Chapter 26

The rest of the summer went by smoothly. Somehow the boys managed to amuse themselves by trying to teach Anastasia how to talk, snuggling and kissing in James's room, or begging Remus and Peter to come over. Usually the didn't, but they always found something else to do.

One day they had gone out to go swimming, which was basically a chance for them to snog by the pool, until they got caught by Mr. Potter at least. And once they had gone on a hike, which ended up being just a snog in the woods. And then they had gone on a picnic, which turned out to be no more than a snog in the meadows.

"We should cook something," James said randomly while they were sitting in James's room doing nothing. Sirius had Anastasia in his arms and was teaching her how to dance.

He looked up and his eyebrows drew together, as if to say, 'are you crazy?'. "Do you really know how to cook?" he asked, surprise showing through his voice.

Slightly put off, James responded, "Of course I know how to cook. It's in my blood."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "I have dark family heritage in my blood, yet that doesn't really mean much to me," he said, a smile flashing across his lips. Anastasia laughed slightly and clapped her hands together in glee. "She agrees with me," Sirius added, tickling his daughter under her chin. She giggled and gently pulled on Sirius's hair. Rolling his eyes, he carefully extracted his daughter's hands from his hair. "You're going to be my little headache child, aren't you, always causing me and my hair grief."

"My hair and me," corrected James absently. Recently he had gotten into a hey-let's-use-correct-grammar-or-die attitude. If Sirius said anything that was grammatically incorrect, James would automatically correct him, causing Sirius more than a little bit of frustration. Of course, if Sirius tried to correct James, he would always counter it by some other grammar rule that was either made up on the spot or unheard of and unused for centuries.

Sirius rolled his eyes again and stood up, setting Anastasia down on the ground so she could crawl around. "Let's go bake cookies. I can do that and you can do that, and they're fun, and they taste good!"

James looked up at him and smiled. "Brilliant idea!" he exclaimed and picked up Anastasia before getting up. "I don't know why I didn't think of it."

"Duh, James. You didn't think of it because I thought of it," Sirius laughed and led the way out of the room, James following with Anastasia now pulling on his hair, only not so gently.

"Sirius was right, you are going to be a headache child, simply because your hair pulling technique is giving me a headache," James told her as he walked down the stairs. When he entered the kitchen, he set her in her high chair so she could watch and went to help Sirius find things to make cookies.

"What type of cookies do you want?" he asked as James joined him.

"Chocolate chip, what else," he replied and began rummaging in the kitchen for butter and vanilla extract.

"Of course. There's no other type of cookie, is there?" teased Sirius, setting the flour, sugar, and brown sugar on the counter.

"Definitely not," he responded, going to find chocolate chips in the pantry. He arrived shortly afterwards and then looked at everything organized around them. "Is that all?"

"Eggs," Sirius answered and went back to the refrigerator to get some out. He came back and smoothly set the eggs on the counter.

"Salt and baking soda," James spontaneously said and went to fetch some. Within moments he was back and setting the things on the counter with the rest of the items. Sirius looked around and his eyebrows drew together in concentration.

"Is that everything this time?" he asked, trying to think about what else they might need. James also looked around and then nodded that they did have everything.

And so they began baking. Sirius was stirring the butter and sugars together while James was mixing the flour, salt, and baking powder. Sirius smiled as he stirred. He remembered when he was twelve, he had gone to James's house for a week during summer break (without his parents' permission). They had spent most of the time just playing around outside, but the night before Sirius had to leave, they stayed up all night baking cookies, which had resulted in a flour fight. They had been covered in flour and had cookie dough all over their hands. Mrs. Potter had gotten up the next morning and had nearly had a heart attack.

He chuckled and James turned to look at him. "What's so funny?"

Sirius sighed and said, "I was remembering the last time we baked cookies together. What a huge mess we made!"

James laughed and shook his head. "My mom was so angry about that, I thought that she would never forgive me."

"Why?"

"Well, in the process of ruining her kitchen, we also destroyed about three bags of flour, four batches of cookies, and two bowls."

Sirius laughed at that and stopped when Anastasia started crying. After glancing at James and then the bowl, he went to go check on her. As he bent to down to pick her up to soothe her, a movement outside of the house caught his eye through the window. It was a formidable looking woman walking up the path to the door. His heart sank and he immediately backed up into the kitchen.

"James," he panted as he hurried into the kitchen, "we've got a problem."

