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PART I:  JANUARY 8
TH
,1984

(488)

Sirius Black's parents taught him that money is everything and that it could buy everything, even love. He had to learn on his own that sometimes even love itself can’t buy love. Some things are a little bit more complicated than that.

“It’s a funny thing, ain’t it Moony?” Sirius marveled, grinning to the horizon. “How despite everything, some love stories can have happy endings.”

Remus Lupin sitting next to him on the black park bench, smiled as he pressed his hand tighter against Sirius’. He liked the way the golden wedding ring embraced Remus’ skin, as if it was meant to be from the beginning of times.

Yes, some love stories are meant to have happy endings.
 
(1)

Sirius Black met Remus Lupin on January 8th at the Office of Postage and Enlightenment in the Ministry of Magic. In an instant, he knew he was the one he’d been looking for.

There is no easy way to explain how Sirius Black ended up working at the

Office of Postage and Enlightenment

, two floors below his actual dream job. There is, however, an easy way to explain why Sirius Black was so happy to be a part of the

Office of Postage and Enlightenment

that exact Wednesday morning.

It all begins with the whispered rumors about a new member joining the office back from Christmas’ holidays. Since November, gatherings around the

Automagical

water server increased astronomically, and by January, everyone was buzzing to meet that mysterious new employee that used to work for muggles. Despite alleging that he hated gossip, Sirius Black was as excited as his co-workers and he secretly wished for the employee to be a woman. He had even spent a fair amount of Christmas holidays imagining her; concluding that she had to be beautiful and funny, and even if she wasn’t pretty, she was definitely adventurous and she would have a lot of muggle stories to tell. James agreed with him, mostly because he was relieved to see him back on his feet after his last failed romance. Peter, who had spent all holidays scribbling furiously in mountains of parchment, nervous about his presentation to the

OPE’s Board

, mostly nodded and shrugged absently.

Just now, Peter was levitating, with a shaky hand, the multiple parchment rolls he had composed all through December. He was the only one not intently staring at the desk in the front door, usually occupied by the former secretary, Sarah Goodman. The new girl, as it was, would be late on her first day at work.

“Oi, what’s another way to say improvement?” Peter said, claiming Sirius’ attention by elbowing him on the ribs. “Should I say bettering? Progression-essing? Is that even a word? How was that word you said the other day again… enhan-something?”

Sirius rolled his eyes and unceremoniously slapped Peter’s elbow away. He’ll have to wait to check out the new girl until after the meeting anyway, since everyone was already marching to the conference room.

“What was the word then?” Peter insisted, sweating profusely.

“For Merlin’s sake, fucking take a breath,” Sirius barked in nuisance. “And stop twitching. You’re gonna do just fine.”

“And what if I don’t?” Peter replied, giving a small leap to keep up with Sirius’ long strides. “Oh Godric! What if the Minister shows up?”

Sirius chuckled, “Seriously Wormtail? The Minister of Magic? In a den like this? I bet even Mrs. Montgomery hates it here.”

“I don’t think so,” Peter fumed. “Without our help, there wouldn’t be a way for the Ministry to communicate with the rest of the Departments. And, AND! Padfoot, last year’s ad campaign was fucking badass! Everyone loved it!” he insisted, pointing to one of the posters hanging across the hall. This one featured Mad-Eye Moody being his usual gloomy self underneath white letters claiming KEEP CALM AND JOIN THE AUROR FORCES. Sirius stopped just a second to decorate Mad-Eye’s upper lip with a French moustache.

“Oh, that’s so mature,” Peter disapproved.

“More mature than the time you wrapped your underwear in a gift box and owled it to McGonagall?” Sirius retaliated with a wicked grin.

Peter blushed violently. “You dared me to do it!” he shouted at the same time someone laughed behind them.

Sirius and Peter glanced back at the same time, discovering a lean young man with a rather ugly scar sort of disfiguring the right side of his face. “Sorry,” he muttered before scurrying in the opposite direction the rest of the employees were going.

Sirius looked at Peter. “Is that a new guy?” he asked.

Peter shrugged. “I dunno. Reckon I’d remember seeing that face. Don’t think that’s the new secretary tho. I heard Mary from Weekly Memos saying that Dumbledore himself had recommended her for the job, and he...”

“That’s ridiculous,” Sirius huffed, striding inside the Conference Room. “If she’s Dumbledore’s protégée what can she possibly be doing here? I would take any other department if I had a chance.”

“Well, you had the chance,” Peter muttered under his breath.

Sirius turned back, about to sit in the farther chair to the front. “What was that?”

“I said: me too,” Peter lied with an innocent smile. 
 
Half an hour later, Mrs. Montgomery complimented Peter’s work --he smiled so wide that his face looked twice its size. Sirius toyed with the idea of pointing out all the wrongs in his friend’s work just for the joy of pissing him off, but he ditched it at the last minute out of something like pity.

“Excellent work, Pettigrew.” said Mrs. Montgomery. “I really hope this can encourage all those employees that are too… shy, to share some of their ideas.” When she said this, she stared intently at the back of the room, where Sirius was too busy doodling on the table. “Do you have something to add, Mister Black?”

“Not really. You’re the first one I’ve ever heard call Peter encouraging tho,” everyone but Peter and Mrs. Montgomery roared with laughter. Peter’s smile smeared down and Mrs. Montgomery frowned in a way that resembled McGonagall’s.

“As a matter of fact, you don’t seem to be easily encouraged to do anything, Mr. Black,” she said, cutting the laughter right away.

Sirius bit the inner of his cheek furiously, choking back the embarrassment.

“Please take a seat Peter, you did a great job,” Mrs. Montgomery ordered with a sort of motherly voice. “What are your plans for this month, Mary?” she continued, addressing a brunette two seats behind the spot Peter sat on. Mary began ranting about owl efficiency but Sirius could still feel a couple of eyes fixated in his nape, mumbled gossip already brewing, so he stood up as swiftly as he could and paced his way to the door.

Just as he put his hand in the knob, someone else opened it from the outside and Sirius found the guy from before, inches from his own nose. He didn’t move, challenging him with his eyes, and for a few seconds it looked like the guy was actually going to keep up but then he slunked and said. “Sorry,” in the same submissive tone he used earlier in the hallway and moved to the side.

Sirius took a step out and the new assistant stormed inside, shutting the door behind him but standing behind it for a few seconds. His heart was beating fast from the humilliation and anger. From under the thrumming of it, he could hear Mrs. Montgomery’s voice, speaking the worst news of that Monday.

“Oh everyone! I want you to meet my new assistant… Remus, meet the team. Have you settled already darling?”

The new assistant. Not a girl but a guy. And the most infuriating guy at that. Even his voice, low and nasal, was annoying. Merlin, Sirius thought while striding down the hallway to his desk, this guy’s so annoying it’s twisting my guts and I’ve only seen him twice.

(291)

Regulus strode up the stairs of his brother’s complex, fumbling with his broom and quidditch uniform. He was about to knock at the door but James and Peter were already there, staring with identical consternation faces. “We didn’t know who else to call,” James said.

“It’s Mary McDonald all over again,” Peter added.

“You did the right thing,” Regulus replied, tossing his broom behind the door. “Where is he?”

Peter and James pointed to the kitchen and Regulus heard Peter muttering “Be careful,” as if his older brother was a rabid dog.

“Sirius,” Regulus called.

Sirius froze. He was standing in the middle of a mountain of broken plates and teacups. Lily’s Christmas gift, a purple kettle, fell to the ground with a loud clunk when Sirius finally reacted and withdrew his wand.

“Reg? What are you doing here?” Sirius inquired, raising both eyebrows.

“I’m here to help you,” Regulus replied. He waved his own wand across the room and mumbled

Reparo.

Most of the shattered ceramic pieces turned into dishes again and came back to its shelves. “Come on. Let’s get you something to drink shall we?”

Back in the living room, James handed a glass of vodka to Sirius, who drank it as if it was water instead. He sighed and sprawled on the couch, defeated. Regulus sat down on the coffee table, his hands resting interlaced on his lap.

“So,” he began. “What is it now?”

James re-filled the glass. Sirius re-emptied it in two sips and stared vaguely at his younger brother. “Does mom know you’re here? You know, with the black Black in the sheep family? Wait, I meant…” Sirius frowned.

“Sirius,” Regulus scolded.

Sirius breathed heavily and shut his eyes close for just a second. He smiled bitterly as he began his story.

(245 1/2)

If there was something Sirius wanted to share with Remus from magic London it was Mrs. Rose Clement’s pancakes. He used to say that the best thing that could happen to gastronomy would be if Mrs. Clement and Florean Fortescue from Diagon Alley got married. They both had a family of their own, but Sirius didn’t lose the hope of one day being able to have his favorite ice cream on top of his favorite pancakes.

“I’m telling you, it’s like eating a slice of heaven with maple syrup on top,” Sirius said to a rather distant Remus sitting in front of him. “It can cure everything. They’re even better than Mrs. Pomfrey’s… anything.” Remus scratched the side of the table. “Oh, I didn’t mean to,” Sirius apologized. “I often forget about your homeschooling and all that. Sorry.”

“I think we should stop seeing each other,” Remus blatantly announced.

“Yeah, right,” Sirius indulged at his lover’s attempt at a joke, but Remus wasn’t laughing at all. “Wait, what?”

“I said: I think we should stop seeing each other,” Remus repeated calmly.

Sirius opened and closed his mouth several times before he could blurt out a “Why?”

Remus looked down to his legs. “This… thing, whatever we have here. I mean, don’t you think it’s not… not right?”

“Not right?” Sirius blurted. “Not ri… Who cares? I’m happy. Are you happy?”

“Are you?”

“I asked first.”

Remus finally raised his eyes to exchange a look with Sirius. “All we do is argue!”

“I’m not arguing! Are you arguing?” Sirius snapped as he turned to the old lady in the table next to theirs. “Do you think we’re arguing ma’am?” The old woman took her purse from the back of the chair and quickly moved away to a farther table. Remus gripped Sirius’ wrist to get his attention “Stop it,” he snarled.

Sirius turned back to look at him. His eyes, usually in a light shade of grey, darkened with a coal spark. “Stop what?”

“Just stop it. Stop acting like it’s such a surprise. We’ve been like Gryffindor and Slytherin for weeks now.”

Sirius sighed in exasperation. “Remus, Slytherin built a frigging secret basement and hid a monster inside without telling anyone just because he disagreed with his friend. Not to mention that they weren’t even a couple. I hardly doubt we’re motherfucking Godric and Salazar. But forget about it… it doesn't matter, you couldn’t know any of this.”

Remus’ left hand trembled behind the table and his lips were a thin pale line. “Just because I never went to Hogwarts doesn’t mean I don’t know anything about it,” he remarked. “Also, if you think I am unable to keep secrets from you, then maybe you should think again.”

“Oh, so you’re hiding things from me now?” Sirius almost yelled.

A tall horsey waitress put their pancakes over the table in slow motion. Sirius bit his lip to avoid shouting something else to Remus until she left. Remus beat him to it once they were alone, in his monotonous, peacemaking tone.

“Forget about it, Sirius. Let’s just eat ok? I’m starving.” Remus lifted the fork in his plate with the right hand as calmly as he could, ignoring the vicious stare in Sirius’ face. “Mmmh, you were right, they’re actually very good,” he noted, mouth full.

Sirius glared at his plate as if it was a basilisk egg instead.

“What?” Remus asked, trying to sound innocent. Sirius stood up and headed for the door.

“Hey! Stop, we still can be friends!” Remus called.

Sirius slammed the door on his way out.

(3)

“First thing you have to remember is to be kind to wizards, no,

coworkers

. You might find new additions to your office are insufferable bastards who… dammit, this ain’t working,” Sirius growled under his breath, crossing an entire line in the parchment.

“What’s not working?” Peter asked, from the contiguous desk.

“Nothing,” Sirius mumbled, staring at his sketch of the annual

Now you’re back to work

pamphlet, as if he could write it by sheer anger.

Peter shrugged and tapped the top of his typewriter, which came to life happily slamming keys here and there. After a few seconds, Sirius ripped the top portion of the parchment and tossed it in the bin. “I’m done with this,” he sighed, crossing his hands behind the nape. “So, Pete? What do we know about this new guy?”

Peter turned at Sirius in confusion. “Who? Lupin?” The typewriter slammed  the word Lupin several times before Peter could notice. “Shit.

Finite Incantem.

Well, not much. I heard he takes muggle jobs. Oh, and Amanda from

Owls and Packaging

found him in the Gemino room once and asked him out.”

“Really?” Sirius inquired, carelessly leaning his chair back so he could spot the front door’s desk. “Wasn’t Amanda the one dating that guy Marcus from fourth floor?”

“Um… I have no idea,” Peter replied, struggling to take the piece of paper off the typewriter. “Not that it matters (fucking machine) because he said no (For Merlin’s fishnets, let it go!).”

Sirius lost balance and his tilted chair slammed loudly on the floor. Peter jumped and the movement finally got the paper sheet out of the cylinder. He couldn’t properly celebrate his success because Sirius leant over his desk and asked, almost in a whisper. “Do you think he’s…?”

“Nah,” Peter shrugged, throwing the ruined paper in the bin. “Maybe he was just in a hurry.”

“Or maybe he’s a pompous know-it-all dick,” Sirius replied, sitting straight again.

“Maybe,” Peter hovered his wand over the typewriter before deciding to go back to ink and parchment. “Why do girls always fancy idiots?”

“They think big dick literally means big dick?” Sirius suggested. “Anyway, that Lupin guy doesn’t seem the type.”

“The type to have a big dick?” Peter asked, jokingly.

Sirius huffed.

“I mean the type to be a big dick. For Merlin, Pete, stop projecting so much.”

Peter stopped scribbling in his parchment to chuckle.

“I was just joking. Yeah. I think he’s actually a cool guy.”

Sirius looked at the front desk again, where Lupin was chatting with Mary and laughing at something she had said.

“Not the best nose, though,” he said out loud. “And what an obnoxious laugh too.”

“I bet you fancy him. You wanna get railed in the supply room and all that,” Peter teased, absentmindedly fanning his parchment to dry off the ink.

“Like I said,” Sirius punched him over their cubicle walls. “Stop projecting, you shithead.”

(4)

There were a few things Sirius hated about the Ministry. Owls shitting in the halls when they delivered the memos, Unspeakables talking very loud and only with nouns —as if they couldn’t wait to be asked about their “secret business”… but without any doubts, the top of the list were the jingles inside the lift. Sirius didn’t have a proper reason to hate them, but then again, Peter didn’t have a proper reason to hum along every-fucking-time. Sometimes he hummed before getting on the lift, like the world’s most annoying music box.

The only day jingles became tolerable were Saturdays, because that meant they were finally free for the weekend and Sirius wouldn’t hear the supermarket version of

Für Elise

until next Monday. There was nothing in the world that could bother Sirius on Saturday afternoon.

At least he thought so. But of course, he was proved wrong when Peter and him rounded the corner to the elevator’s hallway and Mary’s laughter chimed in their ears. She patted Remus Lupin in the shoulder as she complimented him in a teasing accent “I can’t believe you did that, Remus! It’s so funny.”

Sirius felt as if an invisible hand clenched his intestines and he suddenly noticed that Peter was humming, and in fact, had been humming all this time, “Could you stop that?” he burst angrily.

Peter jumped and Mary looked in their direction. “Was I doing it again? Sorry, the tunes are so catchy I can’t help it,” he replied, tapping the golden doors with his wand to call the lift.

“Hi Sirius, Peter,” Mary said, smiling in their direction.

“Hey,” Sirius replied with a crooked smile. Peter waved at her shyly. “Oh well, it’s getting late and I told Esther I’d help her with a thing,” Mary announced. “Have a nice weekend boys!”

“Wait, I can walk you if you want,” Remus offered.

“Kiss ass,” Sirius spat as soon as Remus and Mary’s blue tunic disappeared round the corner.

Peter nodded solemnly. “But cheer up man! It’s Saturday and we have all weekend for ourselves! I’ve been feeling an itch for adventure all week, ain’t you?”

“Now that you mention so, I do feel a weird itch. But I’m pretty sure it’s an allergic reaction to your new cologne,” Sirius retailed. “It stinks like grindylow pee.”

“I’m not wearing any cologne,” Peter replied, the tip of his ears reddening.

Sirius laughed without humor as the lift stopped, opening its golden doors with a metallic sound. Just a second after Peter got inside the box, a boney silhouette rushed through the hallway. It was Remus Lupin, back from walking Mary to the office. Sirius felt a wicked pleasure as he imagined him cursing to the closing gates.

But then Peter hit his head with his hand and exclaimed, “I forgot something on my desk!” as he pointed to the lift’s door with his wand to keep it open.

“It can’t be that important,” Sirius insisted, but Remus was already inside the box, breathing heavily.

“Oh, it is. But don’t wait for me, don’t worry, I’ll take the next one. See you later!” he said before jumping to the hallway and letting the doors close in front of Sirius.

“Thanks for holding the lift,” Lupin said, half panting, once they began moving.

“It's no big deal,” Sirius shrugged. Silence grew heavy, despite the obnoxious jingle echoing the walls. He couldn’t handle the silence, so he said the first thing that came to mind. “So, what happened to your face?”

Remus blushed violently, the scar gleaming white like a crescent moon on his face.

“I… it was a car accident,” he replied.

“Damn. Where did you get treated? I’ve been in plenty of motorcycle accidents and the guys at St. Mungo always patch me up. Good as new, see?” he said, pointing at his own face.

Remus averted his gaze, trying to compose himself.

“Well I… I didn’t go to St. Mungo,” he muttered. “Raised by muggles you know?”

His voice sounded apologetic, but his shoulders were tense, subtly telling him to fuck off and mind his own business.

“Hit me,” Sirius said.

Remus lifted his gaze, staring at him incredulously.

“W-what?”

“Punch me in the face, come on. You know you want to,” he insisted, smirking for good measure. “I’m being a dick and you’re just standing there, fisting your hands and fuming. Wanna hit me don’t you?”

Remus bit the inside of his lips and Sirius felt adrenaline jolting him as he awaited for the punch.

“As if you could take a punch to the face without calling your lawyer, you cocky rich boy,” he retaliated instead.

Sirius stared at him for a few seconds before bursting into laughter.

“That obvious?”

“Well, the surname did give you away,” Remus replied, blushing slightly again.

Sirius felt a small tug in his stomach but attributed it to making its final stop on the Atrium.

“Are you… isn’t this your stop?” Remus asked, pointing to the open door.

“Huh?” Sirius asked, dumbly. “Oh no… I uh… actually just remembered that I need to get something from the ah… you know.”

“Guess I’ll see you around then,” Remus nodded.

“Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.”

Sirius watched Remus disappear among the crowd, and counted to ten before exiting the lift as well. He would be damned if he were to stay even a second longer trapped with those god awful jingles.

(83)

“I think I’m gay,” Sirius said, interrupting James’ ramble about how expensive lady’s underwear was.

James chuckled. “Of course,” he nodded.

