By Moira Took
(If you have an quips or quibbles please see my author's note at the end of the fic where I explain some of my madness reasoning. Thanks!)
I used to watch him. I would be utterly enthralled by the tangled nest of dark hair he never bothered to comb which framed the angular planes of his handsome face. I would be entranced by the solemn way he bowed his head when sad. The impish smile that played on his fine lips when he was participating in a particularly devious prank was engrossing. The way his spindly fingers tapped to some deranged cadence upon the desk when he was concentrating was fascinating; his rough laugh (which sometimes bordered on maniacal) was harmonious music to my ears.
The past for me is obstructed by grey curls and shrouds of mist, save for the portions of the past occupied by Sirius Black and his devious smirk. Those moments are crystal clear beacons amidst the haze of my memory...
He was sitting beside me in History of Magic, oblivious to the droning of Professor Binns and the gentle snoring of James asleep beside him. He was staring straight ahead, seemingly engrossed in the scribbles a piece of chalk was etching upon the blackboard. The distant look in his grey eyes indicated to me, however, that what he was seeing upon the blackboard was not tedious nonsense about goblin rebellions. The quill I was clutching slipped from my grasp and my clumsy elbow upset a pot of ink as I watch him. His sharp profile was illuminated by the harsh light of the sun spilling through the window. This brilliant sunlight and mischievous smile upon Sirius' face was sharply in contrast with the dullness of the lecture, the words of which were sailing right over his head. I envied him for being able to whittle away time in this class, unaware of everything except what his imagination was conjuring. As for me, no matter how hard I tried I always heard every insignificant detail of every goblin rebellion or witch burning. And when I attempted to daydream the nagging voice of my conscious reminded me that I must receive good marks in this class so I had best pay attention. He looked so serene perched there upon his chair, his head propped up by the hand which cradled his chin. When he tilted his head slightly he caught sight of me watching him.
"Moony," he murmured, his tone saturated with tenderness and love, a tone I had never heard him use before.
Then a faint twinge of scarlet creeping into his pale cheeks (this was shocking to me as I believed Sirius Black incapable of blushing) he veered away and began to furiously take notes about the goblin rebellions.
And I, for one, heard no more of the lecture that particular class...
This slip of his carefully maintained guard planted the first seed of hope for me, a hope that my secret yearning for him was not in vain. And this moment I treasure and hoard along with other memories of Sirius as he was in his seemingly innocent youth.
I wonder if he remembers the precious snippets of time we spent together at Hogwarts in such vivid detail as I do...
Clutching a tattered towel and a bar of soap I entered the boys' bathroom on the third floor. Instantly I was greeted with horribly off key singing emoting from one of the shower stalls out of which bubbles were frothing on either side of the curtain. Thinking little of this I proceeded to rapidly disrobe myself. I was standing in my shamefully tight and very white underwear when the curtain of the shower from which the singing was coming was hastily torn open. I dove for my robe and quickly wrapped it around myself, covering my eyes with my hand.
Rather than the colorful string of explicitness and possibly even hexes I expected to hear I heard a manic peal of familiar laughter.
"Moony," a voice addressed me calmly after the laughter had subsided and I still crouched foolishly on the floor with my eyes closed, "stand up and open your eyes for the sake of Merlin."
I peered through my fingers warily and saw Sirius, stripped to the waist, with a towel slung precariously low around his slender hips. He was soused, having just emerged from the shower, his dark hair plastered to his forehead, each tendril dripping water.
I scanned his pale chest, slightly muscular despite his lithe build. I attempted to absorb every plane of his bare chest, from his thin shoulders down to the slight bow of his hips. A thin line of dark hair ran from just below his navel down into the area concealed by the towel.
Merely the sight of such vast expanses of nearly translucently pale skin was dizzying and I fought for control over my emotions, gasping for breath.
"How was your day, Moony?" Sirius inquired ironically.
"Oh, um, rather decent..." I grated, surprised by the brusqueness of my voice.
After a few awkward moments of stumbling over syllables and stuttering through muddled sentences we bid each other goodbye. I leapt into the shower as he dressed and departed.
As the water, frothing with soap bubbles, coursed down my bare back I could close my eyes and see in minute detail, the slender yet sculpted chest of Sirius Black...
