Chapter 9: Like an Overflowing Pot

Harry was confused, although he tried his best not to show it.

Ron handed him a particularly dusty hand mirror, with sinisterly glowing runes etched into the silver, and Harry unceremoniously dumped it into a bin liner nearly filled to the brim with other such suspicious items.

"What do you reckon's going on then?" Ron asked out of the corner of his mouth. "I mean with your dad. Snape's evil, don't get me wrong, but that was a bit excessive."

Hermione, who was in the general vicinity, bit her lip. "What I'm more concerned about is this occlumency. I haven't come across it in any of the books I've read, which means that either it's not in the books I've read—"

"Or it's in the restricted section." finished Harry. "So we're going to learn it then?"

"It's really hard though Harry." interjected Ginny, who'd been close enough to hear their conversation. "Pretend you're scrubbing something or mum'll get suspicious."

Ron picked up a dirty rag and began slowly polishing the silver vial full of blood without paying much attention, while Hermione picked up two other artefacts and pretended to be perusing them. Harry turned to Ginny.

"About that, I didn't know you still had…about first year." he said awkwardly, unsure of why he was bringing it up but feeling that it was the right thing to do. Ginny smiled at him wryly.

"Don't worry about it."

Harry let it go, even though he still felt he ought to have at least asked Ron about Ginny even once during the summer after second year. But then, he'd been having nightmares of his own, and he hadn't known Ginny that well back then anyway, and Ron hadn't said anything so he'd just forgotten about it really. Not to mention that the whole reason Ginny had succumbed to the diary in the first place was because of him anyway.

Riddle had specifically said that he'd been 'anxious' to meet Harry, and that Ginny had bared her soul for possession because of her crush on Harry—he was already predisposed to feeling guilt, but that just firmly cemented in his head that anything to do with Voldemort was usually his fault.

"You've been practising occlumency? Which books are you using? Do you have a tutor?" asked Hermione, the cogs in her brain already spinning and trying to work out a learning schedule for the three of them.

Ron was both dreading the extra workload and really glad that Hermione's efficient mind was on their side.

"Not any books or anything so structured. Dad just tells me to try and clear my mind before going to bed and spend at least twenty minutes before bed ordering my thoughts so that they don't get jumbled up in my dreams. I usually forget to do it though, I get so tired after a full day of lessons." Ginny answered, glancing at her mother to ensure she was still thoroughly preoccupied with the cabinet.

"Wait, dad's been teaching you occlumency?" asked Ron incredulously.

"It does make sense Ron. Mum did say that everyone in the Order knew it, and Mr. Weasley is in the Order." said Harry, although he was surprised as well—Mr. and Mrs. Weasley were brilliant people, but he'd never imagined them to be…well, competent, as harsh as that sounded. They didn't strike him as fighters at all, but he supposed they must have been if they were in the Order.

Hermione looked like she had come up with a battle plan. She looked at Harry, as though weighing pros and cons in her head, before saying, "Harry, you usually have a good read on people; how likely is Mr. Potter to help us learn occlumency?"

"You want to ask dad?" Harry asked, bemused.

Hermione nodded. "Mrs. Potter would be my first choice, but she seems a bit…downtrodden at this point."

Harry looked over at Lily, seeing her lost in thought while staring at an ornate skull. He could see why Hermione had chosen not to ask her, but he was far more inclined to ask her than his seething dad.

Ron seemed to be of the same opinion. "He'd be better off asking Trelawney to help him than his dad, for all the good it'll do."

"He doesn't have to ask now Ron. I'm not that stupid!" Hermione impatiently snapped.

Eager not to let their fight escalate further, Harry said, "I could try, though I don't know whether he agrees with Mrs. Weasley on how involved we ought to be with the Order."

"What are you four whispering about?" Mrs. Weasley called out suspiciously.

"Trying to figure out what type of blood is in the vial mum. Hermione thinks it's dragon blood, but Ron reckons it's vampire. Harry can't seem to make up his mind." replied Ginny smoothly, and if Harry hadn't been privy to the actual details of the conversation, he would have believed her completely; she didn't even stutter.

Mrs. Weasley pursed her lips before telling them to get a move on. "We've already wasted precious hours painting."

Harry looked at Ginny questioningly. She grinned at him, "It comes with the premise of living with Fred and George."

"No, it doesn't. Ginny just doesn't like getting in trouble." interrupted Ron, used to Ginny getting away with plenty of misdemeanours by lying convincingly.

"No one likes getting in trouble Ron. You're just terrible at improvising." she replied before wandering away.

