Title:
All the wrong places part 1
Pairing: Remus/Sirius. With
background James/Sirius.
Disclaimer: I wish.
Summary:
James and Sirius are both aching. Polyjuice potion helps them fix it
without having to say a word outside of the two of them. But Remus is
the one is hurts most, he's the one in love with Sirius after all.
And when he walks in on them, he walks into more than he could ever
imagine.
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i.
The day Remus walked in on himself having sex with Sirius Black
was the day his life got complicated. He was tired, and cold, and
damp around the edges from the thick trail of mud just outside the
grounds. His eyes were aching, and his hands twisted into tight knots
as he stumbled up the stairs with his books almost falling from his
grip. And he paused. Normally he didn't think twice about skipping
over the spelled step and pushing his way into the room, but he
paused and his roll of parchment had slipped with a soft clatter.
His knees were pressed against the concrete when he heard it. The first moan and low hiss slithering under the rim of the door. His hand stilled and his cheeks visibly paled before the accompying fast heavy breaths hit him, too.
And he tried the door. He was too busy analysing it all in his head to think about what he was doing. His shoulders were shaking and his neck stiffened and all he could tell himself was that he was imagining it.
The door creaked as it slid open and his feet stumbled over the ridge onto carpet. The names were louder then, the chests rising mutually and the hips jutting out at awkward angles. Whispers fell silently between pillows and he didn't have time to be surprised about how -- how open it all was. He didn't have time to do anything expect try and slow his heartrate down as Sirius's very flushed face glanced across the room and their eyes almost locked. Seconds later he was met with a sticky mop of hair identical to his own; scarred cheeks and a decidedly naked body.
Part of him remained embarrassed over how much the scene had aroused him, but he shook his head and books tumbled from his arms.
"Sirius --" the oddly familiar voice had spoken, in the overly familiar body.
And it wasn't until he stuttered and ran out that he realised whose bed they'd been on.
ii.
Breakfast was awkward the
next morning. Remus set his alarm to rush down before the others to
try and avoid any type of confrontation. He tried to sidle around
them in the dormitory and edge out of any impending conversation.
Sirius had been watching him cautiously ever since but he hadn't
tried to find him afterwards. Instead, he'd wrapped himself up in his
own bed and shut his eyes. By the time Remus had creeped back up the
stairs his drapes were shut. He'd crawled into his own bed then, laid
back roughly against the pillows and sighed.
He didn't get any sleep but he woke up with red rimmed eyes and a dry throat, nonetheless.
He hid himself away in the far corner of the Gryffindor table, spooning eggs and beans onto a plate. He'd forgone his usual fruit juice that morning for tea, in hopes that the caffeine could make more sense of it all than he could.
He still wanted to talk to them, to him, and what bothered him the most was that the more he ran it around inside his head, the less he felt capable of saying a single word about it at all. He suspected everything, he'd gone through everything. Dissected, cut it open and threw it around a little bit so it didn't hurt as much. But he still ended up biting his lip as he sat alone, surrounded by people, but completely alone; and tried to focus on his classes.
He was halfway through pushing a sausage end around a pile of tomato juice, just on the edge of his plate, when Peter sat down beside him.
"You okay?" he asked and Remus shrugged, turning to offer him a simple smile and nodding barely.
"Something like that," he replied and the shrill squeak of Peter tucking his chair in made it all seem a little better.
It wasn't until the food was being refilled and the second wave of early birds showed up that Peter nudged him and asked him quietly if something had happened last night.
Remus froze then, fork halfway against his teeth, and he grudgingly bit down before he swallowed.
"No. Nothing," he forced out, "Nothing at all."
He was about to excuse himself, to get away from the questions and the suggestions and the ideas that hadn't been spoken when Peter's hand suddenly shot straight up in the air and he waved. Remus's ankled throbbed against the table leg and he couldn't get up fast enough when a rather flustered looking Sirius and James sat down opposite.
"Morning!" Peter chirped through a mouthful of milk.
James's hair was too messy, Remus thought, and nobody was answering anyway in more than mutters and mumbles and eyes. Sirius's shirt was untucked and his tie was over his pocket. It was wrong, it was just wrong. He always wore it over the left so he could sneak sweets into class on the right. He couldn't explain why but it was all just wrong. And their cheeks were coloured and he couldn't stand it.
He stood up hastily and Sirius looked at him from under dark circles.
"I'm going to the library," he announced, dragging his bag up with him, "It's potions first. And I need a passing mark."
His cloak brushed the table as he turned and Sirius's hand tangled in it fitfully.
"Remus," he pleaded, and his knuckles were almost white.
Remus turned but didn't say a word.
Sirius struggled with what to say then. He deserved it, he knew he did, but he certainly wasn't enjoying it and he half wished it would all spill out so it would at least fall into the right kind of wrong place rather than the second-rate disaster that was making his head spin.
