Finally a long(er) chapter! I'm quite fond of this one, of the utter silent feeling of this. Hope you like it too, and remember, feedback is the purest drug!
Evolution
By: Nekare
After a full year
of gazing out, one morning
I open my door --
to a thin snowfall, frozen --
the far edge of loneliness.
small hitotose o / nagametsukuseru / asatoide ni / usuyuki kooru / sabihisa no hate /small
-- Fujiwara no Teika (1162-1241), 'Winter Morning'
Sirius lays on the snow, black hair spread around his head, mingling with the whiteness, bleeding the opposite color into the coldness beneath him. There are snowflakes caught on his eyelashes, and he has to blink to get the remaining falling pieces of cotton clouds out of his eyes. The white tinted breath coming out his lips would taste of whisky, were Remus to try and taste it (in the way Sirius still dreams about, still wants, still desires ). His clothes are soaked, arms and legs (outstretched, in a plea for help) numb, but his Gryffindor scarf is still warm on top of chest, threadbare with memories and sweet moments passed.
He hunts a werewolf in sixth year, holds him captive with a striped scarf and a smile that wants to be confident but carries nervousness instead. Remus blushes, but he comes closer inside his makeshift cage, willing and half-lidded and making Sirius' mouth go dry. Sirius kisses him, clumsily and hurriedly, and Remus wraps the scarf around them both, laughing softly against his lips (Sirius thinks he might die, but he doesn't, so he steals Remus' breath instead).
Gaze lost in the skies (a petty excuse, as he's seeing nothing at all), he longs, trying to deny himself the reason of the longing on itself, lying in his head, thinking he misses warm food served under thousands of flickering candles that turn eyes alight (brown ones, that always seem starved for food, knowledge, affection), that he misses a red canopy to be the first thing he sees as he wakes up (and after that, the four freckles Remus has on his left shoulder), he misses security.
(He misses Remus).
"Fuck you," is the first thing Remus says to him when he wakes up the morning after Snape almost dies. Corrosive acid leaks from Sirius' swallowing all the way down to his heart at the deception in the words, and after a day of muttered /i sorrys i he falls to his knees in front of a still injured Remus, and as he sucks, sucks, sucks, he wants to suck the hateful poison out of Remus' blood (Remus comes with a gasp, pulling Sirius' hair so tightly it hurts, but he doesn't look at him) . Sirius forgets about dignity for two months, twenty-seven days, four hours and fifteen minutes, and he knows Remus forgives him the moment he won't let him touch him.
It's three in the morning, and somewhere in the back of his mind Sirius knows he could get arrested (if he were a Muggle, that is) for trespassing, but there are no sounds coming from the strange house in whose garden he's trying to vanish and become part of the wind, and the half-fallen remnants of a snowman remind him of snow fights and little Harry discovering the cold, white substance. He takes a hand to his jaw, where the bruise that had painted it purple has already faded.
They fight on New Year's day, while they should be kissing the dead year goodbye, and they shout at each other fueled by the fear of not knowing just where the other one goes for his missions. There's mistrust on Remus' eyes, the kind Sirius hasn't seen since The Prank, and he suspects his own eyes carry the same tint. Sirius crosses the line when he says "it's all your fault the Prewetts died anyway, if you had only gotten there early this wouldn't have happened." (Remus hadn't been able to sleep well since that night, and Sirius regrets his words as soon as he utters them).
Remus holds his breath for a second, face red, and then he punches Sirius, hard, on the jaw. Sirius staggers and spits blood on James' wooden floors, the entire party looking at them intently. Remus comes closer, and then he mutters, "Seeing as I was a bit busy shagging you to the wall, I'd say you share half the guilt." He spits the words, and they just stare at each other, teeth clenched and blood pounding on their ears.
It's been a month, and Sirius just can't stop thinking about it. He has escaped dinner with Peter this night, not able to deal with Remus' quiet way to ignore him, always more painful than actual hatred. There's a crack some steps away from him, and Sirius braces him for what he knows will happen.
"Finally I find you," Remus says looking at the sky too, looming on top of him with hands on his pockets.
"It's not like you care." Sirius tries to make it sound like a statement, but it comes out like the bastard son of a growl, laced with pain.
"I don't." Remus says too quickly, too sharply. "Or at least, I don't want to." They're not talking about Remus' abilities to track someone anymore. Never had been, not really.
Sirius memorizes Remus' figure, every single detail that still sends his imagination to overdrive. Then, he closes his eyes. "Yeah. I know what you mean."
They don't talk anymore, and after they watch the sun coming out (an explosion of colors that feels almost indecent for this gloomy days), they Apparate together without any other word spoken, and the reappear together on Sirius' flat, kissing frantically before any of them is truly aware of what exactly is happening.
They fuck, a love making no longer, urgent and quiet and with evaporated tears on their skins, nails leaving pink letters of despair written over their backs. Remus leaves, after, and Sirius suddenly feels like crying.
(He does, a while after, and longs once again, alone in the room.)