A/N: A chapter from Sirius's perspective. I hope you enjoy it!

The rain splattered messily against the smooth, cloudy panes of the windows in the living room, drowning out the sharp crackles from the small fire that burned in the hearth.

Sirius couldn't concentrate. He was lying on his side on the floor, holding a book loosely in one hand. Every minute or so, he'd glance up at his godson, who was lying flat on his stomach across the sofa.

Sirius watched out of the corner of his eye as Harry idly dragged his fingers through the uneven fringe on the edge of the rug, his green eyes heavy-lidded and glassed-over in thought.

"It's almost eleven," Sirius notified softly.

Harry didn't stir. His occasionally wiggling toes—and fingers kept busy by the threads—had been Sirius's only indication of life on the other side of the room.

The binding of Sirius's book touched the floor now, and the yellowed pages were fanned and floating.

"You look sleepy," his godfather attempted once more, shifting a bit on his hip. "Why don't you go on up to bed?"

The heels of Harry's bare feet disappeared inside the cuffs of his baggy pajama bottoms as he exhaled silently. Untangling his fingers from the musty rug, Harry folded his arm close to his body and glanced over at Sirius.

"Do I have to?" Harry mumbled against plush. His glasses rested crookedly on his nose.

Sirius pressed his lips together, stifling an amused smirk at the image of his droopy-eyed godson smashed into the cushions. Harry had a habit of falling asleep in the living room, and Sirius often had to peel the dead-weight kid away from the sofa before he nestled into the crevice and destroyed his glasses.

"Well," Sirius began, looking over his shoulder to check the clock, "not right this instant necessarily, but twenty minutes from now—yes, you have to." Flipping back around, Sirius settled into the carpet again.

As he gazed once more at Harry's inert form, Sirius felt his stomach tighten, knowing that when his godson became quiet and still, something was bothering him. And Sirius hated it. Harry'd been through enough grief in his thirteen years of existence.

"Hey…" Sirius said, tilting his head a bit so that his cheek nearly rested on his shoulder.

Harry glanced up again, emitting a soft noise of acknowledgement.

"Are you ever going to smile again?... Or are we doomed to a life of endless rain clouds and depression?" Sirius joked in his own gentle way.

Harry shrugged weakly.

"Depression for life, then," Sirius clarified with a nod, flipping the cover of his book repeatedly with his thumb. "At least now I can prepare myself…"

The corners of Harry's mouth twitched for a brief second, and then the jollity disappeared as fleetingly as it arrived. His pale back puffed up again with a deep sigh.

Sirius smiled sympathetically. "Harry, what's wrong?" he murmured.

Harry squirmed slightly on the sofa, sneaking a hand in between the cushion and his stomach to scratch at the fabric-indented skin. He stared at his godfather.

"My stomach sort of hurts," Harry slurred, freeing his hand and tucking his fingers underneath his cheek.

Sirius sat up slowly, genuinely surprised. He hadn't been expecting that. "It does?"

The boy shrugged again. "A bit…"

"Harry… Why didn't you tell me?" Sirius exclaimed, shaking his head in a bewildered way. He picked up his novel and tossed it onto the seat of the armchair before pushing himself off of the ground and walking over to the sofa.

He kneeled down, placing the palm of his hand flat against the middle of Harry's back. "Do you feel like you're going to sick up?" Sirius dragged his hand up to Harry's neck and felt around for fever.

Harry shook his head.

"You're not very warm…"

Sirius removed his hand and rested it on his knee while he carefully studied his godson's face. Harry only sighed again, blinking steadily over unfocused eyes while he scraped his thumbnail along the ridged upholstery.

I wonder… Sirius thought, the solution finally dawning on him. He should have known.

After the two of them had left Dumbledore's office yesterday, Harry had been rather quiet… again. He'd assured Sirius that he was fine, but after a bit of gentle prodding from his godfather, Harry admitted that he was just sick and tired of worrying about signatures and all that legal rubbish as the boy had described it. Feeling guilty, Sirius had promised his godson that this would be the last trip they'd have to make concerning the guardianship. In all honesty, Sirius was surprised that Harry hadn't mentioned anything about his horse-faced aunt or anyone else in that ruddy family. Yes, he'd definitely heard a story or two from James. But Sirius had never actually met any of the Dursleys. Dumbledore had said that Harry's life in Surrey hadn't exactly been blissful, but he'd sworn the child had been provided for… Provided what? Sirius had wanted to ask. But neither the headmaster nor his godson had wanted to discuss the matter over tea and biscuits. So Sirius had done the only thing he knew to do in the situation: he trusted the man who helped him get custody of the thirteen-year-old who was his life. Who saved his life. Who Sirius loved and worried for so much that his heart felt like it was pierced with a thousand shards of glass whenever Harry's eyes were cloudy with apprehension and sadness.

Like now...

Sirius felt his godson's forehead one last time. "Are you thinking about Thursday again?" Sirius questioned after a moment.

Harry stopped picking at the sofa.

