"Harry at the Burrow?" Sirius looked up to see Marlene standing in the drawing room's doorway.
"Yeah. Left about an hour ago, and I daresay Molly'll keep him for dinner, so other than Kreacher we've got the place to ourselves..." He waggled his eyebrows but only got a small smile in response. His own smile faltered. "Everything all right?" She looked almost nervous standing there, nervous in a way he hadn't seen in years, not since they were first beginning to spend time together again after his trial and her escape from muggle prison.
"You probably won't think so," she said, with an odd smile. Sirius frowned and marked his page - on bubblehead charms - then set his book down.
"Okay," he said, standing. He wrapped her in a hug and she sighed and let her head rest against his shoulder. He kissed her hair and she sighed again. "And what do you think?"
"I think- can we sit?" she asked.
"Yeah, 'course we can." Whatever it was wasn't urgent, or she'd have just come out and said whatever it was, and likewise if anyone was in danger. He settled her on one half of the couch and then claimed the other, waiting. When she still hadn't spoken for about thirty seconds, he poked her with his socked foot.
She laughed, then sobered, then sighed again, tucking her knees up under her.
"I think we should take a break," she said.
"It'd be nice, wouldn't it," he said wryly. "Can't really remember the last time-"
"Not... I don't mean-" Marlene huffed a laugh, sad and fond. "Us, Sirius." Now, she looked mostly sad. "We- the two of us should take a break. From.. being us."
"We- what? Marl-"
"I've been thinking about it," she said. "For a few weeks now."
Sirius opened his mouth, closed it again, and then managed to ask, "Why?"
"Honestly, at the moment, it feels like you and I are just… an afterthought. To both of us," She looked down at her hands, which were resting in her lap. "I feel like I'm never around-"
"You've been busy with work," he spluttered. "And it's- Me being at Hogwarts has been a bit of a change, but-"
"When was the last time we spent time together, just the two of us, where we didn't talk about the Tournament, or Harry, or the Order?"
"We have to talk about those things… they're a pretty big part of what's going on at the moment-"
"They are," she said, and he didn't know how she was so calm about this. "But I feel like that's all we've been talking about."
"All right," he said. "All right, fine, we'll set up a word- a phrase, and if one of us says it, then it means we've got to talk about something else-"
"It's not just that, Sirius," she said. She reached out and pressed her foot against his. "It's- we're barely seeing each other, and we're both so stressed all the time… about work, and about Harry and whatever Voldemort's planning, and it just- it's a bit like you and I have just sort of… we're just going through the motions. We're not putting much effort in-"
"Because it's easy," Sirius said. "We're easy. Always have been."
"We're habit," she said gently. "I just- I look at Remus and Dora, and they've not been together that much longer than we have and... they've got married, and had Stella, and- we're not like that. We don't even live together-"
"I didn't know you wanted to live together and get married-"
"I'm not saying I do-"
"Then what's the problem?" he asked. "We're not Remus and Dora, so we don't have to be like Remus and-"
"I just mean that they've grown," she said, and he fell quiet. "And they've done it together, whereas we... You've grown, and I've grown, but we haven't. If anything I think we've drifted apart." Marlene gave him a watery smile. "It happens."
"Yeah," Sirius said, and let out a shaky, gusty breath. "But not to us. We've- after everything- After the war, and thinking you'd died- and then Azkaban and that whole mess around my trial- we're still together and this, now you don't think it's working?"
"I just think that we've both got priorities at the moment that aren't this." She gestured between them. "And- I'm not saying that's wrong, I- I actually think our priorities are what they need to be… Harry, for you, and for me a bit as well, but mostly mine's work. The Order, for both of us… I just don't think that leaves a lot of time or room for us."
"So maybe that's how it is for a little while," Sirius said.
"How long's a little while, though?" she asked. "Do you really think any of this is going to settle any time soon?"
"We'll make time, then," Sirius said. "I can move back in here, and just Floo to work-"
"You can't," Marlene said. "Harry needs you at Hogwarts, and if you were here you'd spend your nights worrying." She was right, of course.
"You could come and stay with me." She'd be up at all hours of the day and night for her shifts, but they could find a way to make it work.
