The New House Rules

Disclaimer: Always one and the same.

Thank you, saiyanwizardgurl from www.fanfiction.net, for editing this.

Chapter 2

Two years later...

"Come in, come in!" Lily smiled in welcome, and Sirius entered the Potters' house.

"Is Angela here?" he asked, taking his jacket off.

"Yes, she came in about an hour ago. Said her business meeting went fine."

"Good." He smiled, entering the living room.

"Hello, Sirius," Angela said without looking away from her magazine. Sirius went to her chair and kissed her on the lips. She immediately tried to bite his lip, but he pulled it away just in time. "Sirius!" she hissed. "Lily will be here any moment."

"Nah, she won't." Sirius dismissed her objection with a wave of his hand. "Her stomach will need half an hour to find the way here, so we have time - "

"Hands down, Black," Angela snapped quietly, deciding not to fall for his charm. "I am still angry with you."

"Black - "

"Oh, don't you Black me, Sirius Black! You promised me that there would be no crazy Padfeet running around the flat this morning and what do I find when I wake up? Caine and Padfoot

playing tag, of course. Do you know that he was so overexcited that he did not leave me alone and I barely had time to make the final checking before my meeting?"

She used the word Padfeet which meant that she was really angry - or she wanted to look like she was. Sirius decided to mend things and since he did not dare to risk having his lip chewed off, he decided to try another method of convincing.

Angela only sighed when she saw the big canine eyes, looking soulfully at her. However, she lost no time and also changed.

Padfoot instinctively jumped back, when he found himself face to face with the growling she-wolf, and she yelped victoriously. Padfoot went to her and nudged her nose with his in an Eskimo kiss. Empress finally surrendered and a note of content fought its way into her growl.

"Merlin, what's going on here?"

Padfoot and Empress separated and looked at a grinning James, who was Levitating a tray with food in front of him.

"Excuse me," he said, "I must have gotten the house wrong. Lily!" he cried. "Come in and enjoy the mini zoo that is currently residing in our house."

Lily followed her stomach into the room and barely fought her smile at the sight of the two canines that were shooting very human - and very dirty - glances at her husband and Remus, who did not bother to even try to hide their mirth.

"Excuse me," she said, "but I've had this dinner planned for six people, not four people and two animals. I think I can arrange something, though," she added. "James, would you mind going to the shop and buying some dog-food?"

Now, everybody laughed, including Angela and Sirius. They finally resumed their true forms, still laughing.

"After a whole day spent in training, I think I deserve better than dog-food," he said, looking approvingly at the salver that was still in the air. "Turkey, salad, Butterbeer - "

"Oranges, and chocolate cake," James finished helpfully.

"NO!" Sirius and Angela both shouted at the same time, and James slapped his hand across his forehead.

"He said the C-word," Remus stated unnecessarily, but his words were drowned in the clambering of small feet. Not even a second later, Caine ran into the room.

"Cake!" he cried, and headed straight for the tray.

"Does he have an implanted radar or something?" asked Peter, trailing into the room behind Caine. "I swear that this boy can smell a cake from fifteen meters."

"Canine nose," Sirius replied, grinning, and went to pick up his son, who was trying to reach the tray.

"Daddy!"

"Hello, Champion."

"The cake, Daddy. I want the cake," the two-year old said, looking hopefully at Sirius.

"I am sorry, Caine, but you can have a piece of cake only after you've eaten your dinner."

Caine frowned. "But I don't want dinner! I want the cake!" he stubbornly insisted.

"I am sorry, but you'll have to eat your dinner first," Sirius answered calmly. "And that means eating your vegetables too."

Caine's face suddenly broke into a smile. "We don't have any vegetables," he said happily.

"Actually, we have them, Caine, just for you," Lily interjected, and Caine's face turned into a picture of misery. "Listen, go back in the other room and wait there. Do you know what we have here?" Caine shook his head. "Prongs is here, just for you," she said.

Caine's face lit up and James' contorted in horror.

"He'll be in the other room in a couple of minutes and you can ride him," Lily added brightly. "But only if you promise to be good and eat your dinner."

"I'll eat it!" Caine promised energetically and left the room, practically bouncing with excitement.

