Fanart and Fic: Young Wormtail, and Doing Better
In July I spent more time on reading and discussing fic than on writing new stories. While I saw a wonderful variety of fanworks and other posts when modding at the Sunshine Challenge, almost all my own Sunshine posts were self-recs of old fics, and in between those entries I posted only one small Molly/Amelia fic. After sharing also two watercolours, I realised that I'd need a lot of practice before attempting portraits (of humans).
Following some advice for beginners, I painted first a still life and then a portrait of a critter.
Now I've posted the latter watercolour on AO3, here: Young Wormtail.
Besides, I've remembered that a fic I completed in early July is no longer anonymous and can be shared here.
Title: Doing Better
Author: paulamcg
Pairing: Sirius/Remus, Sirius & James, minor Sirius/James
Summary: Out on an Order mission with James in December 1979, Sirius can't help worrying more and more that his Moony needs him back as soon as possible.
Word Count: 5800
Rating: R
Notes: Written for the 2021 RS Fixit Fest. Thank you for the beta, justtoarguewithyou! Any remaining and new mistakes - as well as all the shortcomings in Fixing anything and in the happiness of the ending - are totally my fault.
Read here on AO3
or right here:
Doing Better
When placing the fag between his lips for the third time, Sirius can no longer shake off the feeling that this is all wrong. The murky alley, barely visible through the frost-covered windowpane, doesn't scare him, no... Rather calls for him to come out and act, but also threatens to bring back images... not only of Remus's room with no heating last winter, but some memories that are older, repressed... worse?
Huddling under the inconspicuously worn-out cloak, Sirius turns to eye the ragged crowd from under the rim of his hood.
What's brought him to sit waiting here in a seedy village pub, where Muggle cigarettes are such a luxury that James keeps telling him he can't crush one after taking a single drag whenever he feels jittery... What's going on... It must all be wrong.
“You take it!” He thrusts the fag to James. “You don't need to inhale the smoke.”
Remus wouldn't either. But his fingers would linger on Sirius's, reassuring him that something can be - or become - right in this world.
"All right." James lets out a mouthful of smoke to hover above the sticky tabletop between them, and grabs his equally filthy-looking wooden goblet. "It can't make this ale taste any worse."
They've ordered common Magiale so as not to attract attention. Yet, it's turned out that some of the patrons prefer hot drinks and soups. Nursing a steaming goblet or bowl must help ward off the cold that's seeping through the grimy panes.
Not that anyone but a pair of Order members is stupid enough to sit next to the windows. The rough benches closer to the fireplace are occupied by such wretches, too, who have come in only for the warmth, not for any refreshments.
Anyway, it must be reasonable not to drink anything stronger than small beer, and to stay alert in case something happens, after all. But Sirius has got a nagging suspicion that this whole mission is small beer: that any roles given to him in this fucking war are of little importance.
He can't help envying even James, who was sent from London a few days earlier, and who ended up involved in a literally bloody confrontation with a couple of Death Eaters. Any questions about who is chosen, or why you are sent with or after your best mate, would break the rules of the Order. This makes Sirius only more eager to claim that someone with proper Healer's skills should have been summoned to patch up James, whereas a qualified Auror member like Sirius should be sent to a real battle.
"How's your arm?" he hurries to ask when he realises that James has set the goblet back down immediately and moved the fag to his left hand.
"Good enough for finishing this task." James brandishes the fag. "At least this one you gave to me."
Even though he wasn't wounded in his wand arm, it's surprising that he is still kept here, on duty. And for what purpose?
"At least you've now got one you know all the details of."
"And a brand spanking new, spectacular scar to prove what's not my dear brother's strong suit."
Sirius finds it hard to laugh, instead of thinking about the one among Remus's scars which he could have prevented, if he had not learnt only the basics of first aid. If he had not been learning that just on the fucking field training for Auror cadets a year ago, exactly at last December's full moon!
It was a mistake to trust that Wormy would run alone with the wolf even back then. And as he's craven enough to evade questions about finally joining the Order next time he visits from Wales, where he moved so conveniently as soon as possible, right after Prong's wedding, it was no big surprise that he explained as early as on the evening of Sirius's birthday that he barely managed to stay for the following night's furry time, and would be too busy until at least the end of the year.
If now both James and Sirius had been summoned to an Order mission at the very beginning of this month, could Sirius have refused? No, but he'd have sneaked away for one night. He's sworn to himself that never again will he fail to Apparate to be there for Moony when he transforms.
As he catches himself fumbling for the pack of cigarettes, Sirius pushes his hand under a sleeve. No, not as high up as to check that his wand is secure in its holster.
Just to play with his fragile little bracelet: scrap yarn of green wool that had unraveled from his Moony's shabbier jumper. When he'd cut it off, he asked Moony to tie it around his wrist, and to pull the overhand knot even tighter than the one he himself in his impatience always makes instead of undoing the bowknot in the ridiculous shoelace Moony wears as a belt. This wristband is perhaps an amusing, but a most appropriate, sign of Sirius's bond with the man - more than human - into whose pants he's now dying to get again and again.
Neither of them minded too much that this time, when the full moon rose on the third of December, two days ago now, it was just the two of them in their secret spot in the Yorkshire wilderness. After the long night of shared freedom in their furry forms, and a day's rest in the village inn, Remus was not in a bad shape and insisted on attending the last lectures before Merlin College would soon close for vacation. He'd got an owl from home, he said, and he couldn't wait to go and see his parents at Christmas.
And that unnerved Sirius, as he'd still failed to ask... at least failed to ask in the right way, except at the previous full moon, and back then perhaps Moony had already lost his mind to the wolf and didn't hear when finally the question was not whether he needed a place to stay but whether he wanted to share with Sirius, who knew at last that it was the right thing to do. He wanted them to share all the days and nights when they could be together. And they'd celebrate all through the month, not only at Solstice.
Perhaps Remus's mother, too, would accept Sirius after he'd asked Remus to move in. And they'd both spend Christmas Day in Bagendon. Not much longer because the old house was crowded now that she gave refuge to more and more cross-breed creatures. Remus, too, would soon come back home to the flat in Lincoln's Inn Fields, which had felt too empty ever since James moved out.
Yes, Sirius wanted to decorate his flat - their flat - immediately. But he had barely finished, just managed to charm the moon on top of the fir tree to show the real one's phases - now the hopeful waning gibbous disc - when a fiery phoenix feather fluttered onto a branch among his twinkling stars.
Floo at once to the White Thestral in Long Compton!
He hurried to send his owl... hurried too much and must have made the mistake to write only that Remus should come and celebrate Solstice when he'd be back from this urgent mission.
"It doesn't make any sense to keep watch here." James has just downed his ale and is grimacing when Sirius, startled out of his musings, looks up.
"No," Sirius snaps. "When we haven't been told what..."
"I know as much." James leans closer across the table and whispers, "We're supposed to spot anyone who gives a wand to one of these Squibs."
