Sirius blinked sleepily as he slowly drifted back to consciousness. He could hear the thunder of feet in the corridor outside his room and was sure he could faintly smell bacon. His stomach growled loudly in response. It must be morning already, he decided as he shifted uncomfortably, his arm was stiff and he couldn't move it properly. He turned his head slightly and almost had a fit.

His arm was stiff because someone was lying on it, pinning it firmly to the mattress. Sirius gulped. What had he done? Had he taken to sleep walking and somehow got into bed with Harry?

No, he shook his head to clear it; he'd been in to check on Harry and had ended up falling asleep. That was all. Relieved, Sirius collapsed back against the pillow for a moment before he began wriggling his arm to get it out from under Harry, who of course couldn't just do the decent thing and let him get away unscathed to have his lecherous thoughts all to himself.

Harry snuggled closer the moment he started trying to move away and nuzzled a slightly stubbly jaw against the bared skin of his chest. A startled whimper froze in Sirius' throat. This was too much and just not fair. He struggled harder to remove his arm, but Harry was surprisingly heavy for an apparently slightly built man, and he also had his arm draped possessively around Sirius' waist.

Sirius was on the point of hyperventilating as he realized this, and the muscles of his belly twitched beneath Harry's arm, he was about to remind himself to breathe normally again, but he recalled how well that had turned out last time and tried to divert his mind, which had returned to single track again.

Softly chanting a litany of choice words that would have brought shocked rebukes from both Molly and Hermione, Sirius finally managed to force himself to lie still and calm down; if he just pushed Harry away it would probably wake him up with one hell of a jump and the situation would be no better than if he let Harry wake up by himself and move away of his own accord without embarrassment. Yes, that was a good idea; it also meant that Sirius could lie still a little longer and savour the feeling of Harry in his arms. He traced his fingers lightly across the arm Harry has flung over his waist and wrapped his own still slightly stiff arm more tightly around Harry. He was just savouring the moment, he told himself firmly, not taking advantage.

Harry had no clue that he had moved during the night and was even now causing Sirius some serious problems. If he had known, he probably would have woken up, been horribly embarrassed, and leapt out of bed as if he'd been nibbled by one of Hagrid's less pleasant pets. But as it was he slept on peacefully until there was a loud hammering at his bedroom door.

Harry jerked up into a sitting position with a start as Hermione began calling him to get up because she wanted to talk to him before breakfast. Harry glanced down at Sirius lying snug beside him with a slightly bewildered and sleepy look on his face and leapt out of bed, heading speedily for the door before Hermione unwittingly said anything that might incriminate him.

He fumbled to open the door, half-blind without his glasses, and eventually swung the door open, scarlet-faced and gasping.

Hermione stared at him for a moment and then grinned rather wickedly, but as she opened her mouth to speak Harry launched himself clumsily out of the door, slamming it behind him and squashed Hermione into Sirius' door opposite them.

"Really Harry, what is the matter with you!" She protested indignantly.

"Sorry, but Sirius is in there and I was afraid you'd say something about him having the starring role in my dream or something."

"Sirius is in your room?!" Hermione's voice rose in surprise.

"Shhh! Not like that. He came in to talk to me last night, thought I was having a nightmare and stayed to comfort me. He just happened to fall asleep on my bed and I didn't have the heart to move him."

Hermione blinked at him, slowly registering the information before she pushed urgently at his chest. "Harry, get off."

Harry took a step back. "Sorry about that, I just panicked. Why did you want to talk to me anyway?"

Hermione opened her mouth to speak but as she did so Harry's bedroom door opened and Sirius stood awkwardly in the doorway. "Sorry I fell asleep on you last night, Harry. Some comfort I am, probably taking up too much space in your bed and snoring away like an old warthog."

Harry grinned helplessly.  "That's okay. I think just having someone with me helped me sleep better. Are you going down for breakfast?"

Sirius nodded and stepped around Harry and Hermione, making for his own door. "I'll see you down there soon?"

Harry nodded and Sirius went into his own room and shut the door.

Hermione grabbed his arm and propelled him quickly into his own room. "Are you ready to question Sirius at breakfast?"

"Huh?"

