"Move in with me, Moony."
Remus wasn't easily taken aback by these words, by what they implied and how it would change their friendship, quite possibly for the better but just as easily for the worse. He'd heard them many a time since they'd left Hogwarts in June. What he was taken aback by however was the aching with which Sirius now said them. But unlike Sirius, Remus was perfectly capable of concealing his emotions in the presence of the other. If Sirius' tone shocked him or temporarily rendered him speechless (and in all honesty even a little bit tempted), Sirius couldn't have known it. Remus returned the cigarette to his lips, taking a long drag as if he was stealing a pause for thought.
"No," he said finally, shrugging off the disappointed look Sirius proceeded to give him. Remus could feel Sirius' body stiffen beside him, sense the tired roll of his eyes that indicated he would eventually stop asking.
"Well you stay here often enough," Sirius hissed under his breath, his need quickly replaced with spite as he sat up and pulled his boxers up around his hips.
It was true. Remus spent a lot of time at Sirius'. To be fair, he spent the odd night on James' sofa too. Less so Peter's, because like Remus he still lived with his family. But mostly Sirius', especially when Order meetings were followed by a multitude of drinks at the pub. If fortune was in their favour and they didn't have work or a mission to see to the next day, he'd stay for almost the entire morning and afternoon too. There wasn't anywhere Remus would rather be, but he wasn't about to confess this to the man who would hold it over his head for the whole of eternity if he could.
Plucking the cigarette from between Remus' fingers, Sirius stood up from the bed and crossed the room so as to open the window a crack. Flicking the ashes out the window, Sirius tried not to meet Remus' patient gaze.
It got to him. It annoyed the hell out of him, to put it lightly. That much was glaringly obvious. Sirius resented Remus for this, for never giving himself to him completely because of his stupid pride. But Sirius had his independence, something he'd yearned for throughout his entire youth. Remus had a pride of his own, easily justified, and it kept him from moving in with Sirius despite his endless stream of requests.
"I'm sorry," Remus said after a moment's silence. The room felt too still, especially considering that Sirius' presence was electric, the crackling before the storm.
"No," Sirius said simply, before taking another drag. "No, you're not." He emitted a laugh and the smoke escaped his lips in undignified curls. Resting the cigarette lazily between his lips, Sirius pulled himself up onto the windowsill and into a sitting position. It wasn't anger that shaped his movements so much as incessant disappointment.
"No, I'm not."
Remus forced himself to say it and Sirius didn't so much as flinch.
"I'm not sorry. We both know I'd annoy the hell out of you anyway." Remus threw back the bed sheets, scrambling around the floor until he'd distinguished his jeans from Sirius' and pulling them on. "We wouldn't survive a week."
"I've lived with you before, you berk," Sirius said, anger clearly rising in his chest where it hadn't been before.
Still missing his t-shirt, Remus grabbed his wand from the bedside table, silently summoning it from the mess that was typical of Sirius.
"Right, seven years I've lived with this. I think I've suffered enough, don't you?" Remus' tone had lightened, only Sirius wasn't cooperating. He merely turned his gaze out onto the street below, letting the cigarette drop to the pavement one floor down once it had burnt out.
"I'm going out."
Remus' fists were clenched around clumps of hair as he watched Sirius take off down the street and into the night, literally. The bike rose into the air before it even reached the corner, it's rider showing little care for any muggles who might be taking out the rubbish or shutting their curtains before turning in for the night. If he was spotted, that was a hefty fine from the Ministry. But Sirius was reckless in every sense of the word. What were rules, what was a fine when you were Sirius Black, the man to whom laws were merely there to be broken and mocked?
Swearing loudly, Remus let his fists drop to his side. The bike was now beyond his sight, the tail-light having broken during their last run in with the men in masks, Death Eaters. Sirius had slipped behind night's veil and was now entirely concealed. But Remus couldn't tear his eyes away from the scene despite the fact that he very much wanted to. Sirius might appear to be the one dodging the reality of the situation, avoiding confrontation by simply taking off altogether, but he wasn't the only one doing the running. But Sirius running away from him? That was the last thing Remus wanted to see.
