So Much For Love
A/N: I've been wanting to write this for ages and I finally wrote the first chapter. I actually did tons of research as to what being at a boarding school entails. In the end I actually am modeling it after a real boarding school my friend Taryn goes to in the United Kingdom, so hopefully I'm not too far off from what the school is really like. This entire story is AU, no magic and includes the main pairing, which is slash. Just a hint to not read it if you don't like slash. Also, this isn't beta'd yet and I'm dyslexic. For shame, I know.
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters and don't claim to.
Chapter One: Brand New
As most things do, it all began with something new. In this case it was a someone, but Sirius Black wasn't one to deal with such details as that. At times he could debate when things had really begun, but he did know that it all hinged upon the new student in their house. With only seventy boys in Elmshurst house it was easily apparent when someone joined their ranks. To a certain point Sirius had convinced himself that, whether in Elmshurst or not, he would have noticed him, the newest edition to Bromsgrove School.
Libraries were not a place that Sirius was in often before that time. Once or twice a week he dropped in to pay literature a visit for class relationships only, but most of the time he strayed away from the collections of knowledge. Despite this, he was studying in the library that day, a last ditch effort to pass his history test that morning. Uncharacteristic to the last bit, he was ditching breakfast in favor of his studies. It was not something he would usually do, but it could possibly be chalked up to fate.
While he was reaching for a book on the French Revolution, the main focus of the exam he was preparing for, a loud clatter came from behind him and them the soft mutterings of someone who was frustrated. Sirius turned to see a plethora of books on the floor, one centimeters from where he stood, and a young man kneeling on the floor, gathering them up in a hurry, his face covered by a tawny shock of hair. Sirius leaned over and picked up the book closest to him.
"The Renaissance, mate? We're a bit ahead of that, you have some catching up to do," he said, looking at the book in his hand and then looking towards his unknown companion.
"Oh, I know. We were ahead of it at my last school as well," the boy responded, a compilation of books now collected in his arms, amber eyes shining underneath messy bangs. "Just some light reading." Sirius almost laughed until he realized that there were no jokes and that he was being serious. He dropped the book upon the already growing pile.
"I'm Sirius Black," he offered his hand as if to exchange a shake, but quickly realized his mistake and laughed at his own foolishness, withdrawing the extended hand and pulling it back through his raven hair.
The smaller boy, he was, smiled at this in passing. A curious action, seeing as most people would have laughed along with Sirius. It was almost as if he wasn't even amused. "I'm Remus Lupin and, ah. I've heard of you."
Sirius raised his eyebrows as a few stray locks of hair fell into his view. "Have you really?" Truth be told, he wasn't that surprised. He was rather well-known to the school body of just over a thousand, if only by name and reputation. It was his best friend, James, that every one knew and Sirius was just the devious best friend to the malicious cause of corrupted youth.
Remus excused himself, citing the fact that he had to get to class soon and Sirius realized he had the same goal. In spite of his good intentions in the library that morning, he hadn't gotten much done at all and he was forced to go to class as such. In light of his recent academic performances, he had to imagine this wouldn't be a huge loss. Though he was rarely ready for what his teachers through at him he still achieved above average marks; ones he could surpass if he put work into it, but ones he was satisfied with nonetheless.
Their history teacher, Binns, might as well have been dead the way he droned out the instructions for their test. Sirius kept his eyes attentive to the people around him rather than to the speaker. He caught James' eye from where his mate sat next to him and they exchanged displeased looks, because the state of class was not over. Remus was sitting diagonally two seats away from him. The new boy looked to be paying attention even though he wasn't expected to take the test. He seemed to feel Sirius' eyes on him and turned for a quick second in which Sirius winked and Remus flushed and turned back to the teacher, feigning interest.
"He's interesting, to say the least," James said, a week later, shrugging. "Two girls have asked him out already. And he said no to both of them." They sat together in their dorm room on the late September night. James on his bed, looking near ready to fall asleep and Sirius by his desk, work spread out untouched as the two spoke of the new student.
"Quite on the contrary he's boring according to most people," Sirius replied, as he tipped the chair he was sitting in precariously onto one leg, a balancing act that required only recklessness. "Doesn't talk much, but all the girls think he's just heavenly. Must be smart I suppose, he's on here on a scholarship, isn't that right?" With a loud thud the chair landed back on four legs and Sirius left it to rummage through one of his coat pockets.
