Previously in the Darklyverse: The Order moved to Canada. Remus quietly disagreed with Sirius and Lily's plans for the Order. Reg and Remus protested Lily's appointment as one of the Order's delegates to Canada.

xx

January 5th, 1983: Remus Lupin

Sometimes, Remus thinks he might build James up just a little too much in his memory. After all, James was far from perfect: he was a bully with a big ego for longer than not during the time he and Remus were friends, and he never really apologized or made amends for that. If James were here right now, he wouldn't have any more of the answers than the rest of the Order does, not about what to do about the war, how they should be trying to pull strings with Canada, or whether Peter really deserves to rot in indefinite detention with Snape. When he was alone, James didn't always exude confidence—but he sure did when he was in public, and with Dumbledore still in Azkaban, the Order could use some of that energy right now.

After spending the last three months crawling on top of the rest of the Order at Grimmauld Place, and the four months before that listening to people scream through the bars of their Azkaban cells, Remus finds his and Sirius's flat in Canada eerily quiet. Listen, Remus is thrilled that he and Sirius finally have some privacy to be intimate together, but it's not like they're banging every second of the day. When they're not—when it's just the two of them—there's too much space and not enough people to fill it, not when James ought to be over here interrupting them every day and he's just—not.

Honestly, Remus isn't sure which one of them misses James more. For Remus, the wound is fresher: he didn't learn about James's death until after he was out of Azkaban, while Sirius had a whole four months to get a leg up on processing it. On the other hand, James was Sirius's best mate in a way that Remus could never hope for James to be his, and there are times that Sirius's mind seems entirely far away, like he's gone off to wherever James is now and is never coming back.

Of course, that's not the only reason Remus feels like there's a disconnect between him and Sirius these days. There's also the small matter that Sirius is trying to take the Order in a direction with which Remus vehemently disagrees.

It's not even that what Sirius wants to do—assassinate Death Eaters, throw the Order back into harm's way—seems so unethical: this is war, and wartime calls for extreme measures. It's just—killing Voldemort was supposed to put a stop to this thing, and it didn't, and the war is starting to feel un-winnable. Should they really be sacrificing their souls and risking their lives and murdering people in cold blood in the vain hopes that maybe doing so will turn the tides? How many people are they going to have to kill before the Death Eaters fall out of power? All the information they got from Snape, after all, was outdated: there could be dozens more Death Eaters in positions of power right now, and Remus doesn't see any way of dismantling the system short of blowing up the whole British Ministry during business hours.

It would be bad enough that there's so much infighting in the Order over what they should be doing—but the fact that Sirius is one of the ringleaders on the side Remus isn't on makes everything ten times worse. They're supposed to be together now—like, together together—and Remus isn't saying he wants to give that up, but he feels like he's going to ruin the relationship if he doesn't support Sirius in something as major as this. He knows how hard Sirius has worked to hold the Order together, how important the assassination plan is to Sirius—and he can't help but feel like his reluctance to get behind Sirius is going to blow up in his face sooner rather than later.

Remus feels like they both keep dancing around the issue when they're at home because, if they acknowledge it out loud, it's going to cause their relationship to fall apart. Like now, for instance—ever since they left the Weasleys' house last night, neither of them has said a word to each other about the fact that Remus tried to derail Sirius's whole argument that Lily should be a delegate to the Canadian Ministry by agreeing with Reg that she screwed up her internship with the Department of International Magical Cooperation in sixth year. In fact, Sirius has been in high enough spirits that Remus is sure he's faking his mood for Remus's benefit.

If he keeps spending every second of the day dissecting Sirius's actions, he's going to lose his mind or, possibly, his shit.

The one thing they do seem to agree on these days is that their flat feels empty with just the two of them in it, so this morning, they're a few towns over visiting Lily, Alice, and the kids. Remus can't say he ever imagined himself having kids earlier in his life, but ever since Harry and Neville were born, he's enjoyed being an uncle more than he would have expected—to the point that he can see himself and Sirius having ones of their own someday. He wouldn't really feel comfortable bringing children into a war-torn world—and he's never wanted to pass on his lycanthropy by having biological children—but that's kind of a nonissue considering that he's in a gay relationship.

They could adopt someday, maybe, if that were something Sirius wanted, too. It's not anything they've ever talked about, and honestly, Remus is afraid to bring it up. After how rocky their relationship has always been, he doesn't really want to add one more potential disagreement to the pile.

Sirius tries not to play favorites with the kids, but Remus can always tell he's just a little keener to spend time with his godson than he is to play with Neville—so Remus leaves Sirius to Harry and occupies himself with Neville. Remus tries not to play favorites, either, but he sort of relates more to Neville than he does with Harry: Neville has always been shyer and less confident and, in some ways, less the Gryffindors' favorite than Harry is. For one thing, up until now, Neville has been separated from his parents and the bulk of the Order for the last seven months; he's had less time to bond with them all. For another, Remus isn't saying his friends have ever loved Alice any less than they love Lily, but—well—

Even though Lily didn't become one of them until sixth year, when she did, she threw herself all in. Plus, she was married to James, who was always sort of the ringleader of the group. Alice, on the other hand, has kept everybody from Gryffindor House at arm's length where it counts for as long as Remus can remember.