“Prongs, I mean it,” Sirius insisted, dodging a witch with a big basket of singing daffodils.

“You know, if you’re tired of shopping with me, you can leave any time. There’s no need for this kind of stupid jokes.”

“James Charlus Potter,” Sirius said, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk and tugging at his friend’s arm. “I mean it. For real.”

James doubted a split second before laughing again. “That’s very good acting Pads,” he said, heading to the

Broom Shop

. “I almost believed it.”

“That’s because I wasn’t acting!” Sirius burst out, throwing his hands to the sky. “I’m gay. I’M GAY, I’M GAY. I’M G-A-Y!”

James stopped walking. The daffodils were now chanting “I’m gay, I’m gay, I’m G-A-Y” in high-pitch soprano voices.

“Dude, there’s no need to make such a racket,” he said nervously looking at both sides of Diagon Alley. A pair of young witches pointed at them and chuckled with their heads down; the witch with the daffodils gave them a disapproving look.

Sirius sighed. “All right, no more yelling. Just… look me in the eye would you? This is hard enough without having to repeat it over and over again for your tiny, tiny brain to understand,” James did as he was told and locked his gaze on Sirius’. “I think I’m in love with someone,” Sirius clarified. “And it's a he.”

James stared at him, the cogs turning in his head slowly. He hadn’t seen his friend this serious aside from when he had been cut out from the Black family tree.

“Are you… sure? I mean I don’t understand,” he frowned. “Is this an I’m gay as in ‘I fucked every girl in the country so I need choices’ or…?”

Sirius sighed. “Well I don’t know. I just know that I… I have feelings for this bloke ok? And you’re my friend and I wanted you to know ok.”

“Feelings?” James prodded. “You’ve got the hots for a guy? How long have you been dating?”

“That’s not… It’s complicated,” Sirius started walking away and James had to run behind him. “He doesn’t actually

know

. And I don’t even know if he’s into me. Or into guys at all… We kinda started off with the wrong foot like you and Evans did but you’re together now so I thought…”

“Wait a minute, are you asking

me

for love advice?” James grinned. “And here I thought you were being a good friend, baring your soul to form a deeper connection with your best pal, your right hand man…”

Sirius snorted and hit James’ arm playfully. “Shut up,” he said.

(8)

“And then she said I was a pig, which I don’t think I deserve since I was just being nice and besides her friend really was on the ugly si…” Peter cut his speech when Sirius stopped by Remus’ desk, just a few steps from the exit. Remus and Peter shared the same confused look.

“We’re going for lunch,” Sirius said. “Wanna come?”

“I…” Remus wavered. “I still have to do some paperwork for Mrs. Montgomery to sign it and there are some memos to file, and…”

Sirius rested his elbows on top of Remus’ desk and rolled his eyes. “All I heard was bla bla bla boring stuff. Are you hungry or not?”

Remus stammered. “I, uh… Yes,” he smiled. “I’m kind of hungry, thanks.”

“Perfect, let’s go,” Sirius urged, elbowing Peter on his way out.

“I thought you didn’t like him,” Peter mumbled once Remus walked a few steps ahead.

“I don’t like the food in here but I still have to eat it sometimes,” Sirius shrugged, striding into the dining hall with the airs of a knight. “That’s our table,” he indicated Remus, sort of regretting it right away when he realized how pathetic it was to claim a table like they were school children.

“Near the soda machine, nice,” Remus praised.

Sirius felt his neck ruffle.

“So… Remus,'' he began, leaning across the table to where he was seated. “New in town? Making a lot of friends already?”

Remus grimaced. “Well, I’m not much of a friends person you know.”

“Well, now you have us,” Sirius pointed at Peter, sitting awkwardly next to him.

Remus smiled, looking at his hands. “Oh? Well, um, thanks. I guess.”

There was a long silence in which Peter coughed.

“Um… Not to be rude, but am I the only one who plans to eat on

lunch time

?” his stomach growled as if to emphasize the fact that he was starving. “Never mind me, I’ll just go get us some food. Don’t tell him anything bad about me while I’m gone.”

“We should probably help him, shouldn’t we?” Remus asked.

“Nah, he’ll be ok,” Sirius dismissed. “So… why did you move in?”

“Personal reasons,” Remus shrugged.

“There’s no personal reasons among friends,” Sirius teased.

“Has anyone told you you’re incredibly nosy?”

Sirius laughed and shrugged. “Never. They’ve called me many names… incredibly handsome for one, but never nosy.”

“You mustn't talk to many people then.”

“Or people actually find me likable and charming… alluring even.”

Remus smiled and rolled his eyes.

“I just had to get out,” he replied. “Here’s busier, I don’t have to think as much, everything’s fast paced. Have you lived here long?”

“Kinda. All my life. My parents had a mansion at Grimmauld Place. But I moved out when I was sixteen, with my younger brother. We don’t live together anymore, however. He’s got a big penthouse with glass windows, the little shit,” he shrugged as if it weren’t important.

Much to Sirius’ discomfort, Remus stated. “Sixteen it’s too young to be moving out, with someone else too.”

“Yeah… I guess some of us just grow faster. What about you? Any embarrassing siblings?”

“Only child,” Remus shook his head no. “Do you feel bad that your brother has a penthouse and you have…”

“A flat on top of a Chinese restaurant,” Sirius retaliated. “And absolutely not, I get free leftovers.”

“What does your brother do?”

“Regulus? Oh,” Sirius shrugged. “He plays for the Falmouth Falcons. It was his dream job since he was four. He gets me tickets now and then. As you can see, I’m a very resourceful and likable person.”

“Sounds more like you’re freeloading, to be honest,” Remus replied.

“I’m offended. You just lost free quidditch tickets and free Chinese food.”

“Fair,” Remus smiled. “I get why you’re like that now. Lots to compensate for your brother being a quidditch star.”

“Are you kidding me? Working as a bulletin writer has been my dream job since forever,” Sirius replied, chuckling faintly.

“Sure,” Remus laughed. “I always wanted to be an airplane pilot.”

“Sounds exciting.”

“What about you?”

“I just told you, postal worker is where it’s at.”

Remus rolled his eyes and leaned towards him.

“I mean it… What was like  your dream job?”

Sirius shrugged.

“Nothing. Being the heir of a pure blood dynasty is kind of a huge deal, I have enough money to live life with luxury, so I don’t really care.” As soon as the words “pure blood” left his mouth, Sirius wanted to bite them back.

Remus’ mouth twisted in mock disgust. “Oh, Merlin, I really hope that was a joke,” he blurted.

Sirius coughed awkwardly, but Remus didn’t say anything else, as if he were still waiting for his answer. As if he really

cared

for his answer.

“Well, it’s silly actually,” he waved his hand across the room, trying to dismiss the question. “I wanted to be an auror? I even took the tests and all that but… you know.”

“No, I don’t know. Please, Mister Black, enlighten me,” Remus insisted, interlacing his long, pale fingers over the table. They were thin and boney, and full of calluses, and there was something strong and confident in the way they moved.

Sirius sighed. “All right. I was a bit of a dick back then and I did some stupid things. I mean, I’m still a bit of a dick, but… they were willing to take me anyway. Because of my family’s name and all that, but I… I don’t want to owe anything to that, to them.”

“Biting the hand that fed you?” Remus joked.  “How canine of you.”

The comment made Sirius chuckle. “Why, thank you. Actually that’s what my friends call me. Padfoot, like a dog.”

“Oh. Kids in elementary used to call me Anal Boy,” Remus noted. Sirius choked with his own saliva before he could clarify. “It was because I was very neat and organized, Merlin’s balls, what is wrong with you.”

“That’s probably not something you should be sharing,” Sirius laughed, amused at how easily Remus could blush.

(22)

“There should be a quidditch video game,” Regulus assessed, as he unsuccessfully tried to catch a prize box.

“You would suck in that one too,” Sirius laughed.

“Like you suck your office crush?” teased Regulus. Somehow, it worked, as Sirius’ kart lost control for a split second –enough for Regulust to take advantage of it.

“It’s not a crush. And I’m not gonna suck him ever,” Sirius replied. “He’s just a… fellow co-worker who enjoys the same things I do.”

“Maybe that’s because you spend half of the day trying to find things in common,” Regulus replied. “I’m getting tired of the whole ‘He’s a fan of the Holyhead Harpies too, and he has an LP of The Bad Wolves on his desk. We drink the same beer and he wasn’t in Hogwarts, but I bet he would’ve been a Gryffindor. Bla, bla, bla. Remus marry me.’”

Sirius tossed a pillow in Regulus’ direction but his brother ducked just in time, still laughing. “I didn’t say ‘Remus, marry me’. And still, you have to admit it’s too much of a coincidence. Even James dislikes The Bad Wolves.”

“Yeah, because they suck,” Regulus assessed, kicking away the pillow. “Besides, you don’t have the right to rant non-stop about someone just because he likes the same bizarre things you do.”

“For the last time, I’m not in love with him!” Sirius replied, smashing a red shell onto his brother’s kart. Yoshi made a whimpering sound as he entered the finish line in 4
th
place. Sirius tossed the controller on the couch with a self-sufficient smile, his half of the screen shining with the 1
st
place golden number. Regulus smirked, still with the controller in his hands. “What?”

“I didn’t say that you were in love with him,” his little brother replied. Sirius narrowed his eyes before letting his arms loose at his sides in defeat.

“Fuck you and your inverse psychology,” he cursed.

“It wasn’t inverse psychology. It’s just that you’re stupid,” Regulus replied, patting his shoulder playfully. Sirius chuckled and then Regulus asked, in a more solemn tone. “Have you told James?”

Sirius’ smile smeared in a matter of seconds. He stared at the tip of his shoes as he replied, “I don’t think I should. He’ll freak out or something.” He shrugged, trying to send away the knot in his stomach.

“Dude, you almost adopted him as our brother,” Regulus insisted. “He

has

to know.”

Sirius recovered his relaxed pose and tousled his little brother’s hair. “Now you’re the wise one too?”

(13)

Sirius fixated his gaze in a dark blotch on the St. Mungo’s cafeteria wall, trying violently to divert his thoughts from Remus Lupin. Remus Lupin and his stupid love bite in the neck. Remus Lupin and his poor way of lying when he answered the “How was your weekend?” question with a loose smile and a simple “It was

fine

”. As if those dark rings beneath his eyes weren’t an obvious sign that he didn’t slept all over the weekend because he was too busy having wild sex with a chick that he picked up at a muggle bus.

James’ voice brought him to reality. “Are you okay Padfoot?”

Sirius tried to sound natural and thoughtless. “Yeah, I’m super. Why do you ask?”

“Because you just tore your napkins to ant sized bits,” James replied with a half amused, half worried glare.

Sirius turned his gaze to his lap and discovered a mountain of paper napkins turned into confetti. He was about to shrug and blame it on work stress, but Peter chose that exact moment to be a part of the conversation. “He’s just mad because Remus didn’t show up to work last Saturday and he won’t tell him why,” he explained.

“Ah, so it’s just your ego complaining?” James beamed.

“It’s not my ego,” Sirius retorted, a little hurt. “It’s just that Lupin tosser, I can’t stand him, all right?”

“You didn’t say that last Friday when you were talking about that muggle magic trick that he can do with the cups and the seeds,” Peter said with a mordacious tone.

“Shut up, you little rat,” Sirius barked. “At least I didn’t pee in my pants every time James here caught a snitch.”

“Oh, so does that mean you’re like a fan of this Lupin guy or…?” James asked.

“I think the problem is that it’s not the other way around,” Peter noted, swallowing an entire fry in one bite.

Sirius didn’t answer. He was too busy recalling the day when Remus said he was going to the cafeteria and asked him if he wanted something; Sirius had said “I think you know what I want” jokingly flirting of course, but Remus acted all confused and blushed as if it had been a real proposal. He had to correct and backtrack and clarify it was all a joke and even if Remus acted all apologetic too, he had taken the stairs instead of the lift that day. That tosser.

James smiled faintly as he caught Sirius’ concerned look. “Cheer up, mate! We don’t know, maybe he’s got a crush on you.”

Peter nodded with his trying-to-be-helpful face. “I get clumsy when I have a crush on someone,” he said.

Something jumped inside Sirius’ chest but when he talked, he tried to sound annoyed. “I don’t care if he’s got a crush on me. All I want is for him to have the decency to keep his mood swings on check. I’m not his shrink or something.”

“Have you told him?” James shrugged. As if talking to Remus about mood swings was going to help at all.

“Don’t be stupid,” Sirius replied.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

PART II: A FOUR LETTER WORD

Let me give you a clue. It begins with F.

(31)

Sirius couldn’t understand why anyone in

Weather and Background Music

could think that Regina Phalange’s

Near

was a good album to play non-stop all Monday morning. It wasn’t that Regina’s voice wasn’t likable, it was the lyrics that drove Sirius crazy. He tried casting a Silencing Charm around his entire desk to try and do something, but it didn’t help that Remus kept walking everywhere, crossing several times in Sirius’ range of vision.

It was about the fourth track when Peter came back from the restrooms, looking excited to the point of buzzing. He waved his hands insistently for Sirius to take off the charm and Sirius ignored him for a solid three minutes. When Sirius gave up,

King Arthur

was on.

I fought against Fate, but It can’t be tamed.

It held your feet. It tied your hands and shut your mouth,

Fate, take my breath, engulf my voice, I don’t need them anymore.

Peter indeed, engulfed Regina’s voice with an excited statement, “It’s Friday. The Leaky Cauldron. Karaoke night.”

Sirius shook his head, beaming ironically at his friend, “Oh no, there’s no way we’re going back together in there.”

“For Merlin’s sake, it wasn’t that bad!” Peter whined, as if he was expecting the negative.

“Dude, you made out with the ugliest harpy in the bar, threw up in a semi-giant’s feet and threatened to release the Seven Plagues of Egypt before passing out on the sidewalk.”

Peter’s cheeks reddened with a light pink shade. “All right, I get your point. But this time’s different,” he asserted. “The whole office’s coming.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Sirius raised his wand, ready to cast the Silencing Charm again. “Even if I wanted to, I can’t, there’s a lot of things to…”

“You’re not listening to me!” Peter cut in. “The

whole office

is going.”

Sirius let his eyes wander a split second at Remus’ desk before fixating his gaze back on Peter again. A sudden realization lightened up his eyes. It dimmed when he noticed that Peter shouldn’t know about his crush on Remus. “How did you…?” he asked.

Peter shrugged. “I’m a good observer.”

“I think you mean a good spy, you little rat,” Sirius barked in amusement. “Not a word to James about this, though.”

Peter shook his head vigorously. “My mouth is a tomb. But hey… does that mean you’re coming?”

(31 ½)

Sirius decided at the last minute that he wasn’t going and Peter left alone, wearing his ridiculous

Your mom likes the way I hold the mic

shirt and a disappointed face. He ordered pizza and called James for a movie night but he was busy with Lily in the hospital and movie night and pizza by your own was kind of lame. So he ended up going to karaoke night anyway. He wore his dragon leather jacket for no reason that it made him look cool in a nonchalant way. Not that he wanted to impress anyone, much less one Remus Lupin.

By the time he got to the Leaky Cauldron, Peter was already on his second turn on the mic, his pitchy voice destroying

Living on an Imperius

, by

Dragon Arthur Pendragon

.

THE NE-EEW ERA’S HERE NOOOW

Noo-oh We’re not! I’m not

Living on an Imperius OH-OOH!

He spotted Sirius in the final note and he waved at him before jumping off the stage. Sirius dived through the crowd and into the stage, but changed his route when he saw Remus’ chuckling face by the bar, completely forgetting about his friend.

“Hi,” Sirius called, standing at his left side.

Remus turned to look at him and his mouth curved in a wide smile. “Hey! Peter said you weren’t coming.”

“I had some stuff to take care of before I…” Sirius began, interrupted by Peter suddenly jumping inside his arms, clearly a bit drunk. Sirius pushed him away and Peter chuckled as if being tossed around was the funniest way to spend Friday night.

“Over here!” Peter shouted at the witch on the stage, who was handling the microphone over the crowd. “He wants to go next!”

“I don’t…” Sirius trailed, but he found himself being pushed to the stage and when he turned around to look for Remus, he smiled and raised his thumbs encouragingly.

“Well… I’m not drunk enough for this,” he said, taking the microphone in his hands. It took him longer to say this than to get a shot in his hands, courtesy the bartender said, of one of the girls on table 9.

He drank it in a single swig and put the glass on the wooden stool next to the mic.

“This is a little song by a band you all sure know, The Black Wolves,” he said, to a couple encouraging hoots, and several boos from the crowd. He cleared his throat, glancing nervously in Remus’ direction. “

And one, and two and three…”

Oh please, baby

Come on closer, make me howl

Set the claws, tear me up

Baby, we’ll be animals tonight

Remus looked around and he wasn’t surprised to discover that all of the girls in there were losing their knickers for Sirius’ raspy voice. He was amused however, when in the last verse (

You better run on Wolf’s Moon

), Sirius stared straight at him, licking his upper lip, making him blush slightly. God, he was drunk.

Sirius jumped off the stage and got to Remus in three long strides.

“How did I do it?” he asked in Remus’ ear, like an eager puppy. Remus told himself that Sirius was only so close to him because there was too much noise in the bar, it didn’t mean anything else.

“Tremendous,” Remus replied, as calmly as he could. “The Black Wolves should hire you as their new vocalist.”

“And leave a promising career at the Ministry? No thank you,” Sirius replied ironically. Peter laughed hysterically with the comment and Sirius felt as if the little bubble in which he had mentally placed Remus and him, had exploded. “Come on, let’s get a table.”

They found a free table in a corner near the stage and Sirius pushed Peter against the chair in the wall in order to sit in front of Remus. “Do you want a drink?” Sirius offered clumsily. Remus shook his head, raising his half-empty Butterbeer bottle, “I’m good, thanks.”

“I want a drink,” Peter said.

“So… you do like the

Wolves

?” Sirius asked, completely snubbing Peter.

“They’re nice,” Remus replied. “I kinda prefer the

Rollings

.”

Sirius beamed. “Do you? I love

Sympathy for the Devil

!”

“Really?” Remus asked, looking amused. “Doesn’t your family disagree on your music choices?”

Sirius chuckled and shrugged. “My family disagrees with my life choices in general.”

Peter moved in his seat uncomfortably and tried to cut in the conversation. “I like

The Beatles

.”

“They’re good,” Remus agreed, and then back to Sirius, “This is so weird. I named my first dog after Jagger.”

“Really? What was his name?” Sirius asked.

Remus frowned in confusion, “Um… Mick?”

Sirius felt his face turning red. “Oh. That makes sense.”

Remus chuckled and Sirius thought that Remus’ laugh was not nearly as annoying as he had thought that first day they met.

Unfortunately, Peter interrupted the moment. “So, do you have a girlfriend?”

“No,” Remus replied still with a faint smile. Sirius felt a nice fluttering inside his stomach: no girlfriend.

“Well, why not?” Peter insisted. “I mean, you’re a decent bloke, the uh… must be up someone’s alley right?” he pointed at his own face in a tell-tale way.