"Keep up, Harry," she chided. "We agreed on all this yesterday."

Harry shuffled across the room and fumbled for his glasses, not feeling quite awake enough yet to deal with Hermione in her forceful mode. "Oh, uh… I dunno."

"I can begin the conversation. You don't even have to say anything," she pressed.

"Hermione, I don't know if I want to know."

"But what if he tells you exactly what you want to hear? Isn't it worth the risk?"

"What I really want to hear from Sirius is hardly something that he might say over breakfast, or even in public."

Hermione flushed slightly. "Well, not that obviously. But surely it is better to know if your hopes are grounded in reality? If he only likes women, wouldn't you rather begin coping with that and then look around for a man who might be interested?"

Harry rubbed his forehead in frustration. In the few moments between awakening and bolting upright at the sound of Hermione's voice he had been lying wrapped up tight in Sirius' arms, he was sure of it. He hadn't imagined how wonderful that had felt, and that tiny taste of heaven simply hadn't been enough.

"Harry?" Hermione was looking at him with concern in her eyes. "Don't let me push you, but I think this would be for the best. This way you can either move on or forwards."

"I'm not sure. I just need to think about it. Maybe we could leave it for now, just let me enjoy Christmas with my stupid delusions. That still leaves me with plenty of time in the New Year to smack back into reality."

"Reality could be pleasant, you never know."

Harry snorted disbelievingly and slammed open his wardrobe door with unnecessary violence and began scrabbling for clothes.

Hermione deemed it wise to retreat with Harry in this frame of mind. "I'll see you at breakfast." She called over her shoulder as she hurried away.

Harry scrambled into his clothes and glared at his reflection in the mirror, his hair just would not lie down. Now it was longer and waved around the back of his neck, and almost down to his jaw, you would think the extra length would weigh it down, but no, it still stuck up in all directions.

After a short and unpleasant exchange with his mirror he stamped out of his room and down the stairs. His temper did not improve when he heard Ron laughing loudly and saying to Sirius, "Oh, I wish I'd seen that! Priceless!"

Harry stomped into the kitchen and regarded the occupants of the table with a rather jaundiced eye. He'd completely forgotten to talk to Ron about not telling Sirius about his dream.

Sirius shoved out the chair opposite him with his foot and smiled cheekily at Harry from around a mouthful of toast.

Harry's rage faded abruptly. It was almost impossible to stay angry with Sirius around, particularly when he smiled in that breath-catchingly mischievous way.

"Fall out of the wrong side of the bed, mate?" Ron asked grinning.

Harry mock-glared at Sirius, and then at Ron too, just for good measure.

"I told Sirius about you trying to murder your pillow back at school yesterday and he was just saying you rolled out of bed wrestling with your sheet. Did it fight back?"

Harry poured himself pumpkin juice and stole a crisp strip of bacon from Ron's plate, stuffing it all into his mouth and grinning at Ron's indignant protest.

Then he froze in horror at Ron's next words, struggling to swallow fast enough to interrupt the flow of words. "Anyway, before you came in mate, I was about to tell Sirius what came after the pillow killing, how you were mumbling in your sleep about a puppy and Sirius and then -"

"You misheard, Ron," Hermione chipped in quickly, noticing the panic on Harry's face. "He didn't say puppy or Sirius, he said something else entirely. It was all there in the film, you just must have missed that bit."

Ron paused with a forkful of scrambled eggs suspended halfway to his mouth. "But I was right beside him, I heard what he said. You were only there at the end."

"Yes, when he sat up and screamed that there was a man overboard." Hermione said quickly with a little laugh, trying to get the conversation onto less touchy subjects.

Ron scowled. "Hermione, that was the best bit of the story, it was really loud, like this:"

Ron then impersonated Harry waking up, to the amusement of the whole table.

Sirius snickered softly and looked at Harry, who was now staring at his plate in abject mortification, just wishing that the marmalade pot were big enough for him to crawl into to hide. Sirius frowned slightly; it was only a bit of harmless teasing and fun. What was troubling Harry so?

"But anyway," Ron carried on obliviously, "I'm starting to wonder if these dreams are all that they seem to be." He waggled his eyebrows suggestively at Harry. "Got anything to say to that, mate?"