Remus has seen Neville a couple times since moving to Canada; at those times, it's been obvious that Neville didn't remember him all that well from before Azkaban. He's warmed up, though, since Remus makes a point of devoting himself to the kid, playing with all the toys Neville picks out and barely taking breaks, even to use the bathroom. Eventually, Harry joins them so Sirius can catch his breath and chat with Alice for a while.

"Neville, Harry, sweethearts," Alice finally suggests after Remus has been going for almost four hours straight, "why don't you two go play blocks with Uncle Sissi for a while so I can talk to Uncle Lupe?"

"Oh, no, I'm fine, Alice, really," says Remus hastily.

But Alice insists, "Rem, you've helped out more than enough already today. Take a break."

He smiles and half-shrugs, kissing Neville's head and ruffling Harry's hair before they both toddle off to join Sirius. "I don't mind, really. Going nonstop with the kids means I'm not thinking about the war."

"Yeah, it's like that for me when I'm on babysitting duty while Lily's at work, too."

"So she's liking being back at Zoudiams?"

"She likes it well enough, I suppose. We all know that Healing wasn't her first choice of profession, but it's not like the Canadian Ministry would be interested in her."

"I still don't get that," says Remus, drawing his knees up to his chin. "We have loads of on-the-ground experience dealing with the Death Eaters and the British Ministry, and the Canadian Ministry has barely any. Why don't they want anything to do with us?"

"They probably don't want us barging into their affairs and telling them how to handle their international relations. Plus, nobody in Canada has forgotten what happened the last time they interacted with anybody from Britain claiming to need help with the war effort."

Right: Remus saw in the Veritaserum last week that the investigation into Runcorn's administration just wrapped up, ruling him and the rest of the support staff involved in the embezzlement of Canadian funds guilty. "At least we get to have some representation," Remus sighs.

"At least half of it is Reg," Alice agrees, lowering her voice so that Sirius won't hear. "I'm just worried Lily's going to…"

"Yeah, I know."

"I'm not saying I think she'll be bad at it," she hastens to add. "Sixth year was a long time ago, and she was brilliant on the campaign trail when she ran for Minister, changing all those purebloods' minds about Muggle-borns and the war. Even my parents voted for her, and I was sure they were going to vote for Malfoy. She just… doesn't represent Britain's best interests."

The easy thing to do would be to agree, and Remus does agree: he's long established that he thinks Lily and Sirius are taking things too far. But on the other hand… "What is our plan, anyway? Wait and let Canada tell us what to do? It's not that I agree with them, but the rest of us never really formulated an alternative plan of any kind."

"Canada will know what to do," Alice assures him. "And if the plan they come up with sucks, Reg and Lily will both make sure they know why. We've got experience that the Canadian Ministry doesn't—they'll have to respect that."

But Remus isn't so sure that anybody in the Canadian Ministry will really listen to them—that their presence there won't just be a token symbol.

xx

By the time he and Sirius get home that afternoon, Remus is beat. Tossing his cloak onto the sofa, Sirius declares, "I don't know how Alice does full days with the kids seven days a week—and she doesn't even have Lily to help her for five of those days. How does she stand it?"

"I used to think the same thing about James staying at home with Harry," Remus agrees. Something goes dark behind Sirius's eyes, and Remus immediately regrets bringing James up. He casts his mind around for something else—anything else—to divert Sirius's attention. Even though the first thing that comes to mind is one he knows he's going to regret bringing up, too, he blurts out, "You know, every time I see the kids, it sort of makes me wonder if…"

"If you want kids of your own someday?"

"If we want kids of our own someday," says Remus quietly.

That seems to bring Sirius back to reality. He gapes at Remus for a second before saying, "I didn't realize you see us like… like that."

Remus can feel himself blushing. "You're the one who called us 'endgame,' remember?" he mutters.

"Yeah, but I didn't know you felt the same way. You've always been the one with the reservations in this relationship."

He frowns. "That's not fair. You're the one who thought I was a Death Eater spy."

Sirius's face falls. "Moony—"

"I'm not holding it against you," Remus adds quickly. "I'm just saying—there was a time, a long time, when I would have given anything to get back with you. Now that we're finally here, I just… don't want to muck it all up."

"Who says we're on the verge of mucking anything up?"

And the last thing Remus wants to do is answer that question honestly, but if there's one thing that will wreck any relationship, it's pretending like everything is fine when everything is not fine—and he's even more scared of losing Sirius than he is of having this conversation. So he admits, "Come on, Padfoot. Do you really expect me to believe you're not holding it against me that I haven't supported you and Lily's plans for the Order?"

Sirius furrows his eyebrows. "That's why you've been acting so shifty lately? I thought you were just nervous to be alone with me."

