Harry lay awake in his bed in 12 Grimmauld Place. Exhausted but unable to sleep, he listened to Sirius' soft footsteps downstairs and the shuffling in the kitchen, and let his mind wander freely. Eventually they stopped to rest on the person with whom Harry was sure he was meant to spend the rest of his life, though how long that would be was, as yet, unclear. His lover's fingers would graze his chest with phantom lightness, providing him with pleasure that licked at the edges of his consciousness and tortured him into bliss. Hands would go down, down…Harry had imagined that person's lips, so soft, tantalising him with feather-light kisses peppered from his temple to trace around his jaw line, down his neck, into the dip just above his collarbone where his shoulder met his neck, onto his sternum, and then lips would follow hands still further down.
He was fully aroused now, and knew that sleep would be impossible if he didn't relieve himself of the pressure building in his boxers. Stroking his own stomach almost absentmindedly, tracing teasing circles around his navel, he began to caress himself in increasingly more intimate areas, until at long last he slipped his hand inside his boxers, allowing himself the indulgence of his own hand's touch on his manhood, and began to stroke. He was soft and gentle at first but soon his was touching himself with increasing aggression and need as he became more and more aroused, until he was almost frantic with desire. Moans, hisses, gasps. A whispered name. Teasing himself, he allowed his other hand to wander and trace the cuts of muscle above his thighs that led down into his boxers. He was close; he knew it. He knew his own body well from years of exploration behind the veil of the scarlet curtains around his bed in Gryffindor Tower. He knew exactly how far he was and how long he had until he would be pushed over the edge and be sent reeling, writhing in delectable agonising pleasure, but he never got the chance to make it quite that far, for suddenly Sirius was standing at the open bedroom door.
In the half-second it took for Harry to realise that he was no longer alone, he went from being on the border of ecstasy to being thoroughly and profoundly mortified. He scrambled to cover himself up with the blanket, but it was too late. Sirius had seen what he had seen. Feeling the blood draining from his face, leaving him white, Harry was impossibly torn between the dreadful desire to cry and the instinct to hide underneath the blanket, curled up in a ball – or possibly both. His indecision left him frozen in panic, gaping, while Sirius turned slightly red upon realising what he had interrupted.
"I'm sorry, Sirius! I'll never do it again, I swear!" Harry blurted, unsure of what his godfather's reaction would be.
Sirius seemed puzzled by Harry's sudden, unprompted statement. Shifting his weight onto one leg, he asked, "What do you mean, you'll never do it again?"
"I mean, I know it's wrong and dirty and I'm not supposed to and only bad people do it –" Harry babbled rapidly, certain that his godfather would be furious and that it was only a matter of seconds until he came flying at Harry in rage.
Sirius chuckled and interrupted him. "Stop, Harry. Who told you that?"
"Uncle Vernon."
"It doesn't seem to me like he'd be the type to have the consideration to bring something like that up with you, Harry, and from what I know of him, I wouldn't think of you as exactly eager to ask him about it," Sirius said, more wondering out loud than anything.
"Well…I suppose I did 'bring it up', if you'll pardon the expression," Harry admitted sheepishly, his eyes avoiding Sirius'. "He walked in me doing it once and threatened that he'd box my ears if he ever caught me again, and then took away my meals for a week."
"He what?" Sirius demanded, not angry with Harry himself but still with a fire of fury suddenly lit behind his eyes and in his heart.
"Well, he's done that kind of thing before. I used to live under the stairs, for Merlin's sake. Aunt Petunia tried to hit me in the head with a frying pan more than once," Harry admitted in a casual, detached tone that unnerved Sirius deeply.
"Harry…" Sirius said delicately, moving over to sit at the foot of Harry's bed, "do they do that sort of thing often? Threaten you, and take away your food?"
Harry nodded.
"Do they hit you?"
The sudden change in Sirius' tone did not escape Harry's notice, and he recoiled a little bit and averted his eyes, scratching the back of his head. He didn't have to speak for Sirius to know the answer.