"They are not all..." If they were Squibs, it wouldn't make any sense for Voldemort's party to arm them with wands, but James still finds it hard to comprehend that there can be fully magical humans who never got the chance to go to Hogwarts and can't afford the wands that would have chosen them.
"Right. And I doubt the recruiters would approach anyone here. Drink up! Let's go!"
"First, back to the loo to check that you haven't started bleeding again."
In the dark, stinking corridor behind the bar, there's somebody blocking their way. Sirius's hand has already slid up onto his wand holster, but James nudges him.
"Right. No need to show what you've got up your sleeves," the man says in a gruff, derisive voice, which Sirius recognises as the barman's. "I heard the incantations the first time you sneaked back here. We don't want any Ministry people around. Now you go out quietly, or... Better still, I throw you out due to indecency - a pair of poofters!"
Not even considering backing off, since this old Squib isn't a threat to two trained Aurors, Sirius has now come so close to him that, despite the gloom, he can discern a wink - but no sign of scorn on the gaunt, bearded face. He wants to ask if this means open opposition against the Ministry. Or to shove the man aside, and proceed with his wand ready, so as to attack any Death Eaters that are perhaps hiding in the loo.
But there's James's hand on his shoulder. "I'm guessing you've got another fucking pair in there. Not too eager to see them, I can take a leak outside."
Without replying, the barman pulls open a door that leads from right there straight to a back alley. Now James has got his wand out. No matter whether the old man is on their side or Voldemort's or impartial, there's no way to know if there's an enemy in ambush outside.
The smooth beech of Sirius's wand responds to the touch of his fingers; there's the familiar tingle shared by his skin and the wood, and it makes him feel both calm and unrestrained, sure of his abilities. He steps through the doorway at James's heel, ignoring all lessons on tactics.
And he can't help feeling disappointed when, out there between the piles of rubbish, they are assaulted only by snow flurries and gusts of harsh wind.
The chill born of that first night's frost and wind has kept carving a hollow deep inside him. Pulling James by the arm in order to make him crouch with him, Sirius lets his back slide down the wall of the ramshackle building, which he's afraid is about to collapse in the snow storm. The Invisibility Cloak, which covers the two of them, protects them only from being seen - and, so as to serve its purpose, must let the snow through.
Sirius has hated the cold since... He doesn't want to remember since when. He hates staying still, and hates feeling useless, and it doesn't get any better when he wonders if he might be needed somewhere else.
In the week that he's now spent spying with James around these squalid quarters of Long Compton, they've barely caught a glimpse of a masked figure contacting local folk. And Sirius's resentment has only grown while he's grudgingly followed the instructions brought by another feather on the same evening when he'd arrived to find James bleeding on the threshold of the White Thestral.
"Lie low..." he says in James's ear, and it's a comfort to know that the sardonic tone in quoting bloody Dumbledore's words won't go unnoticed.
And trust James to chuckle. That sound alone promises Sirius that he'll get warmer, and now James hugs him close, rubbing a hand against his arm.
As they've found some sheds for having a rest in - for sleeping mainly in turns, so as not to be taken unawares by any of the vagrants seeking shelter in the same places - it's become a most natural and necessary thing to huddle together for warmth. And here Sirius has caught himself wanting James to hold him tight.
Back when they first became Marauder brothers and James kept punching him and urging him into wrestling matches, he had a hard time hiding how those casual, friendly touches caused odd nausea in him... Odd, yes. Since the day when James's parents became his, too, there's no reason to remember why he'd learnt to hate being touched. By that day he'd got used to James, and James had also understood what he didn't like, and Remus had started helping him to gradually figure out how intimate physical closeness could become better than bearable.
He's left behind something that taught him the hatred - or fear? It doesn't belong to him, and he doesn't belong to it. He's able to unlearn it. And that has been confirmed here at this fucking mission. He's doing better. So much better that he must admit to himself he's sometimes aroused when...
Maybe it's because he's thinking about his Moony. Or maybe he starts thinking about Moony, just as James starts talking about Lily - because this closeness they share makes them feel like wanking.
No, not now when they are out here, waiting in ambush, of course not.
And of course Prongs talks about Lily simply because he misses her. In sickness and health, he says. Keeps repeating his wedding vows - no less exasperating than all through the years when he was wooing the bright, feisty witch. And he grins hopefully when he says that Lily explains how feeling sick now means that she's better than in perfect health.
The existence of their baby inside her feels unreal. Lily's at her parents', but she's said she'll still go on missions when the worst morning sickness is over. Still, perhaps Dumbledore considers her too valuable now, whereas James can now be put at risk. And Sirius himself doesn't need to be spared, because he won't make anyone pregnant. Dumbledore must know about him and Moony.
No, no thoughts of Moony now. He's bound to be safe and sound, because he's Dumbledore's great experiment, which mustn't be spoiled. He'll be given no such tasks which might make him resort to violence and undo his humanity - the defective bit of it that those fucking beastologists believe he's got left and they've got the right to examine. Moony will show them. When they made him an object of a secret research project, they didn't know what a man he'd grow to be - or that he'd have friends to help him and encourage him to wriggle his way to more courses than the stupid Dark Creature nonsense, and one day he'd revolutionise the Creature Study. That he'd have a partner to support him.
Focusing on the masked figure at the other end of the alley, Sirius leans only lightly against James's firm chest, and he doesn't need to remind himself of what this companion means to him. His true brother. The solid friend he's always been right to trust. The only one to guide him back when he veers out of control.
If he were here all by himself, Sirius would have already rushed to hex this Death Eater. But James's elbow poking his side was enough to stop him, and he knows that if necessary, James would have lowered his head, as if ready to butt him with the stag's antlers.
They need proof of what's going on. What can that be, really, when it won't be enough that they tell Dumbledore what they've seen? This must mean that the old bugger wants to convince the Ministry to take action together with the Order... Perhaps so as to beat Voldemort's side in what they do here?
There are Death Eaters around recruiting these uneducated wizards and witches. And the barman says they don't want Ministry people at the pub. What...?
"What did you hear?" Sirius whispers in such a haste that he accidentally touches James's earlobe with his lips. "I mean, when I was running on my four feet for a change?"
There was something James wanted to tell him when he came back to the spot near the White Thestral where he'd left James alone under the cloak. He hurried them to follow together the masked man he'd seen walking towards these flimsiest shacks here, and refused to listen, then forgot. His mind's all over the place these days.
"All right, Padfoot. But briefly," James says, pulling Sirius to stand up. "We must start creeping closer. No Death Eater waits much longer for some Squibs... or whatever they are. The old geezer said the same as the barman. Remember? They've got enough of the Ministry. And explained to the boy. Last year a lot of people followed the Ministry recruiters because they were promised wizard status and funds sent to their families. They got back nothing but condolences. And now some younger people have left anyway... Look, there's a pair! Kids!"
Two boys... or perhaps girls have come up an even narrower alley and started walking over to the Death Eater. Perhaps they are still teenagers, or just malnourished enough to look like that.