Hermione would have said something at the sibling squabble, Harry was certain, but she was too busy scheming to notice Ron spluttering in indignation. If he hadn't been eager to learning occlumency himself in order to be included in the Order meetings, Harry was sure that he would be regretting giving Hermione the go ahead.

But that didn't make him stop almost regretting it.

James took a deep breath and let it out slowly a couple of times before finally calming down. He knew he'd blown completely out of proportion at the news about Snape, but he genuinely thought that he'd been in the right. He admitted that he hadn't exactly made Snape's life easy at Hogwarts, what with nearly killing him on several occasions (some of them were genuine accidents, some of them were miscalculated pranks.) Either way, he'd never wanted Snape dead, which was the main thing that set them apart.

Snape wouldn't have any compunctions if he were to kill James, but James would never be able to bring himself to kill Snape. Too much history, an active moral compass and the fact that he used to be Lily's best friend kept him from even contemplating actually enacting any of the murder scenarios his vivid imagination had supplied him with.

James sighed as he thought about the greasy-haired Slytherin. Throughout his Hogwarts life, Snape had been the one person he'd ever been jealous of. He had had everything James had wanted at one point; a mind-boggling grasp of theoretical magic and spell-crafting, a natural aptitude for strategic thinking and potioneering, an indecently complex vocabulary that ensured no one would ever doubt he was intelligent (unlike James, who knew that everyone thought he was baseline or average until the first year exam results came out), the ability to understand people's pain (because leading a sheltered life meant that James never quite understood the pain of growing up unloved, or struggling with anything, and with the friends he had, he wished he could understand them better, even if it meant suffering through all the pains they went through) and, perhaps most of all, his easy relationship with the one person in James' life that had taken his breath away from the moment he truly saw her.

Snape took all these things for granted though, and inevitably lost it all. Perhaps not his natural talents, but his social life was abysmal, and James let the anger drain away because at the end of the day, it's the choices we make that define us.

James hadn't spent the years after the Levicorpus Incident of '75 brooding over all the ills the world had heaped on him. Snape had. He could have chosen to let go, to improve himself like James had done after it had been shoved in his face that he was in the wrong. He hadn't.

And that was not James' fault.

Everything that happened during the war only compounded on their issues and neither one of them was very likely to forgive the other. In fact, not in a million years would James Potter and Severus Snape get along.

Brushing away the bitter, hurtful, disgustingly familiar thoughts that always welled up whenever he brooded on Snape (because there was so much more than jealousy between them), James finally looked at Remus, who was silently waiting for him to get a grip on his usually mellow temper.

"Feeling better?" Remus asked, no judgement at all present in his voice.

"Much. Shall we?" James asked, as though nothing had actually gone wrong.

That was the thing about James—once he had worked his way through an emotion or situation, he genuinely felt as though it hadn't happened. Remus was grateful, because after weeks of dealing with Sirius, who, quite frankly, internalised everything, he was beyond happy that James, for all that the two were similar, didn't brood.

Remus led the way to the Black Family Library and, when they happened upon the heavy-set door, quickly lost all interest he'd had in undertaking this endeavour. He turned to James and said, in a way that was distinctly not whining, thank you very much, "Do we have to?"

James looked at him enquiringly, "Yes. Yes we do."

Remus sighed theatrically, then opened the door before motioning for James to go through first. He walked into the room and immediately understood where Remus' trepidation came from.

The room was filthy, the cobwebs seemed to be more numerous than the books, the shelves were in terrible need of dusting, there was a nest of dead mice on the armchair by the soot-covered fireplace, the chandelier (the Blacks really did love their chandeliers, thought James fleetingly) looked to be the home of a hitherto unclassified species of puffskein hybrids and the air had a distinct crackle of lightning, death and foreboding.

"I'm not cleaning this up." said James immediately.

Remus heaved another sigh and irritably snapped, "Of course not, O Great One. Why would I expect you to do anything even remotely useful?"

James flashed him a beatific smile. "Glad we have that settled. Chop chop Moony! The shelves aren't going to dust themselves you know."

Remus walked off stiffly in search of cleaning supplies, but not before biting out a bitter, "I hate you."

James just grinned.

It wasn't until the clock on the bedside table trilled, informing him that it was eight, that Sirius stopped brooding.

Buckbeak ruffled his wings irritably, annoyed at having his quiet interrupted. Sirius swept a hand across the hippogriff's neck in a calming gesture, cracking his neck in an effort to get rid of the stiffness in his muscles that had settled in after more than three hours of sitting in one position, thinking about his little brother.

Regulus Arcturus Black was nothing remarkable, or at least, that was what Sirius remembered. He remembered having to coax Regulus to come out of his room to play, remembered them playing pretend and thinking that Regulus didn't have that much of an imagination, remembered Regulus being described as a much less enthusiastic, far more well behaved Sirius without a personality.