"Sirius..."
"What?" he said irritably. "It's a better solution than yours. We're partners. We- I trust you with anything, can talk to you about anything, and you-"
"It's the same for me," she said. "You know it is."
"So why would you want to throw that away?"
"It's not throwing it away," she said, "because I'd hope that those things wouldn't change just because we're not together." She gave him a look that was both challenging and unsure.
"'Course they wouldn't," he said, reluctantly, but honestly. "But I'd miss you."
"We'll still see each other, Sirius," she said. "It'll be impossible not to, for the Tournament, and for the Order-"
"And you live on the other side of that wall," he said.
"That was true before your trial and we never crossed paths," she said. Sirius scowled. "But yes."
"So you just want to- what- be friends?"
"I'd like to be," she said in a tiny voice. "Or- civil, at the very least. Remus and Dora are my friends too and I have no intention of cutting them out, and then there's the kids, although that's something I'll have less control over..."
"If you're still seeing Remus and Dora, you'll still be seeing Stella," Sirius said. "And Harry- I'm not a git, you know, I'm not going to ban all contact." Sirius rubbed a hand over his eyes; they were prickling a bit. "As for you and me… I reckon we can manage civil - we're adults, right?" She didn't take the bait and tease him, only frowned:
"Only civil?"
"You and I haven't ever been very good at being just friends," Sirius said, with a shaky smile. Marlene returned it and Sirius' chest ached. "You're sure this is what you want?"
"It's not what I want," she said, "but it's what I think is best." Sirius closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose, then nodded. "I'm sorry."
"Worst Christmas ever," he said. Marlene laughed wetly and wiped her eyes on her sleeve.
"Terrible timing," she agreed. "But there wasn't ever going to be a good time… I was going to talk to you sooner, but then I thought I'd wait until after the second task, and then I was going to do it the other night but Skeeter's article happened, and Harry and Fleur…"
"Yeah," Sirius said, wiping his own eyes with a knuckle. He made a sound that was part sigh, part groan, part laugh, part sob. "Suppose you won't be around much tomorrow, then?"
"I'm working," she said, "so I wouldn't have been anyway, but… no. I think it might be best if I kept my distance for a little while."
"What happened to friends?" Sirius asked.
"Nothing," she said, and her scent was genuine but sad. "I just think we'll both just probably need time to adjust."
"I don't need the second present," Harry said, as Kreacher collected their breakfast plates and handed out mugs of hot chocolate to everyone but Sirius who had tea. "This-" He rubbed a hand over his recently healed and now unmarked neck. Sirius had been feeling a bit sorry for him with the constant scarf-wearing, and a bit guilty; Harry knew enough basic healing spells that he'd have been able to fix it on his own, but hadn't, not because he feared additional punishment, but simply because Sirius had said he couldn't, and now there were photographs of him in the Prophet. "-is more than enough-"
"I reckon you'll want the second one," Dora said, catching Sirius' eye. "But we should probably wait for Marlene-"
"Then we'll be waiting a while," Sirius said, trying not to sound too bitter about it. He retrieved Harry's proper Christmas present from behind the couch and offered it to him. "She's working." Dora still looked uncertain so Sirius mustered a smile. "She won't mind." And she wouldn't, although he thought she might have liked to see the enormous smile on Harry's face as he reached out to take the very conspicuously broomstick-shaped present. "This is from all of us," Sirius said, ruffling Harry's hair as he sat down.
Harry made a strangled sound as he tore off the wrapping paper, smile turning incredulous and scent genuinely, giddily delighted and not marred by nerves or any lingering worry for the first time in… well, Sirius couldn't really remember.
"This is a Firebolt," Harry said, stripping off the wrapping paper with much, much more reverence than he'd used for the first tear.
"Four years of schooling and he can read," Sirius said to Remus, who made an impressed sound, an amused twinkle in his eye. Harry elbowed Sirius without taking his hands off the broomstick.
"This is brilliant - thank you-"
"Happy Christmas, kiddo," Sirius said.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, most of the day was spent not in the Burrow's kitchen and sitting room as had been the case the year before, but outside in the snow-dusted orchard, flying.