Sirius transforms while crouching again, and slips his canine body from under the Invisibility Cloak. This will give James a better chance to get quickly near enough, unnoticed, and to use the camera to record the moment when, if they are lucky, wands change hands.
Slinking after him, keeping close to the walls, Sirius tries to ignore his keener sense of smell, but perks up his ears so as to hear what an uncertain, suspicious voice is saying.
"So we must go with you, and you teach us to use them? Now, soon? Not only after you win the war and open schools for us? And we get the wands right now?"
Sirius can't quite see it, but the masked wizard must be placing wands on the two kids' hands, because now there's the sound of the camera, not only clicking but also whirring for a moment so as to make a moving photo.
And the wizard turns his head and points a wand towards the invisible source of the sound.
The canine limbs have responded to Sirius's frantic mind before he's fully aware of a decision to act. A bounce has brought him against the Death Eater's chest. They both go down, and...
He presses a paw at a bearded chin, making the mask slide aside. And now he's growling, dropping saliva on a frightened and... familiar face. The barman's!
"Back off!" James must have revealed himself and not the camera but his wand.
Still snarling, and gnashing his teeth, repulsed by the foul breath of the man he's pinned to the ground, Sirius watches the two scrawny boys take some steps back. Oddly enough, they aren't turning tail and running.
"You, shaggy dog!" Now James's authoritative voice is accompanied with a hard shove at his haunch.
Thrilled due to the long-awaited action, Sirius finds the misunderstanding hilarious. This time it's James's turn to be serious... And the pun makes it ever harder for Sirius not to laugh while he's retreating obediently. His hysterical merriment turns into a feverish fit of barking.
"What's going on?" Trust his reliable brother to start the interrogation with the right question, the burning one.
"Why, the other side gave better promises." The barman sits up but barely glances at the wand he's dropped into a slush puddle. "Recruited me, and now I do that job here. Not at the Thestral, not in front of the angry crones who lost their sons and daughters and want these babies safe."
"And you don't want...?" James keeps his focus fully on him, not bothering to unarm the two boys.
"They get wands, they get a chance." Rubbing his chest, where the dog's nails must have hurt him, the barman turns to look at the boys, who are standing still, holding their new wands awkwardly. "If the village doesn't supply fighters, we'll all be killed - by either side, or both. We've seen it happen, just a week ago... Right here in the Cotswolds, to crossbreeds and..."
"Our side doesn't kill civilians. I even let you go. You'd better trust me and wait. You'll soon have the best offer." Now James is already walking towards the boys.
Passing them, hardly stopping, he holds out his left hand, and when he's receiving the two wands, he jerks his head back. "Fetch!" he commands.
Sirius leaps forward to snatch up the barman's wand and, carrying it between his teeth, trots after James.
As soon as they've turned a corner, he transforms and spits the crude stick out of his mouth. "Not even polished! But your performance was. What now?"
"To Kingham, remember?"
This must mean that they are finally done here - that... "You got the evidence?"
"A clear photo. And thanks to your beastly behaviour, these pieces of evidence." Having picked up the one dropped by Sirius, James weighs the three wands on his palm. "There is a shred of magic, but perhaps only in one... Interesting. All that we heard, too. Anyway, let's get out of here!"
"Any chance we could forget the orders and use the Floo at the pub, or...?" Having lost the thick fur, and just because they are weakened by the cold, and the lack of sleep and food, too, which means not in the shape to Apparate, Sirius isn't happy about the prospect of trekking all the way to wherever Kingham is.
They've passed the last shags, and after jumping over a ditch, James looks back and is bound to see how reluctant Sirius is to follow.
"From Kingham station there's a train to London." James grins, reaching to clap him on the shoulder. "Come on! It's like taking some time off in the Muggle world. Now we just cross this field to the Rollright Stones. You know, that's where we can exit the magical side of this part of the Cotswolds."
Stumbling after James across the uneven frozen ground that's fortunately covered only with a thin layer of snow, Sirius finally registers what he's heard - just now, and also from the barman.
"This is the Cotswolds?" The Cotswolds where Sirius has got to visit Remus's childhood home only twice?
"Of course. Did you not know? I've never met a stray that's more lost than you!"
"And what did he say... the barman? About crossbreeds? Here - maybe he meant Bagendon!"
"No. That's the other side of the Cotswolds, closer to the Welsh border. Don't worry. In any case, Moony's not there. He's waiting for you in London. When we're snug sitting on the train, you can finish that letter to him, unless you fall asleep."
But the way James lengthens his strides tells Sirius that he is worried.
"Dumbledore will know... if anything's happened in Bagendon," James said when he tried to persuade Sirius to come straight from Paddington, where they unboarded the train, and report together with him.
"Yeah, and share his knowledge as promptly as always."
A week ago, the barman said. Maybe Remus has been in need of his friends all this time, and bloody Dumbledore, of course, doesn't care, and just keeps them in the dark.
No, Sirius had to leave the reporting for James, who wanted to hurry to Charing Cross Road and the Leaky also in order to owl to Lily - and could send the letter to Remus as well.
An owl carries the messages so quickly that perhaps a reply is already about to reach Sirius and to find him right here, still on his way to the notorious magical neighbourhood where Remus has the knack of finding the most hideous goblin landladies and the crappiest rooms... No, there are no birds flying to him.
Obstructing his way, tottering so slowly on this slick pavement, there are just a few people, all bundled up... Sirius is suddenly aware of a frigid wind, and he lets it push him out of his course, to the right, down... Southampton Row, yes. He's not far from Lincoln's Inn Fields, and perhaps it makes sense to go home first, and through his own fireplace and the Floo connection to the bakery not far from the goblin's building.
He's managed to ignore how cold he is, wearing only jeans and a shirt. How stupid he was, or just how distracted at the station, too, like all through the journey! Only at moments did he pay attention to his surroundings, and in Kingham he became self-conscious of wearing a cloak and robes among Muggles, and took them off, and he must have left them on the train. He and James were both groggy when unboarding.
James must have slept, too, and failed to kick him awake so that he could have added more to what he'd kept writing to Moony in Long Compton, scribbling with pencil at night, on his watch. He barely managed to mark the date on top, and there's now nothing about his worries in the letter, nothing about his return today, and perhaps Moony doesn't bother to reply soon, if the owl James has used doesn't insist...
Now finally he's reached the grand Victorian building and got his wand out so as to enter the magical stairwell. His feet in the drenched shoes are so numb that climbing all the way up is a strife. And whose bloody idea was it to attach a Muggle lock! After using his singular unsealing charm, which he masters voicelessly, he must fumble for the key with his frost-bitten fingers.
At last! The door opens, and he almost falls inside, manages to grip the doorframe, and slides to lean against the wall beside it.
There's warmth pressed against his shivering body. As he opens his eyes, some dim twinkling lights play on the image from his dreams: his Moony's lovely face, but framed with unkempt hair, and unsmiling, with the brow furrowed.
He sways forward, and to his surprise there is a solid shoulder to rest his head on, and the skin on the neck feels hot against his chilled face. "Don't," he manages, "wake me."