“I guess,” Remus replied, blushing uncomfortably.

“I think it makes you look badass,” Sirius interjected. “Your scar.”

“That’s what I was aiming for,” Remus smiled, then came back to Peter. “Thing is Pete, I don’t like…”

“Girls?” Peter interrupted. “Do you like guys? Because that’s fine with us, right Sirius?”

“Why, thanks Peter. But that’s not quite what I was going to say,” Remus rolled his eyes and glanced nervously at Sirius. “I meant that I don’t like relationships. They are messy and someone always ends up hurt.  Maybe it’s selfish, but I like being on my own. I’m happy like that.”

“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Peter sighed, frowning in confusion.

Sirius, that up to this point, was mildly pleased with the way the conversation was going, jumped in his seat. “Wait. What if you meet someone and fall in love?” he asked, directly at Remus.

As a response, Remus laughed. “Do you really believe in that?”

Sirius’ guts stung his chest, offended. “Of course I do. It’s love, not Babbity Rabbity. What do you mean by ‘I don’t believe in love’?”

Remus smiled, as if seeing Sirius fuming with anger amused him somehow. “I didn’t say that I don’t believe in love,” he corrected. “I just said that I don’t like the idea of love. I mean, everyone says that a mom loves their children, but that’s just because they are

hers

, no? Same goes for married couples, or couples in general. It’s pretty possessive, so selfish. And it usually disappears at the very sight of a big problem.”

Sirius didn’t give up. “Well, maybe it wasn’t love. That’s what makes it such a big deal: that’s very hard to find.”

Remus shrugged. “Or maybe all problems are really big.”

Sirius locked gazes with Remus for what seemed to be hours. Feeling a discussion coming, Peter slammed his hand against the table to distract them.

It did the trick. The problem was that they both were not staring at Peter this time. “Ok,” Peter said. “Who’s singing next?”

Remus seemed relieved to have an excuse to leave confrontation behind, but Sirius was mad and confused. “I already sang. You already made a fool of yourself… What about Lupin?” he suggested wickedly.

Remus immediately shook his head. “Oh no, no way. As you said earlier: I’m not nearly drunk enough.”

“That’s easy to fix,” Peter twisted his entire torso to call Tom. “Bartender!”

“No, wait,” Remus protested. “You have no idea. I’m very good at not getting drunk. Ever.”

“Bullshit,” Sirius teased. “Wanna bet?”

“I don’t have any money,” Remus refused, leaning back in his chair.

“You’ll pay me later,” Sirius insisted. Tom arrived with a pair of Butterbeers only to be commanded back into the bar by Peter. “Drinking contest,” he said.

“You should be warned,” Tom whistled, addressing Remus. “He once beat a semi-giant.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll let you beat Pete,” Sirius winked.

It took two Butterbeers and three Fire whiskeys for Peter to pass out, drooling all over the tablecloth. Sirius and Remus had had two rounds more and the effects were starting to show on both of them.

“Another round?” Sirius offered. “I can see you’re about to fall.”

“Funny,” Remus retorted. “I was going to say the

tame shing

about you.”

Sirius barked a laugh.

“Same thing! Shut up, you idiot,” Remus corrected himself.

Peter woke up with Sirius’ loud guffaw; he fluttered his eyes drowsily and asked with a sleepy voice “Are we leaving now? Have you told him yet?”

Sirius stopped laughing and Remus frowned. “Tell him what?” Remus asked.

“Not you,” Peter slapped Sirius’ arm. “You.”

“You’re drunk. Here, let me take you to the chimney, there’s no way I’m letting you Apparate in this state,” Sirius panicked, and tossed one of Peter’s arms over his shoulder and headed over the fire behind the bar.

“Shall we call it draws?” Remus asked.

Sirius glanced back at Remus and noticed with nuisance that the man looked very much sober, despite his previous slip with the words. “Yeah. To be continued, right?.”

Remus chuckled. “Right. I’ll see you Monday, I guess,” he waved.

Sirius nodded, huffing under Peter’s heavy self. “WAIT! He likes you,” Peter shouted with urgency.

“Goodnight Remus,” Sirius interrupted, trying to shut Peter’s mouth.

“I mean, he likes-likes you. For real. Tell him, Padfoot,” Peter insisted. Sirius rushed to the chimney and grabbed a handful of Floo Powder, tossed it along with Peter in the chimney and shouted his address anxiously. He then took a step inside but turned back as he heard Remus’ voice next to him.

“Is that true?” Remus asked. “Do you… like me?”

Sirius stared at him, chasing for the right words. “Yeah, yeah,” he nodded. “I mean, as a friend.”

Remus’ face got a little put out, though he did his best to hide it. “Oh, that’s…  well, that’s cool. Friends. You and me.”

“Yeah, friends,” Sirius repeated. “Great.”

“Great,” Remus echoed. “So… good night.”

Sirius bumped his fist on Remus’ shoulder and bent inside the chimney, mumbling his own address again and jumping inside the green fire. The swirl of colors had barely calmed down when Sirius landed into the empty living room. He sighed and mimicked the shoulder bump with dread.

“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” he closed his eyes and strode violently around the place, slamming against the couches and the center table. Just then, he heard another pair of steps hitting the wooden floor. “Go away Pete,” he growled.

“I’m not Peter,” a voice replied.

Before Sirius could open his eyes, he felt his heart pounding faster. He knew that voice.

“I kinda followed you,” Remus explained, hands inside his pockets and  eyes fixed to the tip of his shoes. “Sorry.”

Sirius tried to say “It’s ok,” but he found his words drowning in Remus’ lips.
 
(34)

Saturday’s early morning should have been the beginning of a long-lasting romance but after the kiss, Remus pulled back awkwardly and Apparated elsewhere, alleging that he was too drunk to deal with this. Then they proceeded to avoid each other like the plague at work, and tacitly agreed on not trying to contact each other over the weekend. To shrug the events of the kiss under the rug.

Monday morning was miserable. And in the afternoon, because of Lady Luck’s wicked sense of humor, they stumbled into each other at the Gemino Room. Sirius was inside first, making a batch of

Which floor shall I go?

for the new employees and he thought of leaving after Remus’ arrival, but his pride nailed his feet on the ground. Remus avoided his gaze, carefully pinning his eyes to Mrs. Montgomery’s Monday Memos for the Office.

“One, two…” Remus counted under his breath, waving his wand from left to right as an exact duplicate of the original landed in a neat pile. Sirius felt the urge of saying something. “It was fun, the other nigh…” And for the second time in three days, he found Remus kissing him, eager and needy. Except this time, he was kissing him back, lifting him a few inches from the floor. Remus clung to Sirius’ neck and then he let it go, picked up his memos and vanished through the door, leaving him alone with a hard on almost as tall as the stack of

Which floor shall I go?

on the desk.
 
They were back at his flat. Remus was with him, nosing around the kitchen and pointing at everything with a critical eye. Sirius thought it was nice for a change, to have someone who knew what all those muggle things were.

“Nice table you got here, very sturdy,” Remus noted, smiling from his seat on top of said table.

Sirius wanted to push him back on the table, and kiss him silly but his train of thought got interrupted by a violent knock at the door. Sirius whined. “I’ll get it.”

James Potter let himself inside the flat the very moment Sirius narrowed the door to check who was outside.

“You bastard,” he said, striding through the living room. “You’re dating a cute bird and I had to hear it from Wormtail?”

“I’m not dating any cute bird,” Sirius retorted.

“Ah, now you’re lying to my face,” James scolded. “Peter told me everything. I think after weeks of you getting all gloomy and rosy on our shoulders, I deserve some details.”

Sirius tried to divert his friend’s way out of the kitchen. “Prongs, I…”

James leaned over the TV and retrieved some stale popcorn from Sunday’s (not) movie night. “Have you banged her already?” he asked with his mouth full.

“Dude, no,” Sirius replied, making a disgusted face.

James insisted. “What? Blowjob? Handjob?”

Sirius tried to pretend none of those words sounded like amazing ideas. “What? No, no jobs, don’t be a dick. We just… we just kissed.”

James whined, fetching a handful of popcorn. “Come on man, level me up. I didn’t suffer your midnight wanks all through school for you to get all prissy and private all of a sudden.”

“Oh beat it,” Sirius replied, although with less bite to his words than he’d liked. “It was better than having you whine all day about Evans.”

Remus emerged from the kitchen, looking amused. James frowned at Sirius.

“Prongs, this is Remus. He works with me and Peter. He’s new in town and I was, uh, showing him around,” Sirius explained quickly.

“Hi,” Remus said, smiling insecurely.

James extended his hand towards him. “Now, you look pretty decent to be hanging out with this piece of shit,” he beamed. “Where were you going anyway? I have a few spare minutes; we can all go grab some beers.”

“Actually…” Sirius tried to find a good excuse to be left alone with Remus when an owl flew through the open window and dropped a note at James’ feet.

“Shit, beeper owl,” he said, reading the note. “Emergency at St. Mungo’s. We’ll have those beers later, ok?”

“Yeah,” Sirius nodded, practically pushing James outside, where he Apparated after a quick “I still want the details,” warning and a quick “Go fuck yourself” from Sirius as he entered the flat again.

“Sorry for that. Do you wanna go eat something?”

“Of course,” Remus agreed. “Just let me find my wank, sorry! I meant,

wand

.”

(66)

“There you are,” Sirius said, opening the door to let Remus inside. “I was thinking we could go to a gig that’s… what are you…? OH. Maybe we

cud fptay bhome

then,” he tried to finish, with Remus’ tongue half way down his throat.

“Don’t you ever shut up?” Remus complained. Sirius was about to reply but Remus slammed the door shut and pushed Sirius against the couch until he fell flat on his back. He began trailing a path of wet kisses across Sirius’ jaw all the way to his ear.

“You know what’s a thing I’ve always wanted to do?”

“I suspect you’re telling me anyway,” Remus replied, biting Sirius’ earlobe.

“Shower sex,” Sirius blurted, fumbling to pull off Remus’ wool sweater.

Remus grasped his fingers between his hands and gave him another sharp bite in the ear. “Whatever, just keep your hands to yourself, all right?”

“Oh, bossy, are we?” Sirius retorted, eyes bright with lust and challenge.

It was his turn to man-handle Remus into the bathroom, nearly tearing the plastic curtain apart in his rush to get them both under the shower. Remus tried to pull Sirius’ leather jacket away but was quickly pushed away with a smirk. “Keep your hands to yourself, would you?”

Remus scoffed. “Oh, you’re not the boss of me,” he said, kissing Sirius’ neck with such viciousness he was sure there was going to be a bruise come the morning.

“So good, fuck,” he sighed.

Remus was holding his wrists on top of his head, pushing him against the bathroom tiles in a way that let him unable to move. The total lack of control over the situation felt so arousing that Sirius wondered if he’d been doing the sex thing wrong all this time. He tried to kiss at Remus, his face the only unrestrained thing of his anatomy, but Remus pulled away, unwinding Sirius’ worn-out Gryffindor scarf from his neck.

“What are you…?” he asked, when he began twisting and turning the scarf over his hands.

Remus gave him a wicked smile for all response and tied the other end of the fabric to the shower head. Sirius was a tall guy, but Remus tied him up in a way that forced him to stand on the tips of his toes, and when Remus stepped back, he nearly fell.

“So pretty,” Remus said, steadying him with one hand.

“Fuck, Remus

please

.”

Remus’ laugh sounded almost like a bark when he kissed him again, biting his lips, neck, tongue, ears, sniffing the leather of his jacket and licking the hollow space between the bones of Sirius’ clavicle. Sirius lost it when Remus’ long fingers made their way down his cotton shirt and to the belt of his jeans. Then Remus’ hand was in his trunk, unzipping the buttons and sneaking inside the thin fabric of his boxers. He pulled the pants down and kneeled between Sirius’ legs, holding his hips with pale, scarred fingers. And

fuck

he was breathing in his cock, hot and needy and all Sirius could do was watch, mesmerized by Remus’ tongue running long strokes over the sensitive skin. Biting, nipping and sucking, in ways that Sirius had never been bit, nipped or sucked before. And Merlin, the only reason he was still standing on his feet was because he was tied that way, but his legs felt like soft butter under Remus’ hot lips. Strong, long fingers pressed the tender skin of his hips, bruising and scratching.

Sirius’ cock made a bobbing motion when Remus let it go and stood on his feet again. Sirius ached for more and could barely restrain himself from humping Remus’ leg, still fully clothed while Sirius himself had his entire lower body exposed, the jeans and underwear pooling around his ankles and leather boots.

“Sirius, oh God, I wanna… can I fuck you?” Remus asked in a whisper against his cheek, making Sirius shake from head to toe. Unable to find the words, he nodded.

Remus stepped back, rummaging through the bathroom’s drawers until he found a pot of vaseline Sirius used to comb his hair. The way his cock jerked up at the thought of Remus touching him was embarrassing, but the other man didn’t notice. He fumbled with his own zipper in close proximity to Sirius, spreading the substance all over his length and hands. Sirius vicariously licked every inch of skin that got close to his mouth and licking became biting when Remus’ cock brushed his own and an adventurous finger made its way up Sirius’ crack. He moaned against Remus’ neck, practically weighing all of his body on him since his legs were no longer supporting him much. Remus propped his legs up on his waist and Sirius pulled him closer instinctively.

“Just… try to relax,” Remus whispered, slipping a second finger and making Sirius squirm at the pressure.

He was all but gone by the time a third finger made his way in, his arms aching and grounding him from the delicious pressure on his cock and balls. He was disappointed when he felt Remus pulling all fingers out.

“Just a sec…” he breathed in Sirius’ face. “Tell me if I’m going too fast.”

Sirius nodded, biting his lip to avoid moaning.

“Don’t you look like a piece of art,” Remus sighed, landing a kiss on Sirius’ cheekbone before leaning inside.

Sirius felt one of his boots dislodge itself from his feet, land on the floor with a heavy thud when Remus finally hit home. He was too afraid to move except to hold to Remus’ waist with his legs. Remus kissed at his face again, hugging his back as he rocked inside and out, brushing Sirius’ bare cock with the rough fabric of his sweater from time to time. He kissed and bit at his jaw, leaving a burning sensation behind that made Sirius leak all over his chest.

“Fuck Remus,” Sirius moaned in the dirtiest voice he could find. It worked. Remus increased his pace, clawing his hands under Sirius’ jacket and t-shirt, leaving red trails of swollen skin behind. Sirius clenched his legs, muttering dirty words in Remus’ ear, sucking, licking, kissing, moaning. Harder. There. Faster.

Please.

And then Remus hit that spot. One spot and everything became a haze of lust and relief for Sirius. It was as if his body no longer belonged to him, as if it had a life of its own. Remus felt the wave of Sirius’ orgasm, breathing uneasily as Sirius’ tight muscles shivered over his cock, how Sirius’ come stained the front of his sweater and Sirius’ leather jacket. How Sirius moaned his name like a mantra, cheeks as red as the scarf and tiny bruises crawling over tan skin. “Sirius,” Remus grunted as he came inside.
 
“So, is it true?” James mocked, pointing at Sirius’ neck and wrists.

“Is what true?” Sirius retorted.

“That love bites?”

Sirius barked a laugh. “Well… if you

really

want to know the details...”

“Oh, gross! Shut up Sirius,” Peter jumped, nearly choking with his food.

“I’m telling you,” he went on. “It was… primal. Like…”

“OH, that’s it,” Peter yelled, covering his ears with his hands as James and Sirius laughed out loud. “OLD MACDONALD HAD A FARM, EEE EYE EEE EYE OH!...”

(91)

“How’s he like?” Lily asked.

“How is who like?”

Lily tousled his hair with the tip of her fingers. “Du-uh. Remus, you derp,” Lily said, tousling Sirius’ hair with her fingers. “Oh, don’t go making a fool of yourself young Mr. Black. James told me everything.”

“I…” Sirius grunted. “He did?”

Lily nodded.

“That bastard.”

“And?”

Sirius tried to find a way out of this and trailed for words. He finally sighed.  “I don’t know. Brown hair, tall?”

“Wow, that’s so specific,” Lily mocked.

Sirius laughed. “I really don’t know what else to say!,” he defended. “I… well, he’s always smiling, but not in a nice way, you know? I mean the polite kind of smile. And I hate it. But sometimes, sometimes he smiles differently and it’s so… warm.” Sirius didn’t add that he especially enjoyed it when he was the one making him smile like that. When Lily didn’t say anything, he went on, “He has to wear glasses when he reads, and his music taste sucks most of the time. But I like that. I guess I can’t help it, you know?”

Lily didn’t say anything and Sirius turned away. There was something about talking to Evans. She was so… motherly –in a completely different way than his own mother, of course. And Sirius felt that he could tell her this. Take it off his chest. Just this once.

“I… I just… I love how he makes me feel… Like anything’s possible. Like, you know… like life is worth it.” It felt good, Sirius thought, to finally say the words. As if the world’s weight had finally hopped off from his shoulders.

“Have you told him?” Lily asked, really looking at Sirius now. And the world’s weight was back. Sirius laughed and stood up, leaving any trail of his previous epiphany behind as well.

“Yeah, I think I should. Anyway, I’m gonna go find Prongs, see you around, right?”

(283)

“Honey? I think we have a basilisk infestation,” Sirius said, poking at a marble Pomeranian statue on a shelf.

Remus looked at him vaguely before picking up his basket and leaving.

(38)

“These muggles are really kind of smart ain’t they?” Sirius pointed out, jumping up and down the escalator’s steps. “I mean, moving stairs

without

magic? That’s genius!”

Remus smiled and followed the rest of the people to the second floor. “People can hear you,” he mumbled.

“That’s so not true,” Sirius replied. “I believe they’ve been mesmerized to the sight of your majestic ass.”

Remus got the slightest of the blushes on his face when Sirius’ hand brushed said majestic ass. “Come on, the couches are this way,” he replied.

Sirius got distracted by a small taxidermy section. “Jesus Christ!” he shouted. “Are this alive?”

“Of course not, you tosser,” Remus laughed. “They’re stuffed animals. Some people like to have them in their houses.”

Sirius whistled, poking a small raccoon’s eye. “That’s wicked, dude. But I can see where mom got the whole chopping off house elves’ heads idea.”

“That’s disgusting,” Remus retorted. Sirius shrugged and kept walking only to be amused again by a telescope standing next to a fake window, he leant over to peer through the lenses and turned back to Remus with a frown on his face. “Sweetheart, I think our telescope is broken. I can’t see a damn thing.”

“That’s because it’s not night time yet, darling,” he played along. “Fancy a cup of tea while we wait?”

“Why, I fancy two cups of tea,” Sirius replied, faking a baritone voice.

“Follow me to the kitchen then,” Remus guided. Sirius picked a pipe from a shelf on his way to the other side of the furniture department. Lupin pretended to pour tea on some flowery china cups while Sirius took a seat on one end of a small mahogany table where he pretended to breathe out smoke rings.

Remus put a teacup in front of Sirius and took him to the other end of the table. “Is the tea all right, honey?” he asked.

