Forty-One
Date: Saturday, 10 March, 2001
Time: roughly 8am-ish
Location: Spinner's End
Characters Involved: Remus Lupin & Severus Snape, only
Rating: PGish, I think, for now, we'll see ;-)
( We grow neither better or worse as we get old, but more like ourselves. --May L. Becker )
Time: roughly 8am-ish
Location: Spinner's End
Characters Involved: Remus Lupin & Severus Snape, only
Rating: PGish, I think, for now, we'll see ;-)
( We grow neither better or worse as we get old, but more like ourselves. --May L. Becker )
As evidenced by his continual harangue over the Metamorphmagus. Severus doubted he would ever be completely confident or secure in his relationship with Lupin as long as she kept turning up. 'Old friend', indeed. Life history had taught him, again and again, that in a choice between Severus Snape and anyone or anything else, no one ever chose him.
Remus insisted he would, of course, but that hadn't really been tested much, had it? Sinistra chatting with him about providing her mother with grandchildren had been disturbing enough. To watch the barely-dressed Nymphadora Tonks cling to him around the dance floor had been enough to churn his stomach - an uncomfortable sensation which hadn't stopped until he knew Remus was back at the castle after their 'not-date' Tuesday night!
Clearly, Severus had issues. He had thought that being closer to Remus would be a good thing, and over-all, it was. Particularly when they were alone together, or here at Spinner's End with all the others, it was good. More than good. Better than he'd ever felt in his life.
But when they were living their mutually busy daily lives at Hogwarts, not so much. Sometimes they only saw each other at meal times, and even then not for long with the staggering of their schedules.
While it would surprise no one else, it surprised Severus a great deal to realise he was the 'jealous type'. Insecurity plagued him constantly, and the closer he felt to Remus when they were together, the more savage the insecurity became. Remus preferred women, or he had until Severus had kissed him in that Muggle garage. There was no way Severus could believe he possessed enough anything to make a heterosexual man become 'gay' for him.
He tried, very hard, to get the better of this ridiculous sensation. He had no power over Remus' choice or actions. Remus did not appear to be discontent with their enhanced association. The best Severus could do was continue to go on as they had been, and see where it led. This option was only slightly less distasteful than giving up, altogether. He couldn't stomach the thought of no longer being 'with' Remus, but the constant fear that he would soon leave for someone 'better' was almost equally unbearable.
So. He was irritable and far more touchy than usual - not a very grand state to recommend himself for a permanent association. Still, he had been here since early afternoon, yesterday. Remus still insisted on using the transformation room to become the werewolf, but then they had been together much as they had done the last several moons. Severus had tried, again, the aromatherapy and music to ease the transformation back, but whether Remus was sensing his heightened tension, or Severus was picking up on the distress of the wolf, or whether their mutual misery was just compounding the situation was impossible to say.
After the transformation was over, Severus gently pulled the bedding over Remus' exhausted form, and set about his routine of making and delivering the breakfasts. He then slipped into his lab long enough to retrieve a wrapped box, and then went back upstairs.
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He placed the box on Remus' breakfast tray and carried the lot up to his room. Finding Remus as he had expected - and hoped - to appear to be asleep, he moved as quietly as he could as he set the tray on the bedside table. Quietly slipping around to the other side of the bed, he offered the last part of the 'birthday present' - and the bit he was most worried about being accepted.
Remus was a 'cuddler' and often made joking comments about it, which Severus generally ignored, out of his own discomfort. If there was ever a time to attempt such a thing... well...
Dressed in his own grey cotton pajamas - with trousers rather than his occasional night-shirt - he slipped beneath the sheet and sidled over behind the other man. He was very reluctant to cause additional discomfort to over-stressed joints and limbs by adding weight, so he carefully slid one arm beneath Remus' pillow and rested the other hand gently at Remus' waist.
"Happy birthday, confounding werewolf," he said softly into Remus' ear.