He sits across from me, his once flawlessly black hair prematurely streaked with grey, a product of the trials he has confronted as a man wrongly convicted of a heinous crime. And I wonder if he remembers. For I do. His resounding, haughty laugh, a laugh now coarse and rueful, echoes eternally in my ears. His lengthy stride with had a harmonious rhythm and flow and the cadence of his footfalls is ingrained in my memory. I hoard memories of the distracted way he would butter a piece of toast only to absently set it down upon the table and begin to butter another. I savor memories of him bemusedly chewing on the ink steeped end of his quill, ink dripping down his chin in such a humble, foolish way no one would expect of Sirius Black. I relish in memories of him elegantly sprawled upon the worn rug in front of the dying embers in the grate in the common room, scribbling down bits for a Potions essay due the following morning. I recall the way the fluttering eyes of girls, twinkling with lustful hope, would follow him down the hallway and how he never paid any heed to their stares. One could hardly blame these gaggles of gushing, giggling girls: Sirius, as a student, was wholly beautiful. His features were highly bred but with quirks that gave them a beauty wholly unique. And he never seemed to face the awkward stumbling and eruptions of spots most adolescents due but bridged the gap from childhood to manhood in a single graceful stride.
He was the center, the point of gravity, around which my life revolved and rotated. For how long I loved him I do not know. My love for Sirius was a lurking creature gloatingly fat, fed by awkward touches, uneasy silences fractured by stumbling sentences and stuttering syllables. Before I even knew of this love I was overwhelmed, consumed by it. This unconscious feeling dictated my actions and words. While the unfolding of my feelings for him was not an abrupt, searing jab; my realizing the intensity of these feelings was a jarring, grating shock.
One morning, the Hogwarts grounds were smothered in a thick layer of curling fog and distant thunder resounding in the distance. The whole weekend loomed ahead blissfully and I had risen early. Casting glances at the beds of Sirius, James, and Peter, the curtains of each drawn tightly around the four posts, I presumed them to still be sleeping. Dressing in the dark (a hat and a sock- what difference is there?) I stumbled down the steps sleepily and lurched out of the portrait hole.
I was shocked to see Sirius idly stirring a cup of coffee with a spoon at the far end of the common table. Typically he was rarely awake on time for breakfast before classes much less on a weekend. Dejectedly he brought the rim of the cup up to his lips but placed it back on the table as if it sickened him without taking a sip.
I struck with such pity for Sirius Black, so forlorn, so alone in the deserted Great Hall. I never thought I would have any reason to pity Padfoot who was so self assured to the point of haughtiness, so handsome and so admired and so lusted after. I wanted to enfold him in my arms and chase away his demons and banish his worries...
"Merlin's beard, I love Sirius Black," I murmured softy to myself, almost incredulously. Gazing back at him sitting at the table, his shoulders hunched and drawn up to his well bred chin, all my doubts fled.
"I love Sirius Black," I said with a bit more force and began to walk rapidly, eager to bridge the the space between us. Sirius and I. Sirius and Remus. Padfoot and Moony.
I sank down on the bench beside him, our knees brushing in an intoxicating way.
Sirius veered around and gaped dully at me before turning back to his coffee wordlessly. I said nothing. I could sense that my mere presence was comforting to Sirius, who gradually lifted his head and began to take tentative sips from the mug clutched in his palms.
Even if Sirius had spoken I could not have managed to respond, so caught up was I in my own thoughts, thoughts that were blissful and disturbing at the same time.
I loved my best friend. And I was positive he could never return the sentiment. I was so undeserving of his friendship much less affection from him that exceeded friendliness. He could never think of me in the same way I thought of him. It would be impossible.
As we sat perched side by side upon the bench I swore never to tell anyone of my feelings for Sirius but merely to let them fester and grow in my heart...
Once again he is idly stirring the dregs of yesterday's coffee, intent upon a spot on the table.
"Sirius?" I ask hesitantly, haltingly. My voice catches , grating and cracking, bowing under the weight of emotion.
He glances up suddenly, mouth twisted into a nearly maniacal smirk. The emptiness in his eyes, stoop of his shoulders, his features still sunken and gaunt, betrayed this smiles, revealing it as a grimace.
I know now that he needs me. Our roles have been reversed. It was no longer I who needed tender whispers of comfort and strong and slender arms enfolding me, pressing me to him. It is Sirius who needs me.
Our hands, groping and searching, quavering and trembling, seek each other. Our fingers intwine, woven together, palm pressed against palm.
Rising slightly, bent across the table, fumbling and muddling, I lean towards Sirius, his breath intoxicatingly warm upon my face.
Our lips touched as hands caressed awkwardly, the sensation of flesh against flesh exhilarating. One arm was around my neck, fingers intertwined in my hair as another traced the inside of my thigh through my trousers maddeningly. I was vaguely aware of my own hands fervently blundering as I attempted to undo the buttons of his shirt and loosen his tie. The sensation of his erection pressed tightly against my abdomen was enough to tear a moan from my lips. We drew slowly apart, gazing at each other in wondrous shock, in shocking wonder.
