GOOD DOG || Sirius Black

(Thirteen: For Forever *Reprise)

It was a Friday night in October of nineteen seventy four that it happened. Severus Snape, smirking triumphantly at his accomplishment, lifted a clear vial of amber liquid up to the light, surface glimmering with traces of gold sparks. The potion even looked good, like godly ginger ale.

The boy, known in the privacy of his own imagination as the 'Half Blood Prince', paused for a moment, just a moment, as he did when he finished each and every potion. Moonlight from the progressively shorter days filtered through the tall windows, warping the surface of the potion into something different in it's cheap, rusted-over cauldron. His hair was held back with a rubber band, as it always was. Potions was the nature of repetition, of knowing the formula of the situation so well that he needn't have looked down at all, like keystrokes tracing familiar usernames.

Alex Fawley, he knew, wouldn't doubt the skill of his craftsmanship for even one second, not with it gleaming away there like the personification of the girl's tiny glimmer of hope. Many times in the past week, as he had scribbled notes and calculations next to lists of ingredients, Severus had wondered exactly why it was that he was helping her in the first place. Perhaps it was knowing that someone trusted him more than those godawful Marauders. Perhaps it was just having someone trust him at all, the way Lily used to. Perhaps it was the knowledge that one day he would be forced to ruin Alex Fawley, and that miniscule part of himself that still held all the parts that would be considered human just wanted to give her as much as possible, like he was apologising for all the things he was going to do.  

A short succession of four knocks at the door snapped Severus back into the stiff posture he hadn't even realised he had slipped out of.

Severus Snape, the Half Blood Prince, Snivellous, Dickhead, nodded to the messy-haired girl who slipped into the room, muttering stuttered apologies for being late. All her words stopped as her eyes found the potion. Her mouth was trapped half open, like she was waiting for some sort of accidently ingested insect to emerge.

"Is that..?" Alex gestured with her eyes.

Severus felt a spurt of some sort of emotion spike through him, something unpractised and almost painful in the way that unexpected things sometimes are, "Fawley, I believe I may have solved your problem."

{===}

"One..."

"Stop."

"Two..."

"I mean it."

"Three..."

"I will end you if you take another step."

"Well, Moony. Flirting this early on a Saturday? For shame."

Sirius Black leaned back lazily in the crimson armchair, resting his palms face down regally on the chocolate-stained arms. The homely light of the common room enveloped him with the soft background chatter of kids being kids. Sirius watched James Potter through half-lidded eyes as he grinned daringly at Remus Lupin, perfectly-folded socks clutched in his left hand, and took another couple of steps towards the window.

"If I lose my socks because of you, Prongs," Remus declared warningly, "I will never forgive you or any of your bloodline."

James' smirk only widened, "They all say that, my friend. But when it comes to it, all you will be is a slightly annoyed were-teenager with mildly moist feet."

Remus narrowed his eyes, calculating how long it would take him to dive for the wand resting innocently on the mahogany table, "I hate you."

"You know what you have to do, Moony." Sirius called in a liltingly teasing voice, "Just one little sentence and he'll stop."