"Are --" he stuttered derisively, glancing down; "Are you --"
James busied himself pouring cereal he didn't plan on eating and Peter watched on in silence.
Remus's face turned stony and his eyes snapped into vicious slits.
"No," he hissed, before he could catch himself; "No. I am most certainly not okay. Thank you for asking."
His hand shivered as it tried to hold on tightly to his composure. His eyes were stinging and his cheeks, he could feel, were burning hot. But the lines creased under the anger in his eyes was all it took for Sirius to slink away and Remus to pull his cloak free and storm out of the hall.
iii.
"We have to stop this," James whispered behind the late
night snores outside of his bed. His knees were pressed up against
Sirius's and his neck was damp. A thick roll of sweat trickled down
his back and he felt a tongue follow it.
"We have to -- to stop this," he tried again, but for all it was worth, it came as nothing more than a soft gasp and bucking hips.
The mattress was hard and lumpy and the blankets were always in the way. But Sirius grunted in reply and James pushed a hand hard against his chest.
"Sirius!" he hissed and his nails barely knicked against a plum-coloured nipple.
Hands pressed against stomachs and traced sides and carded harshly through thick hair. Kisses dropped on unshaven jaws. And fingers slipped in just the right places.
"Sssh," Sirius hummed again the base of his spine, and he cried and arched and screamed and raked at the bed sheets as it all just fit together.
"Remus," he heard Sirius stammer in the back of his throat and his hips jerk and his hands still.
"Oh god Remus," Sirius groaned again before nudging James in the side and creeping around over his shoulder for a long, deep kiss where teeth knocked and mouths ached.
"Twenty seven minutes," James mumbled when they pulled apart.
"Twenty seven minutes," Sirius agreed and the curtains crumpled in the wind.
iv.
Everyone could feel the tension between them. The Marauders.
Sirius and James. Remus and almost everyone he came into contact with
recently. Peter liked to stand on the sidelines, to watch and to pick
out parts that were adding up only to stalk off, muttering quietly to
himself, when it didn't go together like he'd hoped.
The common room had started to get oddly empty on a night too and Remus was the only one to still slouch against the side of the couch and read. Nobody ever approached him and nobody quite dared sit next to him. His hands gripped the sides of his book so tightly one wrong move and it looked as if it could break. And he looked like he didn't care. It was difficult to tell which were more fragile, more volatile, although the heavy bags under Remus's eyes told more than his mood ever could.
It was almost midnight when Lily took the seat beside him and the corners of eyes and mouths all twitched.
He didn't say anything but his back tensed and his fingers stilled.
"Remus?" she asked tentatively, placing a hand on his shoulder. But not smiling. Her red hair fell like fire against her cheeks and he sighed.
"It hurts," he mumbled under his breath and she nodded, "It hurts so -- I am such an idiot," he finished and before he had time for any more self pitying, she opened her arms and without another word he sunk into them and let himself ache.
v.
They went
barely a week with nothing more than brushed shoulders and too long
looks. It was when he walked into the Charms classroom and found a
note on his desk that he found out why.
Mother knows.
R.A.B.
vi.
Sirius never went to
James that night, as Remus had prepared himself for. His back was
pressed against the wall with his knees up on his bed, right to his
chest. And he was listening. Those telltale footsteps would come soon
and he would catch them, just in time, and he would sneak down the
stairs and collapse across the couch and pretend he was okay with it.
And pretend his heart didn't ache in all the wrong places.
He expected it. He was ready for it, even.
So when the curtains of his bed were pulled back tentatively and a rather ruffled head popped through he stilled.
"Don't --" Sirius whispered before he got the chance to say anything. He held up a hand that cut off Remus's thoughts and he almost grinned.
"Just -- please?" Sirius asked, and his eyes were sunken and red and he looked so completely broken.
For all he hated him right then, for all he wanted to hate him, he sighed and held out his arms and Sirius settled himself inbetween them in the perfect position to tear himself apart.
vi.
"James was lonely," Sirius whispered as the dimming moon scattered stars over their faces, "He was lonely and he needed to feel wanted. Lily hurt him more than he'll ever admit to."
He'd broken the rule of no talking, the promise that this would only work if they didn't say a word and cause Remus to want to start hating him again when he remembered what this was all really about. But he clung back anyway, his fingers traced idly along his jaw and round the back of his neck. And his heart almost dared to start racing when Sirius's fingers began walking up his stomach.
"And what about you?" Remus asked before he could stop himself. Before he could jut his teeth together and handle the pounding of semi-formed sentences in his head.
Sirius smiled at that; and his cheeks still stung and his eyes still hurt like his heart. But he looked over at Remus and he smiled.
"I already felt wanted," he said softly, pausing and rubbing his damp cheek into the edge of the pillow. He dropped his voice, then, and let the words fall in short rasps of breath against Remus's ear; "Just not by the right person."
"Oh," Remus hushed.
"Oh."