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So, when the sound of footsteps approached the door and the familiar scent of the man wafted through along with those of the light breakfast the man carried, he kept his eyes closed. He assumed Severus would settle the tray as always and then, maybe, resume his 'watch' in the chaise, sleeping alongside Remus' bed as he had done the previous two moons. Once Severus was asleep, Remus would be free to lie awake, watching him and wondering how best to approach this change in the trust that he had thought was growing between them.
Therefore, he was quite surprised to feel one side of the bed dip down and a warm body slip cautiously in beside him!
"Severus--?" Tired brown eyes flew open at the sensation of fingers brushing across his exposed abdomen. "Birthday..? But my birthday's not..." Doing the calculations in his head, he realized that was what he had been forgetting. "Until today..."
Grinning sheepishly, his thoughts turned to other matters his body was already recognizing -- Severus Snape was in his bed!
He turned his head slowly, not wanting to ruin this moment with a sudden pain-inducing motion, he brushed a light kiss across the lips murmuring in his ear.
"So, are you my present?" He smirked mischievously, knowing full well from the slow carefulness with which Severus touched him that any 'present' would not be as 'strenuous' as the question implied. The smirk softened into the tender variation of his usual gentle smile reserved solely for the man beside him, as he raised one hand to trace that fine angled jaw. "Does this mean I'm forgiven?"
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"Not much of a present if that's all there was," he said, nodding his head toward the box on the tray. "Your real present is over there. I just thought you might like... company... while you slept."
Not to mention that his usual morning nap would be more comfortable on the bed rather than the chaise. He already felt his body all but melting against the other man, as though yearning to be one.
But that wasn't his only motivation, as Remus' last question reminded him. He frowned and sighed heavily, his lips pursed into a thin-line.
"There is nothing to forgive. I have been... behaving badly."
Gods! How hard it was to admit that! He swallowed hard and met Remus' gaze, trying (and probably failing) to disguise how very vulnerable he felt.
"It is very difficult for me to accept that you would rather be with me than with her - or damn near anyone else, for that matter. Like Stella and her talk of giving her mother grandchildren.
"It occurred to me that we have not discussed... expectations... regarding exclusivity. I have no claims upon you and no right to expect you not to... date... whomever you wish. But I find the thought of you with anyone else exceedingly distasteful."
As if that wasn't the understatement of the year.
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"No, my real present is right here." He squeezed his arms a bit more to emphasize his point. "Everything else is just icing."
Somehow, he already felt more relaxed just having the warmth of Severus' body beside him. A portion of his earlier tension seemed to just melt out of him, as though the comfort of the other man's presence would not allow for the tightness of muscles and the rigidity of joints that typically plagued him after a transformation.
Fanciful and probably untrue, but the illusion of such was more than enough.
He watched with curiosity as Severus' adam's apple bobbed once and the normally sharp, dark eyes softened with something that seemed almost akin to trepidation. The expression brought Remus' hand back up to caress one pale cheek in what he hoped was reassurance, though his heart secretly soared to hear such an admission.
"That's not true," he said quietly, his voice as serious as his emotions were jubilant as he chose his words carefully to both say and not say what was truly in his heart. "You do have a claim upon me, if you want it. The thought of being with anyone but you holds no appeal to me. I do care for 'Dora -- as a friend, as Sirius' little cousin, but I have never truly wanted to be with her the way I want to be with you. No matter how much I tried to tell myself that's what I should want -- not even when I was technically 'with' her.
"Yes, there's a part of me that would have been happy to make my own parents grandparents. But, I learned long ago that is not an option for me and, even if it was, it is not how I would choose the person to spend my life with. I'm not a pureblood 'noble' like Malfoy, or even Sirius, to hang my heart on the need to 'carry on the bloodline'."
Bringing his other hand up to join the one softly stroking Severus' cheek, he gently cupped the other man's face to hold his attention.
"I want you, Severus. There is no one else for me."
