Warnings: None
They grab a "quick coffee" on Saturday morning. An incredibly quick coffee actually; Sam has to go to a service at the Synagogue, darkly funny really considering how hungover he is. Still, it's inevitable that they'd have this meet. When you spend half an hour with your tongue down someone's throat, it's only polite to discuss anything but that the next morning over an overpriced cappuccino.
Actually, Sam's drinking hot chocolate, and a bit of cream covers his top lip after the first sip. In an ideal world Sirius would gesture to his own lip with a little smile and a wink, or even lean over and swipe it up with his thumb, or possibly even kiss it off. And then Sam would smile shyly and apologise and Sirius would say, "Don't apologise, it's cute" and they'd grin at each other like Harry and Sally.
In reality, Sam wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and says, "I don't even like this whipped stuff" and Sirius keeps his distance because he's never been good with this sort of situation, this whole 'now-it's-the-morning-after-are-we-dating-or-did-I-just-need-a-warm-body-last-night' shebang. A case in point would be how he bailed on Fabian.
Not that he and Sam had sex, or even touched much, or even did anything other than kiss messily for a good twenty or so minutes. But this conversation could be the make or break of their friendship, or the start of a relationship, and Sirius isn't sure if he wants one of those at all.
He should, by all accounts, want one. A relationship, that is. Sam is cute and friendly and knows a lot about films and plays a lot of sports and has nice curly hair and big brown eyes, and he's small enough that Sirius could put an arm around him and he'd fit perfectly beneath him. He's a good kisser too, from what Sirius remembers.
And he seems to like Sirius, judging by the way his hand is creeping across the sugar-strewn Starbucks table, and beneath it the way his Converse are subtly brushing against Sirius's Oxfords. But he's not Remus, and Sirius would never say that out loud but it's true. He is not Remus.
"I'd love to see your films some time," he's saying now. "If you don't mind showing me, that is."
"I don't mind," says Sirius, "it's just they're all..." Lost.
"I review independent movies for the university paper," Sam explains, "so maybe we could, you know..." He pauses, gives a little smile. "Work together some time."
Sirius suddenly wants to give him a massive hug. He wants to ruffle those lush Colorado curls. He wants to like Sam, wants to really really like him, but it's far from simple, especially when he's looking into Sam's eyes and thinking, yeah, those are a nice shade of brown, but Remus's eyes...
It takes him a moment to realise Sam has spoken and he's now looking at Sirius expectantly, and his hand has crept even further so their fingertips are touching. Sirius blinks.
"Sorry, what was that?" he asks, closing his eyes and shaking his head a bit as though to show he's definitely not ignoring Sam, he's just so tired and so silly.
Sam just laughs. "I wanted to know if you're coming to Q Ball," he says patiently. "The last FilmSoc meeting before it is on Thursday. The festival's on Saturday. I'd like it if you came." He doesn't add with me, but he doesn't really need to.
"They're holding it in February?"
"Mm. Why not?"
"Bit cold, isn't it?"
Sam laughs again as though he's joking. "So we're screening a couple films and handing out these great flyers about gay cinema that Seboneli fixed up."
Who's Seboneli, Sirius wonders? Some kind of gay Italian mastermind?
"Then there'll be a talk about, you know, the power of entertainment, how important it is for gay actors and actresses to come out, all that..." His large, dark eyes flicker up and catch Sirius's, and he gives another of those bone-melting little smiles. "Stuff."
"Sounds great."
In what is clearly a moment of overwhelming passion, Sam then pushes his whole hand forward so it's covering Sirius's, and now, yes, they're actually doing this; they're actually sitting in a coffee shop with one of their hands covering the other's. It's touching and novel and a bit embarrassing.
The man sat to the left of them with his nose buried in the Daily Telegraph is peering out from behind Ed Miliband's glaring face and looking very, very disapproving. The two teenage girls sat to the right of them look as though they might burst with joy.
"So you'll come?" Sam says earnestly, giving his hand a little squeeze.
"Of course I will."
