I started to think of the choices we make everyday and how we are affected by them.  I started to think of the choices we make everyday and how others are affected by them. I started to think about Severus Snape and what might motivate him.  This is the result.

Title:               Choices

Author:           The Treacle Tart

Pairings:         SS / RL

Rating:            R - but only just.

Summary:       Sirius Black makes a startling discovery and now he has a choice to make.

Disclaimer:     Anything associated with Harry Potter belongs to JK Rowling.  I am simply an obsessed fan.

A thank you to bluemeanie who helped me through this.  It has changed much since you first read it so very long ago.  I hope this is better.

Special thanks to Angelfeather for her insight and patience.

Choices

Part One - Discovery

Sirius Black had a choice to make.

And it was one he had never thought he would have to make.

The War between 'The Dark' and 'The Light' had been raging for months.  People were disappearing.  People were dying.  It could be anyone at any time, and Sirius knew that.  It could be him…or Harry…or Remus.  The thought of losing the people he loved terrified him. Years of forced isolation made him fierce about protecting those closest to him, especially since it was only recently that his innocence was proven and he could be with them, in the open and unafraid.

Sirius thought about others as well, for to lose anyone at this juncture of the battle would be detrimental to the cause.  He thought about the effect on the War if something happened to Albus Dumbledore, who was still trying to convince a corrupt Ministry that they needed to take action.  He thought about the effect on the school if something happened to Minerva McGonagall, who spent most of her time running it as if already planning for Dumbledore's eventual departure -- by his own hand or another's.  He thought about the children, especially Ron and Hermione who had only just discovered each other in a way beyond the boundaries of normal friendship.  He thought of the littlest Weasley, Ginny, and the way she looked at Harry.  And, when he thought no one was looking, the way Harry looked back. Yes, Sirius Black thought about a lot of people during that time.

The one person he did not think about was Severus Snape.  In fact, he tried his best to never think about Severus Snape.  But one day, he did.  Sirius took a really close look.  He looked at the small lines that cut into his face, each marking a reminder of the tightrope Snape was walking on and how thin it was. He thought of how very easily that tightrope could snap, how very easily he could be the next to disappear.  He thought how likely it was, in fact, that one day he would disappear, for if anyone was in the line of fire on a regular basis, it was the dour Potions Master.  Sirius thought about it, but, in the scheme of things, he did not imagine he would care at all.  Until, that is, he looked at his friend, Remus Lupin.

Sirius remembered all to well the days before the Wolfsbane Potion, the days when the most kind and gentle person he knew, transformed into a creature thirsty for blood with a primal urge to rip and tear.  He remembered what that change did to his friend, physically and emotionally.  Seeing the werewolf now you would never know he still had the affliction.  Sure, Remus was occasionally tired and bone weary from the transformation, but the potion allowed him to retain control of his mind.  In retaining his mind, he retained his humanity and his dignity.  The change in the man was tangible.

It was when Snape disappeared for three days that Sirius Black started to worry.  Though Remus never said a word he knew they were both thinking the same thing -- what if he never came back?  Who would brew the potion?  It was a selfish thought no one voiced, but it hung in the air, getting heavier minute by the minute, until the greasy git finally returned.  It was that day that Sirius made a decision.  Someone else would have to learn how to brew the potion.  Someone else had to be able to do it if Snape could not. 

Sirius was a good potions student.  He was not a master like Snape was, but he had the capacity to learn.  He owed it to his friend to try.  So one day he approached Severus Snape, explained his concern and asked, as politely as he could, if he would teach him how to brew the potion.  After many sarcastic and acerbic remarks and a few dog jokes thrown in for good measure, Snape acquiesced.  Even Snape had to see it was the only way to help Remus Lupin.  They needed everyone at their best; it was war, after all.

So Sirius Black started spending a lot of time in the dungeons and in the company of the one person he despised only slightly less than Voldemort and his minions. Well, with the exception of Peter Pettigrew.  He had a special sort of loathing for Peter Pettigrew.   

And after the name calling got boring and the verbal abuse required more energy than either was willing to expend, an amazing thing happened: Sirius grew to like him.  He could not say when it happened or how; Merlin knows, it wasn't overnight.  But over the course of many months, somewhere between chopping the Taro Root and measuring the Aconite, a sort of comfortableness presented itself and two archrivals hated each other a little less.

Sirius Black would never call it a friendship.  No one would believe him anyway.  But he admitted to himself that he had grown to respect the man and his abilities, as well as his devotion.  The Wolfsbane Potion was a difficult one.  Precision was key as was constant attention.  And after six months of failed attempts, lost tempers and some remarkably creative swearing, Sirius was finally able to do it.

Now here is where Sirius Black got into a little trouble.  He knew Remus almost vomited every time he drank it.  All Sirius wanted to do was improve the taste.  A very innocent and charitable desire, all things  said.  He spoke to Snape about it on several occasions, but Snape always insisted that nothing could be done to the potion without lessening its effectiveness.  Sirius was not convinced, so he followed the advice of the most industrious and talented student he knew; he went to the library and did some research.