Regulus Black was nothing remarkable, and for the majority of his former years, it had been the boy's saving grace.

Sirius remembered Regulus being constantly compared to his older brother, his cousin sisters, his uncles…in short, anyone with the last name Black. He also remembered pitying Regulus for his lack of presence, and the way their mother belittled him without even trying.

But then, he also remembered confronting his little brother about it, asking him why he let himself fade into the background, let himself be second best. Regulus had smiled and said that he preferred it that way, because he pitied Sirius.

Sirius hadn't understood it then, but maybe he did now, even a little bit.

He'd been re-evaluating a lot of things about his brother in the last three hours.

Regulus had never truly revealed his opinions about anything, not even when he had been specifically asked for it; he'd always been vague enough that people made their own assumptions about what he believed based on what they expected him to believe, Sirius included. But in hindsight, his brother had been far shrewder than anyone had believed.

Regulus might have thought all muggleborns were scum, but he might also have thought that they needed to integrate better like Uncle Alphard had; He might have loved Quidditch as a pastime, or he might have wanted to go professional; he might have been like Hermione with her House Elf Rights, or he might have just thought that Kreacher was the only house elf that was acceptable for treating with affection.

Sirius felt hollow when he thought about the man (no, he had still been a boy when he'd died, hadn't he?) that his little brother, his little Reggie, had become.

He left his mother's old bedroom and walked down the stairs, following the smell of cooking food.

Another guilt to add to his growing pile of what-ifs, could-have-beens and should-have-dones.

He walked into the dining room, shaking away the pessimistic thoughts of how he should have tried harder with Reggie, should have been a better big brother, should have taken Reggie with him when he ran away, could have changed his mind about joining the Death Eaters, what if—

"Sirius, stop being a creep in the doorway and come in; Molly's cooked something that smells like Dearborn's shaving kit!"

He looked at James, took in his boyish smile and the amused light dancing in his eyes, and the pain receded, like as though a sponge was absorbing all the negativity in his mind. He put on a grin of his own, and it took far less effort than it had before today (had it only been a day since James was back?), and sat between James and Harry, where they'd saved him a seat.

He took a whiff of the quiche and said, "Nah, it smells more like Alice's handbag."

"Why do I know you two?" muttered Remus in exasperation.

Lily sighed. "Duck, I don't think anyone can answer that question."

All was right in his world once more.

After the last of the dinner was cleared away and the adults had had a minor argument about who was indebted to who, Harry cleared his throat.

It was disconcerting when everyone turned to look at him, but he brushed his stage-fright aside and asked, "So have you two figured out anything about the locket yet?"

Immediately, all the noise ceased and everyone trained their eyes on James and Remus.

"It's only been a few hours, and most of that was spent making sure the library didn't give us an asthma attack, so no, nothing on that front." replied James. "What about you lot on the cleaning front?"

Mrs. Weasley looked grateful that the conversation had moved away from dangerous topics and replied enthusiastically. "We've made good progress on the drawing room, and we've nearly got another room usable for the two of you James."

Harry grimaced at that. Usable was pushing it, even by Ron's good-enough-if-it-looks-alright standards. At any rate, it looked like the five of them would have to share the same room again.

"That's alright Molly," said Lily with a smile. "I'm sure we can manage another few days of sleeping in the same room, can't we James?"

James nodded and Mrs. Weasley beamed.

Something about that beam made him want to crush it, but Harry had absolutely no idea where that thought had come from. Before he could stop himself, the words started spilling out. "Mum, could you teach us occlumency?"

Ron and Hermione snapped their heads to look at Harry, wondering at his stupidity. Ron just admired his guts, and Hermione wanted to strangle him; what point was there to secrecy if he asked in front of everyone?

Lily blinked. "Why would you want to learn occlumency?"

James looked on curiously, having not been present for that particular bit of the conversation that afternoon, but Remus and Sirius shared resigned looks; they'd known the minute Lily had mentioned it that the children would want to learn it—they would have too.

Harry swallowed to get rid of the sudden dryness in his throat. "Well, what you said got us thinking and, er, we don't want…"

"We don't want You-Know-Who to use us like his puppets." said Ginny fiercely, and even Mrs. Weasley couldn't bring herself to reprimand her, not after what she'd been through.

"Ginny's right," said Hermione, her voice firm. "We're targets for You-Know-Who to use—he's after Harry and we're the easiest way to him."

"Not that we mind Harry. If it means sticking with you, it doesn't matter even if we have cow's eyes painted on our foreheads." said Ron, reminding Hermione that she'd touched on a sore topic; no one could do guilt and self-blame like Harry could.