Sirius took a sip of invisible tea and slammed his hand over the table. “For Merlin’s beard! This is the best tea I’ve ever tasted.”

“Why that’s because it is the best tea ever made,” Remus replied. Frowning, he fixed his eyes in a corner of the fake kitchen. “Ah, darling, I believe our sphinx has been petrified.”

Sirius followed Remus’ gaze to find a two feet tall stone sphinx. It was really far from what a real sphinx looked like and Sirius fought back a smile. “Oh shit, my mother must’ve come to visit,” he said, making Remus chuckle. “Come on, I race you to the bedroom!”

“Hey, that’s not fair!” Remus shouted, jolting behind Sirius towards the beds display. Even with his head start, Remus quickly left him behind and landed swiftly on a huge bed next to a living room display. Sirius crawled slowly next to him, heavy and elegant strands of hair framing his face. He leant over Remus, breathing on his cheek. “Honey, I don’t know how to tell you this, but…” he began, Remus held his breath. “I think we’re being arrested.” Remus turned to the stairs to discover a couple of muscular staff guys going in their direction, guarding a tiny muggle in a navy blue suit.

“Gentleman,” he said, a manager badge hanging from his jacket. “I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave. This is a family business you see.”

“Indeed, and we’re trying to make some family here, you see,” Sirius retorted, making Remus blush all the way up to his brow.

And that’s how they ended up escorted out by a couple of beefy guards.

“I believe I had a hat!” Sirius shouted as soon as the staff members went back inside the store.

Remus cracked with laughter at this and had to hold himself against the wall. “You idiot,” he said, still smiling.

“You sexy motherfucker,” Sirius replied, cupping his face on his hand and planting a soft kiss on his lips. Remus smiled against Sirius’ face and split apart, leaning over the hard concrete wall.

Sirius stared at him for a brief moment before asking, “Is something wrong?”

“Not exactly,” Remus replied, looking away from him. “It’s just… I wanted to let you know that I… am not exactly looking for a serious thing. I have other stuff going on in my life right now.”

Sirius freaked out but years of practice made him push that feeling down, beneath layers and layers of sarcasm and carelessness. “Yeah, it’s fine.”

“All right,” Remus replied. “Back to your place then?”

Sirius nodded, walking to a small alley so they could Apparate without being seen. Remus held his hand tightly right when the bricks began to turn into a red swirl. Sirius smiled, landing neatly on his feet, contrary to Remus, who tripped with the bed’s border and fell over it.

“Now,” Sirius smiled, tugging his shirt off. “Where were we?”

“Oh, I bet you planned all of this, didn’t you?” Remus laughed.

“Mhm,” Sirius nodded, brushing his lips on Remus’ fingertips.

“So wanton,” Remus mocked.

Sirius chuckled and tried to unbutton Remus’ shirt but he grabbed his hand and tossed it aside. “Shouldn’t you buy me a drink first?” Lupin laughed.

“I’ll get you a fucking pub next time we go out,” Sirius promised. Remus beamed, sliding his long fingers across Sirius’ back, tracing a cold path underneath his clothes, unbuttoning the jeans and zipping Sirius down. “Deal,” Remus whispered hot and fuzzy on Sirius’ cock.

(39)

“Dude, what’s gotten into you?” Peter said, waving his hand in front of Sirius’ dreamy face.

James swallowed a French fry without chewing it, a wicked grin forming on his face. “It’s as clear as

Veritaserum

, Wormtail. He got laid,” he explained.

“Jealous much, Prongs?” Sirius teased.

“Jealous? No way. More like eager for the details,” James retorted.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

PART III: I BELIEVE YOU, LIAR

(300)

If Sirius would’ve kept his eyes fixed on Remus' former desk for any longer, said desk might have caught fire, along with the new assistant.

Fortunately for the desk and Mrs. Montgomery’s secretary, Ernie Biggs blocked Sirius’ range of vision when he leant over the desk to shamelessly flirt with her. If Sirius felt in the mood, Ernie wouldn’t have had any chance. But Sirius didn’t feel like flirting. Or breathing. Or living at all.

“Did you get him back yet or what?” Peter asked, glaring at him as if Sirius was about to burst out in tears.

“I’m working on it,” Sirius replied, fighting back a sigh.

Peter’s face went from a little worried to extremely helpless. What kind of advice could he give to someone like Sirius? “Moody’s doing interviews for the Force again,” he tried.

“What.”

“I said that my mom’s doing fondue for dinner again,” he backed out.

“Why do you tell me that?” Sirius replied. Fortunately for Peter, a brown owl chose that moment to fly across the door and drop a small note in Sirius’ desk. He checked the calligraphy and beamed in happiness, suddenly forgetting about the rest of the world.

“It’s his,” he announced. Peter stared as Sirius’ eyes ran across the parchment, his hopeful face smudging with every second that passed.

It was good to hear from you.

I can’t this week but maybe next? I’ve been very busy.

I hope this means you’re ready to be friends.

Love,

Remus

(43)

If there was one thing Sirius was very good at, it was moving in silence. Years of hiding from his mother’s frightful

Cruciatus

and his father’s cold-hearted beatings had raised him that way. Maybe that was the reason he didn’t brag about it so often. This time, however, he was glad of this almost natural talent since it had allowed him to follow Remus Lupin inside the Gemino Room without being seen nor heard; at least, not until he locked the door behind him.

“I want to talk to you,” Sirius demanded firmly.

Remus lifted an eyebrow. “Here?”

“

Muffliato

. It’s kind of urgent,” Sirius insisted.

Remus didn’t know what that spell was and he had the weird sensation that Sirius had invented it. He wondered if it was dangerous. “Fine,” he nodded. “What do you want to talk about?”

Sirius went straight to the point. “You weren’t here yesterday, nor the day before yesterday. Where did you go?”

“It is none of your business,” Remus replied, a little too rude. This however, did nothing but make Sirius angrier. “Has London become too boring for you?” he asked. But the way he said it implied that he didn’t really mean London.

“My grandmother was sick,” Remus gave in. “I had to go help my mom with some stuff. Satisfied?”

Sirius grinned, relieved. “For Merlin’s sake, couldn’t you just say it was your sick grandmother from the beginning? I was so worried, why the secrecy? Is she the Queen or something?”

“If she is I wouldn’t tell, would I?” Remus replied, breathing easily when his lie succeeded. “Can I go now? Mrs. Montgomery is waiting for her mail.”

Sirius waved his wand across the room and the door opened with a soft click. “Oi Remus,” he called. Lupin stopped with his hand in the door knob. “Is she better?”

“Who?” Remus realized it was a stupid question to ask the moment it left his mouth. Sirius’ smile was replaced by a pair of arching eyebrows. “My grandmother of course. Sorry, I’ve been a little distracted lately,” Remus rushed. “She’s fine. Mom’s taking care of her now.”

“Good,” Sirius replied. “Tell her I said hi.”

“I will,” Remus nodded and left the room.

Sirius stood there alone for a good five minutes. He was very good at being stealthy, but he was even better at detecting lies and Remus Lupin was lying. He only had to figure out why.

(54)

“I still don’t get it. What’s the big deal with the nerd glasses?”

Remus sighed, “For the last time, Sirius, it’s not about the glasses, or the high waisted pants. It’s about the brains.”

Sirius frowned at the Betamax cassette on his hands. “I still think he looks like my uncle Cygnus. But if you say he’s good, then he must be good.”

“He’s not just good, he’s God!” Remus stressed.

Sirius let out a crooked smile and pulled Remus behind a shelf. “We’ll take that one,” he said, planting a lazy kiss on Remus’ lips. “But first let’s get a porno.”
 
Remus panted at Sirius’ open mouth as he stumbled against every piece of furniture in his house, struggling to get inside the bedroom. Sirius felt dizzy and drunk with Remus’ kisses, his touches, his muffled

I love yous

into his ear. When they finally made it to the bedroom, Sirius pushed Remus over the bed and jumped over him like a hungry dog. He spread his legs with one knee and left a wet trail of kisses over Remus’ jaw. Remus moaned when Sirius kissed a spot behind his ear and Sirius bit him there when he discovered it made Remus faintly thrust his hips upwards. A hand sliding inside Sirius’ pants told him Remus was tired of him having all the fun. Sirius twisted and panted and breathed uneasily against Remus’ skin. But when Black adventured a hand under Remus’ shirt, he got pushed away. “Shit Remus,

please

…”

When Remus didn’t give up, Sirius decided to go for a more aggressive tactic. After all, he wasn’t that good with words. Remus whimpered at the heavy weight of a hand over his crotch, fabric feeling heavy and painful.

“I could do so much better with your clothes off,” Sirius whispered into his ear. Remus bit his lip and Sirius thought it was the sexiest thing he had ever seen. “Turn off the lights,” he ordered with a harsh voice. So Sirius did.

Even if he couldn’t quite see his face, Sirius could feel Remus trembling against him, hear him gasping for air. Even if Sirius couldn’t see a thing, it was Remus’ legs being tossed over Sirius’ shoulders and it was Remus’ coarse voice saying “Fuck me,” in Sirius’ ear. Shit, even the neighbors must have noticed the headboard slamming against the wall, pacing Remus’ moans as Sirius fucked him between wet kisses and heavy breathing. They must have heard when Remus melted around Sirius, howling loud and savage. Sirius wished that the lights were on so he could see his own fingers turning white on the tips from clenching Remus’ hips through his own orgasm.

He did reach for the light once they were both lying side to side, trying to regain their breath, but Remus stopped him, pulling Sirius’ body inside his long arms, “Don’t.”

“Don’t you wanna get cleaned?” Sirius asked, even if he felt his own body lazy and numb.

“Later,” Remus replied, pulling him closer. And later it was.

(108)

“Are we there yet?” Remus asked, struggling to get Sirius’ fingers off his eyes.

“Just a second,” Sirius guided. “There.”

Remus blinked a couple of times to get used to the light again. When he did, the only thing he could see in front of him was grass, an old elm and “It’s just a park bench,” he stated.

Sirius made an offended noise and Remus couldn’t tell if it was for real or just one of his usual exaggerations. “How dare you Remus John Lupin? This is not just

a park bench

! Sit there you idiotic git.”

Remus did and this time, he looked around. It really was a park bench, but it was the only one within at least a five meter radius. Behind him, the elm cast its old shadow over his face but his long feet tangled on small sun threads. It was cleverly positioned at the very top of the hill and Remus had an astounding view of the city and —maybe because of his werewolf ear, he could even hear all kinds of sounds, voices and music coming from it.

“Do you like it?” Sirius asked, sitting next to him.

“I love it,” Remus beamed. “What is this place?”

Sirius shrugged, but Remus could feel that his next words were more important than what he wanted him to believe. “I found it when I was a kid. I used to come here to think, and… just so I could be alone, you know?”

Remus took Sirius’ hand between his. Remus knew. Sometimes your life’s weight seems too much to keep it over your shoulders. It was nice to have a place to unwind.

“It’s my favorite place in the world,” Sirius whispered, almost as if it was a crime to have a favorite place.

Remus leant his head on Sirius’ shoulder. People didn’t usually trust him with important or significant details of their lives —not many people were willing to open their souls to a cursed beast anyway. “Do you want to come to my place?” Remus asked.

It was the first time he had offered to share his hideaway, but it was only fair.
 
Sirius had always considered himself a free spirit. He abandoned his family’s house without almost any regrets and he had a flying motorcycle that could take him anywhere in the world if he wanted to, for Merlin’s sake. But that Friday afternoon, he realized he wasn’t a free soul at all. Remus was. And it was not as romantic as everyone else pictured it.

Because even if Lupin had been living in London for nearly three months now, there still were unpacked boxes here and there and the only things Remus had taken out were just basics: a tablecloth in the kitchen, a set of cheap teacups, old jackets and a scruffy pair of brown slippers. There were also weird souvenirs over the chimney and the tea table: a wooden piano sculpture, a moving replica of the Thames, unsettling paintings by unknown muggle painters, a black top hat, a creepy voodoo doll and a rusty cauldron. It all resembled more to a nest than to a house.

“Do you want to come into the bedroom?” Remus asked, looking dubious. Sirius nodded, fearing he might regret inviting him.

As soon as Remus opened the bedroom’s door, Sirius decided he loved it. It was similar to the rest of the house, but it smelt like Remus, and despite its emptiness, it felt like Remus. The only furniture was a plain steel bed with clean white blankets and a carved wardrobe that seemed to be the only expensive thing in the entire house. The room however was full with books: old books, new books, books piled in towers higher than the floor lamp, unread books marked with parchment and quills, open books sprawled over the bed —Sirius guessed with a grin that the wardrobe was also full with books instead of clothes. Finally, tangled in the bedhead it was Sirius’ red and gold scarf. Remus blushed when he noticed, “I found it yesterday. I didn’t even know I had it,” Remus explained, taking it between his thin fingers.

Sirius wrapped the scarf on Remus’ neck and it was so long that after two twists it still brushed the floor. “Keep it, as a trophy” he winked. Remus smiled.
 
Sirius couldn’t understand why Remus considered his house a sacred place, even if it was more a nest than a house. Still, he was glad that he had opened the door for him. He loved the silences in Remus’ sacred nest and he loved Remus’ narrow bed because they had to squeeze to fit inside. He loved how easy it was to say the silliest fears without feeling silly and he loved how Remus asked absurd questions about him.

“No. I’ve never been in a tornado,” Remus replied and elbowed Sirius’ chest. “It’s your turn to ask,” he pushed.

“Can I stay here tonight?” he asked.

Remus kept silent a split second and then he said “Why yes you can, but that wasn’t a proper question.”

“All right, um…  What's your worst fear?” Sirius inquired again, maybe he had gone too far, but he was eager to drink as much of Remus as he could.

“Vampires,” Remus replied, smiling.

“Come on! I’m serious.”

“And I’m Remus, nice to meet you,” Remus chuckled and Sirius couldn’t fight back his own laughter. They laughed so hard and for so long that they forgot what they were laughing about in the first place. Remus almost fell from the bed and Sirius pushed him closer.

“You know,” Remus said, absently tracing circles on Sirius’ chest. “When I was a little child we lived in a country house. It wasn’t too big but it had huge windows. My mom loved to sit in the backyard and stare at the woods when dad wasn’t home. She used to tell me stories…”

“Muggle fairy tales?” Sirius interrupted.

Remus didn’t look at him but he chuckled and Sirius felt that laugh vibrate through his own skin. “No. They were stories about dad, about my grandparents… You know, nice stories. My great-great grandfather killed a bear in those same woods,” Remus stopped then and took a deep breath. “When I couldn’t sleep I would stare at the woods from my window. I was afraid that a bear could somehow come inside the house and kill my parents while I was sleeping, so I didn’t sleep some nights, keeping them safe…” Remus laughed coldly, as if trying to brush away the sudden shiver running through his spine. “I was just a kid. So… naïve.”

Sirius couldn’t find any words for a while and when he did, he realized he didn’t want to break the silence for it was as sacred as Remus’ house and Remus’ fear. Instead, he held Remus’ hand tight between his and wondered if anyone had heard this story before.

(109)

“But he does, right? He, you know, swings for your team?” James attacked.

Sirius didn’t know what to answer. He blamed it on the St. Mungo’s aseptic environment. Like, even their cafeteria smelt like medicine —it felt like some kind of torture. So he took the easy way out. “I don’t know yet.”

“Are you his boyfriend?” he asked.

Sirius decided not to look him on the eye. “It’s not that simple. It’s…”

Peter came back from the counter with an ice cream bowl. “What’s not that simple?”

“I want to know if Sirius’ crush is his boyfriend or just a one night stand,” James replied.

“Oh,” Peter sat next to James and licked the spoon. “And what’s the hard part then? Padfoot loves to brag.”

“I know!” James agreed. “It’s not even a hard question. Look: Pete, are you straight and do you have a girlfriend?”

Peter cleared his throat and replied in a silly pompous tone “Why, that’s two questions dear Prongs. But for the sake of our endless friendship I’ll try to respond to both right away. Yes indeed, I am straight. And, no I don’t have a girlfriend. In fact, I’m starting to believe girls find my very existence to be offensive. But do tell me, do you have a girlfriend?”

“Astoundingly I do. Her name’s Lily and we’re getting married,” James replied. “See Pads? It’s not a hard question.”

Sirius sipped at his pumpkin juice. “Well it’s not hard if you’ve had the same girlfriend since sixth grade.”

“And you’ve been seeing this dude for what… Two months? Three months?” James pointed out. “You’ve got to talk to him.”

“I’m not discussing this with you guys,” Sirius said blatantly. “I’m not having any kind of ‘talk’ with Remus because I know what I feel and he knows what he feels and we’re not doing labels.”

James’ made a coughing sound and tried to swallow the piece of carrot stuck in his throat. Sirius thought he deserved it.

“You sound gay,” Peter said, taking advantage of the sudden silence.

“Yeah, you really do,” James agreed once he un-choked.

“Maybe because I am? Morons,” Sirius replied.

(116)

Sirius waved at Regulus before taking a seat in one of the higher rows. It took his little brother less than a minute to stop the training session and fly his broom in his direction.

“What’s up?” he asked, dismounting neatly next to him.

Sirius shrugged. “Not much.”

Regulus gave him a side look. “What’s wrong? Is it Remus again?”

“I don’t really want to talk about it,” Sirius gave up. “James won’t understand and Pete won’t understand. Even Evans won’t understand! Long story short, I’m here because I didn’t have anyone else.”

“Now, that’s what I wanted to hear,” Regulus replied. “Do you mind telling me more about me being your last choice?”

“Come on, you were my parent’s last choice, Lorna Mathews’ last choice… you must see a pattern somewhere,” Sirius beamed. “Can I have an extra broom or what?”

Regulus elbowed his brother’s ribs. “Come along young grasshopper,” he said, calling a broom from the supplies room. Sirius jumped on it quicker than you can say

Accio

.

“Oh, and Sirius?” Regulus called, once there were a few meters between them. “Do you still think you’d be Lorna’s first choice if she knew about your filthy deviations?”

“Your nose is the only deviated thing in our family!” Sirius shouted back, laughing.

(117)

“Are you ok?” Remus asked.

From where Sirius was sitting he could only see half of his face but he seemed honest. “Yeah. Perfect.” he replied.

“Sure?”

The tube stopped and the old woman sitting in the seat next to theirs got off. Sirius took a deep breath. “I just… I gotta ask you something.”

Remus closed the book he had been reading and stuck it inside his messenger bag. “What is it?”

The moment Remus looked at him, Sirius forgot his speech —he even considered changing the subject and leaving the things as they were. But he was a Black, goddammit, he wasn’t going to back away like that. “What are you?”

“What kind of question is that?” Remus replied, looking confused.

“Did you like men before me? Or am I just some kind of experiment?” Sirius asked straightforwardly.

Remus seemed put-out for a second. But he recovered quite quickly “Did

you

like men before me?”

“No, but… Forget it, that’s not the point… I just… I just need to know where we are going, all right?”

