Work Text:
There was a scratching at the cottage door. The sound caught the breath at Remus’s throat: he had been waiting for it for days. He lay his book aside and hurried over, but hesitated before he turned the handle to take a deep breath. He opened the door a crack, letting in a shower of icy raindrops and a gust of the wind that howled around the cottage. Huddled in the doorway, tail firmly between his legs and body hunched against the cold despite his shaggy fur, was a large dog.
“Padfoot.”
Remus grinned and stepped back, ignoring the cold in favour of pulling open the door to admit his friend. Padfoot shot inside and immediately shook himself, spraying mud and water across the kitchen. Remus shoved the door back into its frame, shutting out the cold, and surveyed the damage.
“I suppose you’re pleased with yourself.” Padfoot’s tongue lolled in a doggy grin. Remus laughed despite the mess and shook his head. “I’ll go and run you a bath. You stay in here,” he said, emphasizing the command in the hopes that it would sink in, “Until I’ve got you a towel, at least.”
Patfoot barked once and went over to the aga, which was still warm, where he curled up. His bright eyes remained open, however, with a hangdog expression that made Remus hurry rather more than he had been planning to. When he returned with a large towel, Padfoot rose to his feet, tail wagging enthusiastically and coating the aga in a splattering of muddy water. Remus held the towel out.
“Come on, change. My best towels aren’t being wasted on a dog.”
“Wasted?” Sirius said indignantly a moment later as he stepped into the warm folds of the towel and pulled it tight around his shoulders. The transformation had made him no dryer. His shoulder-length hair was plastered to his scalp and neck in thick, dirty strands, and his clothes were in no better shape. He was shivering from head to foot, which Remus hadn’t noticed when he was in dog-form, but he was smiling. “I’ll have you know that I’ll have only the best – in dog or human form.”
“Of course, Sirius,” Remus laughed and patted Sirius on the head, almost as he would Padfoot. The other man ducked out from under his hand, glaring indignantly. Before he could protest, however, Remus grabbed him around the towelled shoulders and steered him towards the fire in the living room. “Come on, let’s get you warm.”
“Bath?” Sirius said hopefully, his eyes drawn to the stairs as they passed. “I hate to be pushy, but personal hygiene hasn’t been high on my list of priorities and I’ve got mud in places I didn’t think it could even get into …”
“You’ll have to wait while it runs,” Remus said, setting his friend down on the chair nearest the fire and ignoring the dirty footprints he had left on the wooden floor and across the rug, and the drips from his robes that were running into a pool at his feet. He couldn’t help but notice that he had no shoes.
“And you call yourself a wizard,” Sirius said, rubbing at his face and arms with the towel and shifting fractionally closer to the warmth of the fire. Remus watched him closely. Even in the golden light, his skin looked pale and thin.
“Says the man who used to complain that the water in the Prefects’ Bathroom ‘didn’t feel right’ because it was enchanted,” he teased gently. Sirius flashed him a grin.
“Needs must, and all that, Moony,” he replied. Despite all his complaints, Sirius had never passed up an opportunity to wheedle the password out of Remus and take advantage of the Prefects’ Bathroom. Remus smiled at the memory.
“That was hardly need, Sirius,” he said firmly. “That was just you being contrary. Breaking rules for the sake of it.”
“You sound like McGonagall,” Sirius grumbled, though without any real anger. His body convulsed in a shiver that made Remus frown. Outside, the storm moaned against the eaves. Sirius threw a filthy look at the curtained window and sniffed. “Bloody weather. It was fine until I got out into the wild, then this kicked off.”
“Come on, your bath will be nearly ready,” Remus said, his frown deepening as the other man sniffed again and wiped his nose on his sleeve.
Sirius levered himself to his feet with a groan and stood hunched for a moment, his muscles obviously starting to stiffen from the exertion in the cold. Remus started towards the stairs, glancing fretfully back at Sirius every few steps to make sure he was all right. At the top, he hurried into the bathroom and shut off the taps, hastily waving his wand at the water to top it up and ensure that it wouldn’t cool. Sirius staggered in and gave the steaming bath full of bubbles a hungry look. Remus smiled at him.