"Apart from 'shut you mouth', not really." Harry managed amiably enough as he kicked Ron under the table.

"Ooh, I think I may have stumbled onto the truth of these so-called scary dreams," Ron said gleefully, rubbing his shin as he watched his friend blush.

"The truth?" Tonks asked curiously.

"Yeah," Ron said smugly as he carefully watched Harry's expression. Then he suddenly remembered that not everyone at the table was privy to information about Harry's sexuality and abruptly fell silent, turning an unnecessary amount of attention to buttering his toast.

"Yet, you leave us hanging," Remus said with a smile.

"Uh, yeah. I think I'd only embarrass Harry a bit too much if I said."

There was an awkward silence.

"Well, perhaps you can explain this film to me at least. I'm rather at sea so to speak," Remus offered eventually.

"Bad pun, Moony old man," Sirius grunted.

"Ooh, it was a great film," Ginny rushed in. "The hero, Will Turner, was simply gorgeous and did all sorts of brave things to save the girl he loved from these evil zombie type pirates."

"The heroine, Elizabeth, was pretty nice too." Ron mumbled. "But not as nice as Hermione," he added quickly, suddenly remembering his girlfriend sitting beside him.

"So Harry is dreaming about scary evil zombie pirates?" Sirius asked, trying not to laugh. "It is embarrassing I grant you, but could be far worse."

Harry sighed, he might as well get this over with. "No, Ron was right that my dreams had nothing scary in them."

"Huh? No pirates?" Sirius wrinkled his nose in confusion.

Harry mustered a lopsided grin, "Well it did have pirates, or rather just one pirate. But it was one of the good pirates, well…sort of good anyway."

"Captain Sparrow!" Ron choked out, realizing what his friend might be trying to convey.

"Captain Sparrow?" Remus asked just before Sirius could.

Harry grinned as rakishly as he could. "Hell yes! Captain Sparrow is sex on legs."

"Harry!" Ginny laughed, "Captain Sparrow is way too old for you!"

Tonks erupted into giggles, spilling pumpkin juice onto the table and Remus' sleeve. "I see mate, that kind of dream!"

Remus sighed, wrung out his sleeve and gently righted the mug with a glimmer of interest in his eyes. How likely was it that a pirate captain would be a woman? He stole a look at Sirius, he was listening intently but he seemed to be his usual dense self.

"Forty-ish is not too old for me," Harry retorted.

Sirius' eyebrows shot up at that comment; he wasn't even forty yet, so maybe there was life in the old dog yet.

Ginny smiled and shrugged. "Give me Will Turner any day, or Neville," she added, nudging her shoulder against a blushing Neville.

Harry smiled back; this was easier than he thought it would be. He looked at Hermione, who smiled encouragingly. This was it. "Well, I suppose I'm just more attracted to dark and dangerous older men."

Remus hid a smile behind his teacup; unmindful of the fried egg Tonks had just dropped into his lap as he took in the deeply shell-shocked expression on Sirius' face. There was hope yet.

Harry held his breath and waited; well there hadn't been a negative reaction so far, but then the words had only just left his mouth and might not yet have sunk in. He didn't quite dare to look at Sirius. Some Gryffindor you are, he told himself, and forced himself to raise his eyes.

Sirius found his Godson's penetrating eyes fixed upon him, managed to shut his slightly open mouth and swallowed hard. It was difficult. He hadn't remembered to chew that damn bit of toast and it now felt like he had a bludger wedged in there. Emotion threatened to close his throat completely, and didn't help either.

It was one thing to want to be with Harry, something else entirely to learn that it wasn't such a complete impossibility as he'd thought. He mentally counted off the short list of attributes Harry had just reeled off and compared it to himself, and favourably. He stared dazedly at Harry for a moment before realising that he was doubtless making Harry uneasy, and that the jam on his toast was sliding off the bread and oozing stickily down his hand. He hastily licked his fingers and abandoned the toast, hunting through his mind for something supportive to say that didn't run along the lines of 'I like men too.' Which would only sound like a come on.