“I thought we were going to the library. Movie night, remember?” Remus replied.

“You know what I mean,” Sirius blurted.

Remus shrugged, calmly, as if he wasn’t as nervous as Sirius for having this conversation. “I don’t know. But who cares? I’m happy, aren’t you happy?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m happy,” Sirius replied, except he wasn’t happy. He felt anger rising in his stomach. He was angry because Remus couldn’t care less and he was angry because his palms wouldn’t stop sweating.

“Good,” Remus smiled.

“Good,” Sirius replied.

Remus leant his head on Sirius’ shoulder and his anger recoiled and cooled like a hypnotized snake. Remus was right, they were young, they were happy and they were going to see a stupid French movie. Who cares about labels?

(249)

Throughout the years, Sirius had learnt that girls were more likely to have sex after the first date if they felt understood and there was no way to make a bird feel understood than taking her to Madam Puddifoot's Tea Shop. This was one of the reasons he was glad Remus wasn’t a girl: the Three Broomsticks was more than ok for him. When he mentioned this fact out loud however, Remus shrugged and let his eyes wander across the wall. Sirius tried to change the subject, with abrupt results.

“Say, have you read The Prophet lately? I don’t understand why the Ministry is so interested in developing those hybridization potions,” he said. “It’s just sick, if you ask me. ‘The strength of a werewolf, the speed of a vampire… It’s like… have they forgotten those are curses, not super-magical powers, or what?”

Remus shrugged. “Some people don’t think that way.”

Sirius shook his head. “I think they should focus on keeping them from hurting someone else. Or themselves. Merlin knows that’s the right thing to do. Stupid Unspeakables.”

“They are science men,” Remus replied stoically.

“Well, yeah. You’re smarter than them,” Sirius amended.

Remus arched his eyebrows. “I was thinking about taking one of those potions,” he said, challenging.

“No,” Sirius said, maybe a little too fast. “You don’t need any of that.”

Remus grinned wryly. Sirius regretted reacting so hauntingly fast and looked for the words to explain Remus that he would love him even if he decided to switch bodies with Dumbledore, but another man chose that moment to approach drowsily to their table. “Hey,” he said, staring at Remus. “How’s it going?”

“Okay, thanks,” Remus replied, deliberately not looking at him. Sirius nailed his gaze on the guy, as if he could make him vanish with the mere strength of his will.

“Are you with this guy?” the man asked, staring back at Sirius.

“Hi I’m Sirius. It’s not my pleasure to meet you, jerk,” Sirius replied. “Can you leave us alone now?”

The guy drank what was left in his glass and continued, pointing at Remus. “You know, they shouldn’t let people like you inside nice places like this.”

Remus didn’t reply but Sirius did. “Don’t worry, if you keep drinking like that you’ll black out very soon and won’t see us anymore.”

“Ain’t you Sirius Black?” the man said. “What would your mommy do if she knew you’re hanging out with

this scum

?”

Sirius let out a cold laugh. Next thing the guy saw was a fist slamming to his face, making bones crunch beneath sweaty skin.

“SIRIUS, DON’T,” Remus called, but it was a little late for warnings. The man punched back and Sirius pushed him into the ground, where they began rolling, biting and scratching each other. After a few tables were knocked to the ground and a bunch of over-enthusiastic customers began kicking Sirius and the man as they rolled next to them, Rosmerta (honoring the pub’s name) tried to split them apart using a broomstick.

Remus cursed behind his breath and conjured a shield spell that made both men jump to opposite sides of the room.

“I’m so sorry,” Remus mumbled as he passed next to Rosmerta on his way out. Sirius jogged behind him a few blocks and when he finally got a grip to his elbow, Remus Apparated inside his own house. Sirius landed in all four, staining the carpet with nose blood. Remus picked him up with a violent pull and Sirius pressed his hand to his nose to prevent any more bleeding.

It took a few strides from Remus to reach the fridge and toss him a plastic bag filled with ice. Sirius caught it and laughed. “What?” he called. “It was fun!”

Remus stood in the middle of the kitchen with his lips pursed together. Sirius didn’t let himself down and continued. “Did you see the look on his face? He must’ve thought I was going to challenge him for a duel or something but BANG he got a punch straight to his face. Fuck, I’ve forgot how fun it was, there’s been some time since I… All-right What’s the matter?”

“Nothing,” Remus breathed. He frowned and added, “I can’t believe you.”

“What?” Sirius jumped. “Wait. Are you mad at me? I just got my ass kicked for you.”

“Oh really?” Remus pushed. “Was that for me? Because it felt as if it was for you and your stupid ego.”

Sirius stumbled on his words. “What? It wasn’t… I didn’t… That idiot was saying awful things!”

“You were saying awful things as well. Did I punch you in the face for that? No,” Remus replied, tossing his wand over the coffee table mess.

“I knew you were upset,” Sirius replied. “And it’s me who can’t believe you. It was very easy to just open your mouth and say ‘Sirius, I don’t agree with your bullshit’ and I would have shut my mouth right there.”

“Please! As if you ever shut up,” Remus roared. “The only person you listen to is yourself, you selfish bastard!”

“Am I now? It’s you who's completely obtuse!” Sirius barked. “You walk around pretending you’re the best employee anyone could want, the best son, the best everything. But you’re just as selfish as me. Shit, you can’t even admit you love me because that’ll be committing and I bet you have never committed to anything in your life. You just

love

to be free to flee whenever you’re bored and a bond like that doesn’t break easily.”

“You don’t know me at all,” Remus replied.

“How am I supposed to get to know you if you don’t let me?” Sirius shouted. “You keep building this stupid walls around you. And every time I try to tear one you go ‘turn the lights off’.”

Remus slammed his hands in the air. “So it’s all about me? Well, you know what? Fuck off Sirius! You knew how this was from the moment we started. I told you that it wasn’t going to work but you insisted and insisted because you’re a fucking rich kid that always gets what he wants.”

“What! How come I am the childish one? Because as far as I remember, every time we have a problem it’s you and not me the one who comes up with the

‘AMAZING’

idea of breaking up. Instead of you know, TALKING LIKE EVERY OTHER COUPLE IN THE FREAKING WORLD. So who’s the brat now?”

Remus’ face twitched. “Fine! You want to talk about

‘it’

. You want to pretend that you don’t know. That you don’t know why that man was saying those awful things. That you don’t already know why I deserve each of them. That you don’t know why I’m ashamed of my

very skin

. WELL! LET’S TALK!” Remus snarled. Sirius didn’t notice he had been stepping back until he hit the wall with his back. “Do you want to know why I have to take muggle jobs? Do you want to know why I can’t afford to bond with anybody?”

For Sirius’ surprise, Remus was stripping down his sweater, then unbuttoning his shirt and kicking away his pants. He wasn’t driven by any sexual urge, but a raw rage, that made him twitch and growl. Something so strong that made Remus, a boney pale man in underwear, look far more threatening than any grown up man in underwear should be. Sirius’ gaze got stuck in Remus’ deep scars, breaking the soft white of his skin. Some of them were new, pink in the edges but most of them were old and bumpy.

“There you go. Lights are on and I’m here… Look at me while I’m talking to you, goddammit!” Remus called.

Sirius shivered.

Remus’ eyes were as yellow as burning gold, almost animalistic. “And? Have you figured it out yet?”

Sirius was not stupid. He had figured it out a long time ago. But he chose to ignore it. Thinking about the word ‘werewolf’, even saying the word out loud was not the same as labeling the person in front of him as one. This was not a game anymore, this was real. Sirius hadn’t been so afraid, so grossed out and so confused since he was sixteen, running away from Them.

It was this realization that made him settle his mind. This felt like Grimmauld Place all over again. And just as he did back then, he cooled his mind, lied to himself, numbed whatever he was feeling and raised his chin high up. “You might want to lower your voice down. Don’t want any neighbors hearing you howl.”

Remus’ eyes lit with a vicious wrath. “This is it? You begged for me to break down my… everything just so you could mock me? Well, that ain’t gonna happen. Because I’ve had enough of people like you, hedonist pieces of shit. You try to blame it all on me but guess what? I didn’t choose to become this! But you… you are a big, spoiled brat on your own.”

Remus’ words stung like nails under Sirius’ skin. “I don’t want to see you near me or my friends anymore. You… beast,” Sirius said, poison bathing each word.

And just as quick as it began, Remus’ rage turned to hurt and embarrassment. Remus was still standing in front of him, hands no longer clenched in fists, naked and boneless. Sirius took advantage of this and pushed him away, fleeing to the exit door before his lips could say what they were longing to.

When are you going to trust me?

Sirius landed on all fours,

like a dog.

When he pushed himself up with the hard brick wall he felt something stuck in his chest and thought he was going to puke. What left his mouth instead was a short whimper. He wasn’t going to cry, he was going to force all the tears back with Firewhiskey and a quick snog.

Except that after he took the first swig of Firewhiskey, his will to leave the flat abandoned him. Angry tears did drip their way down his cheeks as he shot several spells in every direction. Burning furniture and crashing dishes, books, LP’s and…

“Who is it?!” he yelled, straddling furiously through the stairs and opening the downstairs door with a violent pull. “Remus?”

Remus looked down. “I… I just wanted to give this back,” he said, reaching Sirius’ old Gryffindor scarf.

Sirius pushed Remus’ hand back. “It was a gift.”

“There’s something else. I… I shouldn’t have said all those things before. I’m very, very…”

“Don’t. I… don’t want to hear it. You were right. I’m the one who should…” Sirius trailed. “You need to understand. Sometimes it feels as if you were drifting away. And I don’t want to lose you.”

Remus’ lips tugged in a crooked smile. “You can’t lose me Sirius. You can’t own people,” he mumbled, laying a soft kiss on his lips.

You own me.

“Do you want to come upstairs?”

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

PART VI: MOONY

(400)

Dear Remus

I just thought you would like to know that I’m banging women again. And that I don’t really want to see your face again. I think you’re an ambiguous piece of shit and if it wasn’t because of you I would probably be an auror by now. But turns out you made a mess with me when you decided to leave. And I’m not sure if I can ever forgive you for that.

And you don’t have an idea of how eager I’m to be over you. Because the truth is, I don’t hate you as much as I would like to. And it’s not your fault that I was stupid enough to fall for you.

Sirius

He wasn’t going to send it, of course. But it was February, every street had red and pink paper hearts. He had gotten an invitation for Frank and Alice’s wedding in the mail this morning and writing this made him feel better. All he wanted to do was write this same letter over and over again and feed a fire with its words.

(250)

“I know you’re not going to tell me whether you’re straight or not but,” Sirius said. “Could you at least tell me how many relationships you have had?”

Remus sat properly on the bed. Sun rays tangled around his face and hair. “Oh, you don’t want to go there.”

“Come on! I’ll tell you mine,” Sirius almost begged.

“Well, it’s not as if it was a secret. I bet I could go and ask either Peter or James and they would tell me everything about your past love life and a few embarrassing anecdotes,” Remus replied, pulling one of his legs closer to his chest. “But if you really want to know…” Sirius nodded. “Fine. But I warn you, it’s not a very long list.”

“I can share you some of my list,” Sirius offered.

Remus chuckled. “Good. Let’s see… There was my teenage sweetheart, Gemma Smith; she was our neighbor, and we just kissed and held hands. Then there was August Healey, he was a muggle journalist. And finally Edmund Schott, his father was a werewolf. It didn’t work out.”

“Oh, so do you only date people with smart names?”

“Until now,” Remus beamed. “Well, your turn.”

Sirius took a deep breath. “Do you really want me to tell you about all the girls I’ve dated? Because we could be here until sunset.”

Remus gave him a gentle kick. “Don’t be stupid. Tell me about the ones that lasted more than one night.”

“Does it count if there were two different nights?”

(166)

“Are you dressed?” Peter asked after knocking three times in Sirius’ bedroom door.

“It’s not as if you haven’t seen me naked before Wormtail.”

“I’ve seen

you

, but I still have some respect for Remus,” Peter replied.

Remus chuckled. “Yes, we are dressed,” he said.

Peter opened the door and peered his head inside. “Great. James and I are gonna go eating out. Do you guys want to join us?”

Sirius exchanged a look with Remus before responding. “Is Evans coming?”

“She’s got the night shift. It’s just us.”

“Guys night then,” Sirius smiled. “I needed one of those.”

“We’ll be waiting outside then,” Peter said. “And Sirius? It was going to be a guy’s night but now you’re coming along so I’m not sure how are we supposed to call it”

Sirius tossed a shoe in Peter's direction. “Sod off, Stinky Pete!”
 
Despite Peter's joke, the evening went on as their usual guy’s night, with the obvious addition of Remus to the gang. Muggle downtown and sushi for the evening was something Sirius had been eager to show Remus since they met, and now he was ecstatic. After a few sakes, James even suggested honoring their guest with the Marauder entitlement.

“I think that’s a great idea,” Peter agreed.

“You’re gonna need a nickname, then,” James pointed out, giving Sirius’ consent for granted. “We need something that goes along with ours.”

“It’s gotta be a good one,” Peter replied. “A better one than mine, at least.”

“They used to call him Anal Boy in muggle school,” Sirius snorted. “There can’t be anything worse than that.”

Remus went red in the face. “It’s because I was very neat and organized,” he clarified.

James and Peter laughed and Remus stepped on Sirius’ foot beneath the table. Sirius beamed beatifically at him.

“What about… Rookie?” Peter suggested.

“Why Rookie?”

“I don’t know. It begins with an R and also Remus is kind of a rookie, ain’t he?”

Sirius laughed. “That’s an awful nickname, Pete.”

“What do your nicknames mean?” Remus cut in the conversation.

James sighed dramatically and leant over the table. “All right, you’re about to be part of a secret almost anyone has ever got the pleasure of…”

“Don’t be stupid. Your girlfriend knows,” Sirius cut off. “Peter’s parents know. Remus knows about mine. I’d be surprised if Rita Skeeter didn’t know.”

James rolled his eyes. “All right then, you tell him.”

Sirius sipped his sake before telling the story. “Well, Prongs is related to a very ugly episode of James’ life in which his very beloved girlfriend cheated on him with a ball of sebum named Severus Snape,” he began and James went red in the face.

Remus laughed so loud that he almost choked in his own saliva. “Severus Snape? Really?”

“She only kissed him out of pity!” James shouted.

“Do you know him?” Peter asked.

“Of course I do! The guy’s an idiot; he’s the reason  I lost my teaching vacancy at Hogwarts!”

“You don’t say!” James and Peter replied in unison.

“You didn’t tell me about that,” Sirius frowned.

Remus stopped laughing and stared intently at his thumbs over the table. “It’s a silly story actually. A lot of bureaucracy; you wouldn’t like it.”

Sirius shook his head and bit his upper lip. All of sudden, the air was tight and cold. James and Peter exchanged a worried glance as Sirius leaned towards Remus. “I want to know,” he insisted.

Remus locked gazes with Sirius and, for a fraction of a second, something violent and savage shone inside his pupils. But then the brown overtook the golden and Remus sighed. “After Dumbledore hires someone new, all of the professors must agree with the new hire. Severus didn’t and that was the end of my teaching career. Told you it was boring.”

“We would’ve played more pranks on him if we had known, right James?” Peter shared with a soft laugh. James nodded and Sirius backed away quickly and smiled past his previous state.

“Don’t you wanna know about Pete’s nickname, though?” James contributed.

Sirius interrupted with a wave in Peter’s direction. “Of course that doesn’t need an explanation. Just let Remus spare him a quick glance and he’ll know.”

All of them, Peter included, laughed in amusement and they laughed even more when Peter blushed with a violent shade of red and tried to hide his face behind his hands, giving him a mouse-like appearance.

“But…” James cut in, brushing laughter tears from the corners of his eyes. “But you should know the truth about Sirius’ nickname.”

“He told me it was because he was very loyal,” Remus replied, unsure.

James and Peter cracked in laughter. “He did!” James burst. “Truth is, my dear Lupin, that we nicknamed him like that because…”

“Don’t you dare!” Sirius jumped, covering James’ mouth with one hand. James bit him and Sirius released him briefly. “In fourth grade he had a sixth grade Ravenclaw for a girlfriend and he used to walk her to every class carrying her books,” James rushed.

Peter laughed so hard at Sirius’ frowny face that he almost peed himself. Remus couldn’t help but smile: it was really hard to imagine Sirius jumping behind an older girl like a common domestic dog. Once the laughter calmed down, James insisted, “We still don’t have a nickname for our honorary marauder.”

Sirius bit his upper lip before suggesting. “Well, wasn’t your father’s name Lyall?”

Remus frowned. “Yeah, so what?”

“I mean, Lyall Lupin,” he explained and James’ eyes shone with the realization of his friend’s joke. “You’re literally Moon Moon’s son, for Merlin’s sake! So… Moony Moony?”

The trio burst in loud guffaws as Remus tried not to laugh but eventually gave up. “Sod off,

Padfoot

,” he said, giving Sirius a push in the shoulder.

(280)

“Hey. Are you there? We missed you at work today, and yesterday… And you missed Frank and Alice’s engagement party. Remus?” Sirius stopped.

The apartment was empty. No one in the living room, no one in the kitchen and no one in the bedroom. For a split second, Sirius felt a cold hand twisting his insides. What if Remus was gone? But no. Everything was still there: the quirky souvenirs in the living, the books sprawled over the neatly folded bed and the mahogany wardrobe. Maybe Remus hadn’t been home in a few days, but he wasn’t gone.

Yet

.

Sirius shrugged past his anxiety and dug around the books until he found a quill and a piece of parchment. After leaving the plate with chocolate cake over the bed, he leant over the wall to scribble a note

(You traitor. Have some cake. —S)

and just as he was placing it next to the plate, a chill wind blew it away.

“Fuck,” Sirius picked the note and walked to the window to close it. Except that the window was already closed and the chill wave of wind revolved his hair when he walked past the mahogany wardrobe. “What the…?”

One of the wardrobe’s doors was cracked open. This was enough invitation for Sirius, who snuck his head first and then the rest of him inside the wardrobe. It was completely empty and dark and, when Sirius shut the door behind him, he felt an unpleasant tingling and next thing he knew, he was inside a different wardrobe, a small white pine one that smelt like old clothes and termites.

Sirius opened the door and the wooden floor of the room creaked in agony when Sirius stepped outside. He was in a dusty room, with all windows blinded and most of the furniture in different states of wreckage. Sirius casted light in his wand and gave it a deeper glance: a queen size bed turned upside down, chairs, scattered clothes and rotten fabric curtains hanging loosely from twisted metal bars. And the door, a few steps to his right.

“Remus?” Sirius dared to call. The outside had much more light and Sirius was able to see the narrow hall he was stepping in, all handrails tore down and scratched marks across every wall. “Remus, are you hurt?” Sirius called again.

No one responded. Sirius switched his wand off and walked across the hall, opened another door just to find a bedroom in such a pitiful state as the one he was in before. Stairs at the end of the hall led to the attic and to the first floor. Sirius chose the latter.

“Moony it’s me. You don’t have to hide,” he said. The stairs creaked with every step Sirius gave.