After some stumbling steps, the dream goes on. He can now recognise the two of them in it: with hollow cheeks and longer stubble than he's ever seen on Moony, who hates facial hair on himself. This is his... That was his bathroom mirror, and what he's guided to sit down on is the toilet lid.
There's a duvet over his shoulders, and he wraps it tighter around himself, looking up just when Remus turns away and bends across the bathtub. Yes, it is him, his fine arse covered with the worn-out, now also filthy denim, and he's wearing the corduroy jacket, too.
The sound of running water is extinguished, and into the warm, humid silence Sirius hears his own trembling voice drop words heavy of wonder, "You are here. What are you doing here?"
No matter why, his Moony is where he should have always been. Now Sirius has managed to convince himself that this is real, and can't wait to feel the bliss of another embrace.
"Giving you a bath." Moony's eyes slide aside again, but this time he comes only closer.
He kneels and starts taking off Sirius's shoes. Oh, that's what he needs, and a hot bath.
"How did you know?"
"I didn't. I prepared it for myself." Remus sounds absentminded, indifferent, and there's a pause before he goes on, muttering, "I mean… What are you doing here? In the letter you didn't say…"
"You got it? I told Prongs to keep kicking me..." Sirius can't possibly concentrate on his own words.
Remus is undressing him, but not with the urgency of desire, not playfully, not even cautiously like in the first years when helping him unlearn his fear of intimate touch. He seems to be doing his best to keep his hands both gentle and efficient, but they are shaking.
Stripped naked but wrapped in the duvet again, Sirius is still sitting while Remus takes off his own clothes. Now Remus holds eye contact, perhaps so as to stop Sirius's gaze from roaming all over his body and seeing how thin he is. Maybe even now when Sirius isn't in the best shape either, he hates to reveal any signs of having not been able to feed himself well enough, just as he hates to take a handout from his friends or...
"Today, just before we could leave, we heard that a week ago, somewhere in the Cotswolds some crossbreeds had been..."
"No," Remus says, or perhaps... I know? In any case he shakes his head.
He grabs Sirius's both arms and pulls him up and towards the tub. A hysterical chortle escapes Sirius, as they scramble over the edge, trying to support each other, and they fall to sit down with a splash, Remus between his thighs, facing away from him.
The water is almost too hot, an amazing treat after the awful week...
After he was stranded, suddenly out in the cold, just sixteen, and a stray rather than... in the house with an evil will forcing him, behind the heavy poison-coloured drapes, against the frozen glass... No. He found his way to a real Christmas, to a new home, his true brother's, and miraculously his Moony was there, too, the first one to hold him... Back then not in the bath, but later, too, under the covers until he was able to sleep.
There's a shudder under Sirius's chest, which he's resting against Remus's back, and he becomes aware of the sharpness of the shoulder blades and the spine. He must have been dozing off, and perhaps Remus has spoken.
"What?"
"No, just... Breathing!" There's strange relief, something close to but not quite joy in the way Remus says that.
He becomes lively, reaches for a soap, and wriggles in Sirius's lap, turning to face him. "Must scrub you a bit cleaner before the water gets cold." And he begins to rub Sirius's skin with his bare hands, starting from the arms - and pauses for a moment to trail the yarn bracelet with a fingertip.
The touch of his fingers, even the smell of dirt in his scraggly hair, the sight of his collarbones and of his tongue between his teeth, his mouth opening when he... just breathes. All of his Moony, any detail of him is so much more arousing than anything Sirius could fantasise when lying beside James.
Sirius's hardening cock brushes against Remus's knee and seems to first startle him, then makes him smile and focus on offering a beautiful hand job.
Oh... No matter how tired Sirius is, he wants to do the same soon to Remus, who must have missed this... who's the one always eager for sex... who'd certainly love to do it with James, too, and perhaps wouldn't mind if Sirius described how... hell, who's wanted to do it even with Snivellus, and been bold enough to confess!
And now he's ejaculating too soon, before quite formulating the thought that this is sex between partners who love and trust each other, and dare need each other. His hands have reached only Remus's chest, and the oldest claw marks. Panting, he starts trailing these scars down, aiming at the slender waist and hips, and the inviting groin.
But Remus makes him stop, and guides one hand up to his left shoulder instead, onto the first, worst, fatal scar. "Hungry?" he mutters, and he bites his lip, making Sirius suspect it wasn't a question, after all. "Let me wash your hair with the shower."
As they lather each other's head, simultaneously - perhaps playfully, or just efficiently, Sirius tilts his face closer. And finally they kiss. Even after Remus had slowly tamed this stray, he never knew before how much he needed a kiss, but this one is tentative like the very first ones back at school. Sirius's own lips must be chapped, too, and Remus's are very red, sore.
Perhaps after the next kiss he'll ask Remus to move in with him, to be his true partner.
But Remus hurries to get them out of the water, and towelled, and Sirius only manages to say, when offering one of the bathrobes, "This is yours. I mean it's all yours, the bathroom, too, and..." Perhaps that comes out all wrong, like a handout.
At least Remus doesn't hesitate to open the kitchen cupboards. There's a tin on the counter, but he looks for more. Only soup, though.
By the time the soup's heated, Sirius is aware of being so ravenous that he doesn't have to worry he'd end up watching Remus eat, which sometimes makes Remus pretend he's not hungry at all. Both plates are empty when they look up at each other.
Remus licks his lips. "Your mission must have been... a nightmare. You need to sleep."
"You too."
"I slept... most of the day. Here. I came in last night. I think I can sleep more. Better now."
When pulling aside the covers, which Remus seems to have arranged exactly like before they left for their furry time, Sirius catches himself babbling, "After that bath and the soup and now some sleep we should both be soon in the shape for a proper shag."
And when lying down and pressing his Moony's head against his heart so as to stroke the hair, damp and fragrant now, he's started imitating his first silly phrases, "You're here... What are you doing... We both know what you want to do whenever you are here. But..."
But he can sense a feverish glow, a raggedness in the breaths against his chest, and repressed coughing.
And he goes on, "But now you've come to stay... Live with me here." In sickness and health. "I've wanted to ask..."
As Remus finally responds, it's to interrupt him, "I won't be going back... to that rented room or..."
"Good."
Remus raises his head and lets his eyes linger on Sirius's face in that curious way of his, as if what he sees were worth capturing in a painting. The eyes gleam in the gemstone colour that Sirius - though the one of them who's definitely not the artist - has known to name, in warm amber, as they shift aside again, perhaps to gaze through the doorway at the stars and the benevolent waning crescent moon on his - their - Christmas tree... and now to search for something on the side table.
He's snatched a cigarette, and Sirius parts his lips to receive it. No lighter or matches, no wand. Remus seldom agrees to demonstrate the small tricks of wandless magic once learnt from the half-goblin he's known since before he found out he'd have a chance for education. But now he carefully bends his left hand's thumb, and curls the fingers above it, and guides Sirius to stick the end of the fag into that small space, where some of the heat of his weary body has condensed into a hot flame.