Harry watched Sirius' stunned expression and winced. That told him a lot, though at least Sirius didn't seem angry or upset, just a bit surprised maybe. Then he had to look away again when Sirius began sucking the jam from his fingers. Harry could think of other things for Sirius to suck, but didn't imagine that Sirius would particularly appreciate that thought.

After another few short moments of presumably stunned silence Tonks saluted him with her fork and said, "Good for you mate. Older men are so much more considerate than younger ones. Generally speaking anyway." With that unconcerned pronouncement she leaned over Remus and attempted to retrieve her lost egg.

Harry half-smiled to himself, well that was one good reaction anyway and Remus was smiling benignly at him, at least he was until he yelped loudly and glared at Tonks.

"Sorry," Tonks said grinning unrepentantly, "I lost my egg in your lap in the excitement of that announcement."

"That was my leg you just stabbed."

Sirius snorted delightedly, "Careful you don't stab a sausage too while you're down there Tonks, or that'll be one less of your considerate older men available for action."

Tonks only seemed to grasp the implications of that statement when the rest of the table gave in to great howls of merriment and Ron sprayed a mouthful of pumpkin juice several feet across the table even as he tried to hold in his chuckles. Her face pink with embarrassment Tonks misjudged her next feint with her fork and toppled off her chair into Remus' lap only succeeding in making the laughter louder.

"Would you like to sit on your bacon too, so the rest of your breakfast doesn't get cold?" Sirius asked her innocently, relishing the opportunity to get at Moony for a change.

Remus flushed too and Tonks glared and tried to get to her feet but only succeeded in tipping the chair over entirely. Remus and Tonks slowly tilted backwards, their legs skyward for a brief moment before they both lay in a tangled heap on the floor.

Sirius noticed that Remus' hands had ended up planted on a part of Tonks' anatomy where they simply didn't belong in public; couldn't restrain himself and pointed and simply roared with laughter. This was shaping up to be the best morning ever.

Tonks scrambled awkwardly to her feet, the egg stuck fast to her bottom. Which nearly finished Sirius off. He slumped forwards on to the table still laughing and felt his elbow sink into the butter. Which only increased his amusement yet another notch.

Harry watched Sirius still chuckling as he pulled his elbow out of the butter. He was glad Sirius wasn't too shocked or upset to make jokes and have a good laugh, but was it his imagination or was there a hint of hysteria to the amusement? Bearing in mind that Sirius had given way to manic laughter just before he was hauled off to Azkaban too; this was not shaping up to be the best of mornings.

Finally, long after a flustered Tonks and Remus had resumed their places at the table, and everyone had finished breakfast. Harry found himself in the kitchen with Sirius, Ron and Hermione. They had been elected to clear up the debris from breakfast, including the egg that Tonks had eventually hurled at Sirius, only narrowly missing him.

While Sirius was absorbed for a moment in unpeeling the worse-for-wear egg from the wall behind his seat, Hermione gestured urgently at the door and then raised her eyebrows questioningly at Harry. She was asking if he wanted to be alone with Sirius he realised and nodded quickly.

Hermione immediately picked up her cue. "Harry, I just remembered that I need to get some books from Diagon Alley. Would you and Sirius mind awfully if Ron and I were to go with Molly after all?"

Ron looked up with an unusually perceptive look on his face, understood what was going on and put up no argument.

Harry shook his head teasingly, "More books Hermione? I suppose that would be okay, just as long as they aren't for my Christmas present. I expect better than books if I'm going to do you share of chores."

Hermione smiled and hurried to the door, "Come on Ron. See you later you two."

Ron grinned and managed a shaky wave. "Bye."

"Bye." Harry echoed.

Sirius grinned and fluttered a teacloth at them as if shooing them out.

The door closed behind Ron and Hermione and Harry could faintly hear them shouting to Molly and the others that they wanted to come shopping too.

"Well, you have me alone now. Did you want to talk to me?" Sirius asked gently, all traces of mocking humour gone.

Harry blinked in surprise, "Was it that obvious?"

Sirius just grinned and sat back down in the chair he had vacated a few minutes earlier. "I know I look thick, but yes, it was quite obvious."

