"Padfoot?" asked James as Sirius and Peter unpacked their things.

"What?"

"You and Moony... are you fighting or something?"

"No" said Sirius, rather too abruptly

"Liar" said Peter with a smirk

"Fuck off" snapped Sirius, Peter flinched "You know as well as I do Moony's barely spoken for almost two months" Sirius sighed "Which means he's barely spoken to me. Which means he hasn't let me touch him for the same amount of times" Sirius flicked his hair huffily from his eyes "And I need a haircut"

"You're damn right you do, every girl you've done that flicky thing near has had a border line orgasm" said Peter resentfully

"What do you mean border line?" smirked Sirius

"It's not fair!" said Peter, angrily slamming the lid of his trunk shut

"What isn't?" asked James, half amused

"He gets to look like that" he guestured at Sirius. His long dark hair, his lean elegant frame, his height, his classicly handsome, aristocratic face. Everything Sirius had, Peter lacked. "and every girl is in love with him and he's not even interested in them" Peter scowled at Sirius "It's not fair" James sighed. It really wasn't fair

"You know, I hadn't realised I was so ironic" said Sirius cooly, flipping his hair again. James wondered if he did that deliberatly

"Oh you sod off with your hair, Sirius" Peter sulked, melancholically twirling his own whispy mousy coloured locks around his fingers.

*

"Are you sure you're alright mum?" Said Remus, his hands trembling with worry as they approached the Potter's Devon cottage

"I'm fine Remus! I'm busy, Sylvia's coming round later, I am fine" She said calmly. Remus was sure he'd heard her crying again last night.

"Okay..." before he could think about what he was about to say, he blurted "No drinking"

"Remus! I'm the parent here, remember that" she said, aberrantly stern. Remus couldn't help but be distrustful at her sudden change in tone. He was sure that after she'd gone up to her room to "do some paperwork" the last few nights, she'd come down stairs again distinctly wobbly with the suspicious smell of too much toothpaste on her breath and the lightest scent of firewhisky that Remus wouldn't have caught were it not for his hightened sense of smell.

"I know mum. Just promise me you won't" He said, trying to sound as stern as she had

"Oh alright... I promise. Now go and have fun with your friends"

"Thank you" He said with a smile "I won't have to worry then?"

"Oh for goodness sake sweet heart! Of course not. Now come on" She smiled and knocked on the door, both James's mother and father answered it smiling.

"Hello Remus!" said Dorea Potter merrily, ushering him in

"How've you been Rhea?" said Charlus Potter, offering the sympathetic head tilt. She shrugged and blushed.

"Not bad... I s'pose" she said particularly quietly. Dorea joined her husband in the tiliting of their heads "I'm going to head off then. Enjoy yourself Sweet Heart" she smiled and waved, walking a little whle down the path before she disapperated

"So nice to see you came Remus" said Dorea kindly "The boys missed you on Wednesday and yesterday. Sirius has just been so sulky" she gave a little grin, embarressment flooding over Remus as he remembered the Potter's New years Eve party, when everyone had seen Sirius give him an entirely innaprpriate New Years kiss. He still turned bright red at the memory

"There's no need to be embarressed Remus" said Charlus earnestly "We're very opened minded people" he clapped Remus on the back

"I'll have the house elf take your bag upstairs" said Dorea with a smile, she clapped twice and an elf with giant purple eyes appeared with a soft crack, took Remus's bag and disapeared again.

"Er... thanks"

"Well, go on upstairs then" she said, still smiling. Remus nodded curtly and trotted upstairs, he followed the sound of voices down the long hallway and entered James's room, it was exactly as Remus had remembered it from New years.

"Moony!" Yelled Peter enthusiastically, jumping out of one of James's plush, red and gold bean bags, running over to give him a speedy hug.

"Nice to see you've finnally graced us with your presence" Smirked James, giving him a longer hug

"I'm only two days late, and I had a fair reason" said Remus indignantly

"You feeling... better?" asked Peter tentatively

"Yeah. A lot better. Mum's not half as bad as I thought she might be and she's drinking, I know she is, but she promised she wouldn't before I left. And she wouldn't break a promise" said Remus confidently

Sirius looked him up and down coldly, he had not gotten up to greet Remus, but sat in his bean bag, staring sullenly out of the window.

"Padfoot... I... I'm sorry. I've been ignoring you, all three of you, the last couple of months and... I'm just sorry. I've had a lot to think about. A lot. And... I just didn't want to see anyone... I felt really bad and... sorry" Said Remus hesitantly. Sirius sighed irritantly

"I'm sorry for being a twat and getting angry and stuff. I'm a nob. Sorry." Said Sirius, not making eye contact with Remus. He still had trouble with apologies if he had to mean them.

