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A Dirty Mouth


Regulus was rather enjoying being the center for attention at school. Growing up, it had always been about Sirius - Sirius this and Sirius that - until the wondrous day that his stupid brother had been caught looking after a muggle in the square in front of Grimmauld Place. Since then, Regulus had become number one in his parents eyes. It was odd, then, when he’d come to Hogwarts the year before and not been given the attention that he’d become so accustomed to at home. Even odder when Voldemort stepped in at Grimmauld Place after the fiasco with Abraxas Malfoy’s place being raided by the Ministry, and Regulus had tried so very hard to impress the Dark Lord, only to end up placed under Severus Snape as a “mentor”, like that greasy haired git was any better than he, Regulus, was! So now, walking across the Hogwarts grounds to the Quidditch pitch with his brilliant new top-of-the-line Cleansweep ‘75. They were all excited to see Regulus Black mount the broom and take to the skies as the new Slytherin Seeker.

He was just hoping he wouldn’t be a complete spaz on the broom. After all, he’d only actually flown the Cleansweep maybe three times since he’d gotten it, only because there wasn’t really a lot of places around that he could fly it at by himself - Grimmauld Place was sort of in the center of a very muggley neighborhood and Orion and Walburga were always busy with their work for the Dark Lord and couldn’t bring him much of any place to test it out. The couple times that Orion had brought him out to the country, apparating far off to a cliffside seashore he knew of, he’d flown alright, but the broomstick was much, much faster than the brooms at Hogwarts that he’d learned to fly on…

“I’m the most bloody brilliant flier you’ve ever seen!” Regulus boasted, carrying the broom over his shoulder as he’d seen Isaac Horan do the year before, strutting along the path down to the pitch. “Best seeker in all of London, they say.”

The Slytherins, whose number one player had graduated the school the year before, were eager to hear that they might have another brilliant player on board this year - wanting to positively destroy the Gryffindors on the pitch. They were eating up his boasts like children being offered candy.

Halfway to the pitch, they ran into James and Sirius, who were laughing and playing about on the path as they came walking along. James Potter had his broomstick flung over one arm the same way Regulus did, and Sirius was right beside him, making some sort of noise that sounded like a shrieking hippogriff but seemed to amuse James, because they were both laughing uproariously.

“Ohhh look, it’s my ickle brother,” Sirius said, interrupting his own rambunctiousness to smirk at Regulus, “Oh don’t tell me someone’s been stupid enough to give you a broomstick!”

“Father bought it for me,” Regulus said, “When he heard that Slytherin would be needing a new Seeker this year.”

“Gonna be the best broom on the pitch this term,” said Evan Rosier, grinning, “Much better than that bit of kindling you’ve got, Black. It’s a Cleansweep ‘75, just like --”

“Just like Puddlemere United’s flying this year, yeah?” James asked, and he lowered his broom to show it, too, was a Cleansweep ‘75. “Looks like both Slytherin and Gryffindor are outfitted with a professional grade broom.”

Regulus looked sour. “Well bully for you. You’re not a seeker, so --”

“Yeah, I’m a Chaser,” said James, “I’ll outstrip your loser beaters’ brooms with this one and sink the quaffle in your net fifteen times before you’ll find the snitch once.”

Sirius guffawed, “Yeah, what’s it you said last term about the Seekers? Glorified Spectators?”

Regulus turned quite red. “Whatever,” he said, not able to come up with a better response quickly. He’d never been as quick on his feet as Sirius had been when it came to stuff like that. Their fights had always been quick-wit coming from Sirius and short, angry bursts from Regulus, usually quickly ended by one of the two of them threatening to hex the other one - though neither of them had ever actually hexed the other successfully yet. Not really.

Sirius snickered, “Go tell mummy that Sirius is being really, really mean to you,” he said in a baby voice.

Regulus balled his fists, “Yeah, well you go cry to your ugly little cut-up boyfriend, why don’t you? Oh, well, actually, you might not want to interrupt him right now, seeing as he’s busy with someone else down behind the greenhouses.”

Sirius had been about to snarl out a response to calling Remus “ugly” and “cut-up” when the second part of the statement had come out and instead of defending Rey, he demanded, “What?”

James turned with surprised interest, too, looking at the Slytherins with a stupid sort of look on his face.

“Well look at this, will you? They don’t know!” Regulus snorted, “Oh, brother. I’m so sorry. Your boyfriend’s cheatin’ on you.”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Sirius growled.