When the distant roar of the motorbike had all but ceased, Remus finally gave up. There was no use hoping that he'd return. That he'd think better of his actions and better of his last words, turn the bike around and just come back; it was too much to ask of the man, too much to expect. Remus felt a stab of anger to his chest. A lump formed in his throat and his fingernails were like daggers on his palms, threatening to pierce his skin should his clench persevere. But Sirius was his anchor and tonight Remus had lost him. There was nothing to hold onto and in light of everything that they had lost thus far, everything that they could lose, the sensation was overwhelming. Remus returned to Sirius' flat, alone, because in all truth it might not be his but it was the only place for him and always had been.
It was selfish. Sirius didn't want to feel the weight of the war on his shoulders and he especially didn't want to feel it if it meant spoiling the haven he and Remus, and by extension all the Marauders, had built together. If Sirius was brutally honest, he'd admit to the fact that he was terrified, not only of the war but of what it meant for them. Coming from a strictly pure-blood background, he knew exactly what they were up against. He saw families, friends torn apart. When they had first collided in a painfully glorious storm of heat and want and feelings, everything made sense. More precisely, it didn't have to because life was too perfect for them to even think about the consequences. But only fragments of that remained. Sirius asking Remus to move in was his means of making sense where there was none, clinging to what he held dear in the realisation that it was all too easily lost.
Sirius knew it was pure selfishness that had propelled his feet forwards and gotten him on his bike. He didn't want to feel the rift that had formed between them only widen because they were too proud and too damn stubborn to cross it. Sirius had only felt distance from Remus once in his life but on that occasion he'd had himself to blame. As wretched as it was, as much as he hated himself for what he'd jeopardised, with blame came control. Sirius cared enough about Remus that setting things right wasn't beyond impossible. It should have been, but it wasn't.
The tips of Sirius' ears were soon entirely numb from the cold. The knuckles of his hands, tightly clutching the handles of his bike, were white from brute strength. The wind and the force of the bike propelling him forward and away from Remus whipped his face, stinging his skin until tears burned his cheeks. Sirius told himself they had nothing to do with Remus and everything to do with exposure to the elements. It was cold, clouds loomed ahead of him; only a madman would choose tonight to fly. But the bodily effects on Sirius were also soothing because anything physical was easier to endure than the sound of Remus' voice as he'd said it.
Why do you even care if I move in with you? What am I to you, Sirius?
Love had never come into it, or so Remus had implied. Until now, it'd only been felt, never voiced, and even then only sparingly. And yet love had everything to do with it. Sirius had always loved Remus. He'd always known it too. Wasn't this what had always set his friendship with Remus apart from that of the other Marauders? The difference was in the fact that he wanted to hold him, mould to him, just simply be with him.
Remus had made the mistake of following Sirius out of the flat without pausing to put on his shoes. It was a mistake for two reasons; one, he'd instilled no reason into Sirius in the short time it took for him to jump onto his bike and depart; two, he'd managed to trod on a great piece of glass that lay in waiting on the curb.
Hunched over his foot with his wand in one hand a makeshift bandage in the form of a handy tea towel in the other, Remus tried to pry the glass from his flesh. Blood seeped into the cloth as he worked and he winced at the pain, but soon enough his foot was glass-free.
Being a werewolf with a myriad of scars, each a token of his self-inflicted wounds, one would have expected Remus to excel at healing spells. As it was, Remus had always had someone to do the healing for him. At Hogwarts, it was mostly down to Madam Pomfrey to patch him up. But that didn't stop Sirius beating her to it once he'd started sticking around for the full moons. Of course it'd been required of Remus once or twice due to the war. But when it came to others, a sense of determination and adrenoline kicked in and Remus was able to recall those few relevant Charms lessons. Much to Remus' astonishment, only very rarely was he required to work the magic on himself. More often than not, Sirius was there to beat him to it.
Taking deep breaths to steady the rapid beat of his heart and the panic that was slowly creeping over him, Remus set his mind to the spell at hand. Vulnera Sanentur. Gradually, the skin began to knit until the wound was all but healed. It required patience and a steady hand which normally Remus possessed, but then those words resounded in his head and withdrew him from any hope of concentration.
Maybe you're just a mate, or maybe I love you.
Sirius had halted at the door, one hand resting on the door-frame which he tapped impatiently with the signet ring he'd inherited from his Uncle Alphard and worn on the index finger of his right hand ever since. He was waiting for Remus to give him a reason to stay, but Remus only answered with silence.
