CHAPTER 4

Sirius realized it for the first time in the middle of losing his virginity to a Ravenclaw girl with a reputation. They had been dating for two weeks when she'd offered to take him to bed, and as a sixteen year old wizard who hadn't yet been to bed with a girl, he had readily complied.

So, here he was on top of her. She was making all sort of noises that he didn't find appealing at all: whimpers and squeals and girly cries of pleasure. He wished she would just be quiet and let him focus on the job at hand.

That was honestly what it felt like: an arduous task that needed completing. Sure, the girl was soft and warm and it felt quite good, but something just felt . . . off. Her breasts were bobbing up and down, distracting him. Her hips swelled out after a thin waist, which annoyed him. It could look so much . . . cleaner . . . yes, that was it. When the body from shoulder to hips made a tapered "V", the lines just looked cleaner.

Then it hit him. The only people on which the line from shoulder to hip made a tapered "V" were . . . men. And so, there he was, pounding away at this girl who was making different kinds of high pitched sounds, and all he wanted to do was get it over with. It became frighteningly clear in that moment:

Sirius Black was gay.

Sirius walked into the Gryffindor common room after his tryst with the Ravenclaw girl to find his three best friends lounging lazily around the fireplace, their usual hangout. James was fiddling arrogantly with his messy mop of hair, Peter was writing a letter with his tawny owl sitting patiently nearby, and Remus had his eyes scanning the pages of a book, one that Professor Slughorn had assigned the class to read by the next class session. Remus was always the only one to do that sort of assignment.

And subconsciously, he was eyeing his three roommates to check for that "V" shape that had come to his attention while he was losing his virginity. It wasn't that he found any of them attractive: in fact, this whole homosexuality thing had hit him so recently he hadn't even had time to think about who he might fancy. He just wanted to see if it was so, if the shape of body he preferred was that of a young man.

Peter was a bit pudgy so the shape of his body was impossible to see. James was slouched down on the sofa, and Sirius could just barely make out the straight swoop from his friend's shoulders to his waist. But Remus . . . Remus was sitting up straight in his chair as he read, and Sirius took a deep breath.

There it was. Sirius nodded to himself. Broad shoulders that tapered elegantly down to slim hips. He was staring vacantly at Remus when his thoughts were interrupted.

"What's the matter, Padfoot?" asked James absently. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

Sirius shook his head to take his mind off the tapered-body phenomenon.

"I just lost my virginity to Elena Lacqua," he announced.

James's jaw dropped.

"What?"

"You heard me," said Sirius.

There was momentary silence.

"And?" asked Peter.

Sirius cocked his head to one side and shrugged.

"It was all right," he concluded.

Remus raised an eyebrow, and Sirius shrugged again. What good was it to pretend that the sex had been amazing?

Sirius had always been something of a ladies' man. Since his first day at Hogwarts, that wonderful day when he was Sorted into Gryffindor and not Slytherin, the girls had loved him. As a First year, the older girls had ruffled his hair and kissed the top of his head affectionately. As a Fourth year, the younger girls had all gone twitterpated for him. And now, as a Sixth year, the older and younger girls were after him. He had soaked up the attention from day one, dated a few here and there, snogged a few more.

But it had never seemed quite right. And now he knew why.

Sirius flounced down onto the sofa next to Remus and took a deep breath. The realisation was entirely too overwhelming.

It wasn't as though he'd never had hints, sometimes anvil-sized hints, about his sexuality. One day, when he was on a date with a Gryffindor girl a year younger than he, he caught her staring off into the distance. Sirius followed her line of sight to find out that she was gazing at Randall Wallace, the Ravenclaw Head Boy with shoulder length blonde hair and beautiful blue eyes.

He caught himself staring for a while, too . . .

Homosexuality wasn't unheard of in the Wizarding world. James had an uncle with a long-term, live-in male partner, and rumour had it that there was more to Dumbledore's relationship with Grindelwald than met the eye. But it still wasn't wholly accepted, and Sirius certainly didn't want to elaborate on the reasons why his first time had just been "all right". They had all accepted Remus's lycanthropy. He didn't want to take chances on a second dirty secret, as it were.

"Just all right?" asked James.

"Just all right," replied Sirius firmly.

His friends knew him better than anyone else in the world, knew him better than his own family did. They could obviously sense his emotions, as Sirius wasn't normally one to be tacit about any experiences at all. He knew they would return to the subject later, but his friends knew him enough to realize that now wasn't the time. He furrowed his brow. One thing was for sure: he wasn't going to go out with Elena Lacqua again, and he had a feeling she wouldn't be happy about it.