"Oh my- I don't know how you manage it," Molly said, pressing a hand to her heart. After having been passed around to everyone else for a turn, the Firebolt was back with Harry; he'd flown full pelt directly toward the frozen ground until the last moment, then pulled up to do a full loop, and was now speeding along about a foot above the ground, laughing like a madman, and with snow flurrying up in his wake. "He's worse than Charlie."
"What are a few more grey hairs after the year we've had so far?" Sirius asked. He sprinkled snow over Stella's downy head, but she was too busy patting at the snow by Sirius' feet to notice. Molly smiled and opened her mouth to say something, then looked up.
"Arthur, be careful!"
"He's fine," Sirius said; Arthur, it seemed, had just tried to knock the Weasleys' beaten up old Quaffle out of Ginny's hands, but she'd done some sort of roll out of the way and Arthur had overbalanced and almost come off his broom. Ginny zoomed off to try to get a goal through the ring Ron was protecting, but Dora and Fred descended on her and a moment later, Dora had the quaffle and was headed toward Percy's goal. He'd been a very reluctant recruit, but his regret seemed only to manifest when someone was actively flying toward him; the rest of the time he'd spent chatting to Remus and Hermione - the latter on the jumpers-on team, and the former on the jumpers-off team with Percy - and actually quite enjoying himself.
There was a soft whoosh and Harry came shooting over, leaned down and then- well, not quite sped away, but rather drifted leisurely off, very low to the ground. It took Sirius a moment to realise it was because he'd acquired a passenger on the way through.
"Harry, be careful!" Sirius shouted after him. "Support her head!"
"I am!" Harry said, and turned the Firebolt slowly with his knees. "See?" Sure enough, Stella was tucked against his side, her little head held against his shoulder and it was only when Molly cast him an amused look that Sirius realised he'd echoed her.
"Urgh," Sirius said, and pushed to his feet, broomstick in hand. "Listen to me."
"I suppose you're going to supervise," Molly said, eyes sparkling.
"No," Sirius said. "I'm going to fly around like a lunatic until I feel less like a mother hen." He rubbed a hand over his face and took off, Molly laughing at him from the ground.
"Oh, good," Hermione said, when Sirius joined her and Remus. "Would you like to take over for me?"
"That's not a fair trade!" Draco called, flying past with the Quaffle tucked under his arm and Ginny and Fred in close pursuit.
"Too bad!" Hermione laughed. She slapped hands with Sirius as he tagged in and headed for the ground immediately.
"Shall we?" Sirius asked.
"After you, Mr Padfoot," Remus said grandly. Sirius grinned, shoved him ("Honestly, Sirius, are you twelve?!"), and went zooming into the fray.
Sirius lost track of time for a bit there, rough-housing with the others. He scored against poor Percy twice, had a few assists, and he, Dora, and Fred ganged up on anyone and everyone that had the Quaffle on the other team.
"Breather?" Remus asked, slowing to a stop, one hand pressed to his side, and breathing hard. At the other end of the orchard, Arthur was catching his breath by Percy, who seemed pleased for the company.
"We're getting old," Sirius said, stretching and twisting his aching middle; he hadn't flown hard like this in months, and working at Hogwarts meant he hadn't done one of the D.M.L.E.'s fitness sessions for a while either. Not like Marlene, he thought, and sighed.
"You all right?" Remus asked, watching Fred wrap Draco in a headlock so Ginny could wrestle the Quaffle free.
"Get him with your elbows, Malfoy!" George shouted.
"Yeah, fine," Sirius said, forcing all thoughts of Marlene out of his head. "Why?"
"You looked..." Remus shrugged, then cocked his head, clearly concerned. "Is it Harry?"
"Harry's fine," Sirius said, with a nod and smile down at where Harry was chatting to Molly and Hermione, a sleeping Stella in his lap, the Firebolt rocking gently from side to side. "I'm fine-"
"It's been nice to have a change of scene," Remus offered, apparently unconvinced. "To get away from the school, and-"
"Moony," Sirius said, and Remus put his hands up.
"Sorry," he said. "You're fine."