James’s jaw set with that, angry at the Slytherins because the tone of Sirius’s voice was cold and harsh and it felt as though it was a hundred steps back from where they’d been… Lily Evans would be really disappointed, James thought. He sort of wished she was here - she’d throw a bat bogey hex at Regulus if she’d heard that. Or maybe even worse, she was so excited about the Remus-Sirius affair that she might’ve hexed Regulus clear into the following weekend if she’d heard the tone his remarks had brought to Sirius’s voice.

It was not good. Not good at all.

Regulus smirked, “Well, good thing then. You won’t have to be jealous over the --” he paused and his eyes sparkled menacingly, “-- the very sexy boy he’s probably puffing right now.”

Sirius drew his wand, “I’ll puff you, you little mother-f----”

Evan Rosier said, “You know, you’ve got an awfully dirty mouth, Mr. Black, you ought to clean it out. In fact --” and he waved his wand quickly, “Sapo!”

Sirius made a great choking noise, like he was being strangled and he grabbed onto his neck with a panicked expression on his face, scrabbling at his throat with his fingers. James dropped his broom and instantly went for Sirius, attempting a move he’d once seen a muggle do in a restaurant that was basically like hugging Sirius from the back and squeezing him (though he wasn’t entirely sure what good this would do).

Regulus and the other Slytherins streamed about them, laughing loudly. “Well there you go, brother,” said Regulus, “We got you James Potter as a replacement for the Puffer Fish. At least he’s a pureblood...” he paused and, when he was really close to Sirius, he whispered, low enough only his brother would hear him, “And also a human.” And off they went, making their way on down to the pitch.

“Breathe! Breathe!” James was slapping Sirius on the spine with the heel of his hand, having figured out rather quickly that the squeezy-huggy motion wasn’t doing much help in getting whatever it was Sirius was choking on out of his mouth. Sirius started gagging loudly and great foamy bubbles started coming out his mouth in a thick froth. “Bloody hell! It’s soap!” James exclaimed, “C’mon, we’ll get you to Madam Pomfrey!” He scooped up his broom and glared behind him at the receding backs of the Slytherins with hatred as he and Sirius ran for the hospital wing.




Twenty minutes later, Madam Pomfrey had magicked a great big bar of Lux out of Sirius’s throat and given him a potion that would help calm the bits of it he’d swallowed from bubbling up in his belly. He kept burping bubbles - great big things that had tinges of purple and blue and hot pink around the edges and he kept scraping his tongue along his teeth, trying to clear away the horrible flavor from his mouth.

James sat next to him in the chair he’d settled himself in by Pomfrey’s desk, refusing to be confined to a bed - “I’m not ill,” he’d argued, even as a stream of bubbles popped out of his mouth with each word he spoke. James twiddled his thumbs nervously, still wearing all his quidditch gear, including knee pads and gloves. His broom leaned against the seat next to him. He looked over at Sirius, who had his head tilted back so that his adam’s apple stood out quite a lot and his mouth open, the sound of the bubbles just fizzing in the back of his throat amplified by his hollow cheeks.

He looked profoundly upset.

More upset than just having a bar of soap in his throat, really…

And far more upset, even, James thought, than someone who wasn’t sure what they wanted would look...

“They were just trying to get your goat,” James said, “The Slytherins I mean. I doubt they saw Remus at all.”

Sirius wondered how it was James knew exactly what he was thinking. He couldn’t really answer - thanks to the soap.

“I’ll bet they just made that up to upset you or to say nasty stuff. You know they know talking rubbish about Remus gets you mad.”

Sirius nodded.

“Remus isn’t seeing anybody. He said so just a couple weeks ago, in the Shack, remember?”

Sirius nodded again.

“Blimey, there’s not even anybody Remus was interested in, besides you, far as I know…” James said. Surely Lily would’ve told him… But would Remus have told Lily? It had been a year since he’d told her about Sirius, James realized, and since March that he’d kissed Sirius… and it’s not like Sirius gave him any indication… James felt kinda sick. Was it possible that Remus had moved on…?

Sirius mumbled something James didn’t quite understand. “What’s that mate?”

Sirius finished choking and he forced out, “S’long as he’s happy.”

James frowned and reached out to pat Sirius’s back as he continued on, choking and gagging, streams of bubbles floating down and pooling about his feet.