"Bullseye Ron, bullseye." said Hermione, hiding her blunder in correcting Ron, a favoured pastime.

"I was trying not to be sexist." said Ron, although Hermione didn't know whether he genuinely thought that, or if he was just being ridiculous to get Harry's mind off of what she'd just said; another thing no one could do like Harry was brood.

"That's not—you are so—ugh!" groaned Hermione, not even bothering to deign that with a response.

"Thanks guys." said Harry, promising to himself that he wouldn't think about how much danger he was putting his friends in, simply by being him, until he was alone, because right now wouldn't be a great time to start brooding. Instead, he focussed on the fact that his friends were awesome, and he couldn't have asked for anyone better.

"Wait, why would Harry be Voldemort's target specifically?" asked James.

Everyone avoided the elder Potters' gazes, and Lily and James felt an extreme sense of foreboding.

"Harry?" Lily urged quietly.

Harry felt his throat closing, and it was difficult to even swallow. How would his parents take all that had happened? Last night, they'd only gotten the highlights of his third year, with a bit about Dobby, Fluffy and the Blast-Ended Skrewts (Hagrid had come up), but third year had arguably been his safest year, all things considered, and they'd only touched upon Voldemort's resurrection. So, he diverted their attention.

"You haven't answered my question yet; will you teach us occlumency?"

Lily pursued her lips, and James paled. "That bad, huh?"

"You know we're not fragile right? We can handle it." said Lily irritably.

"Which is what he's been saying all this time." stated James. "It's not fair of us to ask you for information without us extending the same courtesy to you, is that it?"

Harry hadn't been thinking that at all, but because it had turned out so well, he nodded, as though that's what he'd meant to do all along.

"Well Harry, prove it." said James.

"What?" asked Harry, blinking in surprise.

"Prove what, Mr. Potter?" asked Hermione tentatively.

James looked so utterly in control of the situation that everyone on the dining table unconsciously sat straighter, even George, who'd been experimenting with Fatigue Fondues just before dessert. He looked directly at Harry, maintaining a piercing eye-contact that made Harry wonder whether he'd done the right thing by, in essence, bargaining with James.

"Prove to me that you deserve the information you so desperately want." James said. "I have known you hardly a day Harry, and I can't know whether you even need to know anything about the Order. I don't have enough background information to make a sound decision on whether your need to know is actually warranted."

Sirius opened his mouth to speak in Harry's defence, but James forestalled anything he had to say. "I don't want any second-hand observations and reasonings Harry. I want you to earn the knowledge on your own merit."

Harry found this incredibly unreasonable, and he was about to say something he would likely regret later, when Mrs. Weasley beat him to it.

"You cannot be serious James! I won't allow that; he's just a child! This is a fight he doesn't need to be a part of, no matter how much he seems like he can handle it!"

Sirius turned a steely gaze at her. "Oh yeah, and you'd rather they be kept out of a war that revolves around them, do you? Do you want them dead?!"

Remus looked aghast, having never thought the argument that had been going on most of the summer could escalate so quickly, so soon. The two of them had had a silent pact that they wouldn't argue too much in front of the children, and yet here they were, forgetting themselves completely. This wasn't boiling point; this was overflowing from the pot.

"And you would rather they fought at the frontlines? They're barely fifteen! They don't know enough magic to cook breakfast, let alone fight Death Eaters!" retorted Mrs. Weasley, her face flushing an angry red.

"I didn't say anything about them at the frontlines, but I bet even they want you to stop mollycoddling them. You're doing none of them any favours by keeping them uninformed!" yelled Sirius, his voice becoming harsher and harsher with every word.

"This is the day for blowing up isn't it?" whispered Lily to Remus bitterly.

"I can't wait for my turn then." replied Remus darkly, his own temper flaring up at the sheer pig-headedness of everyone around him.

James just watched the two of them throw barbs at each other with thinned lips, while the children didn't know how to stop it, even if they wanted to.

"I'm keeping them alive, which is far more than a reckless, idiotic, dark wizard spawn like you could ever accomplish!" she screamed, but then immediately regretted it because of the livid, murderous look in Sirius' eyes.

"I think that's quite enough." said James evenly, and everyone did, in fact, stop. Mrs. Weasley was avoiding Sirius' gaze completely, and Sirius was angrily glaring at the butter dish.

"This is a discussion between me and Harry and has nothing to do with the rest of you, as much as you'd like to butt in." said James, and it sort of made Harry grateful that his dad wasn't going to let Mrs. Weasley or Dumbledore or anyone influence his decision, because let's face it, he thought to himself bitterly, neither one of them wanted him to know anything anyway. This summer had proved that.