"That's right," Sirius said.
"If you weren't, though, you wouldn't not talk to me because you're worried I've got enough on my plate, would you?" Remus sounded both mild and stern in that way that only he could.
"You're never too busy to bother," Sirius assured him, and Remus rolled his eyes. "Honestly, it's nothing, Moony, really." And it wasn't; he and Marlene were nothing now, and that was that.
"Hmm." Remus watched him with narrowed eyes so Sirius gave him the brightest grin he could muster. Remus twisted in midair and shouted: "Padfoot's the snitch!"
Snitch was like the Weasleys' version of Bludger, but instead of whoever was bludger chasing anyone and everyone, anyone and everyone ganged up on whoever was the snitch.
Sirius made a rude gesture at Remus, equal parts exasperated and amused, and then urged his Nimbus upward as everyone on a broom - including Harry, who'd left Stella with Hermione and Mrs Weasley - raced toward him.
The Christmas holidays were over before Sirius knew it, but this year he didn't mind; he'd been struggling to be in Number Twelve without thinking about the occupant of Number Thirteen. In a lot of ways, nothing had changed - they really hadn't been seeing each other much - but that didn't make it any easier. If anything, it made it worse.
Remus - and Dora, once she'd caught on or Remus had mentioned it to her - had been well-meaning but relentless in trying to work out why he was a bit off, and Harry hadn't said anything but he'd been shooting Sirius a lot of troubled looks, and he'd spent several nights at the end of Sirius' bed as a wolf. He claimed it was nightmares and though Sirius didn't believe him, he appreciated the quiet company too much to bother pointing that out. The fact that none of them had considered Marlene as the cause, or asked her whether she knew why he was so off was yet another uncomfortable and unwelcome indication that Marlene might have had a point. But only about some things. And he maintained that ending things hadn't been the best way to fix the situation.
Though returning to school wasn't an escape from Harry or Remus by any stretch since they'd both be right there with him, it was a good distraction for all of them; Remus had his hands full with the Beauxbatons students and with trying to wade through the rumours and questions that had come out of Skeeter's articles, Harry was preparing for the Tournament's third task and also trying to navigate his new, fake, and very public relationship with Fleur, and Sirius- well, it was safe to say term returned with a vengeance.
Sirius had worked with Harry on bubblehead charms over the break and they'd turned out to be fairly easy - Sirius had managed first go, and while Harry had needed a few afternoons to get them consistently right, he'd been able to do them non-verbally by the end of the holidays.
As such, Sirius was utterly unprepared for a pale, panicked Ginny to tumble out of a formerly non-existent door and into his office and tell him Harry had almost drowned trying to use it.
Sure enough, a very wet Harry and Ron - the latter looking frazzled, and Harry lying on his side and conscious but not looking well at all - and a very anxious Hermione and Draco awaited him when he and Ginny burst out of the passageway and into the Room.
"Are you all right?" Sirius asked; he and Ginny had been too focused on running to talk. Harry gave him a bleary look and opened his mouth, then vomited water. "Merlin," Sirius said, and cast several quick spells - one to drain Harry's lungs, another to vanish the mess and a third one to dry him. Then Sirius cast a quick diagnostic, and, finally, a fifth spell to fix Harry's apparently ruptured eardrums. Harry coughed - a dry cough now, thankfully - and let Sirius and Ron help him onto a couch that had just appeared.
"What the bloody hell happened?" Sirius asked, looking at the others. He flicked his wand to dry Ron.
"He was testing the bubblehead charm underwater," Hermione said. "Harry said he knew how to do it-"
"I do!" Harry croaked. Draco gave him a withering look.
"- so he tried it in shallow water and that went really well, and so we made the pool deeper-"
"Couldn't get to the bottom with it," Harry said. "Everytime I stopped swimming I'd just float back up-"
"So Granger and Potter had the brilliant idea to weigh him down," Draco said. His tone was scathing, but he'd just sat down beside Harry and tossed a blanket over him, so he was clearly more worried than mad.
"That's how muggle divers do it!" Hermione said, lip wobbling.
