Watching You, Watching Me, Watching Us
Rating: M
Disclaimer: I don't own the Harry Potter world or its characters. J. K. Rowling does.
Summary: Sirius and Remus acquire a television set. But it comes from Arthur, so it's not quite the conventional sort. SBRL slash. HBP spoilers: don't read unless you have read HBP, or you don't mind spoilers. You have been warned.
It would never have happened if Peter's father had not been taken gravely ill, and Peter led away, wide-eyed and fearful, to see him for what might turn out to be the last time. And it would not have happened if James had not injured himself on the Quidditch pitch the day before, and lain groaning all morning in the hospital wing. But as it was, Sirius, who usually worked with James, and Remus, who normally partnered Peter, found themselves facing each other over a bubbling cauldron in their third-year Potions class.
Maybe the Kreddulus potion was too complicated to be attempted by third-years. Maybe Remus was too inept to be working on it. Certainly Sirius was not giving his full attention to the matter, until suddenly he realised what Remus had in his hand.
"Remus, NO!" he shouted. "You can't add the loquat juice after the powdered phosphorescent cryptid shell, you should have put it in before!"
Remus turned his head towards the source of the sudden noise, and as he did so his hand drooped, sending the contents of the small phial into the cauldron. The resulting explosion wrecked the classroom and removed Sirius and Remus from their world forever.
By a coincidence, the chance of which is so beyond astronomical that it could only happen once in the history of all the universes, two boys whom we shall call Sirius Two and Remus Two were working on the same potion at the same time (the word "time" has no real meaning in this context, but there is no comprehensible substitute) in a world separated from ours by a space of, simultaneously, less than a millimetre and an incalculably vast distance. The same accident occurred there as happened in this world, and the pairs exchanged places.
We are not immediately concerned with what happened to Sirius Two and Remus Two on their arrival in our world, though we shall be seeing them later. Our Sirius and Remus picked themselves up, examined themselves for injuries, found only minor cuts and bruises, and prepared to face the consequences for the ruined classroom.
During the next few days, Sirius and Remus became aware that their world had changed in ways major and minor. Their Potions professor was no longer the plump, indulgent, somewhat decadent Professor Slughorn, but a sharp-featured, irascible man with a German accent, Professor Reichenbach. An owl from Remus's mother made him aware that his grandmother was alive, not dead as Remus had supposed for the last four years. And Sirius learned that his brother Regulus was two years older than Sirius had believed him to be. Other things were unchanged; James and Peter were still their friends, Severus Snape and some other Slytherins still their enemies. But James's eyes were now dark brown instead of hazel. Hogwarts itself had changed in a few subtle ways; the red curtains around their beds were now edged with gold, and there were three windows in the Transfiguration classroom instead of two.
When the boys spoke of these changes, whether to a professor or to their friends, they were told that the explosion must have shaken their brains and affected their memories. They were not satisfied with this explanation, because on comparing notes they discovered that they shared the same memories of the world before the blast. But they did not know what had happened, and with the resilience of youth they accepted the situation, pretended to believe the shaken brain explanation, and got on with their lives.
Those lives proceeded much as they would have in our world; Remus continued to harbour his unrequited love/lust for Sirius until sixth year, when it was suddenly requited, to Remus's incredulous joy. After school they lived together in Sirius's little house in the Scottish countryside, and they were happy.
One day Sirius came home levitating a strange object; a square box made of a dark smooth substance and having a glass panel in front.
"Arthur gave it to me," he said. "It's a velly – no, a television."
"Oh, I know about them," said Remus. "Muggle artefacts. It's no use to us, they don't work without electricity and we haven't got any."
"Arthur says he charmed it, but it still doesn't work," said Sirius. "He thought we might like to have a go. Do those little knobs on the front do anything?"
"Only if they're connected to the electricity," said Remus. "No, we'd have to use spells."
They spent the next five minutes trying out various spells until Sirius said "Let's try the one for revealing invisible writing. Aparecium!"
The glass panel lightened, and showed two young men standing in a room.
"That's us!" Sirius exclaimed. "We're talking. Is there any way we can hear what we're saying?"
"One of these little knobs would do it, if it was attached to the electricity," Remus replied. "As it's not, maybe try – Sonorus!"
It worked. Sirius Two (for it was he) was saying "Got something for you, Moony. A ticket to that concert you wanted to go to. Martin Carthy, the Watersons, Skinner's Rats, and that old sailor bloke."
