Live Forever

6: Talk Tonight - Part 1

You and me see how we are...

August 28, 1995

"Could you please stop that?" Minerva asked in annoyance as they waited for the arrival of Albus Dumbledore.

"Stop what?" Sirius asked. He could really use a drink...or a muggle cigarette. Either would be good. Both would be better.

"Stop tapping the table, stop bobbing your knees up and down. Pull yourself together," she admonished.

"Right," he muttered, forcing himself to calm. "Right."

Seconds later Minerva was glaring at him once again. "It does no good for you to stop if you begin again seconds after you've stopped."

"Sorry!" he replied, placing both hands on his knees in an effort to force himself to comply.

"Honestly!" she exclaimed in frustration, "you'd think you'd never spoken to Albus before."

"My nerves have nothing to do with Dumbledore," he retorted.

Minerva immediately softened. "Harry," she stated simply.

Sirius nodded. "I'm out of my depth here," he confessed. He felt like such an idiot since they'd heard the prophecy; a mute, useless idiot.

"We all are, Sirius," she lamented.

Dumbledore entered the room and Sirius' nerves morphed into anger...a preemptive emotional strike against the guilt trip and lecture that he knew would be delivered over the next few minutes. It felt good to have a target to direct his frustrations at. He steeled himself and remembered the agreement with Minerva to let her do the talking.

"Good afternoon," the man greeted them kindly as he took a seat, "I think it would be best if we cut to the chase, as they say. Your message sounded quite urgent, Minerva."

"Yes," she began unceremoniously, "we wanted to inform you that several members of the Order have been working to assist Harry and the Grangers over the last month."

Dumbledore's eyebrow rose. "I'm assuming the members who escorted Harry from Privet Drive are part of this group?"

Minerva nodded. "In addition to rescuing Harry that night we've taken it upon ourselves to protect the Granger household-"

"Should have been done long before now," Sirius interjected, drawing a scowl from his colleague. He realized he'd done the exact thing he promised that he wouldn't do; make unnecessary, emotional comments.

"As I was saying," she continued, "we've done our best to protect the Grangers, and yesterday afternoon a group of us assisted Harry."

That got the man's attention.

"We informed you last week of the dreams Harry has been having," she continued. "It was fairly easy to deduce from what Harry shared that he was seeing the Department of Mysteries. Our group shared with Harry what his visions represented and informed him of the prophecy that we've been guarding. We then offered our help to retrieve the prophecy if he wanted to hear its contents. Harry accepted our offer. We retrieved the prophecy yesterday and a smaller group of us listened to the prophecy last night."

It was petty and unproductive and all the other selfish, immature things you could label it, but Sirius reveled in Dumbledore's shocked and angered expression. As he watched the aged man attempt to control his rage it was also clear why Voldemort feared him.

"Who knows of the prophecy's contents?" Dumbledore asked urgently.

"Harry, the two of us, and Miss Granger," Minerva answered calmly.