Sirius has barely tasted the bitter smoke when the fingers are lifted to caress his lips, too.
Behind the warm, resilient, loving silence there are nightmares, but something... Something is right in their world.
Following some advice for beginners, I painted first a still life and then a portrait of a critter.
Now I've posted the latter watercolour on AO3, here: Young Wormtail.
Besides, I've remembered that a fic I completed in early July is no longer anonymous and can be shared here.
Title: Doing Better
Author: paulamcg
Pairing: Sirius/Remus, Sirius & James, minor Sirius/James
Summary: Out on an Order mission with James in December 1979, Sirius can't help worrying more and more that his Moony needs him back as soon as possible.
Word Count: 5800
Rating: R
Notes: Written for the 2021 RS Fixit Fest. Thank you for the beta, justtoarguewithyou! Any remaining and new mistakes - as well as all the shortcomings in Fixing anything and in the happiness of the ending - are totally my fault.
Read here on AO3
or right here:
Doing Better
When placing the fag between his lips for the third time, Sirius can no longer shake off the feeling that this is all wrong. The murky alley, barely visible through the frost-covered windowpane, doesn't scare him, no... Rather calls for him to come out and act, but also threatens to bring back images... not only of Remus's room with no heating last winter, but some memories that are older, repressed... worse?
Huddling under the inconspicuously worn-out cloak, Sirius turns to eye the ragged crowd from under the rim of his hood.
What's brought him to sit waiting here in a seedy village pub, where Muggle cigarettes are such a luxury that James keeps telling him he can't crush one after taking a single drag whenever he feels jittery... What's going on... It must all be wrong.
“You take it!” He thrusts the fag to James. “You don't need to inhale the smoke.”
Remus wouldn't either. But his fingers would linger on Sirius's, reassuring him that something can be - or become - right in this world.
"All right." James lets out a mouthful of smoke to hover above the sticky tabletop between them, and grabs his equally filthy-looking wooden goblet. "It can't make this ale taste any worse."
They've ordered common Magiale so as not to attract attention. Yet, it's turned out that some of the patrons prefer hot drinks and soups. Nursing a steaming goblet or bowl must help ward off the cold that's seeping through the grimy panes.
Not that anyone but a pair of Order members is stupid enough to sit next to the windows. The rough benches closer to the fireplace are occupied by such wretches, too, who have come in only for the warmth, not for any refreshments.
Anyway, it must be reasonable not to drink anything stronger than small beer, and to stay alert in case something happens, after all. But Sirius has got a nagging suspicion that this whole mission is small beer: that any roles given to him in this fucking war are of little importance.
He can't help envying even James, who was sent from London a few days earlier, and who ended up involved in a literally bloody confrontation with a couple of Death Eaters. Any questions about who is chosen, or why you are sent with or after your best mate, would break the rules of the Order. This makes Sirius only more eager to claim that someone with proper Healer's skills should have been summoned to patch up James, whereas a qualified Auror member like Sirius should be sent to a real battle.
"How's your arm?" he hurries to ask when he realises that James has set the goblet back down immediately and moved the fag to his left hand.
"Good enough for finishing this task." James brandishes the fag. "At least this one you gave to me."
Even though he wasn't wounded in his wand arm, it's surprising that he is still kept here, on duty. And for what purpose?
"At least you've now got one you know all the details of."
"And a brand spanking new, spectacular scar to prove what's not my dear brother's strong suit."
Sirius finds it hard to laugh, instead of thinking about the one among Remus's scars which he could have prevented, if he had not learnt only the basics of first aid. If he had not been learning that just on the fucking field training for Auror cadets a year ago, exactly at last December's full moon!
It was a mistake to trust that Wormy would run alone with the wolf even back then. And as he's craven enough to evade questions about finally joining the Order next time he visits from Wales, where he moved so conveniently as soon as possible, right after Prong's wedding, it was no big surprise that he explained as early as on the evening of Sirius's birthday that he barely managed to stay for the following night's furry time, and would be too busy until at least the end of the year.
If now both James and Sirius had been summoned to an Order mission at the very beginning of this month, could Sirius have refused? No, but he'd have sneaked away for one night. He's sworn to himself that never again will he fail to Apparate to be there for Moony when he transforms.
As he catches himself fumbling for the pack of cigarettes, Sirius pushes his hand under a sleeve. No, not as high up as to check that his wand is secure in its holster.
Just to play with his fragile little bracelet: scrap yarn of green wool that had unraveled from his Moony's shabbier jumper. When he'd cut it off, he asked Moony to tie it around his wrist, and to pull the overhand knot even tighter than the one he himself in his impatience always makes instead of undoing the bowknot in the ridiculous shoelace Moony wears as a belt. This wristband is perhaps an amusing, but a most appropriate, sign of Sirius's bond with the man - more than human - into whose pants he's now dying to get again and again.
Neither of them minded too much that this time, when the full moon rose on the third of December, two days ago now, it was just the two of them in their secret spot in the Yorkshire wilderness. After the long night of shared freedom in their furry forms, and a day's rest in the village inn, Remus was not in a bad shape and insisted on attending the last lectures before Merlin College would soon close for vacation. He'd got an owl from home, he said, and he couldn't wait to go and see his parents at Christmas.
And that unnerved Sirius, as he'd still failed to ask... at least failed to ask in the right way, except at the previous full moon, and back then perhaps Moony had already lost his mind to the wolf and didn't hear when finally the question was not whether he needed a place to stay but whether he wanted to share with Sirius, who knew at last that it was the right thing to do. He wanted them to share all the days and nights when they could be together. And they'd celebrate all through the month, not only at Solstice.
Perhaps Remus's mother, too, would accept Sirius after he'd asked Remus to move in. And they'd both spend Christmas Day in Bagendon. Not much longer because the old house was crowded now that she gave refuge to more and more cross-breed creatures. Remus, too, would soon come back home to the flat in Lincoln's Inn Fields, which had felt too empty ever since James moved out.
Yes, Sirius wanted to decorate his flat - their flat - immediately. But he had barely finished, just managed to charm the moon on top of the fir tree to show the real one's phases - now the hopeful waning gibbous disc - when a fiery phoenix feather fluttered onto a branch among his twinkling stars.
Floo at once to the White Thestral in Long Compton!
He hurried to send his owl... hurried too much and must have made the mistake to write only that Remus should come and celebrate Solstice when he'd be back from this urgent mission.
"It doesn't make any sense to keep watch here." James has just downed his ale and is grimacing when Sirius, startled out of his musings, looks up.
"No," Sirius snaps. "When we haven't been told what..."
"I know as much." James leans closer across the table and whispers, "We're supposed to spot anyone who gives a wand to one of these Squibs."
"They are not all..." If they were Squibs, it wouldn't make any sense for Voldemort's party to arm them with wands, but James still finds it hard to comprehend that there can be fully magical humans who never got the chance to go to Hogwarts and can't afford the wands that would have chosen them.
