Trying to imagine himself as a massive bookworm, surrounded by countless books, papers and empty coffee mugs, working tirelessly to make up for his lack of formal education, Sirius at first felt a bit intimidated.
Pull yourself together! You survived 16 years with your awful family and a war, so why are you afraid of getting more education? he then berated himself.
"I'll make it... well, perhaps if you can help me out?" Sirius gave him a hopeful look.
Why do I have the feeling I'm going to regret this? Remus thought while reluctantly voicing his agreement.
...April 29th 1982...
Barty Crouch was in a miserable mood while returning home. Today had been the lowpoint after months of a constant slide.
The whole mess had pretty much started when he had sentenced his useless son, who had dared to become a Death Eater, to life in Azkaban. That had started the destruction of his reputation, with all kind of backstabbers turning up and relaying their attacks through the press. Over months his reputation had slid further and further, the more stories were dug up. Oh, it wasn't all at once, it always was in small doses.
Additionally, his wife had finally admitted that she was ill - terminally ill that was. The healers saw no chance to help her and even all the magic in the world would be unable to cure her. That had been the second strike against him, as if fate itself decided to conspire against him. He was used to be in control, but now these two developments were something he could do nothing about.
He still wondered why he had given in on her plan on getting their son out of Azkaban. Perhaps it was due to weakness - she was one of his few weaknesses after all.
Visiting him, he had put his son under the Imperius Curse and then polyjuice was used to make his son and his wife take each other's form, so that she could take his place. Just two days ago he got the news that his "son" had died in Azkaban and only yesterday he had staged a funeral for his wife with a secretly empty grave, while Barty Jr. was safely locked up and guarded by Winky, the house-elf.
Well, with these seeming death of his son in prison, the whole smearing of his name was complete.
They only waited for it, he thought in bitterness.
It was like everyone had only waited for that event to dump tons of vitriol over him. He was sure even before leaving this morning, that his ambitions had hit a dead end. He got a long-winded explanation from Minister Bagnold about how circumstances were convincing her this was the best decision, but he knew she wanted to make sure that the Ministry would not be caught in his downward spiral.
From the head of the Department for Magical Law Enforcement to head of International Magical Cooperation. That's a barely disguised demotion, he steamed.
He however would not give up. Oh yes, he would make a return, regardless how long it would take!
Thing was, Crouch had no idea he was lying to himself.
In actuality, all the things that had been dragged back into the limelight had happened exactly as described, the whole thing with his son was just a catalyst for the public to begin to doubt him. That was, why his popularity had sunk like a rock; people looking back and realizing what he did was not that different from the enemy. Crouch of course didn't see it that way and needed to blame someone else. In his world, he couldn't be at fault for anything.
That way of thinking after all was far more convenient.
Stepping of of the fireplace, he right away was greeted by Winky. "How is he behaving?" he asked right away, not bothering with acting nice, since he felt a house-elf didn't need that.
"Winky is proud to tell that young Master is behaving very well, Master Barty," Winky reported. She tried to sound enthusiastic, but the loss of her Mistress had hit her hard.
That he behaved well was no surprise, due to him being under the curse. "Good, and I want it to stay that way. You are responsible for him, elf. So serve me well."
Winky for her part was excited for this long-term assignment. Sure, part of her was disappointed that her Master didn't use her name - her late Mistress having always addressed her by name - but unlike other masters, Master Barty wouldn't force her to punish herself.
Winky was a good elf and would follow her Master's orders to the letter.
The postman had just left and Sirius was going through the day's mail after closing the front door. Putting his motorcycle magazine aside - he still couldn't believe how he hadn't found something like that before - he put Remus' mail onto the table and then looked through his own.
"Invoice, invoice... Oh!" Sirius stopped when seeing the coat of arms of Surrey on the envelope. "Oh, finally it's here!"
"What is here?" Remus asked, walking down the stairs, having stopped his writing work after hearing the doorbell.
"The reply if I'm in the police training, or not!" Sirius showed him the envelope, before again looking a the seal on it. "I'm kind of afraid to open it."
"Well, then don't stare at the envelope like that, Padfoot. Finally open it and see if you are in, or not," Remus told his friend.
"It's almost like you are more excited about this than me," Sirius observed.
Remus rolled his eyes. "Don't forget that without me, you would never have managed to get the needed educational level in literally record time. I suffered just as much as you through that."
Now Sirius grimaced. "Don't remind me. In retrospect, this was way worse than school could have ever been. It was like taking our NEWTs, only every day for almost seven whole months."