Of course he will. Remus will be there.
The week hurries by, and he somehow manages to get his first essay of the semester in on time. By the time next Saturday rolls around, he is in a fairly calm state of relaxation. No essays for another month. No new novel until Monday. No major upsets regarding the friendships he is slowly stitching back together with Peter and Fabian. And he hasn't thought about Remus in any great depth for at least two days. Meaning, although he's thought about him while engaging in day-to-day activities, he hasn't wanked over him or anything like that, which is probably a good thing. It's not really healthy to wank over someone who broke your heart. If anything it's sort of creepy.
On Saturday morning he stays in the shower so long he misses breakfast and shaves and dresses very carefully in a tight white t-shirt and dark jeans and leather jacket and rubs on some but not too much of his most expensive aftershave.
In spite of the time it takes he doesn't look particularly extraordinary when he peers in the mirror, but at least he doesn't look like he's on the verge of a mental breakdown or a guest on the Jeremy Kyle show, and that's really all he wanted. Can't have Remus seeing him looking like a guest on the Jeremy Kyle show, after all. That would be tragic.
On the way out he picks up his camera and considers it for a moment. He could take it. But what would he do with it other than show it off? And anyway, it would probably only get nicked. In the end, he places it carefully back in the night stand and pats it gently, almost as if to say one day, old boy, one day.
"Coming to Q Ball with me, Pete?" he asks by the door.
Peter looks up quickly from his laptop, sounding far too relieved when he says, "I've got work."
Bugger you then. Sirius leaves by himself and goes all the way downstairs by himself and steps out into the actually rather beautiful February day by himself and starts towards the city park.
He's not sure he wants to be going at all. No one has called it a pride festival but that's what it is, and pride festivals have never really been his thing. Maybe they would have been, were the circumstances different, but being gay in a conservative boarding school in Devon isn't at all like being gay in a liberal city state school. He isn't sure the boys on the rugby pitch at school would have appreciated him saying things like, "What did you get up to this weekend, lads? I myself paraded the streets of London in a feather boa".
Pathetic, really, but at least he can admit that.
No, what's more pathetic is the real reason he's going to this fun fair. It's not like he's expecting Remus to see Sirius with his hour-long-washed hair and trendy jeans and suddenly fall in love with him. It's not like he's even expecting Remus to want to talk to him. But Sirius wants him to see that he's, well, okay. Not totally heartbroken. Not totally useless. Not totally mourning the loss of whatever strange relationship they shared during those few short, confusing months.
And maybe he'll make a load of new friends who are both gay and into cinema, and maybe Sam will kiss him again, sober this time, beneath the lights of the projector screening Milk, and maybe they'll hold hands and share candy floss and Sirius will win Sam one of those lolloping great cuddly toys off a dart stand, and then maybe he'll be so happy he'll forget about Remus altogether.
And maybe he's talking complete bollocks.
"Oh God, I'm really early, aren't I?" Sirius looks around at a party which has definitely not kicked off yet, and then back at Sam who is smiling bright as starshine.
"No, no, not at all! In fact, you're right on time to help out!" he burbles. He's wearing one of the FilmSoc t-shirts and a bright red hoodie with a fur hood, pulled up over his head so his dark curls hang out around his eyes like a rag doll. It's very cute, but in a puppy dog sort of way more than a Marlon-Brando-in-Sayonara way.
"First though, come and meet Seboneli." Sam takes his hand and begins weaving him through the seats and stalls that make up the Film Society's portion of the festival.
Sirius is rather intrigued to meet the famous Italian, but when they get to the large canopy Sam has been leading him to there are only two people standing there, one short and red-haired and freckly, the other tall and stern and sharp.
Sam introduces them both, and Sirius suddenly understands what he means: Seb and Ali. Sebastian and Alister, the presidents.
"Well, I'm president," Sebastian says snippily. "He's vice."
"One day I'll overthrow him," Alister jokes. Sebastian looks outraged.
"Do you know what a projector is, Sirius?" he asks, saying Sirius's name like he's got a dead cockroach in his mouth.