"Right. And I doubt the recruiters would approach anyone here. Drink up! Let's go!"
"First, back to the loo to check that you haven't started bleeding again."
In the dark, stinking corridor behind the bar, there's somebody blocking their way. Sirius's hand has already slid up onto his wand holster, but James nudges him.
"Right. No need to show what you've got up your sleeves," the man says in a gruff, derisive voice, which Sirius recognises as the barman's. "I heard the incantations the first time you sneaked back here. We don't want any Ministry people around. Now you go out quietly, or... Better still, I throw you out due to indecency - a pair of poofters!"
Not even considering backing off, since this old Squib isn't a threat to two trained Aurors, Sirius has now come so close to him that, despite the gloom, he can discern a wink - but no sign of scorn on the gaunt, bearded face. He wants to ask if this means open opposition against the Ministry. Or to shove the man aside, and proceed with his wand ready, so as to attack any Death Eaters that are perhaps hiding in the loo.
But there's James's hand on his shoulder. "I'm guessing you've got another fucking pair in there. Not too eager to see them, I can take a leak outside."
Without replying, the barman pulls open a door that leads from right there straight to a back alley. Now James has got his wand out. No matter whether the old man is on their side or Voldemort's or impartial, there's no way to know if there's an enemy in ambush outside.
The smooth beech of Sirius's wand responds to the touch of his fingers; there's the familiar tingle shared by his skin and the wood, and it makes him feel both calm and unrestrained, sure of his abilities. He steps through the doorway at James's heel, ignoring all lessons on tactics.
And he can't help feeling disappointed when, out there between the piles of rubbish, they are assaulted only by snow flurries and gusts of harsh wind.
The chill born of that first night's frost and wind has kept carving a hollow deep inside him. Pulling James by the arm in order to make him crouch with him, Sirius lets his back slide down the wall of the ramshackle building, which he's afraid is about to collapse in the snow storm. The Invisibility Cloak, which covers the two of them, protects them only from being seen - and, so as to serve its purpose, must let the snow through.
Sirius has hated the cold since... He doesn't want to remember since when. He hates staying still, and hates feeling useless, and it doesn't get any better when he wonders if he might be needed somewhere else.
In the week that he's now spent spying with James around these squalid quarters of Long Compton, they've barely caught a glimpse of a masked figure contacting local folk. And Sirius's resentment has only grown while he's grudgingly followed the instructions brought by another feather on the same evening when he'd arrived to find James bleeding on the threshold of the White Thestral.
"Lie low..." he says in James's ear, and it's a comfort to know that the sardonic tone in quoting bloody Dumbledore's words won't go unnoticed.
And trust James to chuckle. That sound alone promises Sirius that he'll get warmer, and now James hugs him close, rubbing a hand against his arm.
As they've found some sheds for having a rest in - for sleeping mainly in turns, so as not to be taken unawares by any of the vagrants seeking shelter in the same places - it's become a most natural and necessary thing to huddle together for warmth. And here Sirius has caught himself wanting James to hold him tight.
Back when they first became Marauder brothers and James kept punching him and urging him into wrestling matches, he had a hard time hiding how those casual, friendly touches caused odd nausea in him... Odd, yes. Since the day when James's parents became his, too, there's no reason to remember why he'd learnt to hate being touched. By that day he'd got used to James, and James had also understood what he didn't like, and Remus had started helping him to gradually figure out how intimate physical closeness could become better than bearable.
He's left behind something that taught him the hatred - or fear? It doesn't belong to him, and he doesn't belong to it. He's able to unlearn it. And that has been confirmed here at this fucking mission. He's doing better. So much better that he must admit to himself he's sometimes aroused when...
Maybe it's because he's thinking about his Moony. Or maybe he starts thinking about Moony, just as James starts talking about Lily - because this closeness they share makes them feel like wanking.
No, not now when they are out here, waiting in ambush, of course not.
And of course Prongs talks about Lily simply because he misses her. In sickness and health, he says. Keeps repeating his wedding vows - no less exasperating than all through the years when he was wooing the bright, feisty witch. And he grins hopefully when he says that Lily explains how feeling sick now means that she's better than in perfect health.
The existence of their baby inside her feels unreal. Lily's at her parents', but she's said she'll still go on missions when the worst morning sickness is over. Still, perhaps Dumbledore considers her too valuable now, whereas James can now be put at risk. And Sirius himself doesn't need to be spared, because he won't make anyone pregnant. Dumbledore must know about him and Moony.
No, no thoughts of Moony now. He's bound to be safe and sound, because he's Dumbledore's great experiment, which mustn't be spoiled. He'll be given no such tasks which might make him resort to violence and undo his humanity - the defective bit of it that those fucking beastologists believe he's got left and they've got the right to examine. Moony will show them. When they made him an object of a secret research project, they didn't know what a man he'd grow to be - or that he'd have friends to help him and encourage him to wriggle his way to more courses than the stupid Dark Creature nonsense, and one day he'd revolutionise the Creature Study. That he'd have a partner to support him.
Focusing on the masked figure at the other end of the alley, Sirius leans only lightly against James's firm chest, and he doesn't need to remind himself of what this companion means to him. His true brother. The solid friend he's always been right to trust. The only one to guide him back when he veers out of control.
If he were here all by himself, Sirius would have already rushed to hex this Death Eater. But James's elbow poking his side was enough to stop him, and he knows that if necessary, James would have lowered his head, as if ready to butt him with the stag's antlers.
They need proof of what's going on. What can that be, really, when it won't be enough that they tell Dumbledore what they've seen? This must mean that the old bugger wants to convince the Ministry to take action together with the Order... Perhaps so as to beat Voldemort's side in what they do here?
There are Death Eaters around recruiting these uneducated wizards and witches. And the barman says they don't want Ministry people at the pub. What...?
"What did you hear?" Sirius whispers in such a haste that he accidentally touches James's earlobe with his lips. "I mean, when I was running on my four feet for a change?"
There was something James wanted to tell him when he came back to the spot near the White Thestral where he'd left James alone under the cloak. He hurried them to follow together the masked man he'd seen walking towards these flimsiest shacks here, and refused to listen, then forgot. His mind's all over the place these days.
"All right, Padfoot. But briefly," James says, pulling Sirius to stand up. "We must start creeping closer. No Death Eater waits much longer for some Squibs... or whatever they are. The old geezer said the same as the barman. Remember? They've got enough of the Ministry. And explained to the boy. Last year a lot of people followed the Ministry recruiters because they were promised wizard status and funds sent to their families. They got back nothing but condolences. And now some younger people have left anyway... Look, there's a pair! Kids!"
Two boys... or perhaps girls have come up an even narrower alley and started walking over to the Death Eater. Perhaps they are still teenagers, or just malnourished enough to look like that.
Sirius transforms while crouching again, and slips his canine body from under the Invisibility Cloak. This will give James a better chance to get quickly near enough, unnoticed, and to use the camera to record the moment when, if they are lucky, wands change hands.
