A/N: Okay, this is actually the second edition of this fic. I edited it a bit, and thanks to all of you devoted fans out there, I was able to fix the Pomfrey mix up! Thank to all of you who took the time to read it the first time, and cared about it enough to review!
17-year-old Remus sighed contentedly against Sirius's warm back, his pale brown hair pooled over the leather jacket, and squeezed his arms lovingly around Sirius' waist. They speeded down the nearly empty streets of London with the stars twinkling down at them and the waxing gibbous above them casting them in an unearthly light. Sirius was having the time of his life, knowing that Remus was behind him and sharing with him the secret nighttime venture that no one else knew of. Sirius loved his motorcycle that Lily and the Mauraders had given to him. Lily had found it for sale in her muggle neighborhood, and she the rest of the group pooled their money together to get it for him for his seventeenth birthday. It was beat up, and barely running, but they knew that Sirius would like to work on it, anyway.
And work on it he did. For months he would sneak into the secret passage where he stored his bike and work on rebuilding the engine and the accelerators before finally detailing it. He had decided to paint it a gleaming, midnight blue with purple flames licking at its sides, a single black paw print in the very center of each flame. He was quite happy with the finished result, really. But then he came up with another idea that he knew would make his baby even better: making it fly. He had been researching the spells for weeks now, and had been writing formulas and doing trial and error runs on it, but hadn't been able to get the spell quite right. Remus often offered to help, being good at charms, but Sirius always said no. He wanted to prove to himself that he could do this. And besides, it gave him something to do when he was bored, and gave him and Remus a place to go as an excuse to be alone.
Sirius smiled at the memories of the late night conversations between him and Remus, when they had just been friends. Their kisses and soft caresses later on when their relationship progressed from friends to lovers. And from fifth year on, they had stayed that way. It was moments like this, where they didn't even need to talk, and could just relax and enjoy each other's presence that he lived for. He sighed, his breath causing bits of condensation against the plastic shield of his helmet. He only had one at the moment, and had been meaning to get another one for Remus, or whoever else he might decide to take on his bike. Seeing as he was the driver, and it was illegal in London for the driver of a motorcycle not to be wearing a helmet, he wore it instead of Remus. He knew that Remus would be safe, though. Sirius never went fast enough to be dangerous when Remus was with him; just fast enough to have a bit of fun.
Remus had performed a silencing charm on the bike before they left, so that they could sneak it out of Hogwarts and through Hogsmeade unnoticed. It also made it easier to hear each other. Sirius lifted the visor on his helmet and turned his head just enough so that he could talk to Remus, but still see the road. "Do you realize that in two weeks we'll have been together for three years, Moony?"
Remus smiled and nodded, resting his head against Siri's shoulder. "Yeah, I know. I've been trying to think of something special to surprise you with, but you're just so bloody unpredictable that I never know what you're going to do!" Remus laughed and tickled Sirius' ribs slightly, but not enough to make him go off the road.
Sirius laughed with him as they neared a corner. "Yeah, well, what can I say; I take pride it my romantic charms!" He pressed down a bit on the brakes to take the corner slower, but realized that it wasn't working to its desired effect. He'd have to check that out when they got back to school. But for now, he just pressed harder. Unfortunately, that didn't work either, and they took the corner just a bit too fast for Remus or Sirius' liking.
"Uh, Padfoot? Could you maybe slow down a bit?" Remus asked hesitantly. Sirius squeezed down on the brakes as hard as he could, knowing that there was a small hill coming up that they would have to go down. And that's when Sirius realized it: The brakes weren't just malfunctioning, they weren't working at all. He wasn't sure what he could do without hurting Remus, so he decided that the only thing he could do was protect him, and keep him from panicking. He knew that this wouldn't end well, but he at least wanted some fond memories to take with him in case anything really serious happened.
"Yeah, sure. Hey, Remy? Can you take my helmet off and wear it for a while? It's bugging me and I have nowhere else to put it," he lied, keeping his voice calm and casual. Remus lifted the helmet off gently and placed it on his own head, securing the straps under his chin. He thanked Remus and went down the hill fast, the speedometer now reading 85 mph. Again, Remus was getting a bit nervous, and clung to Sirius a bit more.
