Disclaimer: I own a grand total of nothing. Except the plot.

This is Harry/Sirius slash. Don't like? Then I'm confused as to why you're here right now but don't read it!

Just Knock

Sirius opened his eyes and smiled. He wasn't aware that he had moved during the night but apparently he had, and he wasn't the only one. He lay in the middle of the large bed he shared with Harry with its co owner lying draped across him. The neck he had found so much delight in tormenting was covered now by a duvet, but he didn't want to go for his throat at this time in the morning. It would hardly be fair considering that Harry was so peacefully sleeping against him.

His mind drifted back to the night before. He had been on top of Harry, kissing his throat, running his hands along his body. It had been enjoyable. Okay, very enjoyable. Just as his fingers slid up Harry's body and their lips moved together… the door had burst open and Tonks had come flying through it.

So after Tonks had thrown herself inside, realised what was going on and blushed excessively Remus had had to come in and drag her out. Tonks might have been a bleeding idiot but Remus wasn't and the smile that lingered on his face as he left them alone said far too much. Once they'd left, he and Harry had settled back down but neither of them had wanted to, or been able to continue then… Damn that witch.

He sighed as he carefully got out of bed, managing to be quiet and careful enough to prevent Harry from waking. Then, just before reaching the door Sirius stubbed his toe on the chest of drawers and swore loudly. A bright pair of eyes watched him with amusement from their bed and Harry tried not to laugh as he quickly swallowed his four drops of potion. He had almost forgotten them the morning before and Sirius would have had a hell of a shock then.

"Think it's funny, do you?" Sirius asked as he leapt back onto the bed and on top of Harry who could no longer contain himself and began to laugh. Sirius smiled and shook his head – at least one of them found it amusing. He took the opportunity to glance down at Harry who was showing his bare torso off quite nicely in the way he reclined back and propped himself up on his elbows.

There was a moment in which they both froze before Sirius bent down to kiss him and one of Harry's arms reached up to him, his fingers tangling in Sirius's hair and pulling him closer. Their eyes fluttered shut as the distance between them decreased and then disappeared altogether. Lips brushed together tantalisingly and then…

"Wotcher kids… oops!"

"Have you heard of knocking, Tonks!" Sirius barked as he pulled away from Harry and twisted around to face her. She froze in the doorway looking both foolish and embarrassed as, once again, she searched for what to say.

"You know, as much as I love you Tonks sometimes it's nice to have a little privacy," Harry said mildly and slipped out from underneath Sirius. A wave of his wand later and Harry left with her, leaving Sirius sat alone on the bed with lips which still tingled from their brief encounter with Harry's.

"It wasn't my bleeding fault!" Tonks complained loudly at breakfast when Sirius told of how she'd come marching in whilst he buttered his bread heavily and threw buttered crumbs onto Snape's robes. Dimly he wondered whether the Marmite had come out very easily from the day before. Sirius was shocked to find that there was indeed an upside to sitting with Snape. He was also surprised to find that there was no paper on the table that morning…

"Tonks, you've walked in on us twice in the last twelve hours or so," Harry sighed. "Just knock, for Merlin's sake!"

Harry glanced at Remus who was smiling behind a cup of tea. Harry raised an eyebrow at him but Remus merely shook his head slightly. He didn't want Harry to know that the entire house had been buzzing with the news that he and Sirius had been caught the night before. God only knew what the news of Tonks walking in that morning would do to the group.

"Severus, do try to control your wife," Kingsley grinned, glad that he wasn't sat near the fearsome man but that his jibes would still be heard.

Tonks opened her mouth, her face contorted with fury. "I am NOT—!"

"Silencio!" Remus said quickly and Tonks fell quiet. She was still waving her arms around and managed to knock over two glasses of pumpkin juice before Mad Eye put her in a full-body bind and she fell onto the floor.

"A little drastic, don't you think…?" Sirius asked mildly as he watched Tonks's eyes darting around.

"I'm not putting up with her inane screeching at this time of the morning," Remus said and then added, "whether her husband chooses to hex me for it or not."

