbledore managed to defeat Voldemort so he and his Death Eaters had to flee.

He then proceeded to take the kids back to the school but Fudge and a few others burst into the room and saw Harry disappearing. Fudge, who thought that Harry broke into the Ministry of Magic for no reason but rebellion against the system, had him expelled from school. Only because of Dumbledore's fast reaction Harry had the chance to escape and keep his wand.

Harry couldn't go back to live with the Dursleys, so Dumbledore decided it would be the best for him to go live at Grimmauld Place. Sirius, who never died because he stayed at home during that faithful night, was quiet happy at the beginning that he wasn't forced to live alone anymore, but soon got more and more grumpy for apparently no reason at all.

Lupin and Tonks were still in love with each other but Lupin didn't accept his feelings for her because of his fear of hurting Tonks, so she's still sad and moody.

The whole house was silent. Not even Kreacher's cursing could be heard through the thin walls and so it seemed that time stood still. Harry lay on his bed, bored and without any idea what he could do to end the boredom. Ron and Hermione back at Hogwarts were busy studying and becoming great wizards and he was lying on his old bed and waiting for Sirius' moodiness to end.

At the beginning he'd thought that Sirius seemed quite happy about his expulsion from school. At least he told Harry that an expulsion wasn't that bad, a lot of great wizards were expelled from school. Then he called Fudge a lot of opprobrious names and to tell him what he'd do if he'd meet him somewhere by accident. "... and you can be sure, if he'd ever manage to come back from that desert, I have a lot of other bright ideas what we could do with little Cornelius, for example..." At this point Lupin interrupted him and told Harry that he was very sorry that he was expelled and volunteered for telling Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon that Harry wouldn't come back for a little time. Harry just shrugged his shoulders.

He didn't care if the Dursleys knew about his expulsion or not – there wasn't a single chance that he'd live with them again. Uncle Vernon probably would be quiet happy if Harry wouldn't show up at King's Cross at the end of school year. He and Aunt Petunia would wait for fifteen minutes and then drive home.

"At least they will be happy", Harry thought grimly. For three weeks Sirius kept shutting himself away. He never ate at the same time Harry and the other members of the Order (mostly Tonks, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Bill and Lupin; but most of the time nobody from the Order stayed for dinner at Grimmauld Place) had dinner. Whenever Harry approached the door to Buckbeak's room he could hear Sirius talking quietly to the Hippogriff.

"I have not the slightest idea", Lupin had said when Harry asked him about Sirius' behaviour. "I have tried to talk to him, but he would never give a proper answer."

"Maybe I should ask Sirius straight away if anything was wrong", Harry thought. He stood up and turned towards the door, but stopped as he heard a voice behind him.

"Where are you going, young Potter?"

Harry turned around and saw the painted eyes of Phineas Nigellus Black, Sirius' great-great-grandfather, looking at him. Harry had asked Dumbledore if he could hang up the portrait somewhere else but Dumbledore shook his head. "His portrait is in this room for almost hundred years. I don't think he wants it to hang somewhere else", he'd said.

"Why would you care?" asked Harry, aware of his rude tone of voice. But at the moment he didn't care at all.

"Dumbledore told me to have an eye on you. I never understood why you always seemed to be so special for him, but an order is an order. So stay where you are, Potter."

"Why should I listen to him?" Harry asked angrily. "I can't stay in this room for the rest of my life!"

"Indeed, that's true. But you can stay here for the moment. You are lucky that your wand wasn't destroyed. Stupid boy, always wants get his way."

"I never said that I had no luck, I just want to talk to Sirius."

"Ah, my great-great-grandson. Is he hiding somewhere in the house? I haven't seen him for a few days. Normally he violates my privacy because he wants me to deliver some messages to Dumbledore. The boy always was inconsequential."

"I don't care. I'm going now" Harry told Phineas and left the room. As he closed the door on his way out, he could hear Phineas' mumbling. "...always thinks he got the brightest ideas. If he'd listen more often to the right people he wouldn't even be in this situation ... always told Dumbledore he shows too much mercy ..."

Harry went to Buckbeak's room and knocked on the door. He waited for Sirius to either tell him to go away or to come in, but he couldn't hear anything. As he opened the door he could just see Buckbeak lying on the floor and staring at him angrily. Obviously he had woken up the Hippogriff.

"Sorry Buckbeak, I didn't know you are asleep", Harry said. "Have you seen Sirius? No?" Harry waited for the Hippogriff to do something, but Buckbeak just went back to sleep. "Great, now I'm talking to Hippogriffs and waiting for them to answer me", Harry thought moodily.

He left the room and stood aimless in the corridor. During summertime Mrs. Weasley kept them busy with cleaning the house and furthermore he had Ron, Ginny, Hermione, Fred and George here whom he could talk to. But now it was just him, standing there alone in a creepy corridor.

He could hear Kreacher mumbling on the second floor and proceeded to go downstairs; he didn't want to meet Kreacher now. Dumbledore thought it would be the best if they kept him in the house und forbid him to leave Grimmauld Place and talk to other family members or Death Eaters. Both Sirius and Harry were not happy with his decision but Sirius was the only one who kept telling Dumbledore it would be better for everyone if Kreacher would just be beheaded.

As Harry entered the kitchen there was already somebody there. Tonks was sitting at the kitchen table, her hands clinging to a mug of tea. Her hair was mouse-grey, she had dark circles around her eyes and a forced smile on her face. All in all she looked a little worn out.

"Hey Harry", she said and forced her lips into something that probably should be a warm smile. "How's it going?"

"Hi, err... pretty good. How are you?"

"Oh, I'm fine. I just came back from a mission. I shouldn't go on missions after my regular work. I'm so t-t-tired", Tonks answered and yawned. Harry thought that she looked more than a little bit tired. Normally she used to wear her hair in a bright pink or purple, but now it had the colour of the dust on the kitchen cabinet.

"Have you seen Sirius?" Harry asked to change to topic.

"Nope, I'm sorry Harry. I just came back and found the house nearly empty. Only Remus was here, but he left a few minutes ago."

"Lupin was here and he didn't even bother to say hello? Great", Harry thought and did his best to look as he wouldn't care. Instead he just said: "Oh".

"Yes, he was in a hurry", Tonks said and took a sip of her tea. "Oh, and you might be interested in the fact that the Tutshill Tornados won the game yesterday. The Wimbourne Wasps played really bad, they had no chance. Roderick Plumpton caught the Snitch in less than thirty minutes. What a great game."

"Did you see it?" asked Harry, now curious.

"No, I had to work at that time. But a fellow of mine saw it. Amazing game... i-it's nearly half past three again? Oh damn, I'm already fifteen minutes too late. Moody is going to kill me."

Tonks knocked a chair over as she stood up and hastily grabbed her coat on her way out. "Sorry Harry, I have to go. We'll talk another time, okay? Oh, Moody will bite my head off...", Tonks called.

"Okay", Harry said as Tonks closed the door a little bit too loud and Sirius' mother woke up. The next eleven minutes Harry was busy listening to Mrs. Blacks' cursing as he tried to draw the curtain over her portrait.

"At least", he said to himself, "somebody's talking to me."