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It was only now beginning to occur to Severus that he was showing all the signs of having gone and done something very stupid. He had been quite determined not to allow himself to get overly attached to Remus, so when the other man eventually ended the association, he would not be overly hurt in the process.
Apparently, he had failed.
Failure, itself, was distressing to him - yet he couldn't manage to get as upset as he ought to have been. Not when his sharp, angular face was cradled gently in Remus' hands, expressive brown eyes peering into his with earnest sincerity. He would not have needed to be a Legilimense to see the honest emotion pouring forth, offering him the balm of reassurances. If Remus was equally emotionally entangled, it wouldn't be quite so bad to be in over-his-head, himself.
Phrases stood out fierce and hot in his mind, igniting something suspiciously like joy inside him, causing an odd, inflating sensation in his chest so sharp and tight he could hardly breathe.
...choose the person to spend my life with... hang my heart...
Had Remus chosen him as the person with whom he wanted to spend his life? Had the werewolf 'hung his heart' on him?
If so, it was an awesome, fearsome responsibility, to somehow live up to being worthy of such a weighty thing. His mind raced in confusion.
With perfect, sunshine bright clarity, Severus knew what he sought. The answer rose up out of the whirl of confusion like Phoenix song, wrapping him in the comfort and security of permanence. Breath he hadn't been aware of holding released on a soft sigh of wonder, through lips curling in a shy smile.
As erudite as he was, words of the heart did not flow easily. Nor could he be certain that his fancy had not run away with him, making Remus' words mean more than the werewolf had intended. Something must be offered - Severus had asked for reassurances and Remus had come out on the emotional limb to give them. It was now in Severus' hands to catch him, lest he fall.
He tightened his arms again, pulling them closer, gently scissoring their legs together so as not to knock-knees, entwining his body with Remus'.
"You have me, Remus," he said quietly. "All that I have to give, such as it is."
Corny as it sounded, it was astonishing to realise it was true - and that he hadn't seen it long ago. It had started with his worldly possessions - when had he ever been so free with his resources as he had been with the pack? Even going so far as to put Remus' name on the title of the house and beneficiary to his accounts, should something happen to him? He was a better man, a better person because of Remus' influence in his life. It was no different now, emotionally. With Remus, he was capable of giving more than he had ever realised he was capable of FEELING!
How would he ever let that go, now that he had found it?
He still couldn't put a name to his feelings - though he suspected this was lingering self-delusion on his part. One revelation at a time seemed to be quite enough to be going on with, and the certain knowledge that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with Remus Lupin was weighty enough!
"I want exclusivity, Remus. Commitment. I want to be with you as long as you'll have me - and commitment to making an effort to work out problems which will arise before just giving up and walking away...."
He knew he was an unpleasant bastard - problems were going to arise! There was no way around it. He didn't want to constantly worry that by the umpteenth time he'd lost his temper over something stupid, Remus would decide enough was enough, pack his things, and be gone without a backward glance.
"You have become more important to me than anyone I have ever known. I'll not lose you now. Not without a fight."
Leave it to Severus Snape to phrase an almost-romantic declaration as a veiled threat! He softened the clumsiness of his words by sealing his side of the promise with a fierce, possessive kiss.
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Severus' words, however, came very close to equaling it in that moment.
Though quieter, more accepted as Fate, fears of loss and inadequacy were no less present in Remus' mind as they had been in Severus'. But, Remus was accustomed to these things just fading away. he had set out to clumsily woo the other man with secret messages and the constance of his own presence. But, in his heart he had always known that one day, Severus was going to find him tiresome, find caring for a him each month to be too much of a trial.
That Severus might want as much from Remus as Remus had come to need from Severus was a possibility he had not even considered. In his current state, his own guard was so far down those three dangerous words he had held in for weeks were on the very edge of his tongue, almost begging to be spoken plainly and aloud.
He fed them to Severus upon the kiss, instead, allowing the sentiment to hide inside the answering glide of his lips on Severus' as he accepted the other man's possession exuberantly. He had never felt he belonged to another, never felt as though he could give himself freely into another's keeping -- too many secrets, too many dangers, too many scars...too inhuman.
