FICLET: Higher [R/S - PG-13]
Title: Higher
Pairing: implied Remus/Sirius
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Remus has nowhere to go but down...
Higher
"There’s nowhere to go but down," Remus murmurs softly one evening lying in bed, Sirius resting his head on his shoulder.
"Hmm?"
"I thought you were sleeping," Remus admits. "I was just thinking… Here, you and me right now. This is it for me. I’ve never been happier. There’s nowhere to go but down."
Sirius frowns and removes his head from Remus’ shoulder to look up at him.
"You’re too bloody cynical, Moony."
"And you’re too much of an optimist," Remus replies lightly. They both think to themselves, ‘You’re the reason we’re losing the war,’ and immediately regret it.
"We can go higher, Moony," Sirius says and the frown is replaced with a mischievous grin that Remus knows all too well.
"What do you have in mind, Mr. Padfoot?" Remus asks, cynical thoughts forgotten.
Sirius doesn’t answer but dives under the covers instead, tickling Remus before giving him indescribable pleasure. Higher floats through his mind as he climaxes. When he comes down from the afterglow, Sirius is there with kisses and nibbles on his ear.
In a moment of what can only be described as optimism, Remus thinks, ‘even if I come down, as long as he’s here, it will be all right. As long as he’s here I’ll be all right.’
-*-
1996
‘Well,’ Remus thinks, ‘Sirius did like his extremes.’
He knew they would come down from their high sooner or later. Unfortunately, it was sooner rather than later with the events of October 31st, 1981. Sirius always did have a way of pushing things to the extreme. Remus had never been lower, and this time there was no Sirius there to make things all right.
Like a cruel reflection of the days when Sirius used to push him higher, Sirius pushed him to new lows until one day, there was no Sirius and Remus knew he had hit a plateau.
"So this is it," he says to himself, sitting alone in 12 Grimmauld Place. He pulls his wand from his robes and rolls in between his fingers. The words are on his tongue. He knows there will be no pain, only a green flash before the fading to black. He taps the wand gently against his knee in time with his deep breaths.
He looks up suddenly at the scratching at the window. He drops his wand to the floor when he recognizes the snowy owl. Harry. Hurrying to the window sill, he pushes open the window and takes the letter from Hedwig. Grasping the letter in his hands, he returns to the armchair. He runs his fingers over the parchment, outlining the seal.
He picks up his wand from where it was dropped on the floor.
‘Incendio,’ he enunciates and fire springs to life in the fireplace. He opens Harry’s letter slowly and smiles slowly when he reads how Harry received almost straight Os on his OWLs.
"Maybe," he muses as he refolds Harry’s letter, "there’s nowhere to go but up."
-*-