The impending trip to Surrey was still two days away. And Harry had promised Sirius that he wasn't worried. However, this was the second time today that his little bundle of adolescent energy had gone quiet on him.

Settling back against the edge of a nearby table, Sirius drew a knee up slightly and rested one arm across his leg, hooking his fingers together as he waited for a response.

Receiving none, Sirius breathed evenly and tried a different approach. "Remember how I told you that I moved in with your dad when I was about sixteen?"

Harry glanced over at his godfather. He moved his stilled thumb up to his mouth and began to nibble on the nail as he listened.

"Do you remember?"

Harry nodded against the cushions.

"Well," the man continued, feeling a bit more stabilized by the tiny nod, "I had been living with your grandparents for a month or so, and one day over the summer, I had to go back to Grimmauld Place to pick up some important things I'd forgotten—some papers for school I think—because my parents wouldn't answer any of the Potters' letters that requested they'd send them."

"How come?" Harry wondered, speaking around his thumbnail.

Sirius sniffed and shook his head sardonically. "They were idiots." He left it at that.

"Oh…" Harry replied. Removing the end of his wet, wrinkled thumb from his teeth, Harry burrowed it into his fist of fingers to dry it off before tucking his hand underneath his cheek again. "Were they angry when you went back?"

Sirius shrugged, his eyes trailing absently along the rug's fringe Harry had recently been fiddling with. "My mother was incredibly annoyed. She called me some pretty vile names…"

Leisurely, Harry pried himself up from the cushions, settling cross-legged in the middle of the sofa. He rubbed his nose with the back of his hand, leaning his head upon the backrest, giving his godfather a half-smile when he noticed that Sirius was watching him with raised eyebrows.

From stomach to chest, Harry's pale skin was thoroughly striped with the sofa-pattern, but he paid no mind to it.

"Were you scared?" the boy asked quietly.

"I was nervous to go back, yes," Sirius answered truthfully. "But in the end, I knew that it couldn't last forever; I knew I'd be returning to people who cared for me."

Biting on the corner of his bottom lip, Harry nodded. As if suddenly noticing his ridged skin, Harry glanced down and began rubbing his knuckles over his belly button. Sirius knew the exertion would be pointless, but he said nothing as his godson continued with the nervous habit.

"Are you worried about going back to the Dursleys?" Sirius inquired suddenly, twisting his fingers against each other as he watched Harry smooth his fist along his stomach—the movements becoming smaller and more sporadic as his brain absorbed the question.

After a few seconds, Harry glanced up carefully. He let his hands drop, tucking them underneath his thighs while he chewed on the insides of his cheeks.

Face and ears blushing a subtle pink, the boy nodded.

I knew it, the man thought, scorning himself. Damn you, Sirius…you bloody fool.

He pushed himself up from the floor, feeling stiff and at a complete loss for words. Remus would know exactly how to handle this. He'd know how to comfort Harry without smothering him with sympathy.

Sirius just wanted to cradle his messy-haired godson, not caring that he was almost fourteen years old.

But instead, he simply seated himself on the cushion next to Harry. The boy's eyes followed his godfather's every movement. He didn't pull away.

Forcing himself to swallow the uncertainty, yet still feeling clumsy, Sirius rested his arm across the back of the sofa, behind Harry's head.

"If they were unkind to you, Harry, I'm sorry," he said, his voice cracking. "If I could have been there earlier, I would have taken you far away from Surrey…"

"To where?" Harry glanced over, now resting his temple against the sofa.

"Well," Sirius began, shifting his palm a bit so that it rested on top of the boy's warm hair, "anywhere you would have wanted to go."

"Yeah?"

"Absolutely."

"The seaside?" Harry offered, his glasses slipping a bit as the frames rubbed against sofa.

Sirius removed his hand, pushing them up on Harry's nose with a fingertip. "Sure."

"Brilliant," Harry commented, smiling for a second before looking down into his lap, seemingly absorbed in contemplation. The smile faded slowly as his fingers fussed with the folds of his flannel bottoms. "They weren't really that awful to me, Sirius," the boy said softly. "Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia just didn't really like me, is all. The mostly just ignored me…like I said before…"

Sirius stomach burned—as if the lining were being stripped away piece by piece. But on the outside, he remained calm, forcing himself to listen.

"They hated that I was a wizard, and if something strange happened—even when I was little and I didn't mean for it to—they usually just shut me up in my room until they thought everyone just forgot about it, I guess."

Unable to contain himself any longer, Sirius silently put his arm around Harry's shoulder, slipping his other hand underneath the boy's armpit to pull him closer. Still cross-legged and holding onto his pajamas, Harry allowed himself to sag against his godfather's chest.

"I'm listening," Sirius reassured him softly.

"But then…" Harry swallowed. "Well, remember how I told you about Dobby and how he just appeared in my bedroom two summers ago?"

"Mmmhmm."

Harry had told Sirius a lot about his first and second years at Hogwarts, but he'd failed to mention the floating pudding and how Vernon's face turned redder than any of them had ever seen it.

So he told him now.