"Remind me?" says Sirius, and Sam snorts, and Sebastian sighs in a very long-suffering kind of way and Sirius wants to punch him in the face.
"Help Samuel set up the projector," he orders in a long southern drawl, as though Sirius is even a part of his bloody Society, "and don't muck it up. Cost a fortune."
"He's a little uptight," Sam explains with a quiet grin when Sebandali have wandered off somewhere with clipboards.
"A little?" says Sirius. "If he gets any tighter he'll explode. And then we'll all be covered in bits of comb-over and pompous bastard."
Sam laughs loudly, and Sirius feels a small jab of pleasure at the sound. Together they unpack the projector that simply cost a fortune. One wall of the large white canopy serves as the screen, and Sam conjures a DVD player out of nowhere and plugs it in to the projector. A Dolby logo flashes up, eerie and blue, and he tilts the light and dials this way and that to get it as sharp as possible. He's not doing a very good job.
"You know, if you do it like this..." Their hands brush as Sirius leans over to take command, and Sam smiles but Sirius pulls away just a little too quickly. "Um, yeah. If you just... move this one like that, then..."
"Oh, that's excellent!" Sam grins, delighted, as the logo suddenly comes into sharp focus. "You have a projector at home?"
"Used to."
"Bet that was good. Hey, Ali! Look how sharp Sirius got the picture."
He's suddenly being congratulated by people he doesn't even know, a whole gaggle of people in FilmSoc t-shirts who've arrived to help out, and it feels quite nice for a while until Sebastian comes back over and ruins everything.
"The festival is set to officially start in half an hour," he announces, flinging his watch into everyone's faces
When Sirius peers past their canopy, he can see that everything is starting to come together, and when he steps out of Film Society's territory altogether, he is in awe. The city park has been taken over.
There's a long, long path leading through the entire place, alongside which people have begun setting up stalls selling food and t-shirts and programmes and balloons and stickers, every item emblazoned with pro-gay slogans. There are face-painting stalls and charity raffles and girls wandering round dressed as tigers and zebras and unicorns (because nothing says "Gay is OK" like tigers and zebras and unicorns). A DJ is setting up decks on a large raised platform in one far-off corner, while some indie pop band - at least, they look like an indie pop band in their skinny jeans and cardigans - go through sound check in the opposite corner.
ArtSoc are here displaying Andy Warhol and Keith Haring prints, LitSoc are here selling copies of Maurice and The Line of Beauty and The Front Runner, DanceSoc are taking to the stage in a third corner wearing colours of the rainbow with matching painted faces, and ClassSoc are setting up a makeshift theatre for when they act out the story of Nisus and Euryalus later on in the afternoon.
There's a carousel too, and a group of burly looking men in blue overalls are setting up dodgems and waltzers, and a gaudy, rainbow-coloured bouncy castle bobs in the distance (Sirius can guess that was more Craig's idea than Remus's).
"It's fantastic, isn't it?" Sam says behind him. Sirius nods dumbly, unable to believe that the poxy little LGBT Society actually managed to organise this.
He turns back to Sam, who looks at him expectantly and holds up a couple of DVDs.
"A Single Man or Shelter?"
It's all going swimmingly until Remus walks in. Sirius almost falls over in surprise.
"Hello, hello, hello!" cries a loud voice. "Just seeing how you're all getting on, my lovelies!" Beside Remus, Craig has marched in, bold and fabulous in neon yellow.
"We're getting on just fine," Sebastian grimaces.
Like some Western showdown, the two square up to each other, president of LGBT Society and president of FilmSoc. It should be hilarious, what with Sebastian being so frigid and stern and Craig being, well, Craig. But Sirius can't tear his eyes away from Remus, and Remus isn't helping by not moving his eyes away either.
Sam, oblivious, yaps on to Alister about Morgan Freeman. So Sirius takes the plunge.
"Hey!" he says brightly. Or rather, he tries to say it brightly, but his voice breaks in the middle and the last part of the word disappears into a weird croak, never to be heard again.