After four days of searching and grumbling, of thumbing through hundreds of dusty journals and manuals, of leads that led nowhere, he found what he was looking for, the original formula for the Wolfsbane potion.  And then, right then, he made a discovery that would alter his sense of reality like nothing before it.  There was a very specific reason Snape knew there could be no variations to the formula without altering its effects.  There was a very specific reason Snape could make the potion in his sleep.  Snape's extensive knowledge came not from studying it, but from inventing it.  Severus Snape created it, and due to the complexity of this potion, Sirius suspected its production was no accidental discovery.

Sirius stopped for a few moments to think about the significance of what he was looking at.  Severus knew no other werewolves; that little factoid had come out early in their partnership.

"This is such a complicated procedure and so time consuming.  It must take all your spare time to make it for people.  How many others do you make it for?"

"I personally just make it for Lupin, thank Merlin.  Other werewolves have other sources. I only have the one beast to consider.  Since he elects to remain here and be a threat to the children, I see it as my duty to keep him tame."

How different that conversation seems now that he had this morsel of information in his hands.

Suddenly, his mind was racing.  'Let's assume that Snape was speaking the truth and he really did not know any other werewolves.  If Remus was the only werewolf that he knew then he had probably created the potion for him. At the very least, Remus was the inspiration for the construction of the potion.  But why?  What would prompt Snape to make a potion for Remus?  A complicated and very intricate potion that probably took years to develop at that.  You would think he......Oh…..OH…..oh.'

Sometimes life was better as a dog. 

There were things that Sirius Black believed in indisputably: his innocence, Voldemort being the incarnation of pure evil, and Severus Snape was an egotistical, hateful, vindictive man incapable of emotion.

It was bad enough he had to admit that Snape was devoted to keeping Harry safe and  Voldemort at bay.  It was bad enough he had to admit that Snape put his own safety aside on a daily basis to gather any information he could to help Dumbledore.  It was bad enough that he had to admit that Snape sacrificed himself continuously to aid in the war.  Mind you it takes some very creative rationalizing to allow oneself to admit all those things and still believe unequivocally that Severus Snape was an egotistical, hateful, vindictive man incapable of emotion.

Creative rationalizations aside, now he had to admit that Snape did something incredibly compassionate for his best friend.  He had to admit that Snape created the greatest gift Remus had ever received and did it without taking any credit for it conception.  Sirius had to admit  Snape was not only capable of feeling emotion, but emotion was probably his motivation for said compassionate act.  He had to admit there was a good chance that Severus Snape loved Remus Lupin, had always loved him. 

And suddenly he found himself faced with an odd choice.    

He could forget he ever learnt this particular bit of information.  Snape, it seemed, had no intention of ever letting on that he was the inventor of the potion.  That fact that was evident to Sirius as it took days to find out any information.  Remus was blissfully ignorant, as he never made any attempt to find out who the inventor was.  Yes, Sirius could keep this information to himself and nothing would change and no one would be the wiser. 

Sirius liked that idea except for one small, tiny, trivial detail that kept gnawing at his conscious; Remus Lupin was in love with Severus Snape.  He had never said so; he never needed to.  Sirius knew his friend well enough to recognize the signs of an unspoken love on his lonely heart.  Remus would never let Snape how he felt; the fear of certain rejection would be too much for him.  The werewolf had a hard enough time being alone and out cast.  He seemed satisfied to live in a sort of fantasy world when it came to Severus Snape, as the reality of it was deficient and highly improbable.

At least that's how it seemed to Sirius.

Perhaps it was the far away look in Remus's eyes whenever he looked at Snape, or maybe it was the way Remus would always defend him when Sirius got on one of his tirades.  Perhaps it was that Remus said Snape's name in his sleep on more than one occasion during the years they shared a dormitory and even now when they shared a flat, where the walls are deceptively thin. 

Perhaps it was the look of betrayal and hurt in Remus's eyes when Snape turned away from him after Sirius's childish prank almost turned into attempted murder.  Sirius always had a difficult time with that memory.  A bitterly cold day, gray and icy, made worse by the sight of two people staring at each other with unspoken words of anger, confusion, regret and remorse swirling around them. Unvoiced declarations of love washed away by unvoiced accusations.  Sirius was an anonymous witness to the exchange in the middle of the library where those two would occasionally study together; the place where a friendship was born and where it died.  It was because of that memory Sirius even contemplated saying something now.  A couple of decades worth of guilt will have that effect on a person.

So if Sirius could not ignore the information he learned today, what were his other options?  He could confront Snape and find out why he did it.  No, that would not yield any positive results.  Besides, it really did not involve him.  Whatever it was, it was between Snape and Remus.  His only other course of action would be to tell Remus and let Remus decide for himself what to do with the information.

That could be dangerous.  What if Remus jumped to the same conclusions that Sirius did?  What if they were both wrong?  Remus might be setting himself up for a devastating fall. Then again, Remus has been cautious for twenty years.  It might be a safe assumption that he would continue that tradition.

In any case, it wasn't Sirius's choice to make.  All he had to decide was whether to tell or not to tell, and to whom.  Sirius thought of his old friend and his new one and had to admit, though very begrudgingly, that they would be good for one another - in a co-dependent sort of way. No, he would have to tell Remus.  He would have to give Remus the chance of finding out if there was something there.  Happiness was hard to come by these days, and everyone deserved a chance at finding some, even a lonely werewolf and a grumpy Potions Master.