After Harry had finished stammering his explanation, Sirius bowed his head a bit to get a better look at his godson's face. "You didn't tell me about that…"

"I know," Harry replied quietly.

They sat quietly for a few seconds. Sirius wasn't sure if he wanted to hear about what happened next. Why had Harry kept this from him?

"Did your uncle punish you?" The words made Sirius's throat ache.

Harry squirmed against him, and Sirius squeezed his godson's shoulder lightly.

"Uncle Vernon made me wait upstairs for a really long time…" Harry began.

Sirius felt his tongue snagging in his dry throat. "What for?"

"He told me he was going to flay me alive or something like that—he was really, really angry. And, I mean…he said stuff like that all of the time, but he never actually thrashed me or anything. This time, though, I was afraid, because he looked like he was serious. He took his belt off and everything…"

Sirius tightened his hold on Harry. He was feeling positively ill. Dammit, Albus, he thought. "How long did he make you wait before he came up?"

Harry paused for a moment. He reached up and scratched at his nose again. "He never did."

"He didn't?"

Harry shook his head and began picking at his hem once more, tugging at the baggy material. "I couldn't sleep because I was so nervous that night—I thought he was going to come upstairs and whip me."

"But he didn't," Sirius affirmed. The smoldering tightness in his chest was beginning to ebb.

"No…"

Sirius reached up and smoothed back the child's hair. His own palms were damp.

"I was such baby, though, Sirius," Harry whispered. The man could sense his godson's face and neck warming as the boy leaned against him. "I'd been sitting up in my room for hours, and when I couldn't fall asleep, I cried. I couldn't help it."

"That was a terrible thing your uncle did to you…making you wait…"

"But I should've known he'd just lock me up in my room like he always did," Harry argued, clutching fistfuls of material this time.

"Someone should have locked him up in a nuthouse," Sirius exclaimed, leaning his head wearily against the back of the sofa. "You had every right to be upset, Bub. I would have made myself sick worrying about something like that…"

Harry paused. He craned his neck upwards. "Really?"

"Yes."

Another pause.

His godson seemed to have relaxed the muscles in his back and shoulders. But Sirius continued trailing his thumb along Harry's shoulder, relieved to hear that Dursley hadn't beaten his godson but still disgusted, nonetheless.

"I told you about the basilisk, didn't I?" Harry suddenly spoke up.

"You and Dumbledore both… And I'm still trying to come to terms with it. Merlin's shorts…"

He watched his godson's cheeks puff up with an amused smile. Harry pressed his hand against Sirius's stomach so he could sit up straighter, rolling his eyes as his godfather dramatized an indignant oomph at the pressure.

Harry squinted at the clock. "I've still got four minutes."

"I know," Sirius replied. "Use them to listen to me for a second…"

Twisting around, Harry leaned back against the arm of the sofa, drew up his knees, and waited for his godfather to speak.

Sirius gave him a solemn look. "This is going to be an in-and-out trip to your aunt and uncle's house, Harry. I absolutely promise."

"I can't stand them…"

"I know," Sirius said with a nod. "And you've got several good reasons not to. But after this, I swear— Are you listening to me, Harry James?"

The boy nodded.

"I swear it… You don't ever have to see them again if you don't want to. I'll make sure of it."

Harry studied the man for a moment, adjusting his glasses carelessly. He smiled suddenly, revealing his teeth. "Why? Are you gonna pummel them?"

Sirius looked at his godson as if he'd lost his mind. "Of course I won't…"

"You're smiling…"

"I am not," Sirius cried.

Harry laughed.

Sirius felt his insides unthawing at the high, light sound. And this time, he really did smile. It was amazing how quickly his godson could bounce back from the melancholy… Had he been able to do that at Harry's age?

Harry leaned back, yawning and stretching against the arm of the chair, poking Sirius with his feet.

"I believe that's your cue…"

The boy sprang up immediately. "For what?"

Sirius gave him a knowing look.

Harry made a face. "I've still got a minute…"

"Come here and give me a hug," Sirius replied gently, holding out his arms, ignoring the minute-plea.

Rising up on his knees and tumbling forward, Harry fell into his godfather's open arms, knocking the man back a little.

Swiftly regaining his balance, Sirius gave him a mighty squeeze, breathing in the faint smell of shampoo and the outdoors as he kissed the top of Harry's head for good measure.

He'd been able to keep his composure in the presence of Severus Snape. Surely, he thought, as he patted the tiny amount of baby fat remaining underneath Harry's ribs, surely, he could hold it together in front of the sodding muggles.

Besides, Sirius knew that Harry didn't need him to retaliate. He just needed his godfather.

TBC...

Next Chapter: The Dursleys

Thank you so much for all of your feedback. I plan on continuing this story longer than my other one (Emerald Eyes). Since I only have a few chapters left of my other story, I may spend some time finishing it up completely before I write the next chapter of SfS. It shouldn't be longer than about two weeks. And I promise a nice, long chapter after that. Thanks again for all of the encouragement. Hang in there with me...I swear I won't abandon this one ;)