HARRY POTTER AND EVERYTHING RELATING TO THAT MAGICAL UNIVERSE BELONG TO JK ROWLING, WARNER BROS, BLOOMSBURY BOOKS ETC. AND I AM VERY LUCKY TO BE ALLOWED TO PLAY WITH IT ALL.

Kicking A Puppy

Sirius was changing his own bed sheets when he heard the commotion downstairs. A woman was shouting, there were footsteps and slammed doors. They'll wake my bloody mother's picture if they're not careful, he thought. He had just got the last corner of the linen tucked under when he heard her start screeching.

"Blood traitors and their brats!"

He gave a quick look backwards on the way out of the room: not exactly hospital corners but good enough considering he wasn't a House Elf and his was sulking.

He sprang speedily down the stairs, determined to pull the curtain and shut the old bag up as quickly as possible. Also, there was just the possibility, among all those Weasleys, wasn't there …?

"How dare they pollute the purity of the house of Black? Toujours Pur! Half breed! Foul maggots devouring the body of our family home!" The vindictive voice pervaded the whole house.

The door to Harry and Ron's room slammed shut just before he reached it. Adolescents! Somebody was having a fit of the dramatics, then. Even if it was Harry, it was probably best to leave him to calm down on his own for a while.

Sirius leapt the last landing and got within grabbing distance of the curtain flapping over the nasty hag's face. Molly Weasley was almost as angry, berating the twins. It always seemed to be them. He tried to interrupt her flow, saying, "Sorry, Molly, still haven't found the unsticking charm."

She acknowledged him with a nod, taking a deep breath as though to recommence her tirade. Sirius was yanking hard on the curtain but it wouldn't budge. He faced his mother to yell "Shut up you old cow!" then turned back to Molly to ask the most pressing question: "How is Arthur?"

Molly's face shifted through gears and settled into a concerned expression. What she said, though, was, "Better than this morning. Yes, I'm sure they're making progress."

"Glad to hear that." He really was very glad to hear it. He liked Arthur.

Mrs Black had a different response: "He'll die of his injuries and his wretched corpse will infect the soil …"

Sirius tried to shout over her, "Sorry, can't get the bloody curtain across."

In unison, Fred and George jumped up a handful of steps and started to haul away at the other curtain. They seemed to have grown even since the summer. They were strong and they put their backs into it.

"Thanks, boys. You two in trouble again?"

"Aren't they always?" Molly huffed, from below them, her temper spent now.

One of the twins - he couldn't tell them apart - said, "I'm sorry about last night."

"No, no, don't apologise."

He expected the other twin to speak next, that was usually the way it worked, but instead it was the same boy who insisted, "Don't want to fall out with you. We're on the same side."

"You were worried about your father, of course you confronted me." It had broken his heart, but the Order came first. He added, "Very impressive, it was, Molly."

One final co-ordinated yank and the torrent of abuse finally ended.

"That's better, that's silenced the old hag."

Sirius looked around. His hall was full. Most of its occupants had red hair, apart from Tonks and Remus, standing together near the umbrella stand. He looked away from them. He didn't want to see Remus and the man he did want to see wasn't there. And then a head emerged up the basement steps. He knew it immediately, from something subtle about the way it moved or the way it was held.

Sirius took a step down. Bill took another step up.

Then two things happened at once. Bill spotted Remus and froze, and Sirius found himself being pushed backwards up the stairs by one of the twins, the other one following close behind.

"What are you doing, George?" The follower asked.

"Doxies," hissed the one with his palm against Sirius' chest.

"Oh, yeah."

The twin who was closest - George presumably - got his mouth up to Sirius' ear and whispered, "Have you got any more? We need the venom."

As he was shoved onto the landing, Sirius looked hopelessly down into the hallway, where Bill had finally turned to face the stairs.

"Your mother got rid of them all over the summer," he whispered back, "good job, too!"

The teenagers looked deflated but still blocked his way.

"You sure there couldn't be any new infestations?" the one who wasn't George - so, Fred - asked.

Bill looked up. Their eyes met. Bill looked down.

"Yeah, absolutely certain. Have you tried Mundungus? He can get anything."

"Is he around?"

"Well, no but he will be. I owe him money. Something about some vodka I was meant to be storing for him …" Sirius gabbled, his mind entirely fixed on the man avoiding his gaze at the bottom of the stairs.

Luckily Molly saved the day: "Fred, George! What are you doing? Leave poor Sirius alone!" Then she earned Sirius' eternal gratitude by adding, "Sirius, I don't suppose you'd mind showing Bill where he's sleeping so he can drop his bag off, would you?"

Sirius decided on the room directly under his own. They tramped up the stairs in silence, Bill with that Muggle rucksack on his shoulder. Sirius opened the door and gestured for Bill to enter, attempting, and failing, to make eye contact.

Bill threw his bag onto the bed. Quietly, Sirius closed the door and stood in front of it. Bill looked up and they both took a deep breath. Then they both started speaking at once.