"Lily?" James said after a while, lowering the tray on the table.

"Yes, darling?"

"Don't you think you should have asked me whether I wanted Prongs to be ridden?"

"No, I don't," Lily answered, and Sirius, Remus, and Peter burst out laughing.

"You'd better get used to it, James," Sirius advised his friend. "It starts in less than three months and it won't stop until the baby is too big to ride on Prongs' back."

James growled something incoherent, but quite clear in its sense, and that only made Sirius laugh harder. "Maybe we should lend Caine to you for a day or two," he said. "Just so you can, you know, get used to having a child in the house - "

"Over my dead body!" James exclaimed, and then sighed. "Who beat me into showing Prongs to him, can you tell me?"

"I have it worse," Sirius comforted him. "In several hours, we're going home and you'll be free, and he'll be tormenting me - Padfoot."

Lily sat on the sofa, rubbing her stomach. "Come on, Sirius!" she said. "I'm sure it isn't that bad."

"It is!" Sirius and Angela answered simultaneously. "And to think that I felt miserable when Padfoot wasn't allowed to come near him," Sirius said. "Lily, I had no idea that it could become worse!"

The red-head could not hide her smile anymore. "Is that so?"

"Oh yes!" Angela said. "We thought that Padfoot and Empress were going to play with him and then - you know what happened. Oh, how I long for the quiet days when we were forbidden to go near him in our canine forms."

The other four exchanged smiles - they all knew that a child's idea of having fun with the family pets was very different for the animals' in question.

"How do real animals deal with those monsters - I mean, those children?"

"A good question," Angela muttered, and then she beamed at him. "Merlin, just listen to us," she said, "how we are talking about our child."

James sighed and looked plaintively at them. "I suppose I'd better go and have this finished as soon as possible," he said. "When I'm back, we'll have dinner."

"I'm coming too," Sirius said immediately. "I'll enjoy the sight of Caine tormenting someone else for a change."

The four men left and the two women reveled in the silence of the room, feeling quite relaxed. After a while, Lily asked, "Is it really that bad?"

They laughed and Angela replied, "Yes. Sirius has it worse than me, though, because he enjoys spending as much time as Padfoot as possible, while I don't feel the same need."

"Does Caine really drive him mad?"

"Yes, that he does. He thinks that they are playing and they really are - in a way. Sometimes poor Padfoot only seeks for a place to hide in, comes to me and looks at me sadly. Caine folds his ears, plucks his fur, once he even tried to bite his tail - "

"You must be kidding!"

"It's true! He keeps thrusting his hand into Padfoot's mouth, sits on top of him and so on. And what can Padfoot do? He can only put up with it. I scold Caine and tell him to leave Padfoot alone, he stops tormenting him for a minute, and then it all starts again."

Lily burst out laughing. "But I've seen them together and they - they looked happy."

"Oh, they are," Angela agreed. "Padfoot doesn't hold grudges and Caine adores him - and he's ready to do anything for Caine. So, it's not all bad."

She stood up. "I'll go and see what those men are doing. And I'm warning you, Lily, if James has given Caine another chocolate bar, you'll be the ones paying for his first appointment with the dental Medi-witch."

James had not given Caine anything. In fact, he was doing nothing but sitting with Remus and Peter on the sofa, watching the pair that was sitting on the floor.

Caine and Padfoot were eating ice-cream. For a moment Angela stared. Yes, her eyesight was as good as ever. Caine was holding the ice-cream in his right hand, licking at it and then holding it out for Padfoot to have a lick, too.

"What's going on here?"

Caine nearly dropped the ice-cream. Padfoot's fur bristled up with horror, and Peter's face turned green.

"Oh-oh!" said James in a small voice.

"It's no good, Pads," Remus said, looking at the huge dog who was trying to stand between Angela's sight and the ice-cream. "She saw you."

Padfoot's ears drooped miserably, and Angela barely resisted the urge to laugh. Three grown-up men, a little boy, and a big dog, and they were all scared of her.

"Can I have a bite?" she said, sitting on the floor next to Caine, who put the ice-cream to her lips and then to Sirius' mighty jaws.

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