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.

Thanks to La Nuit for the chapter title.

Warning: Swearing, sadness and smut.

For allycat1186 for reviewing.

In The Dog House

Sirius transformed back into a human in mid-air. Unfortunately he was a fully dressed human. His hands went straight to his fly to try to rectify that. By the time he landed hard on the settee cushions he had two buttons undone.

"Shit, Siz, what's wrong with me? Even as a dog you turn me on." Bill yanked down the waistband of Sirius' jeans.

Between them they got Sirius naked from waist to thigh. With a flat tongue Bill traced down the length of Sirius' swollen shaft, round his balls and up again, following the exact pattern the dog had used on himself. Bill was working faster, though, more urgently. His fingernails dug into his lover's buttocks.

Sirius growled with pleasure. He wished he still had his tail, because it would have been wagging huge slaps against the upholstery. He threw his head back over the arm of the sofa. His hair caught under his neck, pulling it.

Bill lapped down the valley between Sirius' testicles. He crawled up onto the settee, into Sirius' lap and twisted his head round. Sirius grabbed his shoulder, urged him up towards his prick but Bill was copying Snuffles. Sirius wished he could remember what had come next.

Bill twisted round again, trying to replicate the right angle of approach. Sirius swung him the rest of the way round to reach the zip on his trousers. Sirius yelped in ecstasy then as Bill's mouth came down onto the head of his overheated cock, tongue darting into the slit, sucking hard.

Sirius got into Bill's pants. Awkwardly, his hand found what he needed. Bill's hips bucked, thrusting towards him. For a few desperate, panting, sweaty minutes Bill sucked and Sirius rubbed. And then they climaxed together.

Once Bill had got his breath back, Sirius knew he was going to get smacked on the nose and told what a bad boy he was for getting out. He decided to speak first:

"So, it's Fleur Delacour."

Bill shot him a wary look. "Yes," he grunted. He dragged his long legs back to his end of the couch.

"I recognised her from the Prophet last year."

"Yes."

"When she was Beauxbatons Champion."

"That's right." Bill eased himself into a more upright position.

"So she's the famous girlfriend is she?"

"Clearly. You shouldn't have tried to bite her."

"I wasn't going to bite her. So. She was her school's Champion. Last year." Sirius kicked at the denim gathered round his shoes, pushed both off to free his feet.

"We've established that."

"Meaning she was still at school last summer."

"Oh, I see!" Bill's voice was low and tight. "You think that's a problem?" he snarled.

"You don't think she's a bit young?"

"I think it's none of your fucking business!" Bill shouted. "She's closer to my age than you are!"

"That's not the fucking point! We're both adults!" Sirius yelled back.

"Then why don't you act like one? Instead of running all over London trying to get yourself killed! You want to be back in Azkaban? You want to be tortured by Death Eaters?" Bill stood up. His face was red. He was shaking.

"It's up to me what I …"

"And I'm not even supposed to care? Fine!" Bill pulled his trousers back up and headed for the door.

"No! Stop! Where are you going?" Sirius tried not to whine.

Bill kept walking as he snapped, "I'm going to take my girlfriend out for dinner." He smoothed down his shirt and his hair, headed for the front door.

Sirius shouted down the stairs after him, "Don't forget to ask for the Children's Menu!"

The front door slammed shut.

Naked from the waist down, Sirius stomped up one flight of stairs. He remembered leaving an almost full bottle of vodka in one of the bedrooms.

"Terribly bad manners, all that shouting."

"I forgot you were in here!" Sirius told the purring portrait. He unscrewed the lid and gulped down alcohol.

"Cover yourself up, boy!" Phinneas Nigellus Black ordered, making a great show of averting his gaze. Sirius concentrated on filling himself with the clear spirit, ignoring the request.

"You know why he got cross, don't you?" Phinneas asked. When his descendant didn't answer, he added, "You broke one of the rules."

"There aren't any rules!" Sirius lay back on the bed Bill's brother Ron had slept in for the summer.

"Don't be silly. You're both Purebloods, even if you are Blood Traitors. You both know exactly …"

Sirius didn't like where this conversation was going.

"No," he said, "we don't do all that out-dated crap! That's not what this is!"

Phinneas sighed impatiently. "It's your heritage. These things can't be wiped out by a little dalliance with fashionable politics. He's quite right - a child bride's the best choice for breeding. You should be doing the same thing. I suppose it just goes to show how the family's standing has fallen. You should be the one keeping a Boy."

"I'm not his Kept Boy!" Sirius sprang from the bed, gripping his bottle. He'd escaped these traditions! This was not happening to him!

As Sirius fled the room, the voice called after him, "The mistress doesn't criticise the wife! Rule number three!"

The Old Pureblood Patriarch ways. A wife and a mistress. The wife was always a witch, for breeding and alliances with other Pure families. But the mistress could be a Boy. He'd been brought up hearing the stories: Great Uncle Librus who'd kept one Boy in County Galway for the fishing and another in the Highlands for the shooting; Orion Regulus Black who'd been so feared in the eighteenth century that he had got his Boy a place on the Wizengamut.

There were numbered rules, ways things were done. The mistress was kept in a separate house and plied with gifts. Sirius stared at his growing collection of C.D.s. He poured more alcohol into his mouth, hoping to sterilize away his thoughts. The wife could insult the mistress, but the mistress never spoke of the wife, any more than their bastards ever inherited.

How aware was Bill that they were mimicking the relationships of their ancestry? Was that how he saw Sirius? A poor man's whore? How low down the hierarchy did that place him?

Absently, he picked up his Discman, his gift. He selected Bill's favourite: Pulp's His and Her's. He had to decide what to do. He could salvage some dignity. He could stop seeing Bill. He didn't know if he had the strength. He sank onto the sofa and took another drink.

If he couldn't keep his hands off Bill's body, then he would have to be more careful. He would have to make sure that he didn't become more trouble than he was worth. He would have to keep to the rules. It wasn't what he was used to, he'd always done whatever he felt like. He pressed play.

How many rules had he broken today? Criticising Bill's choice of girlfriend, spying on them together, snapping his teeth at her. He should have stayed in the house like a good Boy, waiting on his master's convenience.

He glugged booze, eyes shut, hearing Bill's favourite music. His life was a mess. It hadn't always been such a mess. He'd had his own wife once. The gender had been wrong, but that's what they'd been to each other before the horror, the betrayal, prison, escape, aging.

Music poured into his ears, singing, "Do you remember the first time?" Sirius did. He remembered the worn school bed curtains, the smell of boy, nervous fumbling, silver scars shining on the body underneath his. The joy.

He emptied the vodka bottle, his eyes still closed, still remembering the first time. That light gasp of surprise. The soapy, salty taste of skin. The singer had moved on to the next track, he was asking Sirius if he'd "Got it right first time?"

There was sound of a door closing. Sirius saw someone walking over to him. He was so drunk on nostalgia and alcohol that he didn't see the grey in his friend's hair.