A quiet rage seemed to fill Sirius, setting his insides alight, but he betrayed nothing outwardly. If only James were here…
"Harry, I want you to look at me," Sirius requested gently. Harry looked at him with his eyes over the rims of his round glasses, but did not make himself so vulnerable as to present his whole face. "I will never let them hurt you again, ever."
A sort of relief washed over Harry, but he did not allow himself the luxury of displaying his emotion to his godfather. He had been let down too many times to put too much stock into what people promised him, at least until they pulled through a little bit. Somehow, though, Harry knew Sirius' pledge was different than the rest.
The two shared a quiet moment, amiable and tender, where the love and understanding between them hung in the air like a palpable, ethereal cloud.
"Sirius?"
"Yes, Harry?"
"May I ask you something?"
"Anything. Anything at all," Sirius answered.
"Why did you laugh when I said I'd never do it again?" Harry wondered.
Sirius chuckled once more. "Because what Vernon told you is a load of bollocks, about it being wrong. It's perfectly normal and alright. Healthy. Even necessary, for boys at least, and maybe girls too. There's no shame in pleasuring yourself and it's a good way of finding out what you might want from a partner later on, when you're ready. I imagine most everybody does it at some point," Sirius mused.
"Do you do it?" Harry asked, not realising the intimacy of the question until after it had left his lips. He hastened to correct himself, "I mean, you don't have to tell me or anything, just…just forget I asked." His eyes fixed themselves on a particularly enthralling knot in the hardwood floor.
"Of course I do, Harry," Sirius answered softly with such earnestness that Harry looked up and met his eyes. "I told you already, probably almost everybody does it. Most of your friends for certain, and the ones who don't already will soon."
Harry seemed both intrigued and relieved by this information.
Sensing that Harry still felt as though he'd invaded Sirius' privacy by asking such a personal question, Sirius furthered, "And I just told you that you could ask me anything, you know you can. Absolutely anything. You can even ask me if I wank."
To this, Harry smiled bashfully and let out an embarrassed chuckle. "I'm sorry."
Sirius, smiling, swatted Harry's foot, which lay cached under the blanket. "Don't apologise."
After just a moment of silence, Harry spoke up. "Er…Sirius?" he asked, and could feel his face growing hot, blood flooding his cheeks as he blushed.
"Yes, Harry?"
"Well, this is a little delicate, but…" he trailed off, clearly embarrassed.
"But?"
"Could you…could you leave? I was a little…er, busy when you came in and I kind of need to..." here he trailed off.
Sirius couldn't help but laugh. "Of course, my dear boy! I'm awfully sorry about all this. I'll knock from now on, I promise." He stood up and leaned over to Harry to give him a tight hug, but Harry stopped him.
"You might not want to do that," said Harry, looking down into his lap pointedly, all embarrassment gone.
Sirius let a girlish giggle escape his lips. "You are your father's son. Good night, dear Harry."
"Good night, Sirius. And thank you."
Sirius glanced back at the young man lying on the bed one last time before he closed the door and retired to his own bedroom down the hall.
Harry laid his head back on his pillow. He resumed the task in which he had previously been engaged, until he was sated by his own release. Lying in his bed following lines in the pattern on his blanket, Harry reflected on the events of the last hour. He realised that while the men who had shared the experience of being caught red-handed, as it were, were plentiful, the men for whom that event was followed by a conversation as delicate and tender as his own with Sirius had been, were few and far between.
Release had come for Harry that night, but not only in the way he had originally intended.
Author's Note: Thank you for reading! I daresay it's fairly obvious, by virtue of the fact that I am writing FanFiction rather than novels, but just for legal sake I'll say it: I own nothing you recognise. They are the products of the imagination of the most intelligent, most well-read, most brilliant J.K. Rowling. I'm just borrowing it all to play for a while, with full intention of returning everything to her once I'm done. Please do be so kind as to send a review my way if you liked it (or even if you didn't!). As for me, I'm off to dance in the rain – we're having an absolute downpour and it's positively irresistible. :)