Harry hesitatingly took the seat beside him and rested his elbows on the table. Now he had Sirius alone he was a little at a loss at what to say to him. Particularly with his announcement worded the way it had been. If only he had just said he was interested in men, not come out with specifics that could be applied to his probably horrified godfather.

"Harry." Sirius prompted. "You don't have to talk about this yet if you aren't ready."

Harry roused himself, "No, I think I should. But really I just wanted to know that you aren't horrified or anything."

Sirius couldn't resist a small bark of laughter; Harry just had no clue. Obviously he was a better actor than he thought. "Horrified, no. Shocked, yes."

"Oh. I didn't mean to shock you. I'm sorry." Harry dropped his head and hunched his shoulders slightly.

Sirius raked his fingers impatiently through his hair. He was somehow making a real hash of this. "Maybe shocked was the wrong word." He said reaching out a tentative hand to clasp Harry's nearest shoulder. He felt Harry's muscles clench at the contact but then the tension seemed to flow out of him. "Surprised probably works better. I have no issues with who you are attracted to, if I did that would make me a hypocrite. I just seem to recall you having a girlfriend or two over the years."

Harry smiled and leaned into Sirius's touch. He'd been worried for nothing, okay it wasn't the response from his dreams but the chances of Sirius suddenly being overcome with passion and fulfilling all his fantasies on the kitchen table wasn't very likely. Calm acceptance was enough. "Well, put it this way. If there was a scale on which sexuality could be measured, I'd be right down the gay end of bisexual."

Sirius snorted, "Good description." He fiddled with the butter knife, and turned sideways to look at Harry, "Actually that sums me up pretty good as well." He confided.

Harry's heart momentarily stopped beating and then kick-started again with a powerful bounce, "How did I not know that?" he asked, unsurprised to realise that his voice sounded several octaves higher than normal.

Sirius shrugged, "Never came up I suppose. I haven't exactly been around much for you to talk to."

"Not that it was your fault." Harry defended hotly.

"No I suppose not. Well, you know now and I'm still the same guy you always knew and to be honest, even if I had seen more of you in the past, my total lack of love-life still wouldn't exactly figure high in the list of things to talk about."

Harry swallowed hard on a small knot of panic building in his chest, this was the perfect opportunity to question Sirius and make it look like idle curiosity. He was pleasantly surprised when his voice came out not sounding like the squeak of a small rodent, "I don't understand why it would lack so much, I'm sure there are plenty of men who would like to be involved with you. I mean, nearly all the people who know you are innocent are men, so you must have at least one option."

Sirius nearly bent the butter knife in two at Harry's words. Was Harry flirting with him? He didn't dare ask, so he smiled seductively instead. "Well, I don't know about that. I'm still a bit of a wreck after Azkaban; I'm not really even close to being attractive anymore."

Harry grinned and gave Sirius a playful shove, "You haven't changed that much surely. Once you ditched the crazed expression you looked quite approachable and most of the time you manage to act quite normally."

"I meant physically." Sirius grumbled. "I'm getting old and decrepit."

"You heard Tonks. Older men are superior. I must say I am inclined to agree with her."

Sirius shook his head disbelievingly, if this wasn't flirtation then he was more out of practice than he'd realised. But surely Harry couldn't be serious?

"Have it your own way then." Harry muttered in response to Sirius' head shaking. "But if you were so much more attractive back then, I doubt I could have coped with seeing you pre-Azkaban."

Sirius caught his breath and turned sideways in his chair to face Harry properly, "Why not?"

Harry flushed but stared back steadily, "It might have been too much for me, because I think you are more than attractive enough now."

Sirius froze, his eyes widening in surprise. Even though he'd hoped the conversation was going this way he was still stunned speechless.

Harry turned away quickly, "Sorry, I shouldn't have said anything. I should have known you wouldn't feel that way for me, I've only embarrassed both of us now." He hastily stood up sending his chair crashing over backwards and fled from the room leaving Sirius staring stupidly after him for a minute, before he leapt up and chased after Harry.

