Title: The Dog Days of Summer
Rating: G
Notes: Remus/Sirius fluff, written for Sara in the rsficathon of September. seems to hate the strikethrough html coding, so the stuff between the s> and /s> means it's struck through.

The days of summer are sweltering hot, from the time Remus wakes up until the time he falls asleep reading. Now, when he walks outside, he is assaulted by the heat, the air around him; he can feel it clogging up his pores, and there would be no use in swimming to cool off as his skin is already thoroughly soaked. The sun beats down, and Remus had never realized how true that was until this summer. Waves upon waves of pure heat and light, making him sweat, blinding him, and if he stands too long in it he gets dizzy. Inside isn't much better, though, as it is absolutely still and quiet while his parents are out working. In there, the heat is stifling, but if he sits outside under the shade of the porch, he can catch a refreshing breeze now and then.

So Remus spends his days on the porch, a book keeping him constant company, and sometimes a quill and a pad of paper from the nearby Muggle corner store. At first he isn't sure what to write in it – a journal? But nothing is happening to him these days. A novel? He has no ideas – but eventually he finds himself drafting letters to his friends. He only sends one or two, at first, but then the family owl goes lame, and he can't be bothered to go out and borrow another, and he forgets, until there are pages and pages of letters with no reason to send them. Besides, he suspects that James is already vacationing in Majorca, and Peter is off visiting relatives in who-knows-where for the entire summer. Sirius has already mentioned that all his owls are intercepted by his family, and any letters from that half-blood, Lupin would probably be confiscated at first sight. Sirius is furious about this, but Remus reasons that soon enough Sirius will be out on his own, or at least they will be at school together again.

-

Pads,

I'm stuck in this terrible heat wave with nothing to do and nobody to talk to. I've finished my schoolwork already, and I've read about twenty books, and it's not even halfway through July. I wish I could come visit you, though of course we both know that's a terrible idea – family is a tricky thing. I don't even think my parents would let me leave home, really, even if your family s> weren't so /s> s> didn't /s> weren't opposed to it.

I had a dream about you last night (don't smirk, I know what your dirty mind is thinking). It was actually during the full moon, except I was still me, and the two of us were playing Exploding Snap all night and you were speaking French at me. It was odd, because I knew what you were saying, even though I don't understand a word of French.

s>I wish /s> s> I miss /s> s> Sometimes /s> See you once school starts,

Moony

-

The night air is still hot and muggy, though more tolerable without the oppressive sun, and Remus is sitting in the yard in an old deck chair. The dead, dry lawn pricks his bare feet, and the air smells like hot earth and sun-baked grass. Remus is looking at the stars, trying to see how many he can identify. It isn't the best night for star-gazing, as the moon is barely starting to wane, and Remus is still feeling sore. He wishes the others had been there, and remembering this, he looks for the Dog Star. Sirius twinkles and winks at him, blue green; Remus closes his eyes, smiling wryly, and listens to the chirruping crickets.

-

It is another golden, sun-drenched day. Remus finds himself lying on the wooden floor of the porch, still in what is left of the morning shade. A book lies upside-down on his chest, opened to the place where he had given up on concentrating, and rises and falls as he breathes. It is a particularly thick, red-bound volume on the minutiae of various potions ingredients, and Remus hates it. He had opened it to study for his worst subject, but the heat fogs his brain, and makes it impossible to concentrate on anything. It is ironic, Remus thinks, that light moves at such a high speed, but heat makes everything sluggish.

He lets his eyes drift out of focus, seeming to gaze through the trees of the wood behind his house. The wooden boards of the deck feel smooth beneath his bare legs. Warm air lies heavy over him, like a blanket, and the fierce heat of the sun creeps over his skin inch by inch as the sun slowly sinks towards the horizon. He is nearly asleep, eyes half-lidded and dazzled with the afternoon sun, when he realizes a shadow has fallen over him, and the sun is blocked out. He isn't sure how long it's been there; if it has just appeared, or if he has been sleeping for hours and has only now woken to this occurrence.

Remus rouses himself to see what has invaded his yard and broken the sunbeams. Struggling to sit upright from his slouched position against the house, he blinks at this dark silhouette leaning over him in a world of relentless glare.

"Wha…" he mutters, trailing off as he recognizes the source of this disturbance.

"Hallo, Moony." Sirius' voice is oddly soft, and Remus catches a glimpse of some ineffable expression before it changes into a grin, and Sirius says, "You must be bored out of your mind."

"You have no idea."

"It's your lucky day, then, because I have brought the cure to your ailment. Want to see?"

Taking Sirius' proffered hand, he leans into the grasp and lets the other boy pull him to his feet.

-

"I can't believe they make things like this!"