James looked at him confused, wondering what could have possibly happened, considering they hadn't done anything that would cause anything to blow up or burn. "What happened?" he asked.

"Someone's here," he responded.

"Who?"

"My-" Three knocks sounded at the door: knock knock knock. Sirius flinched each time at the horrible sounds. "mum," he finished, looking downtrodden.

James's eyes widened and he immediately took Anastasia from his boyfriend's arms and took her to his mother's office, where she kept a crib for when she was babysitting. "At least she won't find Ana," James reassured Sirius, who had turned pale with dread.

They heard another insistent knock and Mrs. Potter came down the stairs to answer the door. "Why didn't one of you answer it?" she called out to them as she turned the knob. Neither boy responded, knowing she'd know soon enough. Sure enough, with the squeak of the door came an unpleasant, tense silence.

"Where is he," demanded Mrs. Black as she marched into the house uninvited. Sirius flinched and tried to vanish into the counter with no luck. James gave Sirius a pat on the back for encouragement as Mrs. Black stormed into the kitchen with Mrs. Potter right behind her. "There he is," she sneered when her gaze fell upon her son. His scowl deepened and he shrank back ever so slightly. Both Mrs. Potter and James could tell how terrified he was. "I thought we told you to come home for the summer," she hissed as she moved closer, grabbing the teenager tightly by the wrist.

"You get off of him," snarled James, lunging at her. However, Sirius pushed him back with his free arm, shooting him a look that clearly said 'let me handle this'. James calmed himself unwillingly, but he sat down on a chair in the kitchen, praying that Anastasia wouldn't decide to cry out right then.

"Well, so worthless that you have to have your pansy boyfriend stick up for you," she whispered, her grip tightening. Sirius could feel the pain shooting up his arm, but he showed no signs to his mother that it hurt him.

"You know," he snarled in return, "I could send you to Azkaban with one little complaint."

"How do you figure?" she asked, loosening her grip ever so slightly. Both Mrs. Potter and James were watching the exchange with anger and interest. How was Sirius going to handle it?

"Well, my entire childhood I was abused by both of you, not just father. Not to mention the fact that you did nothing to stop the rapes from last summer. That, by the law, makes you just as guilty." Sirius grinned wryly. "Haven't you ever heard of 'guilty by association'?"

Mrs. Black let go of her son and took a step backwards as the words sunk in. That, however, did not stop her verbal abuse. "You pathetic little bastard," she growled. "You were always such a disgrace to our family. We should have killed you at birth. We didn't though, but I can assure you that you are beyond disowned. I will not have you for a son."

"How can you just do that to your own child?" snapped Mrs. Potter angrily. She was tired of watching the tirade of hurtful words towards the boy who had become like a second son. "You're supposed to love your child, not despise him."

Mrs. Black's lips twisted into some harsh smile. "Love? I have never loved this worthless creature some people have the nerve to call a human being, what with his unnatural perversions. How could I?"

With those words, she spun on her heel to leave. Mrs. Potter, Sirius, and James followed, without really knowing why. As Mrs. Black began to open the door, she turned back to face her son. "This is not over yet," she taunted and opened the door only to come face to face with ministry officials with their wands pointed at her.

"Mrs. Black," the man at the door said, "you are arrested under the charges of child abuse and neglect."

Mrs. Potter's eyebrows rose in amusement while James and Sirius looked pleasantly confused. As the ministry officials led the protesting woman away, Anastasia began to cry, which was James's call to go comfort his daughter. Mrs. Potter smiled and gave Sirius a tight hug, which he gladly returned, before returning up the stairs, passing her husband as she went.

Mr. Potter came down and stood looking at Sirius. "So they got her?" he asked as he looked at the teenager.

He nodded and continued to look confused. "How did they know she was here?" he asked.

Mr. Potter smiled ever so slightly and responded, "I saw her coming up the walkway and decided I didn't want to take any chances. So I called the ministry and they were more than happy to offer their assistance. Plus, we all had enough proof against her to have those charges against her."

A smile spread across Sirius's face and compulsively he gave Mr. Potter a tight hug. "Thanks Mr. Potter," he said, happy that someone cared about him enough to do something like that. Uncomfortable with the situation for a moment, Mr. Potter forced himself to relax and returned the hug.

A.N. yep, I have a plan now. I wrote an outline. Things are going good. Please review. I personally really like this chapter. I think I did a good job, I'd like to know your opinion as well. Please review and thank you for reviewing.