Slinking after him, keeping close to the walls, Sirius tries to ignore his keener sense of smell, but perks up his ears so as to hear what an uncertain, suspicious voice is saying.
"So we must go with you, and you teach us to use them? Now, soon? Not only after you win the war and open schools for us? And we get the wands right now?"
Sirius can't quite see it, but the masked wizard must be placing wands on the two kids' hands, because now there's the sound of the camera, not only clicking but also whirring for a moment so as to make a moving photo.
And the wizard turns his head and points a wand towards the invisible source of the sound.
The canine limbs have responded to Sirius's frantic mind before he's fully aware of a decision to act. A bounce has brought him against the Death Eater's chest. They both go down, and...
He presses a paw at a bearded chin, making the mask slide aside. And now he's growling, dropping saliva on a frightened and... familiar face. The barman's!
"Back off!" James must have revealed himself and not the camera but his wand.
Still snarling, and gnashing his teeth, repulsed by the foul breath of the man he's pinned to the ground, Sirius watches the two scrawny boys take some steps back. Oddly enough, they aren't turning tail and running.
"You, shaggy dog!" Now James's authoritative voice is accompanied with a hard shove at his haunch.
Thrilled due to the long-awaited action, Sirius finds the misunderstanding hilarious. This time it's James's turn to be serious... And the pun makes it ever harder for Sirius not to laugh while he's retreating obediently. His hysterical merriment turns into a feverish fit of barking.
"What's going on?" Trust his reliable brother to start the interrogation with the right question, the burning one.
"Why, the other side gave better promises." The barman sits up but barely glances at the wand he's dropped into a slush puddle. "Recruited me, and now I do that job here. Not at the Thestral, not in front of the angry crones who lost their sons and daughters and want these babies safe."
"And you don't want...?" James keeps his focus fully on him, not bothering to unarm the two boys.
"They get wands, they get a chance." Rubbing his chest, where the dog's nails must have hurt him, the barman turns to look at the boys, who are standing still, holding their new wands awkwardly. "If the village doesn't supply fighters, we'll all be killed - by either side, or both. We've seen it happen, just a week ago... Right here in the Cotswolds, to crossbreeds and..."
"Our side doesn't kill civilians. I even let you go. You'd better trust me and wait. You'll soon have the best offer." Now James is already walking towards the boys.
Passing them, hardly stopping, he holds out his left hand, and when he's receiving the two wands, he jerks his head back. "Fetch!" he commands.
Sirius leaps forward to snatch up the barman's wand and, carrying it between his teeth, trots after James.
As soon as they've turned a corner, he transforms and spits the crude stick out of his mouth. "Not even polished! But your performance was. What now?"
"To Kingham, remember?"
This must mean that they are finally done here - that... "You got the evidence?"
"A clear photo. And thanks to your beastly behaviour, these pieces of evidence." Having picked up the one dropped by Sirius, James weighs the three wands on his palm. "There is a shred of magic, but perhaps only in one... Interesting. All that we heard, too. Anyway, let's get out of here!"
"Any chance we could forget the orders and use the Floo at the pub, or...?" Having lost the thick fur, and just because they are weakened by the cold, and the lack of sleep and food, too, which means not in the shape to Apparate, Sirius isn't happy about the prospect of trekking all the way to wherever Kingham is.
They've passed the last shags, and after jumping over a ditch, James looks back and is bound to see how reluctant Sirius is to follow.
"From Kingham station there's a train to London." James grins, reaching to clap him on the shoulder. "Come on! It's like taking some time off in the Muggle world. Now we just cross this field to the Rollright Stones. You know, that's where we can exit the magical side of this part of the Cotswolds."
Stumbling after James across the uneven frozen ground that's fortunately covered only with a thin layer of snow, Sirius finally registers what he's heard - just now, and also from the barman.
"This is the Cotswolds?" The Cotswolds where Sirius has got to visit Remus's childhood home only twice?
"Of course. Did you not know? I've never met a stray that's more lost than you!"
"And what did he say... the barman? About crossbreeds? Here - maybe he meant Bagendon!"
"No. That's the other side of the Cotswolds, closer to the Welsh border. Don't worry. In any case, Moony's not there. He's waiting for you in London. When we're snug sitting on the train, you can finish that letter to him, unless you fall asleep."
But the way James lengthens his strides tells Sirius that he is worried.
"Dumbledore will know... if anything's happened in Bagendon," James said when he tried to persuade Sirius to come straight from Paddington, where they unboarded the train, and report together with him.
"Yeah, and share his knowledge as promptly as always."
A week ago, the barman said. Maybe Remus has been in need of his friends all this time, and bloody Dumbledore, of course, doesn't care, and just keeps them in the dark.
No, Sirius had to leave the reporting for James, who wanted to hurry to Charing Cross Road and the Leaky also in order to owl to Lily - and could send the letter to Remus as well.
An owl carries the messages so quickly that perhaps a reply is already about to reach Sirius and to find him right here, still on his way to the notorious magical neighbourhood where Remus has the knack of finding the most hideous goblin landladies and the crappiest rooms... No, there are no birds flying to him.
Obstructing his way, tottering so slowly on this slick pavement, there are just a few people, all bundled up... Sirius is suddenly aware of a frigid wind, and he lets it push him out of his course, to the right, down... Southampton Row, yes. He's not far from Lincoln's Inn Fields, and perhaps it makes sense to go home first, and through his own fireplace and the Floo connection to the bakery not far from the goblin's building.
He's managed to ignore how cold he is, wearing only jeans and a shirt. How stupid he was, or just how distracted at the station, too, like all through the journey! Only at moments did he pay attention to his surroundings, and in Kingham he became self-conscious of wearing a cloak and robes among Muggles, and took them off, and he must have left them on the train. He and James were both groggy when unboarding.
James must have slept, too, and failed to kick him awake so that he could have added more to what he'd kept writing to Moony in Long Compton, scribbling with pencil at night, on his watch. He barely managed to mark the date on top, and there's now nothing about his worries in the letter, nothing about his return today, and perhaps Moony doesn't bother to reply soon, if the owl James has used doesn't insist...
Now finally he's reached the grand Victorian building and got his wand out so as to enter the magical stairwell. His feet in the drenched shoes are so numb that climbing all the way up is a strife. And whose bloody idea was it to attach a Muggle lock! After using his singular unsealing charm, which he masters voicelessly, he must fumble for the key with his frost-bitten fingers.
At last! The door opens, and he almost falls inside, manages to grip the doorframe, and slides to lean against the wall beside it.
There's warmth pressed against his shivering body. As he opens his eyes, some dim twinkling lights play on the image from his dreams: his Moony's lovely face, but framed with unkempt hair, and unsmiling, with the brow furrowed.
He sways forward, and to his surprise there is a solid shoulder to rest his head on, and the skin on the neck feels hot against his chilled face. "Don't," he manages, "wake me."
After some stumbling steps, the dream goes on. He can now recognise the two of them in it: with hollow cheeks and longer stubble than he's ever seen on Moony, who hates facial hair on himself. This is his... That was his bathroom mirror, and what he's guided to sit down on is the toilet lid.