"Siri? Could you please slow down? I'm really not liking this," he said, sounding a bit frightened.
Sirius turned his head like he had before to talk to him and said playfully, "If you want me to slow down you'll have to kiss me."
"What?!" Remus gasped. "But Sirius, you're driving! Fine, fine..." He leaned over Siri's shoulder and kissed him gently but quickly on the lips.
Sirius sighed contentedly, trying to capture that moment forever. This would probably be the last time he ever kissed Remus, and he wanted to make sure he remembered it. His peaceful silence was interrupted by Remus' almost desperate plea. "NOW will you slow down, Siri?"
"Do you love me?" Sirius asked quietly. Remus was looking quite scared now, and very suspicious.
"Of yourse I love you, Siri. What's all this about? And why are you driving so fast?"
Sirius knew there was a dead end ahead, just as surely as he knew that he wouldn't survive the crash, but Remus would. All he could do now was pray. He took out a poem he had been trying to memorize for their anniversary and looked at it quickly with one hand. He handed it to Remus behind him, but kept his hand around the werewolf's momentarily. "Don't read it now, Remy. Wait until we get back to Hogwarts, okay?"
Remus looked down at the paper in his hand, but didn't open it. He didn't know why Sirius was acting so strangely, but when he looked up, he thought he knew. "Uh, Sirius? You do realize that there's a wall there, right?"
Sirius' hands clenched the handles of his bike. He wished Remus didn't have to see this, but there didn't seem to be any choice. He wrapped his own arm around the one around his waist and intertwined their hands. "Yeah, I know."
Remus' head was pounding as he slowly opened his eyes. Bright light filtered through his eyelashes and he blinked repeatedly to keep his eyes from stinging. When he finally adjusted to the sudden light he slowly tried to sit up in bed, but found himself suddenly pushed back down by a very solemn looking Madame Pomfrey.
"Don't try to sit up now, you'll just get dizzy," she said quietly.
"What happened?" Remus asked, his mind still fuzzy from the healing potions that she had given him. The mediwitch looked at him sadly, and he wondered why she looked like that, but then everything from the previous night came back to him. The bike ride, the kiss, the confessions, the paper. Sirius!
"Where is he? Where's Sirius?!" Remus shouted frantically. Madame Pomfrey tried to shush him, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder as he tried to sit up again.
"Shh, shh. Be quiet, Remus; you'll hurt yourself."
"Tell me what happened to him! I want to know!"
Madame Pomfrey, who was usually stern and repremanding, was now looking down at the young werewolf with placating, sorrowful eyes. Remus could put it all together, but he didn't want to believe it. And he didn't trust himself to believe it. "I'm so sorry, Remus. He...he didn't make it." Her eyes watered as she watched the different emotions flood through the young man's face. Disbelief, anger, guilt, sadness, and finally shock.
His face was frozen with his last emotion, and the older mediwitch leaned over and the bed and hugged him firmly. Slowly, tears ran down his face, and soon, his thin frame wracked with sobs. He clung to her as if his life depended on it, and let the heart wrenching cries tear from his throat. When he was done, he sniffled and leaned back against the pillows that Madame Pomfrey had magically propped up. His eyes were red and puffy, and he looked as though he had just been a victim of the dementor's kiss. The woman beside the bed started to walk away to get a sleeping potion for him, to at least momentarily calm his grief, but she turned around when she was only a few feet away.
"The muggle investigators who found you and Sirius at the crash site said that it looked as if he knew what was going to happen that night. The brakes had gone out, apparently, and he gave you his helmet, knowing that the one who wore it would be alright. He saved your life that night."
As she continued on to her office, her heels clicking quietly on the stone floors, Remus was left to wonder aloud. "Why? Damn you, Sirius; why?" As he ran his hands through his hair, he saw something resting upon the dresser out of the corner of his eye. Looking over, he saw that there was a slightly burned piece of paper, about the size of his palm. Picking it up, he gently held it in his hands and looked down at the familiar paper. Most of it had been burned away, but it appeared to be a poem of sorts. Most of the lines were indistinguishable, except for the last one. He no longer wondered why Sirius had done this; the last line said it all.
Because I loved you.