"And it worked," Harry said defensively. "We went shallow first, only a few feet and I sat on the bottom and it was fine, so then I asked the Room to go deeper - thirty feet or so - but as soon as I sank another few feet my ears started to hurt like they do when I take off on my broom too fast, but they didn't pop like they usually do until they did-" He grimaced. "-but it wasn't a good sort of pop. Then at the same time the bubblehead charm collapsed-"
"What?! Why?"
"I don't know," Harry said. "It was fine and working until it just wasn't. I breathed in a heap of water and started to feel really dizzy and sick and-"
"All these bubbles came to the top of the pool," Ron said. "And then when we looked in, Harry was still sinking, so-"
"Ron jumped in," Hermione said.
"Because I'm stupid," Ron said, grimacing. "I didn't think to ask the Room to bring him back up-" .
"Neither did Harry," Ginny pointed out, "or any of the rest of us."
"-until we were both down there, and then I had the pool go shallow, and..." Ron nodded at Harry, curled on the couch. Sirius went to Ron and wrapped an arm around his shoulders, squeezing. "It's nothing," Ron said, ears turning red as Sirius released him. "And it's not like Harry's not going to return the favour in another month and a bit."
None of them needed to be told not to practice the bubblehead charm underwater again until they knew what had caused it to fail the first time and had some idea how to ensure it didn't happen again; the kids combed the library for books on the topic with little success, Sirius spoke to Remus and Dora and even - after a lot of second-guessing himself - wrote to ask Marlene but none of them could offer any insight, nor, unfortunately, could either Robards or Scrimgeour.
Then, almost a week after the incident, the answer came in the form of Snape:
"Well?" he asked, closing the door behind Sirius and settling back at his desk.
"Bubblehead charms," Sirius said.
"What part of 'not worth the risk and effort when there are other alternatives' did Draco fail to pass on?" Snape asked, lip curling.
"He passed on all of it," Sirius said, "so don't get your wand in a twist. He even passed on Magical water plants of the Mediterrainian, which you gave him, presumably to point out that gillyweed's one of those alternatives-"
"Draco expressed an interest in harvesting methods for aquatic potions ingredients that grow at depth and that book gives some examples of some such ingredients," Snape said, eyebrow raised. "Anything else he might have found in there is a complete coincidence, I'm sure."
"Sure," Sirius said, amused. "But back to bubblehead charms-"
Snape made an exasperated sound and gave up on pretending to be oblivious:
"They are likely beyond Potter's ability-"
"Actually he can already cast one-"
"Well, if you've got all the answers, Black, I don't see why you're wasting my time." He waved a dismissive hand at the door. Sirius didn't move. Snape said nothing.
"Obviously I don't have all the answers," Sirius said irritably.
"Then I'm not sure why you were interrupting and attempting to correct me," Snape said, tone silky.
"Why don't you just assume it's because I'm an idiot, like usual, and get on with explaining," Sirius suggested. Snape snorted.
"As I was saying," he drawled, "they are likely beyond Potter's ability because the variation of the bubblehead charm required to ensure successful functioning in water deeper than six feet or in air at greater than eight thousand feet is a N.E.W.T. level charm that requires an understanding and application of N.E.W.T. level arithmancy."
"There's got to be a simple version, though, right?" Sirius asked. "Other people will have done the work before, found a- a formula, or put together a set of instructions for general use, or something."
"Once again, I don't know why you're wasting my time when you're clearly the expert." Sirius tipped his head back and made a sound that was half-sigh, half-groan.
"Why haven't people found a formula or a set of instructions for general use?"
"Because the success of the charm is conditional on multiple factors, several of which are directly affected by the physiology of the person using it. Most spells are forgiving enough to allow near enough to be good enough - luckily for the majority of wizardkind. This is not one of those."
"What if we hired an arithmancer to just tell us what to do?" Sirius said.
"That would be like hiring a Seer to tell you your animagus form," Snape replied. Sirius grunted.
"So," he said gustily, "Harry should use gillyweed, then?"
"Potter can do what he likes, as he so often tends to," Snape said, lip curling. "But if you'd like him to survive the experience then yes, my recommendation would be gillyweed."