Severus gave him a cold stare. "At least I could afford to keep a wife, Lupin."

"And a younger lover as well, no doubt…" Remus added as he took a bite from his toast. His tone was still perfectly mild but Severus was getting annoyed by his additions to the fictitious lifestyle he supposedly had.

"My business is my own," Snape snarled, "and don't you forget it."

"But surely it is also the business of your wife," Minerva said, choosing to get involved in the strange conversation. The unfortunate thing was that whatever someone said happened in the life of someone else had to be committed to memory should Sirius ask about it at a later date. It was a fun way of getting revenge for everything he had ever done to them but it had its tough parts too.

"Perhaps, but it is not yours. I do not pry into your life," Severus said and then a slight smile touched his lips. Minerva wished she had remained silent. "No matter if it is riddled with illegal potions which produce all kinds of effects."

"It was you who first made me Ampharelyn, Severus," Minerva said coolly. "It is you I ought to blame for any necessary potion-taking I may now have to endure."

Harry stared down at his breakfast, trying desperately not to smile at the idea of Minerva taking Ampharelyn – it was like the Wizarding version of heroin and was highly illegal.

"Yes, didn't you squander all the money you had been granted to attempt a non-addictive Ampharelyn substitute on spirits?" Harry asked mildly. This was far too fun.

"Spirits and dragon hide clothes I seem to remember," Charlie said with a grin from the other end of the table. "He has an entire set of robes made out of it."

"And we never see you wearing them," Fred agreed, suddenly looking like Christmas had come early. However, considering that Christmas was only a few days away that said very little.

Snape looked ready to explode by this point and Remus suddenly began to choke on a mixture of toast and laughter.

"Here," Minerva said and handed him a glass of pumpkin juice.

"It's okay Minerva, I'll do it," Snape said and threw his own pumpkin juice at Remus before he stormed out of the room, leaving everyone in stunned silence and Remus still laughing and choking at the same time as juice dripped from his hair. There was silence and then Snape shouted from the hallway, "WHY THE HELL IS THERE BREAD AND BUTTER ALL OVER MY ROBES!"

"What on earth was all that about?" Sirius asked in utter confusion once his laughter had died down. The only response he got was another bout of hysterical laughter and choking from Remus. "Oh forget it, you useless sod." Sirius shook his head at Remus in disbelief before he wandered off out of the room, almost tripping over Tonks as he did so.

"Thank you for finally releasing me, you maniacs!" Tonks shouted at them once she was finally freed from the spell which bound her and let loose again. It was mid-afternoon and Remus, Minerva, Severus and Mad Eye watched as Tonks walked out of the room, noting the cool look she gave to her 'husband' as she left.

"Something must be done," Remus said grimly. "She's come too close to giving us away too many times."

"Sometimes I wonder whether it might be better in the long run for things to end now," Minerva said thoughtfully as she glanced at the rest of them. "After all, how can things possibly end well between Harry and Sirius after this?"

"If they get close enough before Harry tells him it might be enough to keep them together…" Remus suggested hopefully. He knew it was far from a promising idea but it was the only thing they had.

"They seem close enough to me," Mad Eye scoffed and Remus briefly wondered just how much it would make Harry squirm to know that Mad Eye and Minerva were contemplating his relationship with his godfather.

"So what do we do with Tonks…?" Severus asked, returning them to the present subject who had just started a shouting match with Bill on the landing. "We can't just let her walk around messing everything up! I'm not pretending to be married to her for nothing!"

"We'll have to remove her," Mad Eye said with a glint in his eye that made Remus feel quite uneasy.

"You do know that murder is illegal, right?" Remus asked, sounding about half as worried as he felt. It was still enough to make Mad Eye smile in return.

"Fully aware of it," Mad Eye growled, "but there are some things which are worse than death and Miss Tonks is about to find out just what happens when you mess with Alastor Moody."

"As intimidating as you can be, I don't put all my faith in the ever so slightly insane schemes of one eccentric ex-Auror," Severus said coldly. "Any plan of yours is most likely to be even more elaborate and ridiculous than this current plight. I refuse to pretend to be married to anyone else."

