Fic: Growing Older
Title: Growing Older
Author: liebedance
Recipient: (if applicable)
Pairing: Lily/James,Remus/Sirius, MWPP gen
Rating: PG/PG-13
Word Count: 436
Prompt: Day 4
Warnings: Kind of sad
Summary: "Remus isn’t sure when or how it has happened, only that it has happened. And that it’s happened too soon."
Author's Notes: Thanks to museme87 for, as always, being a great beta-reader and for putting up with the ridiculousness that is me
Remus isn’t sure when or how it has happened, only that it has happened. And that it’s happened too soon.
Wasn’t it just yesterday that James and Sirius were making crude jokes about breakfast sausage in the Great Hall? It hadn’t been that long, had it, since they’d gone on their first mid-night excursion of the Hogwarts castle? When had Lily stopped hating James, and started loving him?
They are still children, really, Remus thinks. They are barely out of school, barely more than two decades old. They’ve so recently applied for their first jobs, moved into their first apartments. They can’t be adults, not yet. They are too young.
And, yet, there is something so very aged in the way Sirius has taken to sitting on the back step, smoking his cigarettes, and staring up at the stars. Their love making is both more amorous and more urgent, all at once. Sirius, it seems, has finally realised his own mortality.
Lily’s hands rest on her rounded abdomen in such a motherly way, so protective and strong. It seems as though she’s been doing it for years. James no longer looks at her with youthful, love-sick desire. His glances are gentler now, the passion burning quietly within them. They don’t fight anymore. Not the way they used to: loud and explosive and for everyone to see. And Remus is almost fooled into thinking that everything between them is perfect.
When Peter arrives at Headquarters to inform the Order that Marlene McKinnon, along with her entire family, has been murdered, he is not the nervous little boy that Remus met on the train so many years ago. His mouth is set in a firm line and his eyes are cold as he delivers the news in a quiet and steady voice.
Even the full moons are different. The four of them no longer roam the woods, looking for adventure. His friends try to keep the wolf at bay in the cellar underneath Lily and James’ small house. And, despite their insistence that it isn’t true, Remus knows that they spend those nights with him out of obligation, that it’s almost a chore.
The war has changed them all. The world has changed them all. They now realise how isolated - how protected they had been at Hogwarts. There are no longer grown-ups and teachers to solve their problems. No, Remus realises, as he sees the awe and admiration in the eyes of the children they save. Somehow, somewhere, they became the looked-up to, the ones who supposedly hold the answers.
But, the problem is, they’re still just kids.
Author: liebedance
Recipient: (if applicable)
Pairing: Lily/James,Remus/Sirius, MWPP gen
Rating: PG/PG-13
Word Count: 436
Prompt: Day 4
Warnings: Kind of sad
Summary: "Remus isn’t sure when or how it has happened, only that it has happened. And that it’s happened too soon."
Author's Notes: Thanks to museme87 for, as always, being a great beta-reader and for putting up with the ridiculousness that is me
Remus isn’t sure when or how it has happened, only that it has happened. And that it’s happened too soon.
Wasn’t it just yesterday that James and Sirius were making crude jokes about breakfast sausage in the Great Hall? It hadn’t been that long, had it, since they’d gone on their first mid-night excursion of the Hogwarts castle? When had Lily stopped hating James, and started loving him?
They are still children, really, Remus thinks. They are barely out of school, barely more than two decades old. They’ve so recently applied for their first jobs, moved into their first apartments. They can’t be adults, not yet. They are too young.
And, yet, there is something so very aged in the way Sirius has taken to sitting on the back step, smoking his cigarettes, and staring up at the stars. Their love making is both more amorous and more urgent, all at once. Sirius, it seems, has finally realised his own mortality.
Lily’s hands rest on her rounded abdomen in such a motherly way, so protective and strong. It seems as though she’s been doing it for years. James no longer looks at her with youthful, love-sick desire. His glances are gentler now, the passion burning quietly within them. They don’t fight anymore. Not the way they used to: loud and explosive and for everyone to see. And Remus is almost fooled into thinking that everything between them is perfect.
When Peter arrives at Headquarters to inform the Order that Marlene McKinnon, along with her entire family, has been murdered, he is not the nervous little boy that Remus met on the train so many years ago. His mouth is set in a firm line and his eyes are cold as he delivers the news in a quiet and steady voice.
Even the full moons are different. The four of them no longer roam the woods, looking for adventure. His friends try to keep the wolf at bay in the cellar underneath Lily and James’ small house. And, despite their insistence that it isn’t true, Remus knows that they spend those nights with him out of obligation, that it’s almost a chore.
The war has changed them all. The world has changed them all. They now realise how isolated - how protected they had been at Hogwarts. There are no longer grown-ups and teachers to solve their problems. No, Remus realises, as he sees the awe and admiration in the eyes of the children they save. Somehow, somewhere, they became the looked-up to, the ones who supposedly hold the answers.
But, the problem is, they’re still just kids.