Sirius took the stairs to Harry's room two at a time and flung himself through the door. "Harry, I do feel the same." He gasped out. Hedwig removed her head from under her wing and glared at him, but Harry wasn't in his room. Sirius strode across to the bathroom door and pushed it open. Empty too. Sirius sank down on Harry's bed with a growl of displeasure. If only he hadn't been too surprised to speak, he might have Harry in his arms by now. Where the devil had Harry gone though?

Harry was in the lounge. He felt sure it was the last place Sirius would think to look; after all it wasn't exactly cosy in its current state. He eased himself down in front of the fire and dropped his head into his hands. He'd soared to dizzying heights of happiness when Sirius had admitted he was attracted to men too, only to swiftly crash back down again after his stupid confession hadn't gone quite the way he hoped. He couldn't decide what had made him blurt that last comment out, the only explanation was that he'd been overcome with excitement, and Sirius' close proximity had somehow loosened both his brain and his vocal chords.

He didn't know how long he'd been sitting there but suddenly there was a gentle brush of fingers at his shoulder and Sirius moved into his line of vision and propped himself against the fireplace.

"I said I was sorry." He muttered at Sirius.

Sirius shook his head, "I think I may be the one who owes you an apology."

"You aren't the one with all the inappropriate feelings." Harry said bitterly as he dug his heels in and scuffed at the glitter.

Sirius took a deep breath, "Look at me."

Harry raised his head obediently, his eyes suspiciously shiny behind his glasses.

"Believe me you are not the only one with inappropriate feelings." Sirius told him vehemently. "In fact everything I seem to be able to think of ends up being inappropriate when it comes to you, so if somebody needs to be sorry then it's me."

A smile began to twitch at the corners of Harry's mouth, "How inappropriate are we talking here?"

Sirius took a few steps closer and then seemed to change his mind opting instead to go and poke a few fairies awake on the tree.

Harry craned his neck to look at Sirius; he was clearly trying to avoid the question.

"Sirius, quit hassling the fairies and answer the question, or if you won't do that at least come over here and kiss me."

Sirius went rigid with shock and Harry snapped back to face the fire, somewhat startled by his own daring.

As Harry bit his lower lip, wondering if he'd gone too far Sirius' arms snaked around his waist and pulled him back to rest against his chest. Harry took a deep intake of breath as Sirius rested his chin on his right shoulder.

"Is that what you really want?" Sirius asked shakily.

Harry didn't even need to think, he turned his head so he could look at Sirius, "Yes."

A moment later Sirius had his hand on Harry's jaw, tilting his head up and back so he could kiss him. There was no hesitation; they were kissing like lovers of old, their mouths clinging together; a perfect fit. Sirius slanted his mouth, deepened the kiss, swept his tongue across Harry's slightly parted lips but when he felt Harry's tongue scrape against his he had to resist the urge to send him crashing onto the floor under him.

Sirius hastily pulled himself up short. The last thing he needed to do was push Harry into something he wasn't ready for, least of all in the lounge where stray returning shoppers might walk in on them.

Harry looked up at him with wide eyes, cheeks rosily flushed with excitement, "Why'd you stop?" he questioned dizzily, as he leaned into Sirius more heavily than before and ran a teasing hand down the inside of Sirius' thigh.

"Um."

His mind was still trying to remember the reason they shouldn't do this in the lounge when Harry stretched up an arm to grab Sirius by the shoulder, pulling him closer still and tantalisingly nibbled and licked his way down the side of his throat before he gently sank his small perfect teeth into a fleshy part between his neck and shoulder.

With a small shudder of pleasure Sirius abruptly decided that being reasonable and logical wasn't working at all well and helplessly slid his hand under Harry's shirt, his fingers making teasing forays under the material.

To which Harry's response was to tug at his buttons, raise the material higher and mutter, "Off."

Sirius was only too happy to oblige. He took his time tracing the slender muscular lines of Harry's body before he eased the shirt from his shoulders and dropped it carelessly to one side.

Harry squirmed against him, trying to reach behind his back to unfasten Sirius' own shirt, his fumbling fingers brushing over Sirius' erection and making Sirius unconsciously jolt his hips forward, pressing himself closer to Harry.

"Harry, I think we should stop," said Sirius, gasping in air. He only got a moan in response. As much as he liked that, he reasoned that someone needed to remain in control. "Harry, I'm serious," he said trying not to shiver as Harry kissed his jaw. "If we don't stop you're going to find yourself very naked, very soon."