"Because you're just that happy with your current wife?" Remus suggested mildly.

"Are you aware that you have pumpkin juice in your hair, Lupin?"

"Are you aware that you have enough grease in your hair to fill a small bathtub?" Remus asked and disappeared before Snape could retort.

Remus spent the rest of his afternoon locked in his room, making alternate plots to remove Tonks from their presence for the rest of the week. He knew that Mad Eye would never be able to make anything which was sane or legal. Briefly, he wondered whether Snape would be doing the same, or at least plotting against himself but his mind was distracted by tapping at his window. He had no idea how Tonks had got hold of Harry's Firebolt but he wasn't going to be pleased to hear that she had crashed it trying to view him, Remus, through his bedroom window.

Snape curled up in the safety of his chambers at Hogwarts, safe in the knowledge that no one would possibly find him there as his mind ran over many ways in which he could suitably humiliate Lupin in front of the entire house. It would have to be new, original and preferably something which would have the residents of Grimmauld Place talking for a long time. A crash from a distant room alerted him that Hermione had probably just broken something valuable, that or Tonks had come to visit her. He added extra wards to his rooms – the ones that would electrocute anyone who tried to enter – and vowed not to leave his sanctuary for the rest of the day.

"What happened, Tonks?" Hermione asked as she cleaned up the potion which had been spilt. She had been told on her first day working for Snape that the fire was never to be used for Potions because it was connected to the Floo network. That had been three days ago now and no one had used it. Snape didn't get many visitors.

"Well I crashed Harry's Firebolt and…" Tonks began but trailed off suddenly. "What are you doing here?"

Hermione blushed slightly. "I couldn't resist the opportunity to get more Potions learnt," she said. Tonks raised an eyebrow as she surveyed Hermione. Clumsy? Yes. Thoughtless? Yes. Oblivious? No.

"And it just so happens that you come to Snape's personal quarters for all this improvement?" Tonks asked lightly.

"It's easier to work here so close to his personal storerooms," Hermione lied.

"Odd that, I mean I was always under the impression that there was a really well-stocked Potions cupboard for students," Tonks said and then grinned at her. "Snape! I can't believe it…"

She began to laugh hysterically as Hermione stared at her with an expression of horror fixed firmly to her face. The more Hermione stared the more convinced that Tonks became until eventually she could take it no more and almost fell over from her laughter.

"Tonks…" Hermione said finally. She was biting her bottom lip and wringing her hands nervously together. If anyone found out that she liked Snape then surely word would get back to the man himself. She would be laughed out of Grimmauld Place…

Tonks stopped laughing when she saw how truly nervous and upset about everything Hermione was. "I won't say anything to anyone," Tonks said to her. "I promise."

"Thank you, that means a lot to me," Hermione smiled a little easier but at the same time some niggling doubt remained. She had known Tonks a long time and whether she meant well or not was irrelevant. Things just went wrong for her.

"No problem," Tonks said and smiled brightly. Hermione pulled her into a hug, pressing the tip of her wand to Tonks's temple. Tonks tried to pull back but Hermione held onto her tightly. "Hermione…?"

"I'm so sorry, but this is for my own safety," Hermione whispered. "Obliviate."

A flash of green flames and quite a lot of spinning later, Tonks staggered out of the fireplace of number 12 Grimmauld Place and stared around in utter confusion. She had no idea what just happened, where she had just been or why she had been Flooing at all. She thought it had something to do with Hermione but she was staying with her parents for the duration of the prank so it clearly wasn't that…

She shrugged and wandered off elsewhere, wondering where Harry was and whether or not he would let her borrow his Firebolt to spy on Remus.

A/N: This story won't contain any more Hermione/Snape than that, at least I don't think it will. There'll be the odd reference to it or so as things progress but there won't be anything graphic. If there's an interest then I might write a parallel story – Hermione and Snape getting together whilst Sirius and Harry are in the background. Thanks for reading:o)