But then he worried about what he'd have to do to 'prove' that he deserved to be a part of the Order, the Resistance, as much if not more than half the people in it. Then there was the part of him that snidely kept whispering haven't I done enough? Four solid years of near-death experiences and murderous psychopaths after me, and that isn't enough? But another, more rational voice said, well, they weren't really there for any of that, and I haven't exactly told them about it, not really, so it's not surprising that they don't know why I want to fight Voldemort, why I think I deserve to know.

"But—" Mrs. Weasley protested.

"With all due respect Molly," cut in Lily, "this is our son, and if we decide something about his life, I think that's our right. Or are you going to tell us that because we're young, we don't know what's best for him, or that we don't want him to survive this war, or that we don't know any better about the dangers he could face, even though you closeted yourself at home, safe and snug in the First War, while we were constantly out fighting? Or that we don't know what it's like to lose people in the war, simply because no one in our families died, unlike you? Or that we're just going to let it slide that you called Sirius a dark wizard spawn without calling you out on it?"

By the end of that, Harry didn't think Lily was even talking about reasons why Molly should stay out of this discussion. Sirius looked vindicated, and James looked at Molly with sympathetic pity.

This, Harry supposed, was where he got his temper from.

"Because that? That was a low blow, even in the heat of a fight. Do you think we can choose who our parents are? Do you think no one here understands what we've signed up for? We, Sirius, James, Remus and I, we fought from the first signs of the last war all the way till the bitter end. We lost more friends than you've known people your whole life, friends we fought with and loved and wanted to protect, and you know what? It's fucking insulting that you think you could do better than Sirius at keeping people alive, because you've done nothing but reign supreme over cleaning supplies and the kitchen while he's been out there risking his neck and watching his friends die so that ignorant control freaks like you had the option of staying at home, like scared ninnies! You think you know better about what could happen to these kids than we do? We were there! You think Sirius wants them on the frontlines? Don't fucking kid yourself! He knows better than you ever will what it's like, so don't you dare use that holier-than-thou tone with him about things you don't understand!"

She took a deep calming breath, and sat down, having stood up some time during that tirade. Everyone held their collective breaths, waiting for Mrs. Weasley to recover, but clearly, James was in no mood to let that happen.

"Just because Sirius is reckless, doesn't mean he's dumb Molly. There's a difference between being impulsive on occasion, and willing to let people die because he hasn't thought something through. He's got a good head on his shoulders, and it'd be nice if you appreciated that once in a while." finished James, leaving Mrs. Weasley with a lot to chew on, and a new appreciation of exactly what had allowed Lily and James to survive the war for as long as they had, even though they'd been only seventeen when they'd started.

"Now, back to the matter at hand," said James lightly, looking at Harry. "I'm going to watch you for the next four days, till the next Order meeting, and you're going to have to show me that you deserve to know what the Order does. Sound fair? You don't have to do anything extra, and if you act out of character, I'll know. I'll be evaluating you, and you'd best be ready."

Harry was still reeling just like everyone else after Lily's anger had burst forth, but he tried his best to pay attention to what his dad was saying. He wasn't too worried if he missed anything though; Hermione would go over it later anyway.

"Do we have a deal Harry?" asked James, stretching a hand out.

Harry looked at the outstretched hand and thought about it; there wasn't really anything to lose from this, and this was the first time an adult had offered an actual tangible promise to let Harry in on the action, even if it was a bit subjective. (exactly what criteria was he evaluating him on anyway?) He didn't think he'd get a chance like this again, so he didn't see any reason not to accept.

He looked at Ron and Hermione, and they both looked encouraging, even though Hermione was biting her lip in contemplation.

Seeing no opposition from his friends, he looked into his dad's hazel eyes and shook his hand.

"Deal."

I don't hate Molly. I don't hate Molly no matter what this chapter sounds like. It's just that I find it kind of annoying that she keeps using Sirius' recklessness as an excuse not to listen to him. He's a war veteran while she was sitting at home, and I know that it was the right decision for her because she had a young family and that it would have been extremely stupid of her to do what Sirius did because she had more to lose, but it still stands that she ought to give his opinions on things a bit more weight than she does. Lily's anger burst forth, and it'll die away just like Harry's does, James got angry on the same day and he got over it in a few minutes, Sirius blew up at Molly and vice versa, all in the same day. It just sort of happened I guess, although I didn't actually mean for it to...my characters just decided to do what they wanted ^^"

I'm really sorry for the long wait! I'll try harder, even though real life is a mess right now...-_-