Please note that I do not own the world or the characters that I use in this fanfiction, they all belong to Joanne Rowling. I merely like to play around a bit with them.
I'm sorry, I really don't have an excuse for my absence. Will this make up for it?
It's a delightful cliffhanger, if I can say so myself.
Every once in a while, Remus would put whatever book he was reading to the side for a moment, and instead pick up a photo album. Sometimes he'd make Sirius look at the photographs with him, but more often than not he'd sit alone, curled up in his armchair in the library. This was one of those times, an unusually cold day in late February, when the snow was pouring down outside and Remus was wrapped in a blanket with a cup of tea at hand.
He didn't think there was anything specific with the photo album he was currently looking at, it was an album filled with pictures from their third year to their seventh year at Hogwarts. He had already looked through the album at least ten times earlier, but never had he noticed the two pages that seemeed to have stuck together, the pages that were now slightly opened. Remus hadn't seen them yet, so he was blissfully unaware of the horror that would await him on one of those pages.
With a slightly heavy heart, he was looking at a picture of the four Marauders together in Hogsmeade, each with a butterbeer mustache, arms flung around eachother's shoulders. Then he turned the old, brittle page and came face to face with a photograph of Sirius and James snogging. The fact that the photograph was moving didn't help Remus at all, and as he took a second, shocked glance at the photograph, he saw that they were definitely drunk and that the photograph was taken sometime around their sixth year at Hogwarts.
The Sirius in the photograph broke away from the kiss for a moment, just to wink at the camera with gleaming eyes and a wicked smile, and Remus dropped the album as if it was poison.
Remus stood up from his chair, knocking over his cup of tea. For a few seconds, he seemed completely disoriented, so he closed his raging eyes, clenched his fists and tried to breathe calmly.
Still, he could feel the wolf clawing inside of him, whispering "Let me out, let me out.. He's betrayed you.. He deserves it.. Let me out.." He growled back, telling it to back off. He wanted to deal with this as a proper human being, with human feelings. He picked up the album gingerly between two fingers and headed out of the library, the paintings on the walls still whispering in their frames about what might have been the cause of his behaviour.
Remus caught up Sirius' latest trail of scent easily, and it was only seconds before he burst into the living room where Sirius was dozing lazily on the sofa, reading an old newspaper.
Sirius didn't notice Remus' livid state to begin with, so he just said "Oh, there you are. I'm so terribly bored, and I think I've read this newspaper a dozen times since I got here already," then he glanced at Remus' rigid posture and his face grew pale.
"You know, if you're so terribly bored, I have something you can read. Or rather, look through. It's a photo album from the library. This," he threw the photo album onto the small table, "photo album, to be exact. Look at page 16." His nostrils flared a bit as he spoke.
Sirius looked confused, he even shook his head slightly, but he did as he was told. The pages had stuck together again, so he had to fight a little to be able to open the page, but when he did, his eyes instantly fell on the picture Remus was so angry about. His mouth fell open and he went even paler than before.
"I.. I'm sorry! We were drunk, it was after one of your full moon nights when you were still in the hospital wing.. We were just fooling around, I didn't know what I was doing! I-It.. It didn't mean anything, I swear!" Sirius was trying to soften Remus up with his puppydog eyes, but it didn't work this time. He had betrayed Remus too badly to be able to mend it with those eyes.
Remus rubbed his temples, as if to clear his thoughts, and then he locked his eyes into Sirius' pleading ones. "Sirius, this was clearly after we became.. engaged with eachother. This means that you betrayed me. You betrayed me! I would never have dreamt of doing that, even while you were in Azkaban, because you're the love of my life."
"But I.." Sirius cut in pleadingly, but Remus wouldn't have it.
"No, no but's, being drunk is not an excuse! Damn you Sirius! You meant everything to me, you still do! You're the one person who's always been safe to me, I've always known I could trust you. But this.. You do realize how this recent discovery affects that, don't you? My feeling of safety, my trust in you is shattered!" Remus was still clenching his fists, trying hard not to let the wolf take over. There was a small, silvery tear rolling down his cheek too.
"And with James of all people! You should have told me.."
And that was all Remus could manage, before he rushed up to their bedroom to gather his things. It wasn't much, but he wanted the few books he had chosen from the library, the ones he had marked as special. His wand. Some parchment and a quill. And a photograph from another photo album.
It wasn't more than he could carry, so he set off in search of a guest bedroom as far away from Sirius' bedroom as possible, the pain weighing down his steps, and the tears blurring his vision. Several times he almost walked through a ghost or stumbled down a staircase.