He was laughing raucously , his peals of laughter sharply punctuated by rasping groans. Our situation was absurd: our homework lay dejectedly on the floor, our trembling fingers ink-stained as we embraced on the floor of the Gryffindor Common Room. Hogwarts was deserted; nearly each student having gone home for Christmas, except for an occasional weeping first year or defiant seventh year. We had been working on an insufferably long and tedious potions project. We were pouring over hefty volumes potions and their properties, sprawled out across the worn rug before the hearth. Suddenly Sirius cast a glance at me and in a swift motion moved to catch my lips under his.
Answer less questions surfaced in my mind but were quickly devoured by thoughts of passion as Sirius' hand grasped my arousal, roughly and urgently yet tenderly. I stifled a gasp.
Sirius stopped laughing. He was staring at me intently, delighting in every sigh, eyes widening as I writhed and squirmed in pleasure. He drew me closer so he was straddling my legs, our erections being pressed together through our trousers. His tongue flicked lightly over my lips and traced a path down to my neck. Resting his chin on my shoulder blade as we embraced he began to suck on the flesh of my neck.
Pulling away suddenly he looked at me mischievously.
"What are we doing, Moony, mate, eh?
He deviously looked at me through his thick eyelashes, his head bowed, chin cradled in the hollow of my neck.
When no answers surfaced in the lagoon of my mind, made hazy by Sirius' tortuous, rhythmic clutching at my crotch, he answered himself.
"We're fucking each other, in this ridiculous common room, still in our trousers," he said ironically. Instead of sounding coarse and crude the obscenity which slipped from his puckered lips could have been lyrical words of love to my ears. Sirius, surprisingly tentative, slipped a warm hand, his spindly fingers searching, fumbling with urgency, into my trousers. He hungrily kissed me, nipping and licking. He devoured the rasping gasp torn from my throat as he ravenously enclosed my erection with his hand. He stifled my cries with kisses, never ceasing moving his fingers along my length.
"Take these damn trousers off. And that white shirt. I want to see Remus, not Remus the student. Plus, fucking someone in their bleeding Hogwarts clothes makes me feel rather dirty," he said impishly.
"And have there been many?" I asked hesitantly. Sirius looked up abruptly.
"Who I fucked in their Hogwarts clothes? Oh, dozens. Snivelus doesn't often change his clothing, even for his lovers," Sirius replied, a sarcastic smile on his fine lips. This smirk soon dissolved as he caught the somber, questioning. look upon my face. I envisioned him before me, lean frame stripped bare, lips bruised and swollen from fervent kisses exchanged with a Ravenclaw seventh year, bite marks upon his neck from the passionate nippings of a Hufflepuff sixth year, and his erection red from the sucking of a Slytherin seventh year. Branded into my memory was the image of the night I found him, trousers unzipped, in an abandoned class room, licking the porcelain neck of a girl with a sheath of dark hair I didn't recognize. The bow of her hips was jammed crudely against his crouch and I saw nothing poetic or poignant in this ravenous game of grindings and sloppy kisses. When he caught sight of me standing dumbfounded on the threshold of the room, mouth hanging agape, he had tried to explain, tried to apologize for me having seen this. He was dashing after me, a rare blush creeping up into his face, muttering that he was a bloody wanker and should at least have told us. I merely returned to our dormitory, drawing the heavy curtains of my four-poster tautly and forbiddingly. Sleep would not come. I lie gnawing on the peeling flesh of my lips, imagining Sirius pressing his swollen, puckered lips to them feverishly...
"No, not many at all, Remus. I know I have quite a reputation shagging but I was just fooling around. No pun intended. Dismissible, all of them. Get a good fuck out of her. See bloody stars. Promise her the world and Dumbledore's underpants. Remember yourself and your damned Potions homework. Forget her except for the guilty little smile she flashes you in the corridors. Silently observe your werewolf friend. Memorize every detail, every quirky habit of his. (You tend to chew on your lower lip quite a deal, mate and when you're cold your left leg shudders.) Realize you love him and that you'd rather have him for one night than all the foolish girls in Britain for a thousand nights. Make a rash move that shocks even yourself, kissing this best friend..."
His words all but dissolved, disappearing ink being absorbed into a scrap of parchment, devoured by the silence.