But, Severus knew him for what he was. He had spent much of the previous evening caring for the canine form of the man who would be his lover -- and in the morning declared his desire to have that 'beast' and no other. Severus never shied away from that part of Remus, never tried to ignore or make less of it than it was -- an intrinsic part of who Remus was, for good or ill. Yet, he still asked for a commitment as long as Remus would have him!
"I think you'll find 'as long as I'll have you' to be quite a long time, indeed," he said breathlessly, pulling back from their kiss long enough to confirm his own commitments.
"I have no intentions of ever 'giving-up and walking away' from you, or us." He'd known going into this, after all, that it wouldn't be easy. Neither of them were truly easy people to be with. "I...I need you in my life, Severus. I need you here, right by my side."
Rising up on his elbow, Remus gently pushed on Severus' shoulder to roll him over onto his back. The man was not the only one with a commitment to make. True, like their more natural cousins, werewolves were serial monogomists. But, the tales about werewolves mating for live were just that...old wives' tales. It was the man who wished to knot his life to that of the man in his arms forever. Still, the 'wolf' also wished to stake it's claim, assert itself with it's chosen mate, whom it had recognized as such months before the man became aware of his own desires.
"You have it all, everything you want -- exclusivity, commitment...and me, everything that I am is yours, Severus."
Leaning in to bind his own promises with another kiss, Remus took his own terrifying leap towards desires he would have never thought possible to bear one short year ago.
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So used to having to be strong, independent, isolated... lonely, Severus had never imagined himself capable of the sort of give-and-take inherently necessary in any relationship. It was a surprise to find himself not only capable of it, but reveling in it, his body easily submitting to the gentle pressure of Remus' hand upon his shoulder even as the doubts of his heart gave way to the far weightier pressure of Remus' words.
Severus was not wholly submissive in the action, nor remotely passive. He tightened his arms and entwined legs around Remus so as to pull the werewolf with him as he rolled onto his back, choking back a groan of pleasure at the very satisfying weight settling over him.
Relief. Security. Desire. Contentment. Belonging. Possessiveness. Fondness. Passion.... So many heady emotions colliding together, it was well that he was not expected to speak. As it was, when Remus offered his own affirmation to be sealed with a kiss, the choked sound Severus made, all but lost in the kiss, was some sort of cross between a sob of relief and a cry of passionate welcome.
Weeks of uncertainty, of ridiculous struggles to try to maintain some distance between them, all evaporated into nothingness. Why ever had he thought it necessary to maintain distance from this?
He opened his lips to the kiss, gliding his tongue across Remus' mouth, seeking, finding, and suckling on Remus' tongue, feasting on his kisses with heady abandon.
He opened his arms to the werewolf's transfiguration-weary body, reveling in the weight of Remus' torso resting against his, gliding his hands in gentle caresses over the warm skin and interesting ridges of Remus' back and spine.
He opened his legs to more comfortably cradle Remus' hips between them, uninhibited, wrapping his legs around Remus', seeking contact in every possible way.
He opened his heart to the wondrous realisation that he was home. He needed and was needed, cared and was cared for, protected and received protection - he was not alone anymore, after a lifetime of loneliness.
It was impossible to remember the last time he had felt so whole.
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It was in the way his lips parted to welcome the sensual duel of tongues twining together. It was in each drifting touch of hands skimming over thin hips, waist, chest, arms... It was in the hitch of breath that accompanied each pass of long fingers over his skin and the hoarse groan dragged from his throat with the increased contact as his entire body was wrapped in Severus.
He had never thought to have this, this sense of knowing, truly knowing he was cared for, supported, wanted -- all of him, darkness and light, total acceptance of the entire package. For as many years as he had simply wanted to find that one person to whom he could give himself completely, who would take his curse in stride without ignoring it's existence or belittling the man in favor of the beast, he had never thought to find that person.