No one was on the first floor. Some of the missing parts of the handrail here and broken couches puking their dusty insides there. It all looked as if someone had beaten them off.

“All right, I didn’t want to do this, but you forced me to,” Sirius warned. “

Homenum Revelio

.”

“Sirius, go away,” replied Remus’ muffled voice. Though it was too late, since Sirius could already see a gleaming shape curled in the attic.

“Yeah, right,” Sirius snorted, climbing the two sets of stairs with cat-like agility.

If the rest of the house was a mess, the attic was much worse. Dust clanged to every surface and the fact that Remus had apparently barricaded himself inside didn’t help much. Sirius levitated a bunch of boxes out of his way and casted a Wand-Lighting Charm again.

“I can’t see anything. Where are you?”

Remus didn’t respond at first, but then he sighed and stated. “I’m fine. Please leave.”

“You don’t sound ok,” Sirius replied. He was guiding his way through the cluttered attic to Remus’ voice.

“C-Could you at least t-turn that off?”

Sirius tripped with something metallic and the wand rolled over the floor, the light tilting as his owner grew farther. When it finally crashed against the wall, Sirius saw a faint trail of blood and mud scattered on the floor. He stood up to retrieve his wand and as his feet untangled from the chains, they chimed, bell-like.

“Oh Merlin, what did you do?” Sirius called.

Remus tried to run away silently but tripped in his own barricade, making so much noise that it didn’t take too long for Sirius to spot him.

“GO.AWAY.SIRIUS!” Remus yelled and all of sudden, Sirius felt his body pushed back by an invisible wall.

“LET ME HELP,” Sirius replied. One wave of his wrist and a sleek tongue of green fire slammed against the wall. Remus’ shield burnt from the edges to the center with impressive speed. Remus himself was laying a few steps in front of Sirius, cornered against the wall and a cheap desk. He was naked and tangled in bloody bandages and dirty hair. Old scars gleamed bright in Sirius’

Lumos

but what made him stop were the ugly burning marks in his fingers. “Oh shit,” he fell on his knees, closer to Remus. “Moony, I’m so… I… It was the only way I…”

“This was a mistake,” Remus cut in. He stared at his own hands, red from the green fire and marked with a thick bloody line in each wrist. Sirius wondered if he had done those too. He didn’t know what to say. “Go wait outside.”

Sirius obeyed, guilt churning his insides. Remus’ voice echoed all the way downstairs and across the backyard’s (also broken) door. He hadn’t even looked at him.

Outside the air was cold and it was darker than it was back in London —the sun was an hour or so from setting behind a pine forest to his left. Sirius found an abandoned tin hanging bench supported by a tree and sat there. It didn’t take much for Remus to walk outside as well, cracking dry leaves from the floor as he did. He was wearing an old pair of running pants and a bulky brown sweater that didn’t do much to hide the wide collar scar in his neck.

“They healed,” Remus said, presenting his palms. It was true, the skin was still pinkish but it looked much better.

Sirius didn’t know what to say. He opted for a dry, “I’m glad,” and practically regretted it the moment it left his mouth.

Remus nodded and sat next to Sirius. The bench creaked dangerously but it didn’t fell. “Why are you here, Sirius?”

“People at work were worried,” Sirius lied. “They don’t know about… well, your thing. But I said I could come over. See if you need some help.”

“Well, I don’t,” Remus replied. “And ‘my thing’ doesn’t need to become yours just because you know.”

Sirius stared at Remus’ long fingers as they picked on a loose thread in the sweater. He wondered why he wasn’t able to entrust him with this burden. What was he so afraid of that forced him to chain himself in a dirty attic in the middle of nowhere.

“Who’s house is this anyway?”

Remus stopped picking on his sweater and looked at him with a sad smile. “My parents’. You’re looking at the woods I talked to you about.”

The sun was already hiding behind the pine trees and Sirius found the forest thicker and darker than earlier. Leaves rustled and the wind made loud, howl-like noises. Remus must have sat on this bench some of those nights, when he tried to keep his parents safe from all harm at night. “There are no bears in there,” Sirius stated.

Remus nodded. “You should leave now. You can tell them that I’ll be back tomorrow morning.”

“I want to stay,” Sirius replied, pressing Remus’ neck scar with the tip of his fingers. “I want to

help.”

“You can’t,” Remus assessed, patting away Sirius’ hand from him. “Please, go back.”

(314)

Peter read somewhere that when some people hit rock bottom, they started dating everything that moved and drank a lot. Since Sirius had always been kind of a male slut and a bit of a drunkard before, it made perfect sense to him that his friend’s response at Remus’ breakup was folding into himself. It was bearable the first days but, after the second week, Peter thought it was time to ask James for help.

Sirius had abandoned all subtlety and was no longer shaving or, apparently, taking any showers. He spent days inside his flat, listening to old music or watching muggle TV. One Sunday he came across a poster announcing a late night Manhattan projection at the local library and it was the only time he actually left the house to do something. Though, he spent the first half remembering the good times with Remus and echoing the dialogues so loud that he received several warnings from the staff. After the second half, euphoria abandoned him and everyone wondered if it was less creepy to hear him echo dub instead of muttering curses under his breath.

Sirius wondered if maybe Remus had picked his twisted idea of love from muggle movies. Eventually, he also wondered if Remus had already seen this specific movie, with whom and if he had enjoyed it as much as movie nights with him.

And since he couldn’t quite grasp all the muggle details without Remus to hand him a clue on middle class life, his mind diverted into his own pain. He felt cheated and hurt and when one of the characters on screen said:

“You can’t save everyone,” she did it in Remus’ voice. But Sirius didn’t want to save everyone, just the one, just

him

.

When he said it, Remus reached for his chest and ripped his heart off. He was choking and when he opened his eyes the heart was inside his chest and the screen was black.

Remus’ words still rang in his ears:

“This was a mistake.”

(320)

It was a Monday when Sirius had a real breakdown against lift jingles and it hadn’t been pretty. People quickly learnt that, unless they wanted to be shouted at, they shouldn’t, under any circumstance, cross words (or paths) with him. And if it was absolutely necessary to do so, they approached with the quiet, fearful steps of a wounded prey.

Kim’s (Mrs. Montgomery’s new assistant) hands were even shaking when she reached Sirius’ desk. “Um… Mister Black?” she called. “I’m sorry but Mrs. Montgomery wants to see you. In her office?”

By the time Sirius glanced up to say thanks, Kim had already fled back to her desk.

None of the employees tried to say anything at Sirius but rather they side looked at him from their work stations in a silent condescending goodbye. Sirius was glad that Mrs. Montgomery had left her door open and he could avoid the awkward minutes of waiting outside.

“Sit down, darling.” She pointed to one of the chairs in front of her desk. “Excuse me if I’m too abrupt but I need to know, has something happened to you lately? Family problems? Has any of your friends died?”

“No,” Sirius replied.

“Look honey, I really shouldn’t care about your personal life,” Mrs. Montgomery began. “But since it’s already getting in the way with your job life… You’re really pushing me to ask this honey, does this have anything to do with Remus leaving?”

“Who?” Sirius asked, but he clutched his hands in the chair’s arms.

“You can stop pretending now. Peter told me everything.”

Sirius gritted his teeth.

That rat.

“I don’t understand how this has anything to do with my job.”

“Let me break it down for you then,” Mrs. Montgomery leant over the desk. “Last week Jessica Bennett cried for two hours straight and she won’t tell anyone what you told her. And the week before that, at the new employees training you were awful. That’s not the spirit we want to show in our department.”

“Mrs. Montgomery, are you firing me?”

“What? No,” she replied. “I could never do that. I’m just… suggesting, maybe you could channel all those feelings on something different. Something like this.”

Sirius took the letters Mrs. Montgomery was handing to him. “Dear: blank space,” he read. “It is our duty to communicate to you and your family that: blank space died today in the commission of their service. Our most sincere condolences. Ministry of Magic,” Sirius stopped. “Wait, this is from the Grievances

and Death Announcing

Department.”

“Exactly,” Mrs. Montgomery nodded. “Sadness, total loss of faith… maybe until you can feel better you could make some families feel better.”

“Well that’s just great. Thank you very much, Ma’am.”

If Mrs. Montgomery caught any sarcasm in his voice, she didn’t mention it and Sirius got back to his desk in a breeze. He diligently stuffed all of his belongings in a cardboard box. “Did she fire you?” Peter asked from his desk.

“Actually no,” Sirius retorted bitterly. “She promoted me. I’m Head of Bad News now.”

(146)

“I brought Chinese!” Peter announced, shutting the door close with his ankle. “I went by St. Mungo’s on the way here…” He trailed. A faint melody came from the living room to his ears but it stopped all of sudden.

“Did James say anything?” Sirius asked.

Peter walked inside the living room with his coat on and the boxes in one hand as a response. Sirius had his old music notebooks spread all over the couches and the coffee table, his black acoustic guitar resting in his lap and a lit cigar dangling from his mouth. “You’re composing again?” Peter asked with a broad smile.

“I was cleaning and I found it,” Sirius replied. “Did you see Prongs?”

“Oh,” Peter remembered. “Yeah, he says he’ll be joining Lily on her night shift.”

“Sure he is,” Sirius barked a laugh and scratched a few chords in his guitar. “I’m feeling inspired tonight, Pete,” he smiled.

“Brilliant,” Peter replied. “I just hope you don’t go walking around with Mick Jagger’s pants again.”

“I’m a rockstar! Course I’ll be wearing Mick Jagger’s trousers,” Sirius hummed in response.

Peter rolled his eyes and strode to the kitchen to open the small white boxes and when he went past Sirius, Remus’ face smiled at him from a square picture attached to the guitar’s neck.

(321)

I hate Remus. I hate his crooked teeth. I hate his boney fingers. I hate his hobo hair. I hate the way he stares at people while they talk. And I hate the way he sounds when he laughs.

“I HATE THIS SONG!”

“Sir, I’m sorry but if you can’t be quiet I’m going to have to ask you to leave the waiting room,” a healer called.

“We’re all dying sad and bitter, what’s there to wait for,” Sirius retorted bitterly.

(345)

A dark room. Cheap perfume and a girl giggling. Kissing him in the wrong way, touching him in the wrong places. They were drunk. At least, Sirius was drunk enough. The rest of the night was a blur of colors and heartache. And Sirius wished that it remained like that. He woke up early in the morning and wrote a note for her before leaving, not daring to glance at her face. Doing so would mean that what he did was real, that he was completely messed up by wishing that her face, her hands, her lips were Remus’ instead.

He took a shower. Shaved. The girl didn’t wake up. And Sirius decided maybe it was time and Apparated in the Ministry an hour too early. He walked towards Alastor Moody’s office and knocked twice. Moody was inside. He invited him to sit down and twisted his mouth in a wry smile as Sirius did.

“I heard you’re recruiting again,” Sirius said.

“And I heard you’re the same ol’ Black as last time,” Moody replied, fetching a Pensieve from a drawer behind him. Grey ghosts appeared once at a time, as Moody poured thoughts inside the stone vessel.

Reckless… Spoiled… Wouldn’t listen to any orders… Not worth the time… Stupid… Childish and thoughtless… After what happened in the fire I doubt we can trust him with anything bigger than a dollhouse…

Sirius stood still through all of them. Bit back his words and thought he was going to make it through. Up until the point a face that he knew too well made its appearance. She was practically a kid. Seventeen, purple hair, ear piercings… and half of her face burnt to a level that made her unrecognizable for anyone that wasn’t Sirius.

“I don’t think it was his fault. He was just trying to do the right thing,” she said. “What? If I forgive him? Of course I do! We’re family. And besides, it’s not as if I couldn’t fix this.”

Sirius missed the moment when the girl in Moody’s memory changed her face into a healthy non-burnt version of it. He was too busy staring at his own feet and only looked up when Moody began retrieving the thoughts from the vessel. Once he was done, Sirius tried to lock gazes with him, but instead found himself fixating his eyes in a black fly by the window frame to avoid the silent judgment part of this interview.

“She’ll be joining the Force next January,” Moody pointed out. “Best recruit we’ve had in decades… What were you going to ask me?”

Sirius’ nails dug deep in the flesh of his palms but when he spoke, his voice was calm and put together. “Sir, I want to join the Force.”

Moody arched his healthy eyebrow high up. “Of course you want to, Black. But the real question here is: have you changed? Or do I still need to trust you ‘nothing more than a dollhouse’?”

“Sir, I can assure you that an incident like that is never going to happen again. I can swear that my behavior has changed entirely.”

“Has it?” Moody blamed. “Because, Black, the rumors are that you’ve been ‘losing’ your mind in the hallways this past weeks. They say that you’ve been erratic, destructive and irreverent (more so). And I’m afraid that I am not interested in working with an element of such characteristics.”

Sirius’ palms were stained with blood. “Sir, I’m afraid this is all a misunderstanding. If my behavior has been different than any other day (which I don’t think), it hasn’t affected any of my duties so far. And, as politely as I can, I’m going to have to ask you to keep my personal life off the table while we’re discussing my job life.” That was going too far. Sirius knew, but, as anger grew inside him, he was unable to care about it.

“Mr. Black,” Moody sighed, standing up. “Perhaps you’ve been misled by my

vain, shallow exterior

. But the truth is, I couldn’t give a damn as to who you are dating: if it’s a man, or if your bad temper has pushed him away, is none of my business, as you brilliantly point out. But I’m not stupid and I feel offended that you suggested so. I know your behavior has been affecting everything and everyone around you and that includes job life.” Moody asserted. “Long story short: Until you man up and apologize for your incompetence and lack of responsibility, you don’t have the slightest chance to be a part of my team. I will not risk any more lives for your stubbornness, no matter whose last name you have.”

After Moody finished that last sentence, Sirius tried to keep himself cool and think with his head, but a heavy wrath was making its way from his stomach to his head, blurring the edges of his vision. He couldn’t tell if it was because of the mention of Remus, the suggestion that it had been himself the one that made Lupin drift away or the fact that Moody would never let him be an auror. Ever. He could tell however, that after he stood up from his chair, there was no way he didn’t push the heavy desk to the ground. Moody jumped away the second it slammed loud against the tiled floor and, before anything else could happen, Sirius walked away, slamming a few books off their shelves as he passed next to them.

Later that afternoon, Sirius wondered why Moody hadn’t hexed him right there. Why the man that could, cold heartedly, kill a dozen Death-Eaters, didn’t do anything about a little spoiled employee that tore his office down. Moody didn’t even need to hex him, all it would take for a man in his position was a letter to the Minister and Sirius would be out forever. But Moody didn’t. Not that day and not the days that followed.

And Sirius felt awful when he realized why. It was because, by acting the way he did, Sirius was actually proving Moody right. About everything.

(404)

“What do you mean you’re not coming?” Sirius grasped the mirror in his right hand as he tossed a few Knuts in the helper’s hand. “No thanks, no toothbrush.” He started walking through the hall trying to find a decent seat by the window.

“I have to work extra hours now, Pads. For the wedding and that stuff, you know I can’t just skip work the whole weekend,” James excused.

“What about you?” Sirius barked in the round shape of Peter’s face.

“Come on Sirius, it’s all gonna be full of aurors and people that’s like three thousand times taller and handsomer than me. I don’t think I…” Sirius missed the last part of Peter’s lame excuse for not attending Alice and Frank Longbottom’s wedding because a face in the hallway caught his attention.

Dizziness dissipated as soon as Sirius realized that Remus hadn’t noticed him. He was reading an old book and a small concentration crease decorated his brow. Sirius jumped in the first and farthest empty seat he found. Just in case.

“Padfoot!” James’ voice called. Sirius jumped, as he hadn’t realized that he still held the mirror in his hands.

“Got it. You’re not coming. Gotta go,” he mumbled, quickly stuffing the mirror in his backpack. His hands felt sweaty and if only the Knight Bus was a little less noisy, everyone could’ve heard his heartbeat racing like a race horse. He rubbed his hands on the front of his pants and breathed to clear his mind. The perspective of staying silent in his place until Remus jumped down the bus seemed so promising if only…

“Mister Black? Sirius Black?” said the helper in a high pitched voice. “Here’s your coffee Mr.”

Sirius felt his stomach giving a triple mortal and falling to his feet. “Great,” he replied, practically tearing the paper cup in his attempt to retrieve it from the charger’s hands. The boy walked clumsily to the front of the bus. It didn’t take more than a couple of minutes before Remus reached over Sirius’ seat. Sirius felt cold air tickling his neck as Lupin leant over to say hi. At the last minute Sirius decided to play it cool “Moon… Remus, what a surprise! Did you just jump in?”

“Not really. I was sitting right there, by the window. I heard your name and I thought I might come and say hi.”

“Oh, cool. Well, hi.”

Remus frowned in discomfort. “I… um… I’m sorry for not showing up the other day. I’ve been a little busy, you know.”

“It’s okay. I‘ve been busy myself,” Sirius scoffed. “So… where are you going?”

“Alice and Frank’s wedding?” Remus replied, as if it was the most obvious answer ever. Sirius made a mental note of choking James and Peter when he got back.

Those bastards knew this was going to happen.

“I thought you wouldn’t,” Sirius trailed. “You know. Since you quitted and all that…”

Remus shrugged. “I’ve been in contact. They were very nice with me.”

“Oh, that’s good,” Sirius nodded awkwardly.

“So… um, how have you been?”

“Great. Yeah, amazing.”

“That’s good to hear. You know, I wrote and I never heard back from you so I thought…”

“Ah yeah,” Sirius tried to grin carelessly but couldn’t make his face obey. “I’ve been kind of busy too. Work and quidditch and stuff and you know… things.”

“Still working for Montgomery?” Remus asked. Sirius nodded vaguely and Remus gave him a pity smile. “Well, I didn’t mean to bother you. So I’ll just…” he pointed back to his seat.

Sirius did a half nod and Remus turned his back to leave down the hallway. At the last minute, Sirius changed his mind, “Wait!” Sirius called back. “Do you want to get some coffee?”

Remus turned back and frowned.

“Or something else?” Sirius added, looking at the cup in his hands.

Remus smiled. “I guess we could go after the rehearsal.”

“Or we could skip the rehearsal,” Sirius offered.

Remus opened his mouth to reply but the driver cut in with a loud yell and the bus stopped so violently that half of Sirius’ coffee landed on the floor.

“Glastonbury! Your stop, Mr. Black, um… Mr. Lupin,” he called.

“All right, I don’t think Alice nor Frank are going to miss us,” Remus replied, pulling his leather ratty case from the floor and climbing out.
 
Sirius smiled widely all the way to the nearest muggle coffee shop. Remus drank three chocolate-cinnamon cups and Sirius’ coffee went cold after he spent the entirety of the night talking. Mostly small talk and crappy jokes but he felt tiny heart attacks every time Remus laughed at something he said or the way he seemed to be really interested in every little thing he did. They ended up leaving only because the shop was about to close.

Sirius offered to walk Remus to his hotel and this time he didn’t say a thing on the way there. It was a neat, peaceful silence, but despite all these signs, Sirius couldn’t pull together enough guts to kiss Remus goodbye once he left him in the hotel’s door.