"s'alright" said Remus quietly, not looking at Sirius, but turning to James instead, who quickly began to plan their next few days

"Fancy going into town tommorow?" He said brightly

"I've only ever really passed through muggle towns before" said Peter excitedly

"My Mother would blow a gasket if she found out. Brilliant" Sirius grinned and got up from his bean bag

"I've been to a lot before" said Remus "Been to some of the bigger city's quite a few times, with my parents. They didn't want me growing up completely clueless about Muggles so they used to take me out to muggle places alot. London's fun, a bit busy though and the people can be rude. Leeds is nice, so's Newcastle, I like Liverpool too." he said quietly, his eyes flicking back and forth from James, to Peter, to Sirius, to the floor. Back to Sirius. Back to the floor. "Are we... alright Sirius?"

"Yeah, course we are Moony" he said sadly "like I said, I've been being a nob."

"A sulky whingy nob" added Peter. Sirius frowned and pulled his arm around Remus, he said quietly into his ear

"You are deffinately feeling better though aren't you... you're not bottling anything up. You're not lying to make us feel better?" Remus smiled shyly and shook his head.

"I'm fine Padfoot"

"Okay. I'm sorry for not being a better boyfriend and stuff..."

"I know you are. It's okay"

"Oi" snapped James "I'm trying to sort out what we're doing tomorow while you two are sitting muttering sweet nothing's into eahother's ears! I need your help Moony, you're the one who knows most about the muggles and stuff!" Remus laughed and Sirius gave James the finger. All four of them were relieved things were normal again.

*

"Psst" Remus sat up in his bed. Dorea had conjured her guest's three four poster beds, sound proof hangings and all, and James's large red and gold room now looked like a very plush Hogwarts dorm. "Psst! Moony? You awake?" Sirius had poked his head through Remus's hangings

"Mmm, just about" he replied sleepily, Remus could see his smile in the darkness as he hopped onto his bed, pulling the hangings shut.

"Considering that you're fine and everything now... can I come within ten feet of you again? Or will that be invading your personal bubble" they smirked, Sirius adopted a more serious tone "You sure you're deffinately alright?"

"Yeah. Mum's a lot better. She still cries at night. She drinks. But once she's stopped drinking, which she's promise me she will, she won't be as depressed and the crying will probably stop. She'll be alright" Remus wondered if he was trying to reassure Sirius or himself, he pushed the thought from his head "I'm a lot better too. My dad... he left me a penseive and a letter. Made me feel a lot better. Made me miss him more but... made things a lot more clear for me"

"Dare I ask what said penseive and letter contained?"

"You'd better not. I'll get upset. I really don't want to be uspet right now" He smiled timidly at Sirius. "So about this coming within ten feet of me thing... you know... I've been thinking of reducing the size of my personal bubble" He crawled closer to Sirius, who smiled lasciviously

"I've been thinking of popping it" Sirius moved closer still. And their mouths crashed violently together, in disbelief that they'd gone almost two months without connecting. Remus nipped savagly on Sirius's bottom lip and Sirius ran his hands up into Remus's hair where they tugged , slightly too hard. Remus's teeth slipped as he yelped with fright

"Ouch!" they dissconnected

"You bit my tongue!" said Sirius his tongue dangling from his mouth

"You pulled my hair!"

"I thought you liked that?"

"Not really... I think it's you who likes the hair pulling Sirius. I try to avoid pain whenever necesary"

"Oh... thorry" said Sirius, tongue swelling. Remus giggled

"What?"

"Thorry, I thaid thorry" Remus snorted again "Fuck oth, thith ith your fault"

"I can't understand a word you're saying"

"I thaid-" Remus cackled before he could find out what he'd "thaid" "Oi! Thtop it!"

"Thorry Thiriuth" Mocked Remus

"You're a vicouth little thit when you want to be, you know"

"I'm a what?" he giggled

"Thut the fuck up Remuth"

"Make me" they grinned. Sirius launched himself at Remus, knocking him on his back.

"Oh I will Moony"

"You know, that is perhaps the least sexy nickname ever created"

"Thinivelouth ith worth"

"True" they smiled again and Sirius bent down for another kiss. A gentler one, no teeth or hair pulling. Remus ran his tongue over Sirius's swollen one and tasted blood from where he'd bitten him before. His wolf gave an internal growl at the strange metallic flavour. The internal bark became an external growl and Sirius pulled off of him

"Did you juth growl?" he asked. Remus blushed

"Yeah... sorry... blood set the wolf off. Sorry"

"Don't be thorry... it wath incredibly thexy"

"Unlike your lithp"

"Thod off"

"It's my bed you're in! You sod off!"

