Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns the Harry Potter world. I own this little plot bunny and a PC.
Author's Note: I hadn't intended this fic to be RLSB slash, but it can certainly be taken either way. Thus, feel free to fantasize! It is indeed a oneshot and was written in response to a prompt, topic being 'cold feet' and characters allowed being 'Remus Lupin and Sirius Black'. Enjoy!
---
Cold Feet
---
"How did you convince me to do this again?" Remus shivered, sitting under a cypress tree by the edge of the Lake in only his shorts.
"I didn't. Tell yourself it's just a very, very bad dream." Sirius winked, as he did stood with his toes right by the water. The rippling water made its way up to cover his toes and he stepped back, "Lord it's cold!"
"It's three in the morning and you're only wearing underwear - what were you expecting?" Remus, being the thinner of the two, was starting to regret his decision to sneak out in the dead of night for a "swim". After all, the full moon had only been a few days past and he was still weary from his transformation. Not to mention the fact that it was November. Remus rubbed his eyes and told himself that Sirius must have had a good reason for wanting to forsake sleep the night before a Potions exam.
"It's not like you to be sarcastic, Moony. Don't start now, it's a terrible habit." Sirius shook his head to get the hair out of his eyes. "C'mon now, last one in looks like Snivellus!" Sirius himself had gone through as many subtle excuses as he could think up ("But I need to talk!", "It's just such a nice and not-at-all-cold night out!", "You've already had five hours sleep...three, whatever.", "But Moooooooooooony...!", etc.) and begged the question over and over again ("You've gotta come 'cause you've...got to come!", "I know you like sneaking out at night because...fine I made that up.") before Remus had finally exhausted all of his own repertoire of excuses and agreed to tag along (likely against the latter's better judgement). As to the other two Marauders, James and Peter had been snoring like complete donkeys and Sirius just hadn't bothered to ask.
"I'm not the one with black hair." Remus said defensively, but stood nonetheless. "And for all that you know, it's going lighter, not darker."
"That's just because you fret about everything. You fret about your hair-" Here, he was interrupted by Remus snorting and then making a face at him, "You fret about homework. You moon about the moon. You ponder the meaning of life. You want to know the etymological roots for breakfast. You continually badger the rest of us about Shelley and Lord Byron and Gabriel Garcia Marquez and..." He paused since Remus was staring open-mouthed at him. "What?"
"You...you were listening to me rant about modernist theory and its juxtaposition with the romantic era?" Remus blinked and then covered his mouth as he yawned hugely.
"Of course I was listening!" Sirius said irritably. "It's not like I had a choice." He added quickly, in case Remus thought he would make a good audience for future literary tirades. And just for good measure, he decided it would be a good time to go for a soak. "Well. here goes nothing." Sirius charged into the water, roaring his defiance at the rocky bottom and then yelling from sheer surprise as he went over the drop off and was forced to tread water. "It's...bloody…C-COLD!"
Remus sighed and gave a look of longing to the patchy sweater and jeans that lay by the cypress tree. He then begrudgingly waded into the water until it reached his knees, before he raised an eyebrow at Sirius. "Can we go back now? This is the sort of thing James should be doing. I, for one, look forward to being a father someday." Fat chance of that, he thought, looking down to find that his legs were turning white from the cold.
"Aww, don't be such a killjoy, Moony! C'mon, I'll reach the other side before you do at this rate." Sirius splashed about, putting a mighty display of his displeasure. "Come ON!"
"Once upon a time..." Remus muttered to himself, "There was a werewolf who couldn't swim..." And then, using all his willpower, forced his body to continue into the water until he was dog paddling next to Sirius, who looked highly amused. Remus could not, at that precise moment, locate a moment when he was more uncomfortable. Sirius raised his eyebrows, confused as to why Remus was unable to control himself treading water. He then realised what was happening and threw back his head, laughing silently.
"OW! There go MY children, Remus!" Sirius grimaced and then growled, "You're going to pay, Moony!" Mustering himself, he tackled Remus, catching him under the arms. Remus wriggled out of his grip after mussing up his captor's hair. Sirius yelped in mock pain and spent several second checking to make sure Remus hadn't done any lasting damage.
"You-are-an-insufferable-brute." Remus nodded as he said every syllable, still dog paddling his way about to distance himself from Sirius' inevitable revenge. This revenge, however, took the form of a large, black...
"WOOF!" Sirius roared, easily catching up to Remus and attacking his hair. Remus, caught by surprise, stopped dog paddling and coughed as some of the water went up his nose. Sirius barked rather joyfully and swiped a huge paw at Remus, who ducked and made up for it by waving his arms madly to keep himself afloat. Sirius took advantage of this and lunged at his lycanthropic companion.
"PADFOOT, THAT WAS MY-- "
Two hours later, the pair were dripping wet and Remus was laughing hysterically on the other side of the lake. He was holding his stomach and writhing on the grass while Sirius was busy combing through his hair with his fingers, an expression of deepest concentration etched on his face.
"We left...ahaha...all our clothes!" Remus said between laughing spasms. "Wow, McGonagall's gonna have a FIT when she finds out!" He rolled over and over in the grass and then hit a tree trunk with a thunk, but continued laughing anyway. A couple of pine cones landed on him and he picked one up, looking very interested at its structure and put it back down on the grass.
Sirius looked up once he had realised that Remus had stopped laughing. "Honestly, I'm more worried about the wands. They won't know whose clothes--"
"They'll know I was part of it." Remus said impatiently, waving his hand. "I mean, who wears fuchsia sweaters?"
"I never...Oh." Sirius raised an eyebrow. "Well, we need to get you some new clothes. All this mucking about in the middle of the night will be the end of your presentable wardrobe, Moony."
"I wish," Lupin sighed. "Dad lost some cash buying powdered iguana toes, thinking it might help with...you know."
"Powdered iguana toes?"
"That's exactly what I told him."
The two miscreants were continued such meaningful behaviour (that is, they pondered the supposed properties of powdered iguana toes, hypothetical cures for lycanthropy, hypothetical cures for James' hair-mussing syndrome and even a little bit of modernist theory) for about twenty minutes, before Remus said seriously, "My feet are cold, Sirius." He fidgeted a bit, poking them here and there and trying to wiggle his toes.
"They are?" Sirius looked concerned, which was dangerous, if Remus knew anything. It was probably that he was worried that Remus would end up in the Hospital Wing and give their little excursion away. That seemed unlikely though, seeing as Sirius actually enjoyed getting caught and flaunting his disruptive side to the world.
"Yes. They're like little ice cubes. I can't feel them." He scowled, "Big trouble now. How am I going to buy those new socks?"
Sirius shrugged, knowing that Remus didn't have enough spare change for an extra scoop of ice cream, as it were. All of a sudden, he flashed a smirk. Remus jumped, and Sirius' smirk turned into a full out grin. "Are you sure?" Sirius then leaned over and tickled Remus' feet, "Can you feel this?"
Remus was so shocked that he didn't even move his feet out of Sirius' tickling range, but stared at Sirius for a full five seconds before he threw his head back. He howled rather convincingly, grinning at Sirius' shocked expression. He then dove for Sirius' ribs, which sent the two of them back into hysterics.