That got Harry's attention. "Would it be so bad if we did go any further?"

"No, with the way I am feeling I'd like nothing better," Sirius answered honestly, taking a deep breath. He rested his forehead on Harry's shoulder again. "But, this is not the time or the place, and I don't fancy being caught here with you." He tried to slip away from Harry's embrace, but he held him fast.

"Please don't go just yet," he pleaded, "I like the feeling of you so near me."

"I'm not going anywhere. I just think we should slow down."

Then Sirius groaned, the pleasure Harry's lips were now giving was almost torturous, his mouth moving with a lazy sensuality against his collarbone in a way that had Sirius squirming.

"You don't play fair." He grumbled, smoothing a shaking hand across Harry's chest as he surrendered himself to Harry's caresses.

"Shirt off." Harry demanded hoarsely.

Sirius quickly complied and Harry rubbed his back against Sirius' chest, luxuriating in the feeling of skin meeting skin for the first time. Then Sirius caught his face in one of his large hands, lifted his chin, and kissed him until they were both dizzy and gasping for breath.

Harry stroked his hands over Sirius' muscular shoulders and arms, revelling in the beauty and strength of his body, as Sirius' lips teased at his own, with small biting kisses and flicks of his tongue.

Lost in their own world as they were; neither Harry or Sirius heard the front door open and slam shut again. They certainly didn't hear Remus and Tonks stop their conversation in pure shock as they glanced through the open door of the lounge and stared astonished at the sight before them.

"Well, I guess that settles that." Tonks said brightly; in reference to the discussion she and Remus had held just a little earlier that morning.

Remus nodded, "Indeed. We should probably also tell them not to do… whatever it is that they are doing in the lounge with the door open."

"Especially not when Molly will be back in a few minutes." Tonks added.

"What?"

"Didn't you hear her say?"

Remus didn't answer. He hammered his fist loudly on the still open door and watched Sirius topple over backwards in surprise, bringing Harry down on top of him.

Remus smirked slightly as two surprised faces regarded him with horror. "I thought you might like to know that you are in fact writhing in a spot visible from the doorway, and that Molly will be returning in a matter of minutes." Then he shut the door and left them to make whatever they would of that.

Sirius stared in shock at the now closed door, only vaguely aware that his mouth was hanging open in a very unbecoming manner. He glanced at Harry who was lying on his back in the glittering snow, an arm flung over his red face as he muttered unintelligibly to himself.

"I knew this was a bad idea." Sirius groaned, as he got to his feet and tried to brush tenaciously clinging glitter off his chest with one hand, as he retrieved his shirt with the other.

Harry bolted upright at this comment looking very distressed, "I, what, bad idea?"

"Not us generally." Sirius clarified hastily. "I meant us getting carried away in the lounge."

Harry relaxed again, for a brief moment he had thought his taste of heaven was going to be snatched away. He grabbed his own shirt and shrugged back into it. "I was worried for a moment there." He admitted with a smile. "But we should listen to Remus and get up to our bedrooms now while we have time."

"Harry, I'm not sure we should just rush into anything."

"Are you trying to say you don't want to be with me?" Harry questioned angrily.

"Quite the opposite." Sirius retorted. "I do want to be with you, we just don't have to go full-speed into bed. I'd feel that I was taking advantage of you if we did."

Harry grinned and stepped as close as he could without actually making contact. "Very noble Sirius, but what if I would actually quite like to be taken advantage of? Anyway, when did I say you were invited to my bedroom? I was only thinking that we should get out of here and cleaned up, and for that to happen we need to go to our rooms."

Sirius chuckled and loosely linked his arms around Harry to pull him against him. "You have me there."

Green eyes met grey and they both smiled rare smiles of unrestrained happiness. For once, something had actually gone right for them. Harry couldn't resist another kiss, and Sirius couldn't resist returning it before they headed for the door awkwardly fumbling to link hands for the first time.

But as they opened the lounge door there was a noisy babble of voices to be heard coming from outside the house. Before Sirius even had time to think about bolting for the stairs the front door handle turned and Harry jerked him back into the lounge. They shut the door and looked at each other in dismay.