"I don't want to thod off"

"Well shut up and kiss me" Remus winked and gave a teasing growl and with a low rumble of laughter, Sirius lowered himself onto Remus again.

He felt happy for the first time in months.

*

"Are we there yet James?" moaned Sirius

"We've been walking for aaaages" whined Peter

"I told you five minutes ago, we're about ten minutes away!" snarled James

"Sor-ry!" said Sirius hufily. Remus tapped James enthusastically on the shoulder

"What is it Moony?"

"I can't believe I forgot to ask sooner! How's the map going?"

"The Map is... well... I took a load of really dodgy measurments when I started drawing it. There's a lot that needs correcting" he sighed and fluffed up his hair "But, on the bright side, I found this very old and" he dropped his voice to whisper "very illeagal book in our library"

"You have a library? In your house?" asked Remus, astoundedly

"Yeah, so does Sirius" he said off handedly, like it was the most normal thing in the world "Anyway, this book, it tells you how to plot people properly. How to tell who they are, track their acctual movents and positions, not just nameless approximations of where random people are. 'Cos they tell you that's the only way to do it in that leagal crap we got from the Hogwarts library"

"I hope you know what you're doing James, you could be in a lot of trouble if you get caught" Remus cautioned

"I know mummy, thanks for the warning. But I know a way to protect the map, we could wipe it after every use with a sort of password"

"That's clever Prongs" said Remus, giving a smile and raise of his eye brows

"I know" he grinned "D'you think Evans would be impressed?" Sirius sighed

"For the love of all that's good and Magical James! Will you shut up about that stuck up bitch for five minutes!"

"Lily isn't stuck up" Defended Remus

"She is a bit" said Peter. James began to argue with Peter and Remus dropped behind them and walked along side Sirius.

"How's your tongue?" he asked shyly, taking Sirius's hand

"Not swollen, still very sore" said Sirius, with a smirk he stuck his tongue out, a large purple welt at it's centre

"Bloody hell Sirius! I'm so sorry!"

"S'alright. I think you made it up to me last night" he winked lewdly, Remus flushed and punched him lightly on the arm.

*

The four boys arrived in town, Remus quickly released Sirius's hand when the muggles started giving them a few funny looks.

"Right" said Sirius "Now what?"

"Er... we could get something to eat?" suggested Peter hopefully

"We only had breakfast an hour ago!" James sneered "All you think about is food"

"We've been walking though..."

"What've they got round here shop-wise Prongs?" asked Remus

"Usual muggle stuff, clothes, books, music, shoes and stuff" he replied

"Can we go and have a look at the muggle music? That record player you got me a while back has had nothing but the same three albums to play for ages" said Sirius

"They're bloody good albums!"

"They are! But there's only so many times I can hear Diamond Dogs before I want to tear my ears off. The same goes for Dark Side of The Moon and Sticky Fingers I'm afraid. I need some new stuff"

"Come on then, there's a record shop down the street" said James ushering them forward

"I don't get your obsession with muggle music. Wizard stuff is much better" Peter huffed

"Bollocks. Every witch, wizard and muggle knows who the Rolling Stones are, whereas absaloutly no one apart from a few magical teenagers have heard of the shite you listen to" Sirius scoffed

"My music is not shite"

"It is Pete" said James "Especially that one band you play all the time"

"Which one?"

"Er... Someone and the Pixies or something" said James, not even really trying to remember the name of the awful band

"Pixie Boots and the Unicorns?" he suggested brightly

"Yeah! That's the one! Fucking shite" said James, ignoring the fall of Peter's face

"Back me up here Rem, they're not that bad, are they" he said pleadingly

"Pete... I'm sorry but... they're shite. If it's one thing muggle's do right, it's music" said Remus apologetically as they entered the muggle record shop "Remember to mind what you say" he hissed at James, Sirius and Peter.

"Alright Moony, we're not stupid you know" tutted James. The boys browsed the records, music playing quietly in the background

"What's wrong with these posters?" asked Peter, prodding at a Talking Heads poster. "It's not moving"

"Keep your voice down!" snapped Remus before whispering "they're not meant to. Muggle pictures don't move, remember?"

"Oh yeah! Boring" snorted Peter "Who'd want a crappy poster that didn't move?"

"I might" said Sirius sauntering over to the posters "These would drive mother mental!" He started pulling at a few random band posters, and began to consider a few posters of a few bikini clad girls, and then a few vaious posters of a topless David Bowie, which he went to pick up with an evil grin on his face. James grabbed his wrist

"Topless, bisexual, muggle man, wearing make up. Do you want to piss your mum off or do you want her to kill you?"

