Author's Notes: Sorry kids, it's another old fic, so if you watch me on livejournal you've seen this before. I think I need to write something new…
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Asymptote
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After Sirius becomes the secret keeper, all three of them go into hiding.
Dumbledore tells Remus that the Death Eaters must know it will be one of the three of them. It is not only to lay false trails and confuse but to protect their own lives.
Remus doesn't know where Sirius went after they, together and also very far apart, stood on the doorstep to their flat Thursday and locked the door for the last time. Sirius turned to him and looked him in the eye without seeing him at all and gave Remus the keys before aparating away. He did not say goodbye.
Remus is sitting on the doorstep of the small cabin Dumbledore sent him to, somewhere in the Scottish highlands, and watching the heather, faded purple in it's last seconds of bloom. He can feel the flowers, the way their colour is fading out of them, the way they sigh as autumn catches their paling blossoms and makes them brittle golden.
He thinks about the last time Sirius touched him, now probably months ago. The weight of Sirius rough palm slung across his shoulder and the heat of his breath across Remus neck when he fell asleep leaning on Remus's shoulder, and how, after Sirius's eyes closed, Remus sat on the couch for hours without moving, knowing that the second Sirius awoke, he would grin and laugh a little and his soft body would tense as he rose and Remus would feel his heart fracture as the light dimmed in Sirius eyes when he retreated behind his own bedroom door.
Remus is smart enough to know that Sirius told James he thought Remus was the traitor. Remus knows that by extension, Peter also thinks Remus is the traitor, and that Dumbledore does too, and that because of that, no one trusts Remus. He is alone.
Remus is smart enough to know that because he isn't traitor, Sirius must be, but his heart is already in too many shards, and so he shies away from this thought, locks it behind iron bars sturdy enough to keep a werewolf at bay and instead he watches the heather.
It is then that Remus smells Sirius. He smells the bike first, really. Tang of petrol and magic and metal. For a moment he wonders if this is the end. This is someone sent to tell Remus that James and Lily and Harry were dead now, because they'd all been fooled by Sirius Black, but then he can smell the sharpness of Sirius too, like dry lightning and black currant jam.
Sirius lands with a little skid in the front yard, and Remus is trying to push the giddy grin that wants to split across his face, down, down, away. Remus is just as much a traitor as Sirius if he can still fucking love him like this.
Sirius looks dazzling and debonair in his leather jacket and dark jeans. His hair is longer than Remus remembers, though it's only been three days and he looks coiled tight, like a lion ready to pounce.
"Hey, Moony." he says, and Remus's heart lurches, because Sirius hasn't called him that in so long, since even before the last time he touched him. Need sweeps over him. He craves to be called that again. To feel Sirius's shoulder pressed against his own. It surprises him how chaste this wanting is.
It seems unfair that Sirius is allowed to know where Remus is, but Remus has no clue where Sirius, or even Peter are hiding out. It doesn't surprise him, though, after all, in everyone else's eyes, Remus is a traitor and Sirius is not.
"Hiya Pads." Remus replies after a moment. His voice sounds dull even to his own ears. "What are you doing out here?"
"I was missing my morning tea, so I thought I'd have to come get some."
This is ridiculous, because Remus hasn't made Sirius morning tea for weeks, not since they'd had that fight where Remus said the one-night-stands Sirius kept bring home were going end up in the middle of something dangerous soon, so he'd better quit it, and Sirius had yelled back that Remus sleeping around in other peoples places was no better, and they'd felt the build up, both of them had, because Remus could see the burn of knowing and not saying in Sirius's eyes, but instead they screamed unforgivable nothings and slammed their doors.
Remus sees that same burn in Sirius's eyes now, but the force behind it is quiescent.
He drags himself to his feet and trudges inside with Sirius's combat boot heavy footsteps behind him.
He makes tea.
The sit at the table and stare at each other after that. No words, just looks, like everything beautiful, flooding houses, and the end of the world.
When the light outside begins to fade from cream to hazel Sirius stands to go, and automatically Remus stands to see him out, though the cabin is only one room and Remus could touch the front door with his foot from where they are sitting.
"I think you're the traitor, Remus."
He doesn't understand how Sirius can say those words and not be lying. How he can believe them. Sirius must be the traitor, but when he says that to Remus, he means it.
"If you really believed that, Sirius, I would be dead."
Sirius is outside the door now, and so when he opens his mouth to reply, Remus shuts the door, carefully, not slamming it at all. He can't listen to whatever Sirius has to say; he isn't strong enough to hear how much Sirius hates him. He's never strong enough when it comes to Sirius. Remus turns around and slides down the door He ignore when his shirt catches on the splintery wood, instead sliding the rest of the way with just his bare skin.
He imagines Sirius on the other side of the door, doing the same thing. He imagines both of them, bare skin pressed to wood, only this between them. The thought hurts Remus so much that he gasps a little.
A tiny slip of paper slides under the door and Remus clutches at it, but waits until he hears the sound of Sirius's bike start and then fade away before he reads what it says.
You're right. Is all that's written. Remus feels raw and lonely.
The next day, Sirius comes earlier in the morning. The questions and fear and anger between them, which usually form a chasm to wide for any bridge to cross is suddenly very small, trust and lack of it is a problem that no longer exists.
They spend most of the day with Remus stretched out across the cabin floor, and Sirius perched like a parody gargoyle on the kitchen table, listening to old records and talking. Remus has not laughed so much since last Christmas.
After dark, they run through the heather fields and feel like boys. They sky is black and clear and the stars make a map. It's cold but it's like summer to Remus when he looks at Sirius, seeing his face, a mirror of everything worth living for.
When Sirius leaves, he gives Remus a real hug that lasts a split second too long, and Remus lays on his single bed for the rest of the night, eyes open and glassy, trained on the ceiling, remembering the heat of Sirius's fingers when they traced words on his back. I'm sorry he spelled out, but all Remus could think was that Sirius was so beautiful when he lied.
When Remus opens his eyes in the morning he remembers that today is Halloween. It seems like a milestone, to Remus. If only they can last through today, it will get better. November will be new, he can tell.
He waits for Sirius all day, and as each hour passes, his hope slips away, though he clutches at it like desperate wings.
When Sirius finally comes, and Remus sees his face, he knows that there is nothing left to hope for, so he lets go and feels the world, grey and suddenly broken fade around him.
Sirius is in a hurry, because this is the end Remus thinks.
Remus waits at the door, and when he reaches Remus, he opens his mouth to say something but no words come out. His eyes are lonely and screaming, and Sirius' hands feel like ice when he grasps Remus face.
"Remus," he says, breath coming in a rush. "Remus, Moony, my love."
He cannot bring himself to be shocked by these words. After all, he has always known they were there, lingering on the edge. For them to be said now is nothing if not right. Sirius's breath is burning against his face. His lips are so close, and Remus lets his own fingers tighten into a death grip on Sirius's jacket. A crowbar could not have pried them apart. Their lips grow so close Remus knows he is literally breathing Sirius and he feels drunk and splintered.
"Please." Sirius whispers. "Remember that I am yours."
And then he is gone, before they collide, crash, connect. "I'll remember." Remus says.
Those are the last words they speak to each other for almost thirteen years.