When he returns to the dormitory with his hands stuffed in his pockets and a crack in his eyes, Sirius looks more vulnerable than James has ever seen him. "Hey," he says, stubbing at the floor with his toes, and his voice cracks, and James just wants to get up and hold him.

He's been off all day, ever since he had that breakdown in the forest, and it hurts like hell for Sirius to look at him and know James isn't as fine as he keeps claiming and—and they're going to have to talk about it. Oh, god, what James would give not to have to talk about any of it.

"How's Remus?" he asks, grasping at straws.

But Sirius doesn't take the bait. "He's fine. We talked. I apologized. I, um… I need to apologize to you, too."

And oh, shit, they're really doing this. James pulls in a breath and regrets every life choice he ever made that brought him to this moment. There's nothing he wouldn't give to not to have to do this, but—

"No, you don't. I understand why you apologized to Moony, but you and I are—"

"James, be real with me here. You won't touch me anymore. I tried to use Moony to get somebody killed, and ever since, you won't touch me."

"It's not—"

"I'm in love with you," says Sirius.

That shuts James up. His first instinct, of course, is to let Sirius down gently, tell him he doesn't reciprocate, remind him they had an agreement and it wasn't to fall in love because they were straight—but James was Prongs last night, and Prongs felt very, very differently. James still does underneath all of his bullshit.

"I've been in love with you for months, maybe even years," Sirius continues. "I've been in love with you ever since I knew what love was. I was in love with you long before we started messing around, and I tried telling myself I wasn't, and whenever that didn't work, I told myself that it didn't mean to you what it did to me—and then I messed it all up. I ruined it. I ruined us. I was the closest I was ever going to get to you, and I—"

"What?"

Sirius raises his eyebrows. "What?"

"The closest you were ever—what? Do you think I didn't like it? Do you think I don't miss it?"

He hesitates. "Don't you?"

And it suddenly hits James that what he says here—what he says here carves out their whole bloody fate. He can continue to drown himself in denial—of his feelings for Sirius, of his goddamn sexuality, of his own self-loathing running deep in his bones—or he can risk it all and make it real and maybe, maybe, get something beautiful out of it.

He's so tempted to choose door number one. He doesn't.

"I'm in love with you, too," James whispers. "I—and I don't know what that means, okay? I don't know what it means about me when I still like girls, too, and I don't—but I liked it. Okay? I bloody loved it. I couldn't stop thinking about you. I could barely stand to keep my hands off of you every second of the day and save it for when we would…"

Sirius's face has gone very pale. "But we stopped. But you stopped."

James feels like he's going to vomit, he's so nervous, but he can't stop, not now that they're getting somewhere for the first time since October, not now that he loves Sirius and Sirius loves him back. "I was just… I mean, you know what happened. You were there. I couldn't… I don't know why I… but I did."

"I'm sorry, okay?" Sirius croaks. "I'm sorry I did it. I'm sorry I did it to Remus, and I'm even sorry I did it to Snape, and—and I can't show you inside my head, I can't make you believe how much I regret it or how much I hate myself, probably so much more than you ever have—"

"Sirius, I don't—I don't hate you. I just… didn't understand. I don't understand."

James can see the moisture in Sirius's eyes and the dark rings underneath them from the sleepless night he had with Moony and Wormtail while James was locked in the dormitory, pacing the room until his feet were rubbed raw from carpet burn, hyperventilating, crying like a baby. On Sirius, tears look like a beautiful display of vulnerability, but on James, they're nothing but a sign of weakness.

"I still have to catch myself sometimes," whispers Sirius. "I still try to do to other people sometimes what Mum does to me and Regulus. I hurt people horribly, and I don't think anything of it, and I have to—I caught myself too late, after I'd already sent him down there, and then I made you clean up my mess because I can't even—I can't look at myself. I can't look my own mistakes in the face. I wish I could. If I were a good person, I would. I want to be good, but I'm not, and I don't deserve any of you—especially you. You're so good, James, and—"

"What?" interrupts James for the second time tonight. It's starting to click, that Sirius is what James thought he was before they fell into this mess, but in other ways, Sirius is making no sense at all. "I'm good? I'm the worst of all of us. You have a reason for being the way you are—you had a fucked-up childhood with an abusive-ass mum—but my parents were only ever kind to me. They never raised a hand or a wand or their voices, and I still—I treat people like shit. I walk around this castle like I own it, and I never change. If anything, I've just gotten worse."

"But you have lines," Sirius argues. "I crossed a line you never would have crossed, and you—the way you treat your friends—your loyalty—your determination—I would give anything to be you." He takes a deep breath. "I would give anything to have you."

"You shouldn't. I'm the one who doesn't deserve you. I don't deserve anything." That's what this is all about, isn't it?—because mustn't a part of James have known that Sirius was feeling more than he'd said just like James was? He could have had what he'd wanted all along, but he's been denying himself because of this, hasn't he?

Sirius, though, is shaking his head. "You've got it all wrong."

"You've got it all wrong."

They stare at each other for a second—and then Sirius murmurs, "Can we just—can we just have this, even if we don't deserve it? Can we just be happy? Can we…?"

James can feel his face turning beet-red. He cannot believe this is his life. Just minutes ago, he was convinced it was all over, and now—"Like, be together? You and me? Be…?"

Sirius hesitates. "Whatever you want," he finally mutters. "I'll take whatever you'll give me."

And James—suddenly, he can see it again. Suddenly, he can see himself giving Sirius everything.

It's not going to last, he realizes forty-five minutes later when he and Sirius are lying naked and spent and tangled on top of James's bed, Sirius grinning from ear to ear with his head balanced on top of James's chest. They're so repressed that they can't even call each other boyfriends, let alone go public with their relationship—and it's not just that. How is James supposed to hold a relationship together when he can't even hold himself together? How is he supposed to be ready for the kind of commitment that Sirius deserves?—and how is Sirius? James would bet anything that Sirius is no better prepared for this than James is.

If they want this to work, they're both going to have to do some serious, serious work on themselves as people before they can be stable. And James knows he's not capable of it, not now, not fast enough to save this relationship—

—but goddamn if he's not going to take everything he can get in the meantime.

And that's when James remembers he's going to have to break things off with Peter.