They were trapped.

Sirius quickly stumbled across the room, dragging Harry with him, before diving behind the Christmas tree and squatting behind a heap of presents already planted in one of his artistic interior snowdrifts.

"I doubt they'll come in here, but if they do I don't think they'll see us back here." He whispered.

Harry nodded and peered between tree branches. "No, they have no reason to come in here."

Sirius wriggled a casual arm around his shoulders, prepared to make the most of any time with Harry and then froze as the door slowly opened.

"Famous last words." Harry muttered under his breath.

"I just don't know what those two boys think they are doing, disappearing off without cleaning up the kitchen like they were told." Molly said loudly, as she bustled into the room with a small armload of gaily wrapped parcels followed by Ron, Hermione and Ginny also loaded with gifts.

Sirius and Harry looked at each other aghast and began burrowing themselves deeper into the glitter in an attempt to avoid detection.

"I thought they might be fooling about in here, making an even bigger mess, but apparently not." Molly continued as she neatly arranged gifts at the foot of the tree.

Sirius snorted softly at that comment. Apparently not agreeing that his winter wonderland could be termed a mess.

All was well for Harry and Sirius until Molly directed Ron to place a few more parcels to the side of the tree. Ron shuffled through the snow with a large box in each hand, but when he caught sight of his best mate and his godfather half buried in a drift of fake snow his eyebrows shot up out of sight under his hair and he dropped both parcels.

"Ronald! Do be careful, some of these are breakable you know."

"Sorry mum," Ron mumbled automatically as he kept staring stupidly.

"Here, I'll do it." Hermione said bossily as she elbowed a goggle-eyed Ron aside.

Then she too stared. But possessed a greater presence of mind than Ron and bent down pretending to adjust the ribbons and tags on several gifts. "What are you doing?" She hissed at them, her eyes alight with curiosity.

"Hiding." Sirius offered in a matter of fact tone.

"I can see that, but why?"

Harry blushed and spoke up, "We were, um… here and um, heard you come in and um… well, you know."

Hermione looked puzzled. "Excuse me?"

 "We were kissing." Harry got out. "But I was just an innocent led astray by my wicked godfather!"

"Oh!" Hermione briefly went as goggle-eyed as Ron had been a moment earlier, which provoked a snort of mirth from Sirius.

Harry smiled slyly at Hermione.

Hermione nodded and narrowed her eyes at Sirius, "I see. Kissing involves removing clothing now does it? Whatever did you think you were doing, rolling around half naked in that fake glittering snow?"

"I'm not making him do anything he doesn't want." Sirius defended himself warily, quite forgetting that Hermione couldn't possibly know what they had been doing.

"Did I say you were? I was referring to your shirt being inside out actually Sirius. Maybe we should protect you from Harry?"

She straightened up with a self-satisfied smile on her face as Molly and Ginny left the room.

Then as she walked towards Ron who anxiously hovered nearby she turned and raised her voice, "Oh and by the way, I don't quite understand your reasoning for lurking behind a tree half-buried in a glittery snow-drift. You could just as easily have been talking, or having a snowball fight as kissing in here." With that smart comment she turned, tucked her arm into Ron's and the two of them walked away.

"It pains me to admit that she is smarter than both of us." Sirius said mournfully.

Harry shrugged and crawled out from under the tree, "This isn't such a bad place to be though." He teased. "In fact you could stay just there and then I'll come along and unwrap you, it'll be the best Christmas present ever."

Sirius laughed appreciatively but clambered out too and set about returning his shirt to proper order.

Harry shuffled nervously, "So, um, we're together now then?"

Sirius laughed delightedly, slung an arm around Harry's shoulder and began steering him towards the door, "Well, actually I roll about on the floor of the lounge groping anyone available, it is a sort of tradition in this house. I'm booked solid all week. I might squeeze you in for another quick tumble some time in the New Year."

"Git."

"Well, I suppose that you are so cute I might just have to claim you exclusively for myself and break all my groping engagements over Christmastime."

"Thank you so much." Harry mocked as they began to ascend the stairs together.