Let Me Go
by
Kelsey
Disclaimer: Not mine. JKR owns them, and likes them to angst the same way I do... but I think we'd disagree about the causes. : )
Summary: Sequel to "If You Love Me, Leave Me," which can be found at Contains SB/JP, SB/RL
Rating: R
When Sirius asks him to fuck him, Remus says no. He does it because it's the right thing to do, because James and Sirius are barely three weeks broken up and because he knows his heart could fall too easily after almost-perfect Sirius, who will never feel that way about him.
It's not that Remus is in love with Sirius. He isn't. But Sirius has a way of worming under your skin when you don't want him to; of crawling into your heart when you least expect it. He's lucky that all Sirius wanted until now was friendship-- Remus would never have gotten as close to Sirius as he is if the other boy hadn't wormed his way, unwelcomed, under the werewolf's skin. And Remus is lonely in the knowledge that there are few who would want him-- a scarred, scared, shy werewolf who generally lusts after others of his own gender. So he knows that entering a relationship with Sirius could easily result in him falling in love even when he doesn't want to.
Sirius, of course, insisted on an explanation, and so Remus told him that he was afraid of being the rebound, that he didn't want to be a James-substitute, and that Sirius meant too much to him as a friend to engage in casual fucking. The last bit isn't so true, but it doesn't matter.
It only backed him off for another three weeks. Then he came to Remus and asked him to please, please, please fuck him. Remus had asked why he didn't just go find somebody else to fuck him, it wasn't like there was any shortage of people who found Sirius attractive at Hogwarts. But though Sirius had shrugged his shoulders and pretended not to know, Remus knew his friend was far too fragile to deal with a new relationship at the moment.
Remus said no again, but it was harder that time.
The third time, Remus said yes. Screw his innocence and celibacy and annoying self-control, he thought, and fucked Sirius through the mattress, reveling in the keening sounds the other boy made as he came over the sheets.
And then nothing really changed. Sirius didn't behave any differently; even when he was together with James, he had been in the habit of kissing Peter and Remus occasionally-- not hot, passionate kisses, but greetings or thank you's or just because he felt like it. So nobody except James really took any notice of Sirius kissing Remus at the breakfast table.
He didn't want anyone in his bed at night, and Remus was alright with that. He'd keep his distance and maybe he wouldn't fall helplessly for someone who didn't want him the same way. And it wasn't as if Sirius was unaffectionate-- he even liked to snuggle together after sex, provided it wasn't nighttime. Sleeping for so many years curled against James had made him wary of letting another share his bed in that strange, almost-more-intimate-than-sex way.
So really, they were somewhere between fuckbuddies and boyfriends. There was kissing, and some sweet-talking, and sex, and even clinging to each other after, but it just wasn't the same as cuddling or loving. And most of all, there wasn't that look in Sirius's eyes when he looked at Remus. The look that said I-would-torture-maim-and-die-for-you.
It was three months into this little arrangement when Remus came back from the library early to find James and Sirius having a screaming row in the dorm. Despite the mild silencing charms on each room, his werewolf ears picked it up as soon as he came into the common room, and he paused.
Peter was down in the kitchen, getting food, and he wouldn't be long. So Remus crept up the stairs on lupine feet and paused in the hallway, listening.
"-want you!" It was James, and he was not happy.
"Well you can't bloody fucking have me, can you?!" Remus winced. Sirius had to be very, very unhappy to yell at James. "You gave that up!"
Silence for a moment. Then "I gave it up? You left me!"
"Yeah, because you were so fucking happy!"
"Maybe I was! It wasn't your place to decide!"
"Somebody had to! You weren't going to!"
"I wasn't going to suddenly decide I was unhappy. Maybe it was because I WASN'T!" He took an audible breath. "I want you. I want you back, Sirius."
"You were miserable, James." Sirius's voice was quiet now, resigned.
"And I'm miserable now!"
"So stop moping around. Find Evans, tell her you've decided to stop being a prat, and ask her to go out with you."
"Lily hates me."
Sirius's voice was tired. "No she doesn't. She hates how you show off and terrorize Snivellus and generally act like a bloody arrogant berk, but she doesn't hate you."
"I don't want Lily. I want you."
"Oh? And that's why you've spent every hour of every waking minute for the last four years devoted to getting her to go out with you?"
James's voice was weaker. "I was just playing."
Conversely, Sirius seemed to be gaining strength. A sad, hurting kind of strength, but strength, nonetheless. "No, you weren't."
There was a pause, and then nothing. James couldn't counter the truth.
Feet shuffled against the floor.
"Let me go, James." Tired, but resigned. "Go be with Lily and have babies and a picket fence and a dog and whatever else is in that normal life you want so badly."
"Can I have you?" James was trying to joke, but too much genuine want clung to his tone for it to be funny.
"You can't have both of us, Prongs. And you couldn't decide to do what would make you happy, so I decided for you. Now go. Please?"
There was silence, and then footsteps and James opened to door. He didn't seem surprised to find Remus standing there, waiting.
They merely looked at each other for a moment, and then James cocked his head at the door behind him. "I think he's going to need you," he said softly.
Remus reached out and put a hand on his friend's shoulder, but James shrugged it off. "I'm going out," he said, and headed down the stairs and out through the portrait.
Sirius was sitting on the end of his bed, looking at his hands when Remus entered. His eyes were red but dry, and blank, as if all emotion had been wiped from them. His posture was limp and slumped, speaking of his anguish, however. The werewolf sat carefully beside him, not sure if the gesture would chase him away, but Sirius didn't look up or even move.
Carefully, Remus put a hand on Sirius's back. Unlike James, he didn't shrug it off, instead leaning into the touch. Encouraged, the werewolf wrapped both arms around the taller boy, and Sirius buried his head in Remus's neck and started to cry.
They were halting, loud, pain-filled sobs, catching his breath and making him gasp and heave. Remus wanted to cry along with him, so tangible was his friend's pain. Instead, though, he merely closed his arms around Sirius as tight as he could, and held him until he fell asleep, hours later.
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