SRSRSRSRSRSRSRSRSRSR

Remus watched his friend carefully. There was something wrong, there was no doubt about that. Sirius normally bounded into the common room like he owned it, every eye turning to look at him. It wasn't that he tried to get attention, he just had a presence. The young man was a dynamo who exploded into a room, commanding everyone's recognition. He and James had that in common, but James had a different kind of arrogance, an egomania: he knew the room would look at him and he wanted it.

Sirius didn't even bother to care. He was the type of bloke who woke up, brushed his teeth, ran a hand through his long hair, and was ready to go. James preened. He checked his hair to ensure that it looked precisely as messy as he wanted it to look, for it would never lie flat in the effortless way that Sirius's did. James polished his glasses, sniffed his breath in the palm of his hand, and changed his shirt three times. Their personalities were reflected in their Animagus forms. The stag, tall and proud and regal and not at all silly, and the dog, who rolled around in the mud and barked at squirrels.

Sirius was just never one to bother, and that was half the reason why everyone adored him, and adore him they did. They adored James and Sirius both, and James and Sirius both enjoyed the attention. But they enjoyed it in different ways. For James, it was a right, a necessity. He had been doted on his entire life and didn't know any different. Sirius, though: he noticed the attention, but he just took it in, observed it, laughed at it. Sirius could be an arse, but the same as when he was being a gentleman, he just didn't know and didn't care.

So, Sirius had lost his virginity, and it had been "all right". That didn't bode well for poor Miss Lacqua, though she did have a well-earned reputation. Remus would talk to Sirius about it later. Remus was, as always, the one who did the comforting when Sirius needed it, and he needed it the most often out of the three. Sirius could be such a spoilt child at times! His emotions ran hot and cold. Brash and loud and saucy one moment; sensitive and hurt the next.

Sirius abruptly stood from the couch and stomped up the staircase to the dormitory. James and Peter both looked at Remus with expectant looks, and he nodded. Marking his place in his book, Remus followed up the stairs.

The curtains around Sirius's bed were closed, so Remus knocked lightly on the bedpost to request permission to enter.

"Crmmen," came the muffled reply.

Remus assumed he had been granted access. He pulled the curtains aside and saw Sirius lying on the bed staring up at the canopy. Remus sank down next to Sirius and raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"All right, huh?" he asked.

Sirius rolled over and grumbled a reply. It was always like this. Sirius never wanted to open up, so Remus had to slowly and gently prod it out of him. To Remus, it was almost like a game that they played, but a good one, and a mandatory one.

"Something tells me you won't ask her out again," Remus commented absently.

Another grunt.

"Did it . . . go well?" asked Remus, trying to contain the amusement in his voice.

Sirius turned onto his back again, and Remus caught the deadly end of one of the famous Black glares. Remus was concealing a smile.

"I mean, you did it right, didn't you?" he prodded.

Sirius narrowed his eyes and lashed out half heartedly with a fist.

"Git," he mumbled.

There was a brief pause while Sirius climbed under the covers. The boy was always cold, and trying to unmake the bed and get underneath the blankets was proving to be a successful distraction from the matter at hand. Remus sighed.

"Come on, Sirius, out with it," said Remus.

Sirius bit his lip, apparently deep in thought, before returning his gaze to the werewolf.

"Have you ever done it?" asked Sirius.

Remus loosened his Gryffindor tie a bit and took a deep breath.

"Yes, I have," he replied.

"Really?" asked Sirius.

Remus nodded.

"Who?" he said.

"Jacey O'Malley," Remus answered.

Sirius sat up on one elbow.

"That Irish bird?" he asked, and Remus nodded. "Lucky catch, that."

Remus half-smiled and nodded again. Sirius collapsed onto his back again.

"Did you like it?" asked Sirius quietly.

"Yes, I suppose I rather did," chuckled Remus.

Remus narrowed his eyes, considering his friend. Sirius seemed distraught about something, and Remus had no idea what.

"Sirius, what did you-"

"Remus?" interrupted Sirius.

"Yes?"

"I want to talk about this," he said in a measured tone. "I really do."

Sirius turned his grey eyes to Remus's amber ones.

"But not right now," said Sirius finally.

Remus nodded. With a quick squeeze of his friend's forearm, Remus stood from the bed and closed the curtains as they had been. Something had the usually-brazen Black vexed, but Remus had no idea what it was.