But, here, in his arms, was that man!
There was a fire in his blood that far out-weighed the less pleasant burn of muscles protesting all movement. Wrapping an arm about Severus' waist to bring them truly as close as possible, he buried the other hand into the fine, dark hair spreading like soft ink across the pillow beneath them. Hot, hungry kisses left thin, now kiss-swollen, lips to trail along the jaw and down the throat, nipping teeth and teasing tongue leaving no skin untasted in their wake.
"This is hardly fair." Pulling back with a soft moan, normally gentle brown eyes, now passion-darkened and stormy looked down to drink in the sight of Severus beneath him, desire lending color to pale cheeks and a glow to night-dark eyes. "I'm at rather a disadvantage, don't you think?"
He made a show of playfully looking down between them and back and forth between the grey cotton concealing the man he currently held beneath him and his own scantily clad form pressed urgently against every cotton-covered inch he could touch. The teasing expression died at his eyes, however, which held no room for anything but pent-up want and yearning. The arm wrapped around Severus' waist slide free, hand grasping the hem of the other man's pajama shirt lightly.
"May I? I want to unwrap my birthday present...just a lttle bit."
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Some self-restraint remained. Severus could not forget the agonising transformation he had witnessed for the third time less than an hour before. He did not tug or pull or grasp at stressed joints or weary muscles.
Instead, he surrendered to Remus' kisses, again baring his throat as he had once done for the wolf, his head thrown wantonly back against the pillows as moans of pleasure slipped past his lips.
Remus was tired. Severus' initial intent had been nothing more exciting than to hold the other man in his arms while they slept away the fatigue of the night before. Conversation and declarations had altered the dynamic. Severus would follow where Remus led, at this point, trusting the werewolf to know the limits of his body and his endurance.
He kissed and stroked and tasted, lips and jaw and neck and earlobes, nipping at the sensitive junction between neck and shoulder, raking his nails lightly across Remus' back, his hips canting restlessly upward against the delicious pressure between his legs.
The request came just at the moment that Severus' skin was protesting at the barrier between them, longing for more contact, more closeness.
He moaned in protest as Remus moved away, his passion-glazed eyes taking a moment to focus properly on the familiar features hovering above him.
Debauched, Severus decided, was a very, very good look for Remus John Lupin!
Kiss-swollen lips smiled mischievously as they echoed Remus' words of two months before back to him.
"As you wish," he said huskily, cooperating as needed to allow himself to be divested of his shirt.
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No, the one thought drawing the focus of his thoughts was touching Severus, loving through his fingers as well as he loved with his heart. Although the more active and more primitive instincts driving him were much less poetic -- touch, claim, mine.
Propping himself up on one elbow, he set to work on the buttons of Severus' shirt with one hand, rejoining in the kisses as he did so. Starting at the bottom, he worked his way up, taking as much time about it as he could endure. It was an effort, much more effort than he would have ever considered, but he refrained from touching this newly exposed expanse of Severus until they had removed the shirt entirely.
Twice before he had seen Severus this way -- once when he had settled Severus into this same bed after the stubborn man had passed out from exhaustion, and once to apply salve to burns received during an accident with a student cauldron during detention. Both times had been before he admitted to himself there was any attraction at all between them. He had then spent months dreaming of Severus' skin, the way it would glide past his own, their sweat-slicked bodies moving together in wanton pleasure...
One hand caressed a path from shoulder, across pects, down over ribs and stomach, around waist to hips. His own chest followed in reverse, sliding up, pressing skin-to-skin, until Remus could bury his face in the crook of Severus' neck with a muffled groan born of the near sensory overload of finally knowing the bliss of flesh against flesh.
With more intimate contact came more insistent needs, the dark, primitive part of him urging him to 'claim'. The newly-contained wolf wanted to mark this man, mark him as his -- his to look after, his to touch, his to love. That Severus was once again offering his throat to the wolf was almost too much temptation.