"Why would I be nervous to be alone with you?"

"Oh, I don't know, maybe because I'm sexually attracted to women and accused you of being a Death Eater?"

"I told you," Remus sighs, "I'm past that. I wasn't lying when I said I'd moved on."

"Fine."

"Fine."

And then—unbelievably—Sirius breaks into laughter. "We're being ridiculous. Look, if you say it's in the past, I'll try to believe you. Just—try to believe me when I say I'm not holding it against you how you vote in the Order, okay? That's just… it's our work life, basically. Work should stay at work, and it doesn't have any bearing on how I feel about you."

Relief bubbles up in Remus's stomach. "Okay. I believe you, too."

"And…" Sirius looks away. "For what it's worth, I've been doing some reading at the library about—about sexuality—to try to understand myself better."

Remus raises his eyebrows. "Didn't you just say that you're comfortable with our relationship being the way it is?"

"I did. I do!" Sirius hastens to say. "I just… I guess I wanted to prove to myself that I'm not the only person out there who's experienced something like this—you know, that I'm not just in denial or… or making excuses."

"Sirius, I never thought that you were—"

"I know." He smiles weakly. "But I needed to do it. I haven't been able to find anything that exactly matches how I feel; maybe they'll invent words for what I am in a few decades, I don't know—but did you know that there are Muggles who've written whole books about love and sexual attraction being two different things that don't always happen at the same time?"

"Really?"

"Yeah. I mean, it makes sense when you think about it. Everybody knows you can think someone's hot without being in love with them, so why can't the same thing happen in reverse? It's like they're two different… I dunno… two different spectrums."

"Spectra," corrects Remus absently.

"What?"

Remus shrugs.

"Whatever. My point is, I'm not lying to myself or you or anybody about the way I feel about you. Maybe I just… maybe there's just a little disconnect between what gender I think is hot and what genders I can fall in love with. And I am in love with you, Moony. I don't ever want to live without you again."

And Remus should probably be having some big reaction to what Sirius has just announced, but honestly, he thinks he figured this out about Sirius a long time ago, even if Sirius didn't (and still doesn't) have the proper words for it. No, that's not the part of what Sirius is saying that's affecting Remus right now. "You mean it? You're really not going to leave me just because I don't want to kill a bunch of Death Eaters?"

"That's the part you're focused on? Dude, I'm pouring my heart out here."

Remus's next words slip out unbidden. "Have kids with me."

"What?" Sirius repeats.

"Maybe not right now. I know we've only been boyfriends again for a few months. Just… someday. I want that. Do you want that?"

Sirius just stares at him for so long that Remus is starting to think he's broken him—and then Sirius beams. "Of course I want that. Hey, maybe Andromeda will let us borrow her eggs or whatever so that we can both be related to the baby. There are spells that let you do that, right? I'll bet we could convince Lily to be our surrogate."

"Actually, I was thinking adoption," says Remus. "The British Ministry has a registry or whatever where you can put your names down in case any magical kids are orphaned, right? Maybe the Canadian Ministry has a list, too."

"Yeah, but how often are wizard kids orphaned? In Britain, sure, all the time, because of the war, but in Canada? Hey, maybe we could adopt Muggle kids instead. We could Confundus Charm our way into a kid in weeks, I bet. I mean, do we really need our kids to be witches or wizards? Love is love, right?"

Sirius sounds so excited about this that Remus's heart must have swelled three sizes. "Let's not get ahead of ourselves," he laughs, even though all he wants to do right now is get ahead of himself. "It's not like we're even married."

Sirius raises an eyebrow. Remus's jaw drops.

"Sirius, I love you, but we can't. You've been my boyfriend for all of two months."

"Yeah, but we were together for years before that—"

"And then we broke up for a long time," Remus mutters.

"And anyway," Sirius continues loudly, "we started dating again in May, exclusively. Just because we weren't using labels at first—"

"You're forgetting about the four months in between when I was in Azkaban with no idea whether I'd ever see you again."

Grinning, Sirius retorts, "And that's all the more reason to go forward with it, don't you think? Seize the day and all that? You're not in Azkaban anymore; we could get married tonight if we bloody well wanted to."

All this is happening a little fast for Remus. "You're kidding me. We can't get married tonight. We don't even know if we can last in… whatever passes for a normal relationship when you're in the middle of a war and the terrorists running your government want to murder you."

"Fine. We'll plan a big ceremony. Lily can be our maid of honor, and Alice can officiate. Is it weird if we make Reg our best man? I know he hasn't been our friend for long, but he did bust you out of Azkaban—we wouldn't even be here if it weren't for him. I know there are plenty of topics where he and I disagree, but—"

"Sirius, slow down. I haven't even agreed yet," says Remus. He can't help himself: he's laughing.

"You will," says Sirius jauntily. "We'll be married by the end of the year, and we'll stay that way until we die of old age. Just you wait."

"Don't tempt me," mutters Remus with a grin, and he grabs Sirius by the robes and pulls him in for a kiss.