James shrugged once more. "That's what Evans said," he muttered, referring to a redhead who had plagued both of their romantic lives at one point or another. For Sirius it had been reality, but for James only in his dreams did he obtain Lily Evans. Sirius had always figured the subject wasn't something to be joked about, lightly or otherwise, and the miniscule days that he had dated her for were never mentioned between the two mates for this reason. "What I don't understand is his apparent philosophy on love."
"And what would that be?" Sirius asked. He bit his lip as he threw his jacket aside and then moved towards his trousers. "Ah and ha," he said with a gratuitous waving of his hand, reaching into the back pocket and exposing two cigarettes. "Stole them offa Carlisle. He was only more than obliging when I mentioned telling the Headmaster he had a pack." James grinned and accepted the smoke that Sirius held out to him.
"Now as for love," he said, leaning back onto his pillow. "The thing with this Lupin boy's idea of it is that he has none."
"How's that?" Sirius asked, producing a flame with the book of matches that was, ironically, emblazoned with the crest of the school they were in. He offered James the light and then lit his own cigarette and sat down on his bed, undoing his tie and inhaling his favorite brand of death slowly, then letting the smoke rise from his mouth in small clouds of toxins, up to the ceiling that he spent all hours of sleepless nights inspecting.
"Well, don't ask me," James said, leaning onto his side, head propped up by hand, waving the lit cigarette into the air. "I'm not him. Personally, I think he's wrong. Evans fancies him, I think, but she knows she doesn't have a chance in hell." A mask of scorn decorated James' face. "She's the one who told me all this about him. Apparently they're great friends."
"Poor thing, he doesn't even know it yet and he's made an enemy of Prongs," Sirius joked. James threw a pillow at him. "Oi! You know you like it, those stupid nicknames we had during Prep School, with Pettigrew, remember?" He laughed at the look on his mate's face and raised the cigarette to his lips. "You never forget anything after all."
Indifference marked James' face, but memories floated freely in his eyes. "That was a while back, but of course I remember. The first time we met you called me a pussy because I rode horses." Sirius' bark of a laugh was extremely loud this time and he clamped a hand over his mouth, snickering into his palm. "That's right, shut it, Padfoot, you dog," James said with a smirk, tapping swirling ashes into the nightstand's drawer; they had a nice collection going.
"Harsh," Sirius said, grinning as he leaned against the wrought-iron headboard of his bed. "And Wormtail, what do you suppose that sneaky devil is up to right now?"
There was a snort from the other bed and then: "Sleeping, I reckon."
"How right you are."
After that they fell into a comfortable silence, conversation dying like the burning cigarettes. Lights out was soon after and James promptly fell asleep as he always did, the lucky bastard, Sirius mused. He, on the other hand, had a profound problem with sleeping lately. Every time he tried to do such a thing as closing his eyes and escaping for some number of blissful hours – or at least some sub-par minutes – his mind would wander off unto some obscure premise, arguing with his own mind until the early hours of day when, if he had good fortune, he would sleep fitfully, but more often than not he would pretend to have gotten some amount of rest, something no one had ever questioned.
They weren't really dating. Sirius hadn't really dated anyone since almost two years ago, not since the Lily Evans disaster. In his mind, girls weren't worth ruining friendships over so he didn't date anyone, at least not in his own words. What he did do, however (and this was in his own words) was shag them. Get in-between their bed sheets, so to speak. Or his own, he wasn't really picky about where they did, just that they did at some point.
Honestly, he thought it was a wonder that not every female had caught on. Perhaps, he had thought more than once, they had and they didn't really care. Some of them, however, seemed to think they could reform him to some sort of life of a long lasting relationship by proving to be the woman of his dreams, as if he had one. All he needed, and what he got, was someone with a rather good figure and who knew what they were doing. They should also be willing to spare a week or two of their time, but no longer. Delusional girls were welcomed as long as they met the other criteria.
Suffice it to say that he wasn't really dating her, she was just the girl of the week and she was getting on his nerves more than any girl ever had or maybe it was just a culmination of all his past relationships and whether or not you could call them that at all. Her name was Lindsey, but it didn't matter much to Sirius as they walked through the halls, her actions making him feel like some sort of new accessory. "Would you stop flaunting me like your mum sent me in the post from her vacation in Italy?" he hissed as she waved to some of her friends.
Through a forced smile she responded: "She's in Greece, for the last time, darling."
"Darling? Don't pull that shit on me at a time like this, love."
"What would be the right time for you, then?"
To answer such a question with complete truth, Sirius would have to use some form of never, but he didn't answer and he never would. They were done with before dinnertime and it didn't astonish anyone. Just another break-up, and about time, many people thought. For Sirius it was a bit more than that. He discussed it with Lily Evans over a cup of tea.