“I’ll leave you to it,” he said. Already, Sirius had discarded the towel to the floor. He sidestepped around him to reach the door. “Clean towels in the cupboard. You can borrow some clothes – my room’s at the end of the hall. I’ll be downstairs if you need anything.”
He was about to close the door behind him when Sirius called his name. He looked up and for a moment Sirius just stared at him. Then he murmured, “Thanks.”
“You don’t need to thank me,” Remus replied, and closed the door before Sirius could say anything else. He hung around on the landing for a moment before realising that Sirius was probably waiting to hear his footsteps on the stairs just as he was waiting to hear Sirius get into the bath. He went back down to the living room and tried to settle himself with his book again.
His mind kept returning to Sirius, worrying that he might have made himself ill, battling through the storm to reach the safety of the cottage. After a few minutes, he abandoned the book again and went to the kitchen to raid his medicine cupboard. It took him a while, but eventually he found a bottle of Pepperup Potion hiding at the back behind the large quantities of bandages.
He thought about waiting until Sirius got out of the bath, but then remembered that the potion worked better the earlier it caught the cold and went straight upstairs. He hesitated outside the bathroom door before knocking.
“Sirius?”
“Yeah?”
“Can I come in? I’ve got you some Pepperup Potion.”
“Yeah, OK.”
Remus hesitated again, then swallowed his nerves and opened the bathroom door. Sirius was lying in the bath with the water up to his chin. His hair was clean now, and his skin had a healthy flush of colour thanks to the hot water. The bubbles covered most of his body from view, but what Remus could see was painfully thin. He stepped closer and held out the bottle, feeling suddenly awkward. Sirius was, after all, naked and in the middle of a bath – and despite his changed appearance, he was still Sirius, the young man whose smile had once made Remus’s heart leap in his chest.
“Here you go.”
Sirius opened his eyes and lifted one arm out of the tub to take the bottle. He unscrewed the cap and downed it on one, gasping as the potion took immediate effect and shot steam out of his ears. Remus smiled and took the bottle back, turning to go.
“So, where am I sleeping?” Sirius asked, leaning his head back on the edge of the tub but keeping his eyes open. Remus paused. “Sofa?”
“No,” Remus replied. Until Sirius had actually arrived, he was going to give him the bed in the spare room. He was fairly sure Sirius would be happy with just that, hard mattress and all, but he couldn’t bring himself to put Sirius in the narrow bed amongst all the stuff he didn’t use any more but couldn’t bring himself to throw away. He smiled and said, “You can have my bed. I’ll sleep in the spare room – don’t argue, Sirius.”
Sirius sat up in the bath and twisted to face Remus fully. Remus’s eyes were drawn to the bubbles that clung to his chest and slid down his skin towards the water. “Look, you don’t have to. I don’t want to put you out –”
“You’re not. And I know I don’t have to, but I’m going to,” he replied firmly, dragging his eyes back to Sirius’s face and hoping he hadn’t noticed his attention waver. “I’m going to make you some soup. You can have it in bed, if you like.”
“Now you’re just spoiling me,” Sirius said with a smile as he lay back in the hot water. Remus grinned without answering and headed back downstairs.
*
The next morning, Sirius stumbled downstairs around eleven o’clock carrying the bowl and plate Remus had left in the bedroom the night before and wearing an old pair of pyjama bottoms. He put them in the sink with a clatter and took a seat opposite Remus. He gestured to the Daily Prophet that Remus was reading.
“Anything interesting?”
“The usual: nothing about Voldemort or Harry, or anything,” Remus replied with a sigh, closing the paper and pushing it aside. “Sleep well?”
“Very,” Sirius replied with a deeply contented smile. He stretched his arms above his head, and Remus couldn’t help but notice the way his ribs pushed against his skin. He forced himself to look back at Sirius’s face and smile.
“I’m glad. Breakfast?”
“I’ll do it,” Sirius said half-heartedly, but Remus had already got up. He smiled at his friend.
