Disclaimer: I'm sure JKR never intended for her characters to be... used in quite this way.
Author's Note: This is birthday giftfic for duva, who is one of my best friends EVAH. She asked for angst, she got this. Thankfully, she seemd to like it.
Don't forget to review!
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Sirius and James had an arrangement. It involved dark closets, secluded corners, and sleeping in each other's beds. Holding and kissing and wanting and everything else that went along with that.
To James it was just an arrangement: practice; a little help; something to do when they couldn't get girls. It didn't occur to him that Sirius couldn't get girls because he didn't try to, because he didn't want to. Sirius didn't want girls. He'd never wanted girls. He wanted James.
And Sirius thought he had James. To him the arrangement was a state of things he didn't want to change or to end. He'd be happy with things like that forever. He thought they would be like that forever.
But it was Lily that James wanted all along, Sirius just didn't realize it. It was Lily that James thought about when he was with Sirius. It was Lily that James would give up everyone else for... including his best friend.
Sirius just didn't realize it.
Life was wonderful for Sirius. He had James, he had freedom, he had a life to look forward to that no longer seemed as bleak as it had when he was younger. For the first time in his life, that mysterious being some people called 'Fate' actually seemed to be smiling at him. A true, honest, artless smile free of deception or condition, such as he'd never had from that quarter before.
Sirius just didn't realize...
When Lily tried to get James, everything fell apart for Sirius.
And Sirius finally realized, when James appeared out of nowhere one day and dragged him into a closet but instead of kissing him like usual, started talking. And talking. And talking. About a girl. About his girl. About Lily.
Sirius was losing James, a lover who was suddenly turning back into a simple best friend faster than Sirius wanted or could really grasp. He didn't know what to do, what he could do, so he did nothing.
James no longer came to Sirius at night, and Sirius wouldn't let himself do more than think of going to him. (creeping into his bed like a puppy seeking warmth and affection just affection please just love me again love me love melovemeloveme...) He knew he'd be turned away if he went. And that hurt him worse than James keeping his distance. For Sirius, self-denial was always harder to take than rejection, especially on the same terms.
Then Lily and James started getting serious, alarmingly quickly it seemed to Sirius, and they were as open about it as the two boys had been secret. Sirius watched them together whenever he could, which was more often than he would have liked. He was always aware of James, and by necessity Lily. It was agony to watch James with someone else but it hurt just as badly to avoid James when he was with Lily, which was almost all the time; Sirius would rather be tortured around James than tortured away from him.
Harder than anything else he suffered -- from cast off, to replaced almost before he was gone, to virtual bystander in his beloved's life -- was the obvious disregard James had for Sirius's feelings. He was being snubbed, and some times he couldn't tell whether it was unintentional or not. Either way, it left Sirius feeling empty, worthless, used.
It was as if James didn't even remember what he'd had with Sirius. Or didn't care. But Sirius cared and knew he would never stop caring.
Perhaps the worst thing that can be said about this aspect of James Potter's life was that when he went to his grave, he took the heart of his best friend with him, a love as strong as the one he'd married for. A love unrequited.
Perhaps the best thing that can be said about it is that James never knew what he threw away. He'd never bothered to look, or to consider, so he had missed it completely. He was, at least, spared years of guilt over his actions that otherwise might have crippled him... even if he'd been a greater man than he was.
Even if he'd never been sent to Azkaban, Sirius would have faded after James's death. Without his best friend, there really was little purpose that he could see in his life.
He'd lived for James as he never could have lived for himself alone.
Like a puppy, looking for warmth and affection.