"Hello," Remus says blandly. They start to inch towards one another very carefully. "You joined then."
For a moment, Sirius has no idea what he's talking about. Then he registers the projector and the canopy and smiles. "Oh no, I didn't actually join. I'm just here helping out a..." He waves a hand, searching for the word, eyes still fixed on Remus's face. "Friend."
"Ah."
Then they slip into excruciating silence, and Sirius wants to punch himself in the head. His body feels suddenly flushed with heat, aware that he hasn't stood this close to Remus in a month and aware that Remus looks more wonderful than ever, if a little tired around the eyes. All Sirius wants to do is hug him. Not even in a particularly romantic way. He just wants to put his arms around him and put a hand in his hair and ask if he's getting enough sleep.
He suspects though, with everything that's happened, that might be a bit inappropriate.
"Who's your friend?" Remus asks after a while.
Sirius turns and catches Sam's eye, and Sam apologises to Alister and eagerly bounds over like a puppy and puts one hand on Sirius's shoulder and sticks out the other for Remus to shake. Remus looks at it like Sam has just offered him a dead rat.
"I'm Sam!"
"Remus." They engage in the briefest of handshakes.
"I recognise you from the festival meetings," Sam smiles. "You were - "
"Really? I don't think I recognise you."
"Oh, well." Sam pauses and blinks. "There were a lot of people there, I guess, and you were speaking and I was just - "
"At the back," Remus supplies.
Sirius shoots him a sharp look, confused. Why is he being so short? Why would anyone be short with Sam? That's like being short with a newborn kitten.
"Right. Yeah." Sam tries to laugh, scrubbing a hand through his curls. "I guess so!"
Sebastian, thank God, calls Sam away then to shout at him for the fact that Alister has accidentally pulled the plug on the projector. Sirius turns back to Remus and tries to be angry. It's difficult.
Remus looks back at him serenely and says in a flat tone, "He seems nice."
"Yeah, he is."
"Very good-looking."
Sirius shrugs. "I suppose."
Remus pauses, and for a moment even seems to hesitate. Then he says, "So is everything alright here then?"
"Yeah, of course. I mean..." Sirius gestures to the commotion behind them, Sebastian glowering and Alister apologising profusely. "We're having a few issues with the plugging in and out of things, but besides that - "
"Sirius."
"Everything's fine."
"Good. I've been going out of my mind trying to get this thing organised for the past month and I really don't want anything going wrong."
"Everything's fine," Sirius says again.
"Right," says Remus. "I'll leave you to it then."
And then he goes, slips through the gap in the canopy, and Sirius sees his shadow bobbing along in the bright February sunshine for a few moments before disappearing altogether.
Behind him, Sam whistles low and long. "Someone's a little jealous, huh?" he says.
Sirius turns in surprise. "Jealous?" and Sam gestures to where Remus has just left.
"Him, I mean. He was being pretty sharp with me, don't you think?"
What does Sam think? That Sirius introduced him as his boyfriend?
"He's always like that," he says lamely.
"Ah, right. Very charming!"
Sirius wants to defend Remus, but he doesn't have the energy. It's like seeing him again, speaking to him again, has completely drained him, which is both cliché and pathetic. Alternatively, he may just be hungry from missing breakfast.
"Want to come and get some food with me?" he asks Sam, in an attempt at both changing the subject and gaining delicious goods.
"Sure," says Sam. Then, gently, "Hey."
Sirius turns back to him and Sam stands on his tip toes and winds his arms around Sirius's neck and kisses him soundly on the lips.
"That's the spirit!" Craig cheers, as he too wanders past them and bounds out between the gap in the canopy.
The day drags on and Sirius doesn't see Remus again at all. That's not to say he isn't looking for him because he is, very subtly, but Remus doesn't show and Sirius wonders where on earth he's hiding away. He organised this whole thing; surely he should be glorying in the fruits of his labour?
