For the 2013 Summer Olympics Competition (Swimming - word: never, circle, tide, salt; colour: yellow); the Cluedo Competition (suspect: remussirius, weapon: society often forgives the criminal, it never forgives the dreamer - Oscar Wilde, location: astronomy tower; bonus: remus' bed); the If You Dare Challenge (214. Life Goes On); the Popular Song Competition (As Long As You Love Me) and the Legendary Gods and Goddesses Competition (Charybdis).
The thing about the two of them is that they are the sea, everchanging and always surprising.
i.
In first year, the two of them were calm, like the sea on a peaceful summer's day.
They became best friends with each other and two other boys who were so much like them that Remus sometimes wondered how it could be that they weren't quadruplets or related in some other way.
The friendship was new and delicate, and even though the four of them set the record for the most detentions earned in the last five hundred years, they didn't dare experiment with their bond the way they played with the rest of the school.
So there was nothing special that happened between Remus Lupin and Sirius Black that year. They were normal, everyday, calm.
ii.
The second year marked the first few waves that broke upon the shore of their sea.
That is the year that Remus' secret comes out. His friends weren't stupid; they could notice the pattern of when Remus disappeared each month. And even though he would rather have had his condition stay hidden for the rest of the duration of their friendship, the truth was a creature that didn't like being hidden.
And when Sirius came to him, arms loaded with evidence, with James and Peter's voices still ringing in his ears, begging him to talk Remus into trusting them, the sea started churning from the peacefulness of the previous year.
But there was a reason why it had been Sirius who had been sent and not one of the other two, and the waves rolled onto the shore, too small to any harm to them at all.
iii.
The third year, the two of suffered their first storm. It was a small one, but it was a milestone nonetheless.
Sirius had finally cracked under the pressure of listening to his parents berate him about everything under the sun, from being in Gryffindor to the fact that he was friends with a bunch of blood traitors and that he didn't show any interest in girls, which somehow translated into a family shame.
Before the second Hogsmeade weekend of the year, he asked the girl his parents were thinking of betrothing him to, Miranda Nott.
It shouldn't have affected Remus at all. He should have been happy for his friend, but he simply couldn't stop himself from making snide comments about the Nott heiress every time she was out with Sirius. Even after Sirius asked him not to, he just couldn't help himself.
That was what caused their first true fight. They had never wanted to fight each other, but circumstances conspired against them, and they didn't speak for a week, not until Sirius caught Miranda snogging Ryan Flint and ended the possibility of an alliance between their families at that moment.
It was the first hint of anything more contentious between the two of them than a few waves, and really, it could very well have been said to set the course for their future.
iv.
Their fourth year was a swirling mass of waves hitting the shoreline and each other. It was the tide making headways into the shore, even if it didn't reach the peaks it was capable of.
The first time Remus felt the strange feeling in his stomach was when he saw Sirius at Platform Nine and Three Quarters. He didn't associate that with a crush or falling in love. How could he? He had never experienced either of those emotions before.
But it seemed that the fact that Sirius was an extremely eligible bachelor had somehow managed to hit the female population of Hogwarts over the summer break, and all through the year, girls were throwing themselves at Sirius, hoping that they would be the lucky one picked to be his girlfriend. And as much as Remus tried to deny it, two months into Hogwarts he couldn't keep lying to himself.
The building mass of hatred he felt towards the girls who attacked and tried to seduce Sirius was nothing more than pure, unadulterated jealousy, and the warm feelings he felt at the sight of Sirius was a serious crush that threatened to develop into love.
And there was nothing he could do to stop it.
Sirius realised that he was in love when he saw Remus grinning and laughing with Lily Evans. He wasn't jealous – the idea of Remus and Lily together was laughable – but the sheer joy on Remus' face as he narrated whatever incident he was talking about made Sirius' heart stop beating for just that one moment. And he couldn't help but remember the way that James had described knowing that he was in love with Lily, instead of it just being a stupid infatuation.
Sirius Black was in deep trouble, and truth be told, he wouldn't have changed it for anything in the world.
Their fourth year was a mass of new and confusing feelings and emotions, just like the masses of water that swirled in the sea. Once upon a time, the two of them had been a peaceful ocean, but those days were really a long time ago.
v.
Their fifth year was like the bright yellow sun coming out over a clouded sea.
If someone asked him later on, Sirius would never be able to tell them where he got the courage from. But somehow, during Christmas break his fifth year he had managed to walk up to Remus Lupin and kiss him full on the lips.
And even though Remus had been utterly astounded when Sirius had done that, he had managed to pull himself together and kiss him back before the silly boy decided that Remus was rejecting him.
(And through it all, Remus managed to ignore James and Peter's cheers in the background.)
vi.
Their sixth year was the true storm, the one that rages and destroys everything in its path.
It was in their sixth year that Sirius decided to open his mouth and let slip the secret Remus guarded with his life, the secret that could have caused Remus to become a murderer simply because Sirius couldn't let go of a grudge.
As Remus looked down at the world from the top of the Astronomy Tower, he wondered if it was all worth it; if it wouldn't be better if he just threw himself of the ledge at that very moment.
After all, had Sirius' plan actually worked out the way it was supposed to, Severus Snape would not be the only one dead at that moment. Sirius would have been forgiven for his actions in letting Snape in on the big secret.
But Remus?
Remus would have been executed as a dangerous beast by the Ministry. After all, he had dared to be stupid enough to dream of a world where he wouldn't be prosecuted, where the fact that he was a werewolf had no importance to anyone. He had dared to dream of a world where everyone was like James, Peter and Sirius, and unlike Sirius' actions, that was a crime punishable by death.
He loved Sirius more than anything in the world. The dark haired boy was the main reason Remus found a way to go on with his life even though he knew that he didn't really have any future waiting for him after Hogwarts.
And knowing that Sirius had betrayed him? Suddenly, throwing himself off the Astronomy Tower didn't seem like such an idiotic thought as it would have a day ago.
"Remus?" A soft voice broke him out of his thoughts.
"What is it Sirius?" he asked, turning to face the owner of the voice. He sounded just as dead as he felt inside.
And suddenly, Sirius was in his arms, sobbing desperately, begging him to forgive him, promising that he never wanted anyone to get hurt – that he never wanted Remus to be in any kind of danger.
And even though he knew he shouldn't, Remus couldn't help but forgive him, pulling him into his arms and kissing away his tears as he reassured him that Remus could forgive him and it wasn't more than he deserved.
Because no matter how much he screwed up, Sirius would always be the reason for Remus' existence, and as long as he still loved him, there was nothing Remus couldn't forgive.
And no matter how many storms battered their shoreline, they would always be able to find the glittering hint of the silver lining that was hiding behind the rains.
vii.
Their seventh year was like the circle restarted all over again, idyllic and calm, like the perfect sea.
Even as the war raged outside the confines of the castle, Remus Lupin and Sirius Black fell deeper in love.
Unlike the past five years, their seventh year was not marred by any large spat or milestone in their relationship. Instead, the two of them spent all the time they could curled up in Remus' bed – because it was on the side near Sirius' bed, it afforded them more privacy that the dark haired boy's bed, which happened to be near James' – imagining ideal futures for themselves.
They knew that it was unlikely that such thing would ever happen – there were too many prejudices the world had to overcome, not to mention a war to be fought. But even though they knew the frailty of hope, it didn't stop them from being dreamers.
The thing about the two of them is that they aren't like the freshwater lakes, calm and complacent. They're like the sea, both peaceful and stormy, the kind of water that happens to have just that tinge of salt to it that brightens a person's day.
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