"Neither can I! Whoo"

The motorbike veers wildly in midair, Remus feels his stomach lurch, and he tries not to look at the ground he knows is far, far below. This is absolutely insane, he thinks, as the shiny black machine rumbles beneath him. He has learned to expect nothing less from Sirius Black.

The airs up here are like heaven after these stifling weeks, a jump into the icy Atlantic after being stranded in the Sahara. The wind buffets them this way and that, whipping Sirius' hair into his face, filling his lungs with a cold shock. Remus feels rejuvenated, as though the lonely, monotonous months of summer had never been, and this was only a week or so since he had said goodbye to his friends at the Platform.

He has what could be called a death-grip on Sirius' waist, trying to keep from being flung off into the air. Sirius is laughing like a madman, so apparently he can still breathe; his back is warm against Remus' chest. Only now does he realize, as he breathes in Sirius' comforting scent, how much he has missed it these past weeks, along with the sound of Sirius' voice, his raucous laughter, the aura of his mere presence. Everything about him is familiar, after years of living in the same dorm, sitting by him at meals, being best friends. It has come to mean home to Remus, more than anything else does.

Gasping for breath, he yells as Sirius revs the engine and the motorbike shoots up higher into the electric blue sky, into the stratosphere, and, Remus imagines, even past the moon.

-

"Why me?" Remus asks Sirius one afternoon. They are sprawled on the floor of Remus' bedroom, flipping through books, reminiscing, and swatting the occasional fly.

"What?" Sirius doesn't look up from his book, his tone lazy and nonchalant, but Remus is slightly anxious about this.

"Why'd you come visit me? You could have visited James, or… well, not Peter, but – I mean," he mumbles somewhat apologetically, "I'm not much fun."

Sirius pauses. It is visible in his stillness, his sudden presence; his thoughts are focused on the question, and he is otherwise entirely unreadable. Suddenly the buzzing of flies is very loud to Remus.

"Do I need a reason?" Sirius finally asks, by way of reply. "Merlin, Moony. Stop being so insecure." This should not be a sufficient explanation, but, coming from Sirius, it just is. He turns his dark head to grin at Remus disarmingly. Remus is certainly disarmed, feeling something seize inside his chest. He resists the urge to grin ridiculously, but his eyes are laughing.

-

One night when darkness comes, it brings with it a thunderstorm of majestic proportions.

Remus lights a candle and sets it by the dark window. Its light flickers doubly, reflected in the glass, and the two boys are still as they listen to the relentless pounding of the rain on the roof, the rumble of thunder, and watch for flashes of lightning. A faint breeze drifts in through the crack that Remus has left, not shutting the window entirely so as to let in some of that cool, wet element he has been missing. Inhaling deeply, each of them savors it, soaking up the dampness into their lungs and their skin.

Sirius rests his chin on the sill, staring out into the night. The candle makes his skin glow and his eyes seem to dance with the flickering of the flame. Remus' bed sheet is wrapped around his otherwise bare shoulders; the other blankets are strewn around the room. The bedclothes had been dismantled long ago, as they only served to make one hotter during a heat wave.

"Isn't it brilliant?" he says, never removing his gaze from the window. Remus sits in the shadows toward the head of the bed, leaning against the wall.

"Mm."

Eventually the lightning grows more distant and the rumbles of thunder gradually fade away, until the only sounds are of their breathing and the spatter of rain. It seems to Remus that the hour is terribly late, but time is irrelevant during the summer holidays, and he does not feel like looking at the clock anyways. Sirius wriggles down to lay his head against Remus' knee, curling his legs up so they don't dangle off the bed. Everything in his manner suggests Padfoot – cozying up, burrowing into the sheets, nudging Remus with his head. It is a strange sensation; the warmth of Sirius suffusing his legs, a cool breeze on his arm and shoulders. Shivering, Remus closes the window.

Absently, he rests his hand on Sirius's head, and is nudged encouragingly. Remus proceeds to scritch behind Sirius' ears, smiling as he hears the other boy let out a contented, doggy sigh.

After a while, Remus stops, letting his hand rest where it lies, fingers threaded through Sirius' dark locks. He is about to lie down and fall asleep when he feels Sirius move next to him, removing Remus' hand from his head. Remus feels the warm puffs of Sirius' breath on his palm, the brush and press of lips. When Sirius lets go and holds his breath, Remus brushes back the hair that has fallen over Sirius' face. Sliding down from the wall, he curls around Sirius' warm body.

"Hey," he whispers close to Sirius' ear, wrapping an arm over and around his chest.

"Hey," Sirius breathes, burrowing deeper into Remus' embrace.

Remus falls asleep with a smile upon his lips.