"Good point... I'll just go for a few of the half naked women, shall I?" James nodded in agreement. Posters under his arm, Sirius strolled over to the nearest shop assistant and asked him

"Which record do you think will piss a Mother off the most?" The shop assistant smirked and picked a few records out, stuffing them into Sirius's arms

"Physical Graffiti the newest fromLed ZepplinIt's a must. Do you have Zepplin iv?"

"Er... no"

"Well, take it. Paraniod by Balck Sabboth'll get on any parent's tits... so would Who's Next by the Who. It's a bit old, have you got that?"

"uh uh"

"Shit, have you been living under a rock?"

"No! I like... The Rolling stones and Bowie and Pink Floyd"

"Now you're talking. Have you got Sticky Fingers?"

"Yes acctually, I do" said Sirius haughtily "Can I buy these?"

"Yep" the assistant hopped behind the checkout "That'll be £12" Sirius looked frantically over at Remus

"Remus" he whispered all too loudly "Can you do the money?"

"Er... I can try... Can I have the money James?" James pulled a handful of muggle notes and coins from his pockets and gave them to Remus "Thanks... erm... I think this is a... 10? Yeah and the gold one's are pounds... right so... is that right?" The Assistant eyed them suspiciously

"Yeah..." he hesitantly took the money "Are you two foreign or something?"

"Yep" Remus said quickly "Erm thanks. Are you two done?" James and Peter nodded and they stumbled quickly out of the shop.

"Do we look foreign?" asked Sirius, before any of them could answer, there was a loud buzz, which evolved into a roar and Sirius saw one of the most beautiful sights he ever would see. A huge siler machiene, flying gracefully and noisily on two huge wheels, glinting alluringly in the bright summer sun light.

"What was that?" he beamed, eyes wide and dancing

"A motor bike, I think" said Remus curling his lip at the horrid arrogant machiene "Loud and dangerous, so many muggle's die on them. I can't bare them"

"Motor bike..." said Sirius in a daze, clearly having become selectively deaf at the words dangerous and die "How many bits of muggle paper do you think I have to give to someone to get one?"

"Lot's, they're bloody expensive" said Remus, frowning "And you have to be seventeen to learn to ride one"

"How hard can it be?" said Sirius cheerfully, Remus put his head in his hands "Just like riding a broom, but bigger and on the ground, isn't it?"

"No. Not even remotely"

*

"Hello boys! How was your day?" asked Dorea who was in the kitchen bent over some hosptal paper work

"Really good, Peter expeirienced a muggle burger for the first time, Remus bought himself a small library, Sirius got enough muggle music and posters to make his mum want to beat him to death and fell in love" Sniggered James. Sirius sighed

"Motor Bike..."

"Oh bloody hell. Those are very dangerous Sirius" warned Dorea

"Shiny"

"They kill hundreds of muggles a year"

"Really fast"

"They injure thousands"

"Mother would get so angry... I wonder if she'd catch fire"

"I've tried warning him Mrs. Potter, I really have, but I don't think he cares" shrugged Remus, sighing "I'm going to take a shower... if that's alright" Mrs Potter nodded.

"Fancy coming up to my room for a game of Gobstones" suggested James

"Go on then" said Peter with a smile, and they all trotted up stairs. Remus collected a towell from the Potter's airing cupboard and entered their huge bathroom. The giant bath, which was more like a small pool, reminded Remus of the one in Hogwarts prefect's bathroom, apart from the large shower head that hung from the ceiling at the centre of the bath. He twisted a few taps before finding the one that controlled the shower, took off his clothes, lay his towel on the side and climbed down into the bath. The water was cold at first but almost instantly adjusted to Remus's preffered water tempreture (not too hot, not too cold). He stood under the water, tepid drops of water beating down sharply onto his plae scarred skin. He looked down at his scars, some of the newer, deeper, badly healed ones on his chest, he ran his fingers across them and sighed. Wondering how Sirius could bare to look at the angry purple blemishes, when he could barely stand them himself. He hated his body, he always had. He was all skin and bones. All skin and bones and scars. He heaved another weighty sigh, and scrubed at his wet hair, absent mindedly watching beads of water dropping off his fringe, he didn't even hear someone stumble into the bathroom.

"Hey hey Moony" Sirius grinned, locking the door behind him. Remus panicked and ran to the edge of the bath, grabbing his towel and wrapping it quickly round his waist.

"Sirius! Knock first!"

"Oh come on Rem, I've seen you with your kit off before"

"Yeah... but not with it all off, in broad daylight!"

"Stop with the shyness Remus. If it makes you feel any better, I'll get naked too?"

"Sirius..." he tailed off, flushing a deep red and not really sure what his answer should be, but Sirius was alreay pulling off his clothes, and hopped into the shower, pressing his groin up against Remus. He sighed.

"You'd better not be thinking about motor bikes"

A/N:It's my birthday on monday. It would be mean to deny me a review :(