Remus Two's face brightened as he took the slip of paper.
"Can they see us?" Sirius asked, sounding a little worried.
"No," said Remus, "it doesn't work that way. They don't know we're watching them."
Sirius Two was talking again. "Concert finishes at ten, I asked at the box office. So……"
"I get it," said Remus Two, grinning. "You're bringing a girl back and you want me out of the way. That's what this is about."
"So forty-five minutes to get home from Croydon, you won't be back till eleven, and by that time we'll be cosily tucked up in my room with the Imperturbable on," Sirius Two added.
Remus Two grinned again. "Either that, or she'll have pushed off," he said. "Thanks anyway. I'll just go and change into my Muggle gear."
The scene in the glass panel changed, as the viewpoint followed Remus Two into a small bedroom, where he took off his robes and put on jeans, T-shirt and denim jacket. The room contained one narrow bed.
Remus stared into the box. "It looks as though we're……straight!" he exclaimed.
"Never!" said Sirius firmly. "We can't be."
"But look," Remus argued, "we seem to be sharing a house, or a flat, but……separate bedrooms? And bringing a girl back? We must be!"
At that the viewpoint in the box shifted abruptly to another bedroom, larger and with a much larger bed. Sirius Two was in the room, sprucing himself up for his date.
"This is ridiculous," Sirius remarked. "I got all that girl stuff out of my system when I was fifteen."
The picture in the box had shifted back to show the living room. Sirius Two and Remus Two had both gone out, and the room was empty but for its furniture, none of which was recognisable to Sirius and Remus. Abruptly the box switched itself off.
"They weren't exactly us," Remus said thoughtfully. Their hair was shorter, and you had pimples."
"Pimples? Me?" Sirius jumped up in alarm to look in the mirror which hung over the fireplace. "No pimples there, thank goodness."
"No, but I definitely saw some on Sirius in the box. Just over your – his – cheekbones. I think they're different versions of us. Remember that accident we had in third year?"
"Yes, when you blew up the Potions room."
"Yes, that. And after that things were a little bit different. Some things were quite a lot different, now I think of it. Well, what if we've been in another world ever since then, and the Sirius and Remus who were in this world are in ours? And that box is somehow able to show them to us? You know, parallel worlds, existing alongside each other, invisible to each other but touching in certain circumstances, like a violent explosion. We changed places with our counterparts in the other universe."
"You've been reading The Quibbler again."
"No I haven't. Well, yes I have, but that's got nothing to do with it."
They argued inconclusively for some while, then went to bed, where they proved most satisfactorily that they were not straight.
In the days, months, years that followed, they took to eavesdropping on their counterparts quite frequently, when they had the time to spare. They discovered that the pictures would switch on and off and shift their viewpoint of their own accord, but always Sirius Two, Remus Two or both would appear in the picture, sometimes accompanied by other people, many of whom Sirius and Remus recognised. They learned that Sirius Two was most definitely straight and liked to play the field; girlfriends seldom lasted longer than a week. Remus Two, however, never seemed to have a girl, although Sirius Two frequently offered to set him up with one.
"Belinda has lots of girl friends, I'm sure she'd bring one along for you."
"No, Sirius, I've told you, I don't want a girlfriend. I wouldn't feel right not telling her I'm a werewolf, and if I did tell her, or she found out, she'd be off like a shot and telling everybody."
"But look, we're not talking love and marriage here, just getting your leg over once in a while. How do you manage for sex, anyway?"
Remus Two grinned and made a suggestive movement with his right hand. Sirius Two dropped the subject.
It was interesting to observe that events in the box-world closely paralleled events in what Sirius and Remus considered the "real" world. In the box world, James and Lily got married, and Sirius Two was James's best man. And their son Harry was born, and Sirius Two was his godfather, just as in the "real" world. And in the box world, the power and menace of Lord Voldemort was growing, and Order work kept Sirius Two and Remus Two as busy there as it kept Sirius and Remus in the real world. They scarcely ever had time to look in the box, and when they did, it was usually one of them at a time, because the other was occupied either with Order missions or their regular jobs. Thus it happened that Sirius was alone when he glanced into the box while taking a hasty evening meal at home. What he saw shocked him, because he had not seen it coming.
"I saw Sirius Two talking to James and Lily," he told Remus when the latter came home. "It was horrible. He thinks you – I mean Remus Two – could be spying for Voldemort."
"Why should he think that?"
