Rating: PG-13, for swearing.
Warnings: Angst. SLASH.
Disclaimer: JKR owns the characters, I merely borrow them.
Death is not the worst that can happen to men. - Plato
Grimmauld Place is cold. It's a cold home for cold people. It reminds Sirius constantly of his parents, of his family, of the whole fucking clan of them and their stone-cold eyes and their composure like ice.
Sirius doesn't want to be like them; he craves heat, and he finds it. There is heat in firewhisky, in the peppery burn of it sliding down his throat and the crimson haze it brings; heat in the tingle it gives his Azkaban-cold fingers; heat pooled in his belly. He drinks it from a priceless, emerald-encrusted silver goblet, reclined in his father's favourite chair before a blazing fire, and there's warmth in imagining his parents raving at him for his disrespect, his disloyalty. Abomination! Shame of my flesh! He smiles with grim satisfaction, and lifts the goblet to his lips again.
And then Remus is behind him, reaching down to take the goblet away. The pale metal burns, but he downs the fiery liquor in a single smooth gulp, then sets the goblet down and circles round to face Sirius.
Sirius blinks and blinks again, trying to clear his head from the warm fog of strong drink. Something is happening, he is dimly aware of that, something that he ought to be sober to comprehend, to play the correct part in.
Remus says, "I love you." His voice is flat. He says the words as if he'd rather they weren't true.
Sirius blinks. It is very important, he thinks, to say the correct thing at this point. He does not know what the right thing is. Perhaps the truth?
"I'm drunk," he says. The words are slurred and fluid, he cannot quite control them.
"Yes," Remus agrees, and adds, "you bastard," before walking silently away, leaving Sirius in his haze of firewhisky and vague regret.
Remus is sitting in the room that was Mr Black's private study, trying to read. Books of the deepest black magic line the walls, so that the room thrills with dark possibilities, immense power at the turn of a page. It's disturbing, but Remus can't deny the draw of it, and anyway, it's practical to learn about your enemies. It's sensible, and Remus prides himself on having sense. Most of the time.
After a while, he becomes aware of a darkness at the door, deeper than the shadows around it. Sirius.
"Did you mean it?" Sirius asks, voice cool and steady, no trace of firewhisky.
"Did I mean what?" Remus counters, without looking up.
"You know what." Sirius' eyes flash in the gloom, but Remus will not look at him.
"No," Remus tells him.
"You liar."
"Why ask if you already know?" Remus says, wearily
"I want to hear you say it."
"I love you."
"You might look at me when you say it."
Remus tosses the heavy vellum-bound tome aside and locks his eyes on Sirius'. "I love you."
Sirius looks away. Every line of him is tense now; jaw set, hands clenched into fists at his side, quivering with brittle rage. "And that makes everything better, does it?" His voice is grating and harsh and icy with bitterness.
"Good God, Sirius, of course it doesn't. Not for either of us."
"Then why did you tell me?"
"I-"
"I didn't want to know." Sirius is looking at him now, a challenge in his eyes.
Remus looks down and away. He can't bring himself to meet Sirius' glare; angry, hurt and hurtful as it is. "I'm sorry."
"Fuck sorry," Sirius snarls. "Fuck your apologies. What good do they do?"
"Then what do you want me to do? What do you want me to say?" Remus' voice is tight and harsh, and he can feel a bitter, stinging anger rising in him. "I don't know why you're angry at me."
"I'm angry because..." Sirius' voice cracks. "I'm angry because...there's nothing left."
"What?"
"I did love you, Remus. Before Azkaban." A ghost of a smile flickers in and out of life in an instant. "But they took it away. They twisted it, and they made a mockery of it until it shrivelled and it died, like everything does in that place." Trembling, hands bunching convulsively into fists and then relaxing, shaking his head slightly, eyes staring beyond the room, far beyond the here and now. To the past. To the future? "And there's nothing left. Nothing inside of me. None of me. Myself."
Sirius' words fall thick and heavy in the room; dark, oppressive, claustrophobic.
"I'm so tired, Remus," Sirius says. "I'm so tired."
Remus wants to vomit, but he doesn't. He gets up on unsteady legs and reaches for Sirius, who grabs his wrist. The thin, bone-like fingers are so frail, so strong. They hold Remus in place when he would have recoiled in horror, because he realises that Sirius is speaking the truth. There is none of him left. The familiar eyes are raw, pained, hollow. He is a shell of a man, a hollow husk of a being. Sirius is dead, and this brutal image of him is all that remains. God.
Sirius turns those eyes on him, and they are the eyes of a drowning man reaching for help. Save me is his unspoken plea. Remus thinks, I can't, I can't save myself, I can't save you.
But he doesn't say that. He doesn't say anything, just reaches out and pulls Sirius close. The painfully thin body is stiff against his own until Sirius relaxes, allows himself to be held and soothed, Remus' hands smoothing his hair and his face and soft kisses pressed to his cold skin. It's not enough, and they both know it. It's not enough because it's too late. But at least it's something.
AN: Hope you enjoyed. Please leave feedback if you did, or even if you didn't.