His caution wasn't wholly unjustified. Sirius had hurt him in the past, something which Remus had been trying not to expect after he'd first been forced to confide in them about his condition. But he'd forgiven him, or so he'd told himself. Something like that was hard to forgive. He'd loved him in spite of it, that much he knew. But if it was merely caution holding him back, those words might have been easier to digest.
Remus siphoned off the blood with his wand. Now clean, he was able to confirm that the wound was pretty much healed apart from a tender layer of skin on the pad of his foot. His mind flitted back to numerous full moons and countless occasions since in which Sirius had shown him more affection, a softer touch, and a deeper devotion than a werewolf rightfully deserved. Shame immediately washed over him and Remus felt sickened to the core at the silence that rung over the flat. It had felt unnaturally still when Sirius first posed him that question. Now, the lack of that spark that defined Sirius was suffocating.
Sirius had every reason to be hurt and yet it was Remus' face after he'd said it that unforgettable. From a great height, Sirius could see almost all of England. At least that's what it felt like. He could see the entire city, not in all it's detail but the lights made a distinct dividing line between habitation and countryside. Wisps of cloud obscured his vision and the landscape was mostly shrouded in darkness but on a normal day he could make out hills, fields and forests in the horizon. From this height, the city and its surroundings had become a miniature map which Sirius had to learn by heart. And from atop the world with the roaring motorbike between his legs, Sirius felt as if it was his for the taking.
And yet it was that image which he couldn't shake; the slight tug at the corner of Remus' lips and his eyebrows before his determination to keep a straight face shattered altogether; the way he squeezed his eyes shut as if hoping the situation would dissolve because those were words that Remus had never comprehended hearing, let alone felt he deserved; then the sheer agony that flickered across his features as he attempted to feign ignorance.
There was something peculiar about muggles which Sirius would never understand. Magic occurred right under their noses but nine times out of ten they never even noticed it. Sirius first discovered this when he travelled by Knight Bus to the Potters' cottage after his fifth year and he was reminded of it now.
The bike touched down and Sirius immediately raced up to the flat. With some luck, Remus wouldn't have left; he'd still be there, clutching his copy of Poe's Collected Works which currently resided on the mantelpiece and a cup of tea to rid him of the chill Sirius had left him with. What he found however was Remus curled up on the sofa, asleep, and looking a right state with only one damp sock whereas the other, stained with blood, had been discarded on the floor. Sirius knelt beside the sofa, loathed to disturb Remus when he looked (for the time being at least) strangely peaceful.
Eyes scanning the flat, Sirius noted that there were signs of Remus everywhere. The book, the mug which over time Remus had claimed as his own, odd items of clothing here and there. Remus was already living there, he just didn't want to admit it. But Sirius had never intended the flat to be entirely his own, just as he'd never intended to be entirely alone. Remus was it and always had been.
Sirius woke soon after the sun made its first appearance, casting a stroke of light through the slight crack in the curtains. Rubbing his eyes, he stretched then curled himself around the man next to him.
Remus was caught in a deep slumber but he instinctively nestled into Sirius' arms at their touch. He was wearing nothing but those woolly socks he'd acquired years ago, woolly socks he'd worn almost every night since, not to be thrown away even though they were full of holes. Remus' habit of pulling the covers so close under his chin meant his toes always poked out at the other end, making the socks a necessity. This was one of the many things that Sirius had come to adore about Remus. It was one of the many things that only Sirius knew about him, a piece of knowledge as intimate as the number of freckles that dotted Remus' nose after he'd caught the sun or that he actually enjoyed being tickled in the side once you broke through his walls (so long as it wasn't around the full moon).
They'd not left Sirius' flat in almost two months.
Suddenly, Remus' toes curled against the cold and he drew further into the concave Sirius had provided. "What time is it?" he asked slowly, groggily, attempting to open his eyes before thinking better of it.
"Go back to sleep, you daft sod," Sirius whispered, smiling as affection towards the sleepy Remus swept over him, affection which burned twice as bright in light of their recent argument and insecurities raked anew. Sirius' toes sought out Remus' and he burrowed his nose in the warm bronze locks of his hair.
"Move in with me, Remus," Sirius said, testing the waters once more.
Remus sighed into the bed covers, almost a laugh only he was too sleepy and contented to summon the energy necessary for it.
"Okay."