"Mm, much better," he murmured, pressing light kisses along the curve of one pale shoulder before giving in to his 'wolf' just a little bit, dragging his teeth lightly across the sensitive tendon where throat and shoulder met, a soft growl held captive in the back of his own throat.
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"Bloody tease," he accused between demanding kisses. At last the shirt was open, and he sat up long enough to shrug out of the sleeves, letting it drop carelessly to the floor. He barely took enough time to remove his wand from the pocket and set it with uncharacteristic inattention on the bedside table.
"Gods!" he gasped as Remus' warm hand caressed over his yearning skin. Muscles trembled beneath the touch as though flesh was leaping in joyous welcome to the long-sought contact. A sharp his of pleasure escaped him as the curious hand ghosted past an almost painfully-sensitive nipple. He'd had opportunity to learn how much he enjoyed touching Remus, learning the planes, angles and ridges of skin, muscle and bones.
This was his first true taste of how desperately he yearned for Remus' touch, himself.
Severus' groan was twin to Remus' as the werewolf returned to his embrace at last, skin to skin, chest to chest, his slightly hairier one creating interesting patterns of friction between them. He again entwined their legs together, as though to entrap Remus just where he was, delicious pressure against his now rigid, aching hardness.
Breathless, lost in a spiral of sensory delight, held secure in Remus' arms, his hips rocked in restless, instinctive rhythm. His head arched back in pleasure as Remus' breath danced across the sensitive skin of his throat, he moaned softly. Remus' thick mane of hair along his jaw was too much temptation, leaving him no choice but to nuzzle his way through the soft mass to find an ear to nip and suck.
"Yes," he agreed in a soft, sibilant hiss. A hand again entangled itself through Remus' luxurious hair. His grip tightened at the graze of teeth, eagerly encouraging firmer contact. A shudder of pleasure coursed through him.
"Much better...," he murmured his breathless approval.
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A very thin veneer...
...that snapped under the combined sensation of tightening fingers in his hair and the press of flesh against rather than away from his mouth. Letting the growl that had been building in his throat rumble free, he gave in to primitive drives and bit down firmly into the soft, warm flesh at the base of the throat, just where it begins to curve into the shoulder.
Eight moons earlier, this man had offered his throat to the wolf -- the real wolf. For one moment, the world had stopped. Nothing seemed to move. Even the very breath of the man in canine form had paused. In that second, the deepest levels of consciousness had finally clicked, fear and want, man and wolf, melding into one thought -- must have.
Remus had been running away from that visceral, gut-wrenching reaction ever since.
Now he had stopped running. He had embraced this raw, savage part of him that seemed more suited to antediluvian times.
And, nothing had ever felt as intense. Beyond the physical pleasure created by the slow, subtle rocking motion of his body, causing his chest to rub in light circles against Severus', bringing stiff, aching flesh into contact with the equally rigid, eager flesh of the other man, there was a fierce exultation singing through his blood unlike anything he'd ever experienced. It was hot and strong and almost suffocating in it's perfection.
For the span of heartbeats there was no focus but the taste of Severus' skin, the scent of Severus' skin, the feel of Severus'. Somehow, he managed enough control to only press deeply into the skin without breaking or (he hoped) bruising from the bite directly. He could not help sucking lightly at the skin held trapped beneath his teeth and one hand wound itself into Severus' hair, matching the strong grip in his own wild locks, -- though whether to anchor Severus for further explorations or Remus in the tide of sensation coursing through him was yet to be determined.
It was the growl still rumbling loudly through his own chest that finally reached him in his dark euphoria. As the sound registered in his mind, brown eyes snapped open in sudden fear and he broke the contact with a harsh gasp.
"Oh gods!" He nearly flung himself to one side to land on his side with a groan of pain at the sudden shift of position, legs still tangled in Severus', breath coming in desperate pants. One hand reached tentatively for the angry red mark now adorning the base of the other man's throat. "Gods, Severus. I lost control. I'm sorry."
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