Sirius was so busy saying, "I want to talk about what happened," that it took a beat for him to register that Bill had asked: "You're not seeing Lupin any more?"

What was that about?

"Not since Azkaban!" he protested.

Bill looked flustered. "But I thought … he said … I thought you were --"

"Who said?" Sirius was outraged! Was that why Bill had been keeping his distance?

"He did. Lupin."

"You believed him?"

Bill looked shell-shocked.

Bloody ex- so-called best friend! What else had he said? When had he said it?

"Did … did you and he - I mean - you know, did you …?" Bill stuttered.

"Shall I tell you what happened that night? After you left? The last time?"

Bill nodded. At last! Sirius sat on the bed. He had to say it. But he was ashamed. He looked at the vile pattern of the carpet.

"After you left, I didn't get dressed. I did get pissed. I was listening to … It doesn't matter. I was on the settee, semi-comatose, half naked. He grabbed me. I didn't .. it wasn't …" Not crying. That would be pathetic. Swallow it back.

Sirius had run through this moment in his head often over the last couple of months, but in none of his projected scenarios had Bill asked, "Did he rape you?" in a choked voice, the way he did now.

"No. He wanked me off. That's all. I didn't even tell him to stop, I was too far gone. Why did you ask that?"

"Lying little dark creature were-wolf bastard! Snivelling shit!" Bill thumped his fist into the wall. His eyes blazed and his face was crimson as he marched over to Sirius. "That's the truth?" he snarled.

Sirius was a bit scared and quite a bit turned on.

"Stay here!" he choked out and Apparated down to the hall where he grabbed Remus by the collar and Apparated back to Bill's room. He threw Remus to the floor and the two taller men towered over him. Remus lifted his greying head and looked from one of them to the other. There was no mistaking the fury in Bill's face and Sirius was sure his own mirrored it.

"You've spoken then?" Lupin surmised. He seemed to be talking to himself as he added, "I've been expecting this."

"Tell him the truth!" Sirius growled.

Moony began again, more breathlessly now, "Look, it was nearly the New Moon. I was in love …" then he stood up and laughed unexpectedly in Bill's direction. "I can't believe you fell for it! You don't know him at all."

Sirius felt the blaze of a fury sweep through him and reached for his wand, but before he could point it, Remus bent forward clutching his face. He writhed on the hideous carpet as something brown and leathery flapped its way out of his clenched fist and flew into the room. As he waved his hand ineffectually at the bat, another burst its way out of his nostril. And then another.

Sirius looked at Bill, impressed. He really could have been a Marauder.

Bill shrugged. "Weasley special," he said, coolly as Remus endured the escape of another bat from where his bogeys should have been.

"How long does it last?" Sirius asked, awed.

"I'll have to stop it before someone starts asking why I did it. Finite Incantatum!"

Remus kept one hand over his face as he hurriedly Disapparated.

For a moment, Bill and Sirius gazed at each other. Then Bill looked away.

"It doesn't matter," he muttered. "It was for the best. We couldn't keep seeing each other anyway."

Sirius felt like he'd been slapped. Unaware that he was moving, he slid slowly to a squat. He thought that everything had been made right. He had thought that it mattered whether Bill knew the truth.

"Look, I'm sorry I let him touch me --" he choked out, before Bill interrupted.

"Don't be," he said in a flat voice. "It's not that. I can't start that up again. I'm sorry. You knew I had a girlfriend before we ever … did anything. I can't sneak around cheating on her. I've asked her to marry me. I want a wife and children and all that. I want to be normal, Sirius. It's as well he stopped us 'cos I couldn't have done."

Bill moved towards the door, past Sirius' hunched figure.

"Fine!" Sirius spat out. Bill stopped moving and looked back at him. "You go and try to be straight!" Sirius stood up. He swallowed, then he continued, "I've watched a better man than you fail. This isn't the end. Every so often you'll weaken and end up in a fumble, or a bed, with me, and if not me, then some other man. The whole of your happy married life will be punctuated by sordid casual affairs like ours," he snarled.

"No!" Bill snapped back, "I can do this properly!"

"That was where you were supposed to say that our affair wasn't sordid or casual."

Whatever Bill's response would have been, they never knew, because it was at that moment that Molly came up the stairs, calling them down to supper.

They both spent the meal deep in conversation with the person sitting next to them. Remus wasn't at the table and Sirius fantasised vindictively about him applying ointments to a still-agonising nose.

Sirius went to bed immediately afterward supper, making some excuse to himself about giving the family time to be together. Harry was nowhere to be seen, so he must have been of a similar mind.

After seeing to Buckbeak, Sirius flung himself fully dressed onto his bed, refusing to cry, staring dry-eyed at the water-damaged ceiling until he fell asleep in spite of himself.

He woke again in the middle of the night. It was completely dark. A noise had woken him. He sat up quickly and reached for his wand. There came another sound: a light footstep. Even before he cast Lumos Sirius could tell who was there.