There's a duvet over his shoulders, and he wraps it tighter around himself, looking up just when Remus turns away and bends across the bathtub. Yes, it is him, his fine arse covered with the worn-out, now also filthy denim, and he's wearing the corduroy jacket, too.
The sound of running water is extinguished, and into the warm, humid silence Sirius hears his own trembling voice drop words heavy of wonder, "You are here. What are you doing here?"
No matter why, his Moony is where he should have always been. Now Sirius has managed to convince himself that this is real, and can't wait to feel the bliss of another embrace.
"Giving you a bath." Moony's eyes slide aside again, but this time he comes only closer.
He kneels and starts taking off Sirius's shoes. Oh, that's what he needs, and a hot bath.
"How did you know?"
"I didn't. I prepared it for myself." Remus sounds absentminded, indifferent, and there's a pause before he goes on, muttering, "I mean… What are you doing here? In the letter you didn't say…"
"You got it? I told Prongs to keep kicking me..." Sirius can't possibly concentrate on his own words.
Remus is undressing him, but not with the urgency of desire, not playfully, not even cautiously like in the first years when helping him unlearn his fear of intimate touch. He seems to be doing his best to keep his hands both gentle and efficient, but they are shaking.
Stripped naked but wrapped in the duvet again, Sirius is still sitting while Remus takes off his own clothes. Now Remus holds eye contact, perhaps so as to stop Sirius's gaze from roaming all over his body and seeing how thin he is. Maybe even now when Sirius isn't in the best shape either, he hates to reveal any signs of having not been able to feed himself well enough, just as he hates to take a handout from his friends or...
"Today, just before we could leave, we heard that a week ago, somewhere in the Cotswolds some crossbreeds had been..."
"No," Remus says, or perhaps... I know? In any case he shakes his head.
He grabs Sirius's both arms and pulls him up and towards the tub. A hysterical chortle escapes Sirius, as they scramble over the edge, trying to support each other, and they fall to sit down with a splash, Remus between his thighs, facing away from him.
The water is almost too hot, an amazing treat after the awful week...
After he was stranded, suddenly out in the cold, just sixteen, and a stray rather than... in the house with an evil will forcing him, behind the heavy poison-coloured drapes, against the frozen glass... No. He found his way to a real Christmas, to a new home, his true brother's, and miraculously his Moony was there, too, the first one to hold him... Back then not in the bath, but later, too, under the covers until he was able to sleep.
There's a shudder under Sirius's chest, which he's resting against Remus's back, and he becomes aware of the sharpness of the shoulder blades and the spine. He must have been dozing off, and perhaps Remus has spoken.
"What?"
"No, just... Breathing!" There's strange relief, something close to but not quite joy in the way Remus says that.
He becomes lively, reaches for a soap, and wriggles in Sirius's lap, turning to face him. "Must scrub you a bit cleaner before the water gets cold." And he begins to rub Sirius's skin with his bare hands, starting from the arms - and pauses for a moment to trail the yarn bracelet with a fingertip.
The touch of his fingers, even the smell of dirt in his scraggly hair, the sight of his collarbones and of his tongue between his teeth, his mouth opening when he... just breathes. All of his Moony, any detail of him is so much more arousing than anything Sirius could fantasise when lying beside James.
Sirius's hardening cock brushes against Remus's knee and seems to first startle him, then makes him smile and focus on offering a beautiful hand job.
Oh... No matter how tired Sirius is, he wants to do the same soon to Remus, who must have missed this... who's the one always eager for sex... who'd certainly love to do it with James, too, and perhaps wouldn't mind if Sirius described how... hell, who's wanted to do it even with Snivellus, and been bold enough to confess!
And now he's ejaculating too soon, before quite formulating the thought that this is sex between partners who love and trust each other, and dare need each other. His hands have reached only Remus's chest, and the oldest claw marks. Panting, he starts trailing these scars down, aiming at the slender waist and hips, and the inviting groin.
But Remus makes him stop, and guides one hand up to his left shoulder instead, onto the first, worst, fatal scar. "Hungry?" he mutters, and he bites his lip, making Sirius suspect it wasn't a question, after all. "Let me wash your hair with the shower."
As they lather each other's head, simultaneously - perhaps playfully, or just efficiently, Sirius tilts his face closer. And finally they kiss. Even after Remus had slowly tamed this stray, he never knew before how much he needed a kiss, but this one is tentative like the very first ones back at school. Sirius's own lips must be chapped, too, and Remus's are very red, sore.
Perhaps after the next kiss he'll ask Remus to move in with him, to be his true partner.
But Remus hurries to get them out of the water, and towelled, and Sirius only manages to say, when offering one of the bathrobes, "This is yours. I mean it's all yours, the bathroom, too, and..." Perhaps that comes out all wrong, like a handout.
At least Remus doesn't hesitate to open the kitchen cupboards. There's a tin on the counter, but he looks for more. Only soup, though.
By the time the soup's heated, Sirius is aware of being so ravenous that he doesn't have to worry he'd end up watching Remus eat, which sometimes makes Remus pretend he's not hungry at all. Both plates are empty when they look up at each other.
Remus licks his lips. "Your mission must have been... a nightmare. You need to sleep."
"You too."
"I slept... most of the day. Here. I came in last night. I think I can sleep more. Better now."
When pulling aside the covers, which Remus seems to have arranged exactly like before they left for their furry time, Sirius catches himself babbling, "After that bath and the soup and now some sleep we should both be soon in the shape for a proper shag."
And when lying down and pressing his Moony's head against his heart so as to stroke the hair, damp and fragrant now, he's started imitating his first silly phrases, "You're here... What are you doing... We both know what you want to do whenever you are here. But..."
But he can sense a feverish glow, a raggedness in the breaths against his chest, and repressed coughing.
And he goes on, "But now you've come to stay... Live with me here." In sickness and health. "I've wanted to ask..."
As Remus finally responds, it's to interrupt him, "I won't be going back... to that rented room or..."
"Good."
Remus raises his head and lets his eyes linger on Sirius's face in that curious way of his, as if what he sees were worth capturing in a painting. The eyes gleam in the gemstone colour that Sirius - though the one of them who's definitely not the artist - has known to name, in warm amber, as they shift aside again, perhaps to gaze through the doorway at the stars and the benevolent waning crescent moon on his - their - Christmas tree... and now to search for something on the side table.
He's snatched a cigarette, and Sirius parts his lips to receive it. No lighter or matches, no wand. Remus seldom agrees to demonstrate the small tricks of wandless magic once learnt from the half-goblin he's known since before he found out he'd have a chance for education. But now he carefully bends his left hand's thumb, and curls the fingers above it, and guides Sirius to stick the end of the fag into that small space, where some of the heat of his weary body has condensed into a hot flame.
Sirius has barely tasted the bitter smoke when the fingers are lifted to caress his lips, too.
Behind the warm, resilient, loving silence there are nightmares, but something... Something is right in their world.