Suddenly time hung suspended, the swinging pendulum halted by some invisible hand. Nothing existed beyond the flesh under my fingertips, under my tongue. Sirius writhed out of his pants, shedding the layers, wrenching at my remaining garments. I was stripped before him, unabashed by the jutting of the bones of my hips and the scars along along my abdomen. Sirius' grey eyes widened as they latch upon my erection and he eagerly licked his lips in torrid anticipation, his own erection straining against the fabric of his boxers (an embarrassing purple and green plaid.) He appeared so vulnerable to me, so humble as he whisked away the fine strands of his dark hair and lowered his head.
Flesh upon flesh. Tongue moved rhythmic, assuredly. I knew nothing more than the raw, thrilling sensation of flesh upon flesh. Shuddering, a jagged cry wrenched from my constricting throat, my release passed through me. I slumped backwards on the sofa, surrounding myself to the nameless emotions overwhelming me and the encroaching darkness. Suddenly I am aware of the length of Sirius' body pressed against mine.
"I took your virginity. You have to be mine now," he whispered deviously yet tenderly, possessively embracing me, his erection is still pressed pleasantly against my abdomen.
I delicately kissed his cheek. "I want you, all of you," I murmured in his ear, my hips buckling upward to grind against his crotch. He stiffened, shifting so his erection was no longer prodding feverishly into my stomach.
"Are you sure? I mean, you really don't have to. I'm fine. It was your first time. I didn't expect anything. I don't. I don't expect anything. If you don't want to that's fine..."
"Sirius, shut up, please," I said, eliciting an abashed smile from him. "I want you, wanker and I'll have you, whether you want it or not. Rape is a possibility if you to do consent to join me in this sordid love affair," I whispered ironically.
Sirius grinned; he clearly wanted it- desperately. We were sprawled out across the shallow couch, lacking room to maneuver at all and realizing this Sirius smirked wryly before slipping off the side of the couch, beckoning me to follow suit. His leaned frame was draped
across the tattered rug before the dying embers of the hearth, tempting and arousing. I pitched off the couch, crawling on all fours, succumbing to the beast like, primal instinct beating deep within me to fuck him and fuck him hard.
I took him in my mouth, delighting in the delectable taste of him and the even more delicious moans and reactions my movements were drawing from him. It was I who was making him groan and writhe, it was my tongue swirling over his erection. Remus and Sirius. Moony and Padfoot. We were meant to be. After his sweet release into my mouth we lay together, limbs interwoven and slipped into sleep. Two as one. One as two.
After so many years we are still dominated by the fiery, raw, and crude urges of our adolescents. We are once again teenage boys, naive in the world of flesh (save that of our own hand bringing as a guilty release), hungry and ravenous for each others bodies. We are as brash and as tentative, as hasty and as timid, as enraptured and as embarrassed. Everything has changed; nothing has changed. We are still Sirius Black and Remus Lupin, Moony and Padfoot as we always were.
Sweet release and then sweet slumber, limbs intertwined, head resting upon chest, arm enfolding lithe frame, breath warm, intoxicatingly warm, on cheek.
I watch him. His sharp features are burrowed into the pillow, his tangled locks of black hair which he never bothers to comb fanned across the pillow, his bare chest, ribs protruding, rising and falling with each shallow intake of breath.
I watch him and this time, roused from his sleep, he returns my gaze.
A/N: I don't like Remus/Sirius fics which rely too heavily on Sirius' arrogant, confidant, experienced, and cocky (no pun intended) facade and translate this to being completely unashamed and not in the slightest bit tentative in bed- not even in the first time. I believe that it is with Remus that Sirius lets down his guard, let's his mask of haughty arrogance (which he uses as a buffer between himself and others) slip a little. Sirius is not all handsome, sexually charge poise though he may appear to be so. My Sirius sings in the shower, stresses over his Potions homework, wears dreadful plaid boxers, and is not entirely confidant when shagging Remus the first time, things he normally works quite hard to conceal from the world. He's vulnerable with Remus, indefinably human with Remus, more so than he is with anyone else. I enjoy breaking stereotypes in characters, revealing a side of him or her that is typically concealed. Sirius is not always haughty and Remus is not always studiously tentative (he's rather beastly in bed- not that I would know of course...)
To my dear friend Oliver (Olivia) who I introduced to fanfiction and she returned the favor introducing me to the wonder of slash and with whom I wrote my first sex scene 3 years ago (between pathetic Scarlett and Jeremy of the ice blue eyes). Thanks for editing smut in study hall, telling me what's utter shit in my writing and just being marvelous. I love you! How many calories does semen have, anyway?