Left in the livingroom was Sirius. He was sitting with his legs spread and his elbows resting on his legs, his head resting in his hand, staring down onto the dark wooden floor. His inner dog was battling feelings of extreme guilt, extreme sorrow, extreme grief and extreme pain.
He regretted that evening more than he had ever regretted anything in his whole life, more than he ever regretted going after Pettigrew so he ended up in prison.
He fumbled with the photograph until he finally got it out of the album, and held it in his hands, tears landing on it in regular intervals. The little James and the little Sirius in the picture just kept snogging, even though the tears made their outlines a bit blurry.
After Sirius had no more tears left to cry, he just sat on the sofa for the rest of the evening, staring into the dying fire, and he couldn't help but think that the fire was his and Remus' relationship. At some point, he threw the photograph into the fire and watched it burn slowly, until it was just a crumpled, grey mess.
The only problem was, a fire could be lit again, but Sirius couldn't afford spending his time relighting their relationship, now that he finally had Remus again. He knew better than to try to apologize to Remus now though, he knew he'd have to wait a few days, maybe even weeks.
After the sorrow disappeared, anger took it's place, and Sirius ventured down into the cellar to smash things. He cursed his father for keeping him locked down there, he cursed Voldemort for ever killing James and Lily, he cursed himself for kissing James that evening. Most of all, he cursed Remus for being so bloody wonderful, beautiful, intelligent and amazing. As the wooden boxes shattered under his punches, and his voice went hoarse from screaming, a silvery ghost of his ancestor silently hovered through the room. The ghost was soon followed by another one, a young lady with beautiful, curly hair. She ventured closer to Sirius, and placed her icingly cold hand on Sirius', making him jump.
"Don't. Don't hurt yourself. He's not worth it," she said in a bright, ringing voice.
"News travel fast in the House of Black," Sirius thought. He then snarled and said, "He's worth it, allright. He's worth this, this and so much more. What he's not worth though, is a lousy excuse for a boyfriend."
More ghosts gathered in the cellar, as Sirius was again sobbing on the floor. They gathered around him in a circle, and began dancing, around and around. They sang a quiet song, a song of lost love, and Sirius could feel the air going cold. Somehow, it was a relief, and Sirius ended up falling asleep on the cold stone floor, in the middle of the eerie dance of the ghosts.
As Sirius spent his night in the cellar, Remus spent his on a dusty bed in a bedroom on the Fifth floor. He didn't know who the room had belonged to, and he didn't care very much either. The tears wouldn't stop pouring, and the wolf wouldn't stop howling. He felt like someone had quite literally stabbed him in the heart.
He also couldn't stop looking at that one picture, the picture of Sirius and him on their graduation day. He looked at their happy, smiling faces, and the way Sirius hugged him just a bit too closely for a friend. But nobody really noticed that, unless they were looking for it.
He could also see James and Peter in the distance, running around on the green grass of the Hogwarts grounds, and he felt another surge of pain in his chest.
He'd do anything to just disappear from the house, to be with James instead. Then he changed his mind, because James had been kissing Sirius back.
Remus curled up on the bed yet again, and promised himself he'd send Dumbledore a letter in the morning.
And so he did.
20 February 1999
Dear Dumbledore,
Because of some recent events, I'm wondering if it would be possible to leave this place right now. To leave, and never return. To die properly.
Would that be possible? I need to know.
Sincerely, Remus.
He creeped through the house, constantly alert so that he'd catch Sirius' scent if he was anywhere near, and in that case avoid any contact with Sirius.
He made his way through the hidden passageway in Sirius' old bedroom to the old, unused kitchen, from which he then sneaked to the courtyard.
In the courtyard, he found Jamesie sitting on a stick. Oblivious to the drama that had been going on between his masters, Jamesie hooted and looked very pleased when he saw Remus appear. As Remus tied the letter to his leg (which he extended gladly and gracefully), the owl tried to cuddle against Remus' arm.
He got very offended when Remus just threw him into the air instead of scratching him, but of course, he didn't know the pain the ageing werewolf was going through.
After all that was over, Remus sneaked back up into his bed, where he stayed for the next few days, only leaving at odd hours of the day to get some food or go to the bathroom.
Sirius wasn't much better off, he was constantly roaming the corridors in the Grimmauld Place, his mind trapped in a haze of firewhisky.
Both men were completely, utterly heartbroken.