"I don't know, but somebody is passing information to the other side, and……"
"Yes, we know that's happening here too, but it isn't me."
"Well, they seem to think they've eliminated all the other possibilities. But you're not even a possibility, Moony, you're the most honest and loyal person I know."
"But I am a Dark Creature. So is Remus Two. And some people think the darkness within us inclines us naturally to the other side, they even believe that we all turn to the Dark at last."
"Not you, Moony."
"No, not me. I never will. I will fight for the Light as long as I live, even if it rejects me, as I believe in the end it will."
"Dumbledore will never reject you."
"He may not always have the last word. But don't let's worry about that now. Did you see anything else?"
"Sirius Two's had the same idea as me about changing the Secret Keeper. He's going to get Peter to do it."
"It makes some sort of sense, I suppose. I still think you'd be better taking up Dumbledore's offer."
"That's what Lily said, but we overruled her."
"Which Lily?"
"Both."
"I think she's right."
"No, Moony, look, we can't go on relying on Dumbledore for everything. He's old, we can't let him carry us for ever as if we were babies. We've got to do this for ourselves. We've decided on Peter."
So it was that when the terrible day came, that day of wrath that was lst November 1981, Remus knew, as Remus Two did not, that Sirius was innocent. He went to the authorities with his tale of Peter's guilt, and was laughed out of the office. He went to Dumbledore, who did not laugh, but explained quietly that Remus had no evidence. He requested permission to visit Sirius in Azkaban, which was refused. He campaigned for a proper trial, knowing it would almost certainly end in a conviction, but that was also refused. He presented himself at the gate of Azkaban, and told the guard he was a werewolf and had bitten someone, and had come to give himself up. The Dementor ignored him. Prisoners came accompanied by an Auror and the correct paperwork; anyone without such accompaniments was not a prisoner. In desperation Remus consulted Seers to try to locate Peter, without success. He consulted less savoury characters in the wizard underworld; people who would arrange a murder for a hundred Galleons; people who dealt in illegal potions and dangerous cursed artefacts; people who professed expertise in the most secret and terrible Dark magic. None of them could offer any hope of springing a prisoner from Azkaban. "Can't be done," they all said. He did not despair. He kept up his campaigns for a trial and his requests for a visit. He did not look at Remus Two in the box, after the first few days when he saw his own misery mirrored there. Remus Two believed Sirius Two to be guilty. But then, Remus Two wasn't in love with Sirius Two. It evened up, Remus supposed.
Eventually, as everyone now knows, Sirius did what could not be done and escaped. Their reunion was joyful but brief, as Sirius went to Hogwarts for the year of the Triwizard Tournament. When they were together again in Grimmauld Place, Remus still had the box, but they did not look in it much; it showed themselves, as anxious and confined as they were in the "real" world, without even the consolation of their shared bed where they rediscovered the pleasures their bodies could give them. Then Remus did something unforgivable, and Sirius shut himself off from him.
"Come and see this," Remus called.
Sirius looked in at the door, and saw Remus sitting by the box. "Don't think I've forgiven you," he said stonily. "I'll never forgive what you did yesterday. Preventing me from going to help Harry, when you know what he means to me!"
"Yes," Remus said steadily, "I know you love him more than you love me. I've known that since he was born."
"Harry needs me, damn it! It's my fault he's got no parents, but at least he's got me!"
"Yes, and it's thanks to me he's got you. Just come and look at this."
Reluctantly Sirius approached the box. Remus Two was sitting in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place, and Arthur sat across the table from him. As they watched, Molly came into the room. Arthur said "Tell her, Remus. Tell her what you told me."
In a lifeless voice Remus Two said "We went to the Ministry to rescue the children from the Death Eaters. Sirius was fighting Bellatrix. She Stunned him and he fell through the Veil."
Molly gasped in horror. "The Veil! That means he's……"
"Dead, yes. The Veil is Death. He's gone, Molly, and it's my fault. I knew I should have stopped him, but I never had the guts to stop him doing anything, and now I've failed him, and I've failed Harry."
Molly sat beside him and put her arms around him. Arthur wandered off to make tea.
Remus said quietly "Remus Two will get over it. Sirius Two was his dear friend, the only close friend he had, but he wasn't his lover. I'm more sorry for their Harry, because if he loved Sirius Two half as much as our Harry loves you, he'll be devastated. Just as our Harry would have been right now, if I hadn't put the Body-Bind on you and locked you in here when we went to the Ministry."