And oh, what delicious fruits they are. The festival truly is fantastic, even for someone like Sirius who isn't normally into this sort of thing. The FilmSoc area stays packed all day, and people actually ask questions, ask him questions as though he seems like the kind of bloke who knows what he's talking about.
He does a lot of wandering too. At about three in the afternoon, he finds himself stood before the ClassSoc stand watching a third year law student collapse romantically on top of a second year medic, both of them dressed in Roman Gladiator outfits nicked from the drama studio. Fabian watches on proudly.
"James Cameron, eat your heart out, eh?" he says when he sees Sirius.
"Definitely a director in the making," Sirius tells him, clapping him on the back, and that seems to mean they're friends again.
By the time night falls, sky darkening properly around seven and pitch black by eight, the festival seems to have taken on a strange, clubby feel. The indie pop band take off, and the DJ starts playing a lot of Queen and Village People and Lady Gaga, and people just start going mental.
It's almost a bit seedy actually. A lot of the day-time guests were straight, supporters of LGBT rights or people who just came along for a hot dog and a go on the carousel. Most of them have left now though, and every gay man in Durham who has been deprived of a night club thus far seems to be taking this as their prime opportunity to 'party hard'.
Sirius doesn't know where to look. Everyone keeps taking their shirts off even though it's freezing, and he feels like if he makes eye contact with anyone he'll be whipped up into some mad gay frenzy. It's no fun being sober at a place like this. If only Remus were here, they could take off somewhere and be wry, ironic observers together, shake their heads at the animalistic scene and share a roll-up.
But all he finds is Sam beneath the canopy, dancing with some boy to The Producers up on screen, high only on sugar and fun because there's no alcohol at the festival other than what people have smuggled in themselves. He detaches himself from the other boy as soon as he sees Sirius, throwing himself into his arms and grinning madly.
"You disappeared!" he says. He's laughing even though it's not really funny. Sirius is beginning to think Sam laughs a bit too much.
"Well, I'm back now."
"You are indeed," Sam says, and he kisses him again, and this is all far, far too comfortable for Sirius's liking. "Come watch the film."
"Musicals... not really my thing."
"Alright, stay with me then."
So he does, and Sam paws all over him and Sirius can feel himself starting to get a bit annoyed, and he wonders if this is why Remus used to get so irritated.
It's when Sam presses right up close and slides his hands down Sirius's back and grabs his arse that Sirius says, "Sam, mate, give it a rest, will you?"
Sam removes his arms almost immediately, but the matey 'mate' doesn't seem to bother him because he grins up at Sirius and says, "Sorry. Can't seem to keep my hands off you."
Sirius wishes he would. At one point, having a beautiful boy fawn over him like this would have made him smug and satisfied and pleased. Now he's not so sure.
He's not exactly tired, but he definitely feels as though he's got his fill of Q Ball. The music is turning shit and so are the films they're showing, and now that it's turning into this strange, surreal party he'd rather just go home. When he says this (not all the stuff about it being strange and surreal, just that he'd rather like to go home now) Sam pouts like a child and steals another kiss.
"Alright," he says reluctantly. "But it's still early. We should hang out later."
"Yeah, well. Maybe."
When Sam finally detaches himself, Sirius says a quick farewell to Sebandali who are arguing about the plug again and don't even thank him, and wanders out into the night, just about managing to dodge four middle-aged men dressed as Native Indians.
He pulls his jacket tighter around him, suddenly freezing in the February night air. As he reaches the city park gates, fingers reaching out to touch the icy metal, his phone vibrates in his pocket. He stops and quickly pulls it out, eager.
Disappointingly, it's only from Sam, but he's sufficiently startled when he reads the four words flashing up on screen.
my roommate's out tonight x
His whole throat goes dry and he pauses, staring dumbly at the screen. He should be flattered. He's not. He's oddly nervous, oddly hesitant and, odder still, he doesn't bother replying; he slips the phone back into his pocket and carries on walking. He'll tell Sam that he forgot to check his phone, that it was on silent, that he fell asleep. Something like that.