(405)

Morning was beautifully bright and Sirius was feeling happier than he had felt in several weeks. There were violets and small white roses all over the garden and silver foldable chairs spread all over the center lawn. There was no tent but Sirius assumed they had put up a charm to the air because it was cool and the sunlight had been slightly obscured to the point it didn’t burn or hurt the eyes. At the very center and in front of the silver chairs there was a beautifully carved wooden arch made by Frank himself, representing scenes of his and Alice’s time together. Sirius felt an immense urge to smile at all times and he also wasn’t even mad at James nor Peter for not coming to the wedding with him. He was even more thankful when he saw Remus arriving with a rather old but clean and hole-free black suit. Sirius had chosen a gray one that sparkled faintly under the sunlight.

Sirius spotted him from the moment he left the front house and entered the garden. His eyes refused to leave his lean figure until he was close enough to make eye contact uncomfortable.

“Hi,” Remus smiled coyly. “You look nice.”

“Thanks,” Sirius replied, his voice rough. “You look good too.”

Remus smiled in a way that stated clearly that he didn’t think that his black suit was in any way comparable to Sirius’ luscious gray one. Sirius said something like “Well, let’s go…” and waved his head over the silver chairs that had been assigned to them.

The moment Alice left the old house and walked, strong and happy to the altar, Frank’s face shone with a glad smile. Sirius knew it was a silly thought, but that was the face he had when he saw Remus for the first time. He was about to tell him when Remus leaned over and said, “Ugh there’s Rita Skeeter.”

Sirius turned over and whispered, “What?” Remus smiled and pointed to a woman with blond, stiff curls, a few rows in front of them. “I don’t think she’s invited, Alice hates her,” he continued. “God I hope she sees her and turns her into a beetle or something.”

Sirius chuckled and Remus beamed. “Glad I can still make you laugh,” he said.
 
The ceremony was rather short. At their vows Frank explained the meaning of the arch and Alice joked about it not fitting in their tiny shoebox of an apartment. The sun was setting at the exact moment the priest said “You may kiss the bride” and Sirius thought it was very stupid, beginning a relationship when the day was dying, but he forced himself to think it was a romantic act.

The rest of the guests, some from the Ministry, some Sirius had never met but assumed were Frank and Alice’s family, roared and applauded in excitement. Some of them cried. Remus didn’t and Sirius was very glad for it.

A tall, square-faced steward asked them to stand up a little and an army of stewards popped up from every corner and arranged an equally profuse army of small round tables, all looking in the direction of a larger square table in which Alice and Frank sat, along with the priest and some of the people Sirius didn’t know. Small floating lanterns replaced the sunlight and all of the silver folding chairs literally ran with metallic sounds to arrange themselves behind the tables. Everyone took a seat and as the night grew old, laughter grew easier.

At some point, a brown-eyed little girl asked Remus for a dance and he refused at first, but Sirius pushed him into the dance floor with a mocking grin. Sirius himself danced a few songs with one of Alice’s cousins but he couldn’t keep his eyes from wandering towards Remus and the little girl. Remus held her hands ever so slightly, as if he could break her, but she was enchanted, smiling and all red in the cheeks. When the song finished, everyone clapped and the little girl gave Remus a kiss on the cheek before letting him go. Except that, properly speaking, she didn’t really let him go, and instead, she coaxed both man to sit at the kids’ table, where Sirius spent the rest of the night watching how Remus joked around with the little kids and he even played a few tricks with his wand to entertain them. These kids were completely the opposite to kids in the Black family and Sirius was glad –he hadn’t heard so many young children laughing and humming silly songs since Hogwarts (and back then, he had been one of those silly youngsters). At one point, Remus ran out of magic tricks and fairytales and kids wandered across the garden, leaving the men alone at the table. The brown eyed girl was now heading an exploration campaign inside the old house along with some other children.

“Feeling the urge to become a father, aren’t we?” Remus asked, noticing Sirius’ faint smile.

That word

father

. It made Sirius shudder. “Not yet,” he replied, his memory recovering a distant echo of drunken steps straddling through the stairs.

“Not yet?” Remus insisted, arching his eyebrows playfully.

“Not ever,” Sirius corrected, shuddering past his discomfort. “Children are gross tiny monsters. Look at them… running, screaming and drooling.”

Remus laughed. “You drool!” he pointed out.

“I do not!” Sirius replied, smiling.

“You did! Every time I woke up there was a massive puddle of your saliva in my blankets, mister. I even had to dump one of my favorite sets.”

“Well,” Sirius replied, knowing his defeat. “You snore! Loud.”

Remus laughed, amused. “I know I snore,” he admitted. “You kindly told that to me after pulling an

Aguamenti

on my face.”

“In my defense,” Sirius blushed lightly. “I had already tried with a

Silentium

four times before and you just kept snoring!

“Yeah, but still…” Remus’ words were eaten by the cries of half a dozen children, running towards the table, guided by the brown eyed girl.

“There’s the dragon! SLAIN HIIIIIIM!” she shouted, pointing at Sirius with a wooden stick.

“Slain me?” Sirius shouted, amused. “SLAIN-ME?!” he roared, standing and spreading his arms as if they were wings. “WE’LL SEE WHO’S GONNA SLAIN WHO, SIR DANCE-A-LOT!” He yelled as he ran, breathing out theatrically, to the army of children. They yelled, half laughing and half babbling, as they attacked Sirius with wooden sticks and bread knives they had borrowed from the tables.

After a few minutes, the dragon was defeated and Remus, still chuckling, helped a very muddy Sirius to stand on his feet again. Several cleansing charms were required in order to get the gray suit back to its original color. After that, the kids began playing Duck, Duck, Goose at the table, but had to stop when Alice called everyone to the dance floor for the bouquet’s catch. In an astounding demonstration of agility and fierce biting, the girl with the brown eyes caught it and, blushing from the neck to the brow, offered it to Remus with a shy smile. It was hard to decide who looked more embarrassed. “Thanks,” Remus finally babbled and the girl quickly ran away to hide her face behind her mother’s dress.

Sirius couldn’t fight back a laugh. “Wow Remus, you’re popular with the ladies, ain’t you?”

“Oh, shut up,” Remus replied wryly.

“Just kidding,” Sirius smiled. He called two glasses from the bar with his wand. He handed one to Remus who sipped it in one gulp. Sirius smiled and, shrugging, he did the same with his.

“Wanna dance?” Remus asked, dubious.

Sirius didn’t want to put him off but he couldn’t help looking at the crowded dance floor. Remus didn’t work at the Ministry anymore, but Sirius would have to listen to the rumors for the rest of his life. And yes, maybe he did care a little. “Here?” he wrinkled his nose.

“Of course not here, you twat,” Remus replied. “There’s a nice spot behind the old house. I bet no one can see us there.”

Sirius nodded with a smile. “So be my guide,” he replied.

“All right, I’ll go first ok?” Remus pointed to a place with his head and walked towards it with long but calm strides. Sirius followed him with his gaze until he got lost to the left of the house. Only then he dared to follow him with what he felt was a relaxed pace.
 
Remus was waiting for him, hands in his pockets and playing nervously with the tip of his shoes. Sirius looked back. The dance floor and silver tables were now just a small spot of light in the middle of the garden. However, the magical orchestra could still be heard from here. Sirius was pretty sure no one could see them or hear them.

“Who’s guiding?” Sirius asked.

Remus let out a nervous laugh as he raised his eyes to meet Sirius. “This is a silly idea,” he said, taking the palm that Sirius was offering him. Remus’ hand was cold and sweaty, but Sirius held it firmly between his. He gave the first step and accidentally stumbled with Remus’ feet. All they did for a while was step over each other’s feet until Remus suggested they shouldn’t move so much and instead, leaned his head on Sirius' shoulder and just stood there, balancing slowly from left to right. A warm, fuzzy sensation grew inside Sirius’ chest as he buried his nose inside Remus’ hair and he didn’t pull back.

“I was wondering…” Remus said against Sirius’ body. “I… um, I am having a party on Friday. It wasn’t… you know, not entirely my idea but…” Remus wandered. “Anyway, maybe you wanna come. If you’re not too busy.”

“I’m never too busy,” Sirius replied in the hollow of Remus’ nape.

Remus laughed in relief and Sirius wondered why he had been so anxious to contact him again. Then Remus split apart and Sirius immediately longed for Remus’ weight against him. “This is not… I mean… we’re still…” Remus stuttered, fumbling for the words.

“We’re just friends,” Sirius finished.

“Just friends,” Remus nodded. Sirius felt empty inside but he smiled gently anyway. “We should come back, ain’t we?” Remus noticed.

Sirius nodded, biting the inside of his cheeks to keep his words to himself. Remus turned his back on Sirius and he had just given a few steps towards the party when he changed his mind and turned back to kiss Sirius fully in the mouth. It was needy and desperate and Sirius couldn’t help but grasp Remus’ face with both hands, to pull him closer, to wish he could melt in his touch. Remus slammed him unceremoniously against the wall and broke off the kiss, eyes gleaming with lust and lips red and swollen. “My room or your room?” Remus asked with a rough voice.

“I couldn’t care less,” Sirius replied, marking a trail of sloppy kisses down Remus’ jaw and neck.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

PART V: EXPECTATIONS VS REALITY

(410)

Sirius walked to Remus’ apartment, intoxicated by the promise of the evening. He believed that this time, his expectations would align with reality. In his imagination, Remus would open the door to reveal that most of the guests weren’t there. Sirius would kiss him between a few beers and Remus would gladly return the kiss. And, after all of the guests were gone, the night would end for them beneath the immaculate blankets of his room.

Remus’ place was at the fourth floor and Sirius jogged upstairs, softly whistling a song that he would later identify as First day of my life, by some muggle band James was very fond of. Sirius knocked at the door, brown and old, with an unpolished golden number hanging somewhat in the top middle section. Remus did open the door and gave him a bright smile.

“You made it,” he said. “Come on, come inside. Let me put your coat over here.”

Sirius handed him the coat as he looked around. There were a bit more guests than the ones in Sirius’ imagination but he didn’t let himself down for this one. He gave a brief glimpse of the apartment. The wallpaper was a burgundy washed out pattern and there were still odd souvenirs and books all over the living, but there was something missing.

“Is something wrong?” Remus asked, still smiling.

“Uh, no. Here, I brought you something,” he said, handing Remus a neat brown square envelope.

Remus took it. “Oh, thanks,” he said, tearing the paper apart to reveal a matching set of blue linen blankets. “You… didn’t have to.”

“You said I drooled on yours,” Sirius explained, feeling it was a stupid gift, after all.

Remus chuckled and shook his head.

“I didn’t remember,” he said, putting the sheets inside the closet, along Sirius’ jacket. “Come on. The stairs are back in the balcony.”

Sirius nodded, walking meekly behind Remus. And then Sirius realized. There were no unpacked boxes around, at least not at sight. Sirius blamed this to the fact that Remus was holding a party, but something told him it wasn’t because of that.

“So… um, how long have you been living here?” he asked, just to check.

“I moved like… three weeks ago, I think,” Remus replied, climbing through the emergency metal stairs.

Sirius followed him, feeling as if a vacuum had sucked all of his happy vibes. “It’s a nice place,” he said, bitterly.

“Oh, I didn’t pick it all by myself. But yes, it’s… quaint, isn’t it?” Remus replied, giving a small jump to reach the last step.

There were even more people on the balcony. It wasn’t a big party, but it was still a pretty large gathering. Sirius didn’t know any of those people and he felt out of place, with all of them drinking and laughing and eating between silver and pastel colored balloons floating around.

“Lovely,” Sirius added, biting his tongue.

Remus smiled, unaware of the sarcasm in Sirius’ voice. “This way,” he said, pointing to a group of three people that sat by the very edge of the roof. There was a blonde witch with loose Boho braids. She was curled like a cat on a white wooden bench. She smiled at Remus and gave him two kisses on each cheek when she spotted them.

“Annie,” Remus smiled. “Sirius, this is Annie, she’s a reporter for The Quibbler. And this is David McKinnon, he’s an architect. And his wife, Marlene, tells me she was in Gryffindor. Perhaps you remember her.”

Sirius glanced once at David before answering. “We… dated for a while,” he said. Marlene blushed.

“Nice meeting you again,” Marlene said, kissing his cheek shyly before getting back to her husband.

“Same,” Sirius replied. He shook David’s hand in an awkward half a minute motion. Annie waved her hands as if trying to scare a fly. “I don’t want bad vibes anywhere near me, sorry. I’m having such a nice time,” she explained with an absent smile. A few minutes later, David and Marlene apologized and moved to a different group.

“And what do you do for a living, mister Black?” Annie asked, as if to break the tension.

Sirius shrugged, sitting on the beach chair David had been sitting in. “It’s no big deal really.”

“He works at the Ministry,” Remus replied. “At the

Office of Postage and Enlightenment

.”

Annie raised her brow in interest. “That sounds fancy. What exactly do you do there?”

“I tie memos to the owl's legs and deliver pamphlets,” Sirius replied bitterly.

“He was accepted in the Auror’s Force, but he refused,” Remus cut in.

“That’s unusual,” Annie said, sipping at her glass. “What made you choose owls over magical safety?”

“Well, you know,” Sirius said, pretending to be very passionate about his job. “I said to myself, why make something so pointless as capturing dangerous dark wizards when you can do something that really matters, like sitting 8 hours in a row behind a tiny cubicle?” Sirius laughed but Annie nodded, thoughtful.

Sirius then turned to Remus, thinking he could laugh at Annie with him. But Remus just pulled his lips together until they were a thin line. Sirius stopped laughing immediately.

“I have to go get some other guests,” Remus said, sipping at his glass for the last time.

“I’ll go with you,” Sirius offered, standing up.

“I can handle it alone, thanks,” Remus cut him. “Go back to the party.”

Sirius clenched his jaw as Remus walked downstairs. He didn’t exactly come back to the party. It was more like he picked up a bottle of Butterbeer from a table and went sulking in the loneliest corner of the rooftop until the sun set behind some stupid buildings David could’ve designed.

A few minutes after the sunset, a new guest caught Sirius’ attention. As a matter of fact, she caught everyone’s attention, as she stomped against a tall broad shouldered man, almost making him fall off the roof. Her hair was a bright shade of pink and she was wearing combat boots and a loose

Macbeth Witches

t-shirt. A heavy weight fell in Sirius’ stomach as he recognized her as Tonks. She had certainly grown up a lot since the last time he saw her, but last time Sirius saw her, she had half of her face burnt and it wasn’t a really nice memory though.

For a split second, Sirius thought of scurrying away, but thought it twice, remembering Mad-Eye’s speech. Maybe they were right, maybe Sirius was a spoiled brat and it was time to stop running. Besides, this way he could prove Remus that he was mature enough to not screw their relationship again.

Sirius approached Tonks but somebody else got there first. It was Remus. He was hugging her –perhaps a bit too enthusiastically. She hugged him back and, to Sirius’ surprise and disgust, she kissed him in the mouth. It was very quick and discrete but Sirius felt as if Remus had thrown shit at his face. Anger roared in his chest and he gave long strides to the beverages table and took an entire bottle of Firewhiskey before going back to his sulking place.

“Stupid Remus and his stupid bi-flirting,” he murmured under his breath. For a few seconds, Sirius worried about Remus looking for him so he could say hi at Tonks, but it was clear he didn’t mean to when she pulled him to a group of witches and he didn’t offer any resistance. Sirius heard her from his sulking corner, she was laughing, and he saw Remus laughing as well, cheeks red with drunk happiness. And just when he thought it couldn’t get any worse, the girl raised his left hand to show one of the witches a ring in her middle finger. It wasn’t big and it wasn’t sparkly, Sirius could’ve bet that the stone in it wasn’t even a diamond, but it was pretty clear what it meant. Sirius felt nausea as a response for the mixed emotions in his head. He tried to choke it back with more whiskey but the bottle was empty.

He felt his skin itching to leave this place. If he didn’t climb down stairs and left this roof, he might actually puke or cry –or both. Making his way through the stairs being unseen was really easy, but the hard part came when he had to cross Remus’ new apartment and look at the lack of clutter from a different perspective. Remus had finally found an anchor, someone he could bond to. And it wasn’t him.

It was too much. He ran to the street, slamming the entrance gate on his way out. His eyes went blurry and dark and his lounges shrunk with nausea spasms. Except it wasn’t nausea, but rather heavy tears landing violently in the asphalt. And with the tears went away pieces of Sirius, pieces that used to belong to Remus but now, ownerless, pleaded to leave his body. When he took a moment to breathe, he heard nothing. Everything was so silent that he literally could hear his heart pounding in his ears, struggling to get out. He roared a fire hex to anything in particular and it drew a red and gold spiral across the street until it hit a light post, bending it slightly. But magic wasn’t enough, vandalism couldn’t solve this. He wanted to scream. He wanted to take his own heart off his chest and set it on fire. And since he couldn’t do that, he had to settle with kicking a few trash cans and smacking walls until neighbors’ heads peered outside windows.

Sirius’ house was nearly five hundred miles away. That night, he walked every one of those.

(420)

Two heavy knocks in the door.

“Sirius, it’s late for work,” Peter called.

“Fuck you!” Sirius shouted, tossing a shoe in the door’s direction.

“Everyone in the office is worried because you’re not showing up,” Peter replied, in a worried voice himself. “Mrs. Montgomery herself wanted me to talk to you.”

“TELL HER TO FUCK OFF!” Sirius roared, tossing blue fire to the door this time. The flames curled around the wood and licked the corners of fresh air. Sirius heard Peter’s steps quickly leaving and he curled back under the comforter.

(421)

Three heavy knocks in the door.

“Piss off Wormtail,” Sirius grunted.

“Padfoot, mate,” It was James’ voice this time. “You have to leave that room eventually.”

“You’re right,” Sirius responded, kicking the comforter away and sneaking inside a luxurious royal blue bathrobe. He opened the door to find a very astounded Peter and a self-sufficiently smiling James.

“Oh really?” Peter exploded. “So James asks for it and he gets it. Fan-fucking-tastic!”

Sirius gave them a smug smile and left barefoot and in a bathrobe, only to come back twenty seconds later with a bottle of Firewhiskey and a basket of butter buns. Peter and James were still contemplating the rat cradle Sirius’ room had become when he landed neatly in his bed again and shut the door close behind him.

“Ha-ha, very funny,” James interjected. “Now get your ass back here, you wanker.”

“Goodnight Prongs!” Sirius shouted as a response.

(422)

Three faint, dubious knocks to the door.

Sirius couldn’t be bothered to say anything.

Soon, the steps faded, walking downstairs in defeat.

A couple of minutes later, he literally rolled off the bed until he landed flat on the ground and crawled to the bathroom to take a shower. He certainly felt better after the water washed out all the dirt. Almost as if he was a new person.

When he looked for some clothes he realized that his room was utterly dirty, and thought of cleaning up, but he was already late for work.
 
