"Sirius?" Remus nearly whispered. Sirius jumped about a foot - he hadn't even known Remus was there.
Turning around, though, he saw that Remus was merely quiet because he had his head deep in some musty old book that he'd dug off of his mother's shelves. Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, Sirius asked, "Yes? Was there something you needed? And weren't you in the library when I last saw you?"
Remus glanced up. "I was, but I wanted to ask you something."
Sirius waited.
"Why are we out of hot chocolate?"
Gaping, Sirius had to wait a minute before he found the breath to answer.
"Because - because you never bloody well bought any more once we were out!" he cried. "What, did you expect Kreacher to go get it for you? Or maybe Buckbeak? Or... or perhaps you were thinking that I would fetch it."
His breath was coming harder than it should have been now, and as Remus glanced down, brown hair strayed over brown eye, and his breath quickened until it was shallow and empty.
"I'm sorry, Padfoot," he offered eventually. "It's just, I've been reading, and then I lost track of what I was doing and, and where I was, I suppose."
"Well, don't feel like I'm keeping you here," Sirius retorted, before spinning on his heel and leaving. He could feel sad eyes on his back, and they burned as he made his way up a flight of stairs. Which flight it was and where it led, he couldn't be sure.
When Remus had started talking to him, it had sounded so promising. But after more than twenty years of conversations just like that one, he thought with a wry grin, he should be used to it.
He wasn't, though.
Every time he heard anything come out of Remus's mouth that sounded the slightest bit inviting, his mind raced. Every time Remus's body came near his, his heart raced. Every time Remus's light touch actually landed on him, well...
The truth was, the reminder of his confinement burned. That wasn't what had truly set him off, though. Sirius knew that if it really came down to it, he loved Remus best, and his freedom came a very close second.