“It’s fine, Sirius,” he murmured, flicking his wand at the pans on the aga, which were still warm from preparing his own breakfast. As they began to heat again, he got bacon, eggs and sausages from the fridge and took them over to the now sizzling pans. “Tea?”
“Please,” Sirius said. Remus put the food in the pans and turned to flick on the kettle before retrieving his empty mug from the table and another from the cupboard. He glanced over at Sirius and found him watching. As soon as he was caught, he looked away.
“Did you manage to contact everyone?” he asked quietly. When Sirius had left Hogwarts following the disastrous third task of the Triwizard Tournament, he had come to Remus’s home first of all and briefly explained his mission. He had left almost immediately after, promising to return once his task was complete and the old members of the Order were aware of the situation. The night before, Sirius had looked too tired for Remus to question, but his curiosity couldn’t keep him from asking now.
“Pretty much,” Sirius replied. “I have you to thank for that – I never would have found some of them, if you hadn’t told me where to look. My addresses are thirteen years out of date …”
“Was there anyone you couldn’t find?” Remus asked, taking a plate from the cupboard and transferring the bacon, eggs and sausages onto it. He passed the plate to Sirius, who snatched up the cutlery on the table and immediately began to eat.
“This is good,” Sirius said around a mouthful. He closed his eyes and chewed blissfully for a moment before swallowing to answer the question. “Mundungus Fletcher posed a bit of a problem – I had to skulk around Knockturn Alley for about three days before he turned up.”
“Lovely,” Remus said sarcastically as he poured hot water into the mugs, followed by milk and a generous helping of sugar in Sirius’s. He took the tea over to the table and sat down. “But you found him?”
“Yeah – gave him a fright though.” Sirius let out a bark of laughter, his grey eyes twinkling. “He thought I was a Grim.”
Remus smiled over the rim of his mug. “Feeling twitchy, was he?”
“Seemed to think his time had come,” Sirius chuckled, spearing the last of his second sausage. “Fell to his knees – in Knockturn Alley, and you know what a filthy hole it is – and started begging forgiveness for all his crimes, if only the Grim would leave him be.”
“You did reveal yourself, of course,” Remus said a little reproachfully, though he couldn’t help but smile at the thought. Mundungus was crooked through and through, and a little fright wouldn’t have done him too much harm. Besides, it was good to see Sirius smiling again.
“Oh, of course,” Sirius said, schooling his expression into one of pure virtuousness that was spoiled only by the sparkle of mischief in his eyes. “After he’d promised never to do another dirty deal.” He snorted. “I bet that lasted all of five minutes.”
“How?” Remus asked, leaning forward across the table. “You could hardly transform in the middle of a public place – even in Knockturn Alley.”
“Well, no,” Sirius replied. He paused to wolf down the last of his fried eggs, then said, “I had to be careful every time I revealed myself – I could never be sure whether the old crowd would believe me. Most of the time I just had to risk it and hope they wouldn’t stun me and call the Ministry on sight.”
Remus’s stomach twisted. He wondered if Dumbledore had thought about the risks of sending Sirius out alone to talk to the old members of the Order, most of whom would naturally think him a traitor, as Remus himself had for so long. After a moment, Sirius continued.
“Thankfully, no one did. I think Dumbledore might have sent out some feelers – told a few people the truth of what happened with – with Peter.” Sirius paused, his jaw clenched. He very deliberately lay down his knife and fork and took a long sip of tea before he continued. “Anyway, whether he did or not, people believed me. As for Dung, I grabbed his robes – as a dog, I mean – and dragged him into the darkest bit of Knockturn Alley I could find before I changed, then demanded that he Apparate us somewhere safe. I think he was too scared and relieved I wasn’t a Grim to do anything other than what he was told, by that point.”
“Dangerous,” Remus murmured. “You never know who’s watching in Knockturn Alley.”
“I know, but what choice did I have? No one knew where Dung was – I just had to follow his trail, and it led me there and then stopped dead,” Sirius replied. He grabbed his fork again and began stabbing at the last bits of food on his plate. “I did what I had to do.”