The tea was hers and she swatted the match away when he tried to light a cigarette. "Are you looking to get thrown out?" she whispered as they sat in Housman Hall's common room, where Lily boarded. As the only co-ed boarding house it was also the only one that allowed the two sexes to mingle inside its walls. Sirius shrugged and slipped the book of matches into his breast pocket and tucked the cigarette behind his ear. "You know and I know we're not each other's favorite person to converse with. May I ask what you want with me, Black?"
"You like Lupin?" he asked, a smile sneaking its way onto his face. He forced himself to hide it and took on a look of actual interest.
She knew what he was doing and narrowed her eyes at him as she took a sip of her tea. For a moment she just pursed her lips at him, but then she sighed. "Did. We're friends now, he tells me things and we barely know each other." She smile somewhat forlornly and Sirius couldn't suppress the upturn of his lips. "Is that all you wanted to talk about?" She was angry now.
"Oh, kitty has claws, I see," Sirius said mockingly, taking the cup of tea from her hands despite protest from the redhead as he toyed with the rim of the cup. "Not really, no. We've broken up."
"I hope you let James down easily, he can be quite the whiner," Lily said, deftly receiving the tea back from Sirius and giving him a warning glance as he eyed the light brown substance once more. Sirius rolled his eyes at her remark and settled back further onto the maroon couch they were sitting upon. "It just isn't exactly a surprise anymore when you split with someone, Black, sorry."
"Maybe if you had spared me your curse…maybe then I could actually stay with someone for more than half a month," Sirius spat, not growing irritated himself, as he always did when he was around the girl for more than just a few minutes. "But that's it, I'm done with you people."
"Us people?" Lily said doubtfully, as she set the tea on the low table in front of them, taking special care to make sure it was at the exact center of the light blue saucer it was meant to be paired with. "What do you mean by that, exactly?"
"Girls. Women. People of the female persuasion. Whatever way you want to put it, I'm not going to date you anymore," he said, crossing his arms in front of his chest. "You people are terribly impossible to deal with." He didn't quite realize the fact that the statement wasn't excluding dating altogether, but only denouncing women, because he wasn't considering anything else.
"You sound like Remus," Lily said, smiling down at the tea.
"Shut your prissy, etiquette-instilled mouth, Evans."
News traveled much too fast around Bromsgrove. Everyone knew of his denunciation of the female gender and plenty of jokes were thrown at him for his choice of words. "I meant dating in general!" was a phrase he found himself crying over the following days, followed by laughter from his fellow schoolmates. Even James found it amusing that his mate was in such a situation.
"I thought we got rid of girls nights ago."
One thing he noticed besides this situation – which he tried desperately to ignore – was Remus Lupin. He found himself going to the library more and more often, loading up a table with books and then drawing something odd onto paper and perhaps inside a book or two if he was feeling particularly rebellious, which he always was. Remus would walk by and he would trace beneath a line of text, nodding as if he was understanding it. He didn't know why he did this, but they would have blasé conversations because of it.
"If it isn't the founder of Rome."
Remus smiled, dreamily, almost, dropping the book he was reading down from in front of his face and eying the immense amount of books that were in front of Sirius. "And you would be a star in Canis Major, wouldn't you?" he said, looking unsure of whether to just stand there. Sirius kicked the chair across from him away from the table and motioned to it. Remus sat down agreeably.
Sirius smiled glaringly, perhaps more than he should have and said, "The brightest star, you forgot that minor fact. Ah!" He held out his hand for the second time in their barely alive relationship. "If I recall we never did shake hands." And they did then, Sirius' grip firm and Remus' not quite there, almost nonexistent. "There we go, now we've been formally introduced."
"Have we now?"
"We've met every requirement. I know your name, you know mine and apparently my reputation as well and I know some things about you, from outside sources, you understand. Now we've sealed the deal with a shake of hands," Sirius explained, leaning back in his chair and tapping his pen lightly against the edge of the table. Remus stood up and smiled.
"Funny," he said, pushing the chair back underneath the table, meeting Sirius' eyes for a second during the swift absence of words, "I always thought you sealed things with a kiss." With that he walked away and Sirius was left watching him, thinking to himself that there was a lot more to this new boy than what met the eye.
A/N: I'm so happy. I love all the MWPP-era characters, even Peter. It makes these stories so much fun to write. And, I would like to add, I'm not getting into Sirius and Lily's past dating much more, just know it was a hot mess. xD Oh, and, gods, I've never smoked a cigarette, so I hope…I don't know, I was like not sure how to write that at all. Anyway, review even if you hate it!