If anything, Sirius was understating how grueling the past seven months truly had been for him and for Remus. In retrospect, it had been sheer insanity to try and pack several years of school education into a little more than half a year, but Sirius' pride and his sheer determination once he'd set himself a goal somehow managed to help Sirius to pull through. Remus probably at the end was running on pure loyalty to his friend, as his own plans suffered due to lack of time.
What was I thinking when agreeing to it? went through Remus' head.
Perhaps the countless cups of coffee had helped as well. Those months blurred in their memories into man-high stacks of books, papers everywhere and countless broken pencils. Not to speak of nerves getting ready to snap. The teacher had looked at Sirius as if he was insane when he had put in his application for the final exam during the summer, which had turned into outright bafflement when the end result were good grades. Not top grades, but good ones. These official grades meant, Sirius finally was able to enter the non-magical job market.
Both of them knew, they would be unable to go through such a colossal effort again.
Of course his private life had suffered tremendously during that time, as he'd done little more than going through all of the material. He'd even seen Harry only occasionally, which he felt guilty about and still was making up for, now that that ordeal was finally in the past.
Naturally, that had not been the end of the effort, since he then had to go through the application and testing process before he would be actually considered for the police training program. While that had been way less grueling, it had made him more nervous. Now he would see the end result of all his efforts.
Sirius finally opened the envelope and started to read the letter.
"Well, what does it say?" Remus asked, since Sirius' expression stayed unreadable. "Please tell me I didn't sacrifice my own education for nothing."
Sirius lowered the letter, giving his friend a big smile. "Well... I'm in! They said my training officially starts in September!"
Finally, Remus relaxed. While he felt happy for his friend, it also meant he could finally go forward with his own plans without having to deal with a depressed Sirius. "Thank all goodness all this pain did pay off in the end! You know that you have to tell Veronica?"
"She would pull my ears off if I try to hide this from her." Sirius remembered the one time he'd tried to lie to her concerning something rather trivial. That woman had the ability to sense when he was dishonest with her, which Sirius found a bit frightening.
"That one time was entirely your own fault," Remus reminded him.
Leaving the house and walking out into a hot summer day, they noticed Petunia again spying on them from behind the curtains. That had become a regular thing and Petunia clearly still thought they were oblivious of it. It was quite likely that while Petunia was too afraid to do anything against them, she had become paranoid enough to spy on them at every opportunity 'to make sure'. It was quite annoying by now.
Remus sighed when seeing that behavior of their neighbor. "Doesn't she ever get tired of watching our every step? I mean, she must have better things to do with her time, right?"
"To her, we are a threat to their way of life," Sirius snorted, paying no attention to Petunia's clumsy attempt at spying on them. "Reminds me of some pure-bloods and their constant fear of losing their social status. Well, since they are unable to do anything against us, she feels the need to always know what we are doing. Paranoid woman."
"Still, it's becoming annoying," Remus complained, seeing how Petunia backed away from the curtains in fear she could be discovered.
Paying Petunia's spying no further mind, they left.
Walking to the Evans house, they could hear laughter coming from its garden and thus took the small wooden gate to the garden, where they found Veronica watching Harry, who was wearing cute swimming trunks, being busy with enjoying the fine water spray from the garden hose Veronica was holding. On such a hot day, this had to be heaven for the little boy.
"Looks like someone got the right idea in this hot day," Sirius laughed.
That was when Harry noticed them. "Unca Padfoot, Unca Moony!"
"Oh, hold it, soldier! No hugging us while the water is running off you!" Remus stopped the little boy, before he could do so.
"Yes, young man, I need to get you dry first," Veronica reminded the young boy, having put the hose away, now approaching with a towel. "He really likes that on such a hot day."
"Oh, I can imagine," Sirius said, looking in amusement how Harry giggled while being toweled dry by Veronica. "You are really good for him and will be a wonderful mother... the total opposite of my own mother."
"Is that how you charm women?" Veronica joked, deciding not commenting on Sirius' horrible family would be better.
"No, that was a nice compliment from him," Remus commented from the side. "Actual attempts at charming women usually resulted in Sirius either getting slapped or hexed, often both."
"Oh no, I did date several girls in school I got all the way with, it just wasn't meant to be anything permanent by both sides. So don't pull that card," Sirius complained.
"Ahem." They stopped when seeing that Veronica clearly didn't want that kind of discussion in front of Harry, even though he wouldn't understand any of it due to his young age. "Now, as happy as I am to see you guys, is there any specific reason for your visit in the middle of the day?"
"Yes, I made it!" Sirius told her with no further delay.