Sirius stared at him, his face stricken, then he ran to embrace him. "Forgive me, please, I've been an idiot," he said.
Remus stroked his hair.
During the next year, the box didn't show Remus Two very often. It seemed to have difficulty finding him when he was out in the field with the werewolves, but it showed him at Christmas in the Burrow. Sirius and Remus spared him barely a glance, as he was only recounting facts they already knew.
Then the day came when it was Sirius's turn to call Remus to the box.
"What is it, love? Is Dumbledore dead there too?"
"Yes, I'm afraid so."
"Severus did it?"
"Yes. But that's not what I called you to see. It's Bill. He was attacked by Greyback, he'll probably never recover fully."
"That didn't happen here."
"No, and he hasn't got that French girl with the excruciating accent here either. Oh look, there's Tonks, looking miserable as usual. I'm glad our Tonks isn't like that, she's her normal chirpy self."
"Oh no, just look what their Tonks is doing, the slut, she's throwing herself at me, I mean at Remus Two. In front of everybody, poor Remus Two, he must be so embarrassed. But he's as bad, he's making these coy little excuses, and what he's really saying is 'Talk me out of it please, I'm playing hard-to-get but another half million times should do it, Tonks, please'. What a hypocrite. And McGonagall, pimping them! I thought better of her."
"Don't get so worked up, Moony, it's him, not you. You've known all along he's straight. He could do a lot worse than Tonks."
"I suppose. It's just so disgusting, to see someone who looks like me behaving like that."
"Forget him. Come to bed."
Remus smiled as he slipped into bed beside Sirius.
"My turn to say who does what to whom tonight, I think," Remus said.
"How come it always seems to be your turn?" Sirius enquired.
"Because you like it that way. Sirius, I need you in me tonight."
"Are you sure? We agreed only……"
"Yes, yes, I know, but tonight, after what we saw, I really need to feel joined to you, I need us to be one body. But first just lie on top of me. No, not propped up on your elbows, I want to feel your full weight. That's it. Now kiss me. Not like that. As if you meant it. Yes. Now wait. Ah, yes."
Remus wriggled under Sirius and turned over to lie face down.
"When you're ready, love. And don't forget the lube this time. Yes, like that, that's……" His voice trailed off into silence, as Sirius's voice grew louder, calling Remus's name, calling other words, then at the end a great wordless cry of pleasure and triumph before he collapsed on to Remus.
Remus wriggled out from under and turned around, taking Sirius's face between his hands and kissing it. He kissed his cheeks, his eyelids, his forehead, murmuring between kisses "Thank you, thank you, thank you."
"This appreciation is all very nice," Sirius said, "but why……?"
"Thank you for being you, for being alive, and for loving me. And I'm so sorry for poor Remus Two, because he'll never have what we have."
"Yes he has, with Tonks."
"Tonks can never give him what you gave me just now. Anyway, he hasn't done it with Tonks yet."
"How do you know that?"
"Because I know how his mind works. He won't do it until they're married. Because he respects her."
Sirius snorted. "Respect? Merlin's floozie, what century is he living in?"
"The nineteenth, I think," said Remus gravely. "And I can't help wondering how Tonks will deal with a thirty-seven-year-old virgin mass of inhibitions."
"How do you know he's a – what you said?"
"Because that's what I'd have been if I hadn't had you."
"Tonks will put him right. She's a Black, after all. We Blacks aren't backward in that department."
"You can say that!" Remus exclaimed incredulously. "If I hadn't practically forced myself on you when we were sixteen, we'd still be waiting for our first time."
"Oh, that was different."
They were silent a few moments, then Sirius said "Remus?"
"Umm?" Remus said sleepily.
"I've been wondering. Do you think maybe we shouldn't watch any more?"
"Yes. Doesn't seem much point. Sirius Two is dead, and Remus Two is with Tonks. We wouldn't like what we saw."
"I'll pulverise the velly-thing tomorrow. Okay?"
There was no reply. Remus was asleep. Sirius looked at him, feeling as if his heart would explode from the pressure of love. "Thank you for being you," he whispered softly, "and for being alive, and for loving me."
If you've read this far, spoilers don't matter as you are already well spoiled. After reading HBP, I thought I would never read or write another fanfic, I was so heartbroken. Then I thought maybe there was a way of holding on to the S/R love while still respecting canon. Writing this story has helped me feel better about things. I hope it might help other S/R fans too.