As soon as he got to the Ministry, he realized that he had become some sort of celebrity, since a lot of people he didn’t even know, kept following him with their gaze. He tried to blame it on the fact that he was wearing his last clean clothes: a pair of muggle jogging pants and the white shirt he wore for Alice and Frank’s wedding. By the time he arrived at the Office, the news of him coming back had been told twice. That’s why Peter barely lifted his eyes from the letter he had been writing.

“I was about to write to St. Mungo’s so they came by and checked if you were still alive,” Peter said, in a tone that suggested that he wasn’t kidding. “What happened?”

Sirius rearranged his backpack in the shoulder. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he replied. From where he was standing, he could see his new desk, back at Grievances and Death Announcements –a massive pile of unsent letters stood in his tray, probably stilled by magic only.

“Really? ‘Cos, you always want to talk about it,” Peter retorted.

Sirius thought about all the people with dead family and whose letters hadn’t arrived yet. “Not this time,” he replied. His throat felt as if someone had plastered sandpaper inside of it.

Peter shook his head and grabbed a pile of files from his own desk. “Fine, come on. Let’s go.”

Sirius’ feet danced in the air, as he stopped dead. “Go where?” he asked. The entire office was leaving the desks and heading towards the end of the Department.

“It’s Wednesday,” Peter nearly shouted to his ear. Sirius blinked twice. Then he cursed under his breath.

He had to choose the freaking weekly reunion day to reappear into the office.
 
Cyntia Grey, from Productivity Improvement, had a lot of ideas for this week’s reunion. Sirius lost track of the times he had rolled his eyes in the last half hour, but still, Cyntia wouldn’t shut her mouth about putting engraved vintage tea boxes in every office.

“And as my last suggestion for today, I think we should bring back the old kitten posters,” she said. “I think they helped a lot of depressed people. You know, who doesn’t love a kitten that purrs when he sees you?”

Sirius couldn’t fight back a sarcastic laugh that came out in the form of a barking sound. Mrs. Montgomery stared at him and frowned.

“All right Cyntia. We’ll think about your recommendations,” she smiled at her and turned to see the rest of the personnel. “Anyone else? Sirius? We haven’t heard from you in a while. Any ideas?”

Sirius shrugged. “Nope. I’m blank,” he scoffed.

“Oh really?” Mrs. Montgomery frowned. “I got the feeling that you wanted to contribute.”

“Well, now that you mention so,” Sirius straightened in his chair. “I… no disrespect, Cyntia, but this is crap. Vintage tea containers won’t cheer anyone up and in fact, I don’t think anything can cheer anyone around here. We’re all just sad slobs, frustrated and working for the worst department in the whole Ministry. So, no one cares about what tea looks like because everything is just a gray piece of shit.”

“Sirius,” Peter warned, but Sirius kept ranting on.

“We are liars! ‘Work for the OPE and make the Ministry a lovely place to be’. No one cares about who we are! Also, I hate cats! No one loves cats!”

Cyntia made a whimpering sound and Peter melted into his chair. Mrs. Mongomery stood up and slammed her palms against the desk. “Sirius, please sit down!” she shouted. Sirius didn’t realize the exact moment he had stood up but he forced himself to get back on his seat. “Now, you know I didn’t want to make this a public matter, but you leave me no choice. I know,” she said and Sirius tried to interrupt but she shut him up with a scoff. “I know that you’re going through a rough time but pouring it all over your work, obstructing our work, is not the right way to deal with it. You are acting like a silly teenager who can’t control his feelings, so I’m asking you, politely, to grow up. Or I’ll have to ask you to leave us.”

There was an uncomfortable silence in the whole room and Sirius clenched his hands into fists but when he spoke he sounded calm. “You’re right. I can’t keep doing this anymore,” he said and for a moment, everyone thought Sirius was going to apologize. “I quit,” he finished, giving heavy steps to the door and slamming it on his way out.

“Wow,” Peter whistled. “That was intense. Wasn’t it?”

Everyone glared at him until he, slow and silently, camouflaged back into his chair.

(444)

“He’s upstairs,” Peter indicated as Regulus hung his coat behind the door.

There was no need for Regulus to knock on the door because it was wide open. Regulus caught a glimpse of Sirius throwing spell after spell towards a target hidden by a column. All the furniture had been moved against the walls and the window was sealed to avert curious muggles.

“Hey,” he called to prevent any accidents.

Sirius lowered his wand and stood stiffly, turning to his brother. “I heard you,” he noted. “What’s up?” His brow was sweaty and his breathing uneven but he looked way more calm than the last time Regulus had to intervene.

“You’re training again,” Regulus said, entering quietly into the room. Sirius blushed abruptly but nodded. From inside the room, Regulus was able to appreciate a picture of a certain ex boyfriend attached to the center of the target.

“Yeah, just… to kill time you know,” Sirius replied, striding quickly to the opposite wall to retrieve Remus’ picture and hide it in his back pocket along with the wand.

Regulus nodded, unsure if he should laugh or try to comfort Sirius. “You’ll lose a butt cheek like that,” he said, impersonating Moody’s voice.

Sirius laughed but it didn’t sound as if he had put much effort on looking happy. “So... I got you guys some tickets for next Saturday’s game,” Regulus said, fishing for the tickets in his front pocket.

“The one with the Holyhead Harpies?” Sirius asked, waving his wand to get the furniture back to its place. Regulus nodded. “Harriet herself gave them to me with the explicit order to put one in your, and I quote: ‘magical hands of pleasure’”

Sirius smiled and took the tickets. “She was pretty good too,” he replied, sitting in the corner of the couch. Regulus approached to sit next to him. He was still staring at the tickets with an absent light in his eyes. “Listen,” he said, choosing his words gently. “I know you think Remus was the one. But I don’t.” Sirius took the eyes off the tickets and looked at Regulus instead. “And I think you’re just remembering the good stuff,” Regulus went on. “and next time you look back I… I really think you should look again.” Sirius nodded absently. “I’ll be downstairs,” Regulus stated.

As soon as his brother left the room, Sirius felt a thick lump knotting his throat. Maybe it had been there for a while, but now he could notice it. Just as he now noticed the times Remus had avoided his gaze, that time he left the theater crying and Sirius couldn’t do anything to help. Or the times they have shouted hurtful things to each other. This wasn’t the way Sirius pictured the rest of his life, hopeless, powerless and anxious. Remus was a bunch of mismatched puzzle pieces, and Sirius couldn’t put them together. His own heart had turned into a puzzle of jagged bleeding pieces while trying. Yes,

look again.

(245)

“That’s it, I get to pick the movie next time,” Sirius teased, following Remus out of the movies. Remus didn’t look at him “What? You know I’m just kidding right? It was a good movie.”

“Yeah. No, I’m just… I’m just being stupid,” Remus nodded.

“It’s fine. I liked Joan, he reminded me of my brother,” Sirius replied.

“How come I haven’t met him?”

“He’s a diva,” Sirius laughed. “Come on, let’s go for a beer.”

Remus stood pinned to his place and Sirius ought to turn back his way. “Actually I thought I should probably, you know, go home and call it a day,” Remus said.

“Oh, all right,” Sirius shrugged as if he didn’t care. “Are you sure you don’t want to have dinner before?” he insisted. Remus shook his head. “Is everything ok? Is this about the movie?”

Remus smiled gloomily. “No. I’m just a bit tired,” he replied, leaning over to rest a quick kiss on Sirius’ cheek. “But you’re right, we should go get something to eat.”

Sirius smiled cautiously. “Cool. I know the perfect place,” he said. “I hope you like pancakes.”

(448-473)

Sirius missed the Holyhead Harpies’ game.

He gave his own ticket to Lily (who wanted to go as much as the next door’s muggle but was more than glad to go on a date that didn’t involve St. Mungo’s cafeteria). After that he spent the rest of the afternoon staring outside from his window and changing the color of the birds that rested in the nearest tree. As a bright red one flew away leaving a trail of gold, Sirius stood up straight and decided it was time. He took his jacket from the peg and brushed the spider webs that had formed in the collar.

The streets welcomed him gladly with a dash of cold, fresh air, which Sirius embraced as he listened to his own heart, beating calmly. Alive and not broken. He went straight to the Leaky Cauldron but didn’t stop to buy Firewhiskey like last time and instead waved Tom goodbye and entered the Diagon Alley, just in time to pick up some DCAO books before it was closing time for Flourish and Blotts.

Instead of coming back to his own place, he drifted to a muggle cafeteria near their building and spread all the books over the table, asked for a dark coffee with three sugars and refreshed his long lost lessons into shape shifting, protective spells, potion brewing, healing plants and avoiding chain curses.

He went to sleep early and sober and he said “Good morning” to a very surprised Peter next morning. The next two weeks he alternated between books, coffee and heavy training with targets and sandbags that didn’t have Remus’ face attached to them. Finally he wrote a letter to Mad-Eye Moody, which he sent back with the reminder that even if he had approved the Auror’s school with all honors, his actions were still tippin the scale against him. Even so, Sirius kept writing letter after letter. Some of them coaxing, some of them threatening and in the last ones, something that sounded vaguely as an apology. As a response, Sirius got various negatives and a couple of howlers.

(474)

“I admit it was not the behavior you expect on someone that’s about to impart justice to the magic world,” Sirius said, clenching his hands with nervousness against the desk. “And I’m… I’m deeply sorry for what I did."

“Your hair…” Remus said.

“I can make it brown. Or red. Or blonde? Whatever you want.”

“Don’t. It’s perfect. You are perfect.”

Alastor Moody glared at Sirius with both of his eyes.

“Hey! You’re not supposed to look at the dress before the wedding!”

“I know this might sound dull, but believe me, sir. It’s a very difficult thing for me to say, but I accept it was entirely my fault. And I acknowledge that anything I can say couldn’t possibly fix anything. But I’m ready to grow up, sir.”

“I just wanted to see you now,” Remus replied. “We all know you will trip with the dress and fall before you get to the altar.”

“You can fucking bet I will trip, mister. And it will be beautiful and clumsy and you’ll love me.”

Mad-Eye didn’t smile but he looked somewhat proud. He circled his desk, his wooden leg beating dryly on the floor until he was facing Sirius. “It took you a while, didn’t it?”

“We have all gathered here…” the priest said solemnly, looking at all the faces in the audience. Most of them were her family but Remus didn’t care. They were his family now.

“You’ll have to pass all the exams again,” Moody warned. “And if you fall behind your own score, even a little, you’ll have to do the training again. And, until the day you get to examine again, you’ll come here every afternoon to help Dorcas with the paperwork. Are we clear?”

“Do you, Remus Lupin, take this woman, Nymphadora Tonks, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish; from this day forward until death do you part?”

“I do.”

“Yes, sir”

(488)

It felt good to be back on his feet, back inside the action, Sirius thought. But sometimes, doing paperwork, no matter how much fun Dorcas’ dirty jokes were, was exhausting. It was a beautiful Sunday, bright sun, chill wind, flowers blooming everywhere as spring arrived… and all Sirius wanted to do was go somewhere he could be alone for a few minutes. He wasn’t sad, but between his not so glamorous intern job, and studying and training for the tests, Sirius had barely had any time for himself. He only wanted to go to his hideaway and forget about the world for a brief moment.

Hideaway was, luckily, lonely as always; the grass had grown a few inches and it was also tainted with a lighter green in some spots, just as the leaves of the trees around. But the bench was still there and, when Sirius sat down, he discovered that it was as pleasant as it had always been. He felt a vague pain in the back of his throat, but it was more a sting of nostalgia than sadness or bitterness.

Then he heard him.

“Sirius!”

At first he thought he had made it up, but the minute he turned back, it was clear that voice was Remus Lupin’s. He was leaning over the elder oak, all angles and thin limbs sucked by clothes that were too big, but at least, he looked healthy, and happy. Remus smiled awkwardly at him and Sirius felt his belly jumping with all of the emotions at the same time. Remus walked slowly to the bench and, still cautious, stood near enough so they could hear each other, but he didn’t sit.

“Thought I may see you here,” he said, breaking a small green leaf into pieces. “I’ve always loved this place, ever since… I… I keep coming back.”

For weeks Sirius practiced in front of the mirror the words he would say at Remus if he ever saw him again; he wrote them, tore them apart and burnt them. But now Remus was actually in front of him, and he couldn’t remember any of those hurtful words. And it felt right. It made him realize that he wasn’t mad at Remus anymore, but more like a little off place. Sort of as a puzzle piece that didn’t belong to this particular puzzle. “Um… I guess I should say congratulations,” he said, struggling to keep his voice even.

“Only if you mean it,” Remus replied quietly.

“Oh, well in that case…” Sirius let the phrase in the air.

Remus smiled and Sirius retorted the smile. He breathed deep and let his shoulders loosen up. Remus approached a few steps. “So, are you ok?”

Sirius shrugged. “I will be. Sooner than later I hope,” he replied.

Remus took a seat next to him. “I heard you’re working at the Ministry again.”

“I am,” Sirius replied with a half-forced smile. “So I guess you heard about my breakdown too?”

Remus shrugged, looking to the distance. “A few rumors here and there.”

“Peter told you, didn’t he?”

“It was James actually,” Remus replied, smiling.

Sirius bit his upper lip and shook his head. “Yeah?”

“I hope you can forgive me,” said Remus. “I didn’t want to write to you. But I’m glad that you finally got to be an auror.”

“Still working on it,” Sirius replied, ignoring the ‘I didn’t want to write you’ part. “But thank you. I’ve still got to pass the exams again.”

“You will do fine,” he scoffed. “Finally, your dream job.”

Sirius nodded. There was a flat silence then.

“And you um…” Sirius tried to break in. “Married.”

“Yeah,” Remus nodded and he let his eyes wander into the horizon.

Sirius looked away from him as well to avoid rushing into anything. When it was clear that Remus wasn’t going to say anything else, he couldn’t fight it any more. “You should’ve told me.” But words felt awkward and weak as they left his lips.

“I know,” Remus trailed. “I know. I…”

“When we were at the… you know, wedding” Sirius babbled. “And the dancing, and the…”

“I know,” Remus cut it.

“And the kissing and the fucking,” Sirius insisted.

“I hadn’t proposed yet,” Remus replied. He was clearly embarrassed and Sirius remembered a time when he wanted nothing but to please Remus and make Remus comfortable with his own skin. It felt like years ago.

“But she was in your life?” he demanded.

“Yes.”

“So why did you kiss me?” Sirius almost choked out.

Remus didn’t reply for a few seconds and instead just blinked awkwardly. “Because I felt lonely,” he finally said.

Sirius’ face changed from anger and confusion to an hysterical grin. He knew he shouldn’t laugh but laugh was what left his lips when he opened them. Remus stared at him as if he had gone completely nuts. “It’s just…” Sirius began, trying to find the words, trying not to tear up. “What the fuck dude?”

“I’m really sorry, please believe me,” Remus replied.

Sirius’ face went stern again. “Right. You know, what I don’t understand is how? Why her?”

Remus shrugged. “I don’t know. I just woke up one day and knew.”

“Knew what?” Sirius pushed.

“What I was never sure of with you.”

There was no way Sirius could believe that Remus was trying to hurt him. But those words were not exactly soothing. He choked on his words and tried to scare the lump of tears down his throat.

“You know what sucks?” he finally brought himself to say. “I spent all this time trying to find out what you wanted. Trying to help you feel less.. I don’t know, cursed?.”

Remus shook his head and opened his mouth to reply but Sirius cut him. “But you didn’t even know what you wanted, did you?.”

Remus smiled. “Thank you,” he said. “For everything.”

Sirius nodded vaguely. “Hope  you’re happy,” he said.

“Ditto,” Remus replied, reaching his hand to take Sirius’.

Sirius lowered his gaze to look at their tangled fingers. Remus’, thin and filled with scars, so strong and menacing and yet so fragile. Sirius allowed himself to dream for a few seconds. To dream about him holding hands with Remus like this, sitting in this same bench, in this same park, every day. Maybe they could’ve picked up groceries together and then come back to their place, or maybe they would have a fight and one of them would leave and the other would know where to find him. A dream in which the ring in Remus’ finger had a match in Sirius’ own finger. But that was going too far.

“I should better get going,” Sirius said, cutting his train of thoughts.

Remus nodded and let Sirius’ hand go, leaving only empty, hollow space behind. “It was good seeing you.”

And despite Sirius being the one that said he should get going, it was Remus the one who stood up from the bench and walked away.

“Remus!” Sirius called when Remus was a few steps down the hill. Remus stopped and turned back. “I really do hope that you’re happy.”

Remus didn’t say anything but he smiled at him, light and…

happy

.

(500)

Most days of the year are unremarkable, they begin and they end. With no lasting memories made in between. Most days have no impact in the course of our lives. May 21

st

was a Tuesday.

“Hold it!” shouted a male voice, his owner running desperately towards the lift.

Sirius, who had no rush at all, waved his wand towards the elevator’s door and held it open, there was no one else inside the cage and he had no interest in hearing the jingles any time soon. A pale brunette man jumped inside with a thump as his briefcase fell on the floor and spread all its contents everywhere.

“Shit,” he muttered.

“I’ll get it,” Sirius offered, waving again his wand and putting the stuff back in. They were so cluttered and wrinkled that the case barely shut and the man laughed. “I’m no master in cleaning charms,” he noted.

“I can see that,” the man said, smiling broadly, which made his already pointy face, more angled. “Thank you anyway.”

Sirius nodded as the man tapped the briefcase’s lid, forcing the pieces of parchment to arrange neatly again. “So… What’s your department?”

“Aurors,” Sirius replied. “Well, I’m almost in anyway.”

“No wonder you’re so fit,” the man said.

“I…” Sirius trailed in confusion.

“Nevermind,” the man interrupted. “I’m going to an interview with the Magical Creature’s Control Department, already late.”

Sirius nodded, letting an awkward silence settle until the other man broke it with a huff.

“Whom can I complain about these freaking jingles?”

Sirius beamed. “Oh, they’re keeping them. Believe me, I’ve tried.”

“I’ll have to take the stairs then,” he sighed. “Oh, well, maybe that way I’ll get to look as hot as you.”

Sirius flustered at the compliment but before he could find something to say, the female voice announced the Department of Magic Safety and Magical Law Enforcement. “Well, my stop,” he said, jumping off the cage.

He then took a step back. If there was something he had learnt, it’s that fate isn’t real. The universe doesn’t have a plan for us, and it’s decisions and coincidences that really matter. He jammed half his body between the doors as quick as a lightning bolt.

“Sorry,” he said, nearly stomping against the mysterious man. “I just… Do you wanna grab a beer after your interview? Or coffee? Nothing weird just…”

“Actually I’m… kind of seeing someone after my meeting?” the man trailed.

“Oh, right. It wasn’t… Well, I’m sorry if I bothered you,” Sirius cut off,  ready to retreat.

“Wait,” the man gripped his forearm. “I guess they won’t mind.”

“Great. So… send me an owl when you’re done?” Sirius smiled. “Oh, I’m Sirius, by the way. What’s your…?”

“Romulus. Nice to meet you.”
 
(1)