“It was brave of you,” Remus said quietly. Sirius looked up, frowning, and Remus smiled at him. “Don’t look at me like that – you could have been sent back to Azkaban. And even if you weren’t, your Animagus form could have been reported to the Ministry.”
“They wouldn’t believe it,” Sirius said with a shrug, turning his attention back to his plate. He chased the last burnt fragments of bacon around it with his fork. “Anyway, I would have got away.”
Remus let the subject drop. He could see the tenseness around Sirius’s shoulders and the haunted look returning to his eyes, and he didn’t want to press the matter. Instead, he got to his feet and asked, “Would you like some more?”
Sirius looked up at him, a hopeful expression on his face. “Please.”
*
The rest of the day passed fairly uneventfully. Sirius had another bath just because the luxury was there, and filled Remus in on what the rest of the old members of the Order of the Phoenix had been doing since the society had been disbanded. By the evening, Sirius was looking far more content than he had the day before. Remus was fairly sure that the three square meals, the clean clothes, the roof over his head and the promise of a real bed that night had quite a lot to do with his high spirits.
They sat in front of the fire in the living room after dinner, Remus pretending to read his book and Sirius sprawled on the rug. After a few minutes, he murmured, “Remus?”
“Yes?” he replied, looking over the top of his book at his friend. Sirius regarded him upside down for a moment, then rolled over onto his stomach and propped himself up on his elbows.
“Can I borrow your wand?”
It dawned on Remus that his friend’s wand must have been destroyed when he was taken away to Azkaban, and that he probably hadn’t had one in his possession since the night – over a year ago now – when he had realised that Peter Pettigrew was still alive, and Sirius innocent. He pulled his wand out of his pocket and handed it over.
“Thanks,” Sirius said roughly as he sat up to take it. “Look, I won’t break anything –”
“I didn’t think you would,” Remus replied mildly, turning his attention back to his book. He heard Sirius muttering under his breath and peered over the top of its pages in time to see light burst from the end of his wand. He smiled and watched as Sirius’s face broke into a grin and he began to cast a sequence of random spells – with mixed success, thanks to his lack of any practice for almost fourteen years, and the complexity of some he chose. He seemed mostly contented with his display, however, and although he swore when they occasionally backfired, the smile never really left his face.
Eventually, he flicked the wand in the direction of the kitchen and said, “Accio chocolate.”
Remus grinned and buried his nose in his book. A moment later, the slab of Honeydukes chocolate Remus had been keeping in a kitchen drawer sailed into the living room and landed in Sirius’s lap. He chuckled and reached up to tug the book out of Remus’s hands.
“You’ve been holding out on me,” he said, waving the chocolate bar at him. Remus snatched for it, but Sirius held it out of his reach and unwrapped it himself, breaking off a chunk and tossing it over. “I knew you’d have some somewhere.”
“You could have just asked,” Remus said with a smile, breaking off a square of chocolate from the strip and throwing it back in Sirius’s direction. The other man dived to the side instinctively and caught it in his mouth. Remus laughed, remembering the many times both Sirius and James had entreated him and Peter to throw various sweets at them to hone their catching skills in the Gryffindor common room. Suddenly it didn’t seem all that long ago. “You still haven’t lost your touch, I see.”
“One of my many talents,” Sirius grinned, giving a small bow.
“So I see.” Remus broke off a piece of chocolate from himself and ate it. “You do know you’re depleting my supplies of comfort food.”
“We can order more,” Sirius said with a half-shrug, biting a large mouthful of chocolate straight from the bar. “Honeydukes still does owl-order, don’t they?”
“Yes, they do,” Remus said with a sigh. Truth be told, he couldn’t technically afford Honeydukes finest chocolate – especially now he was out of work again – but he wasn’t going to tell Sirius that. The other man was looking at him piercingly, however, and seemed to guess what he was thinking.
“I’ll pay for it,” he muttered, swallowing the chocolate. “Least I can do, what with you putting me up and everything.”
“It’s no trouble,” Remus insisted, eating another square of chocolate.
Sirius shook his head and put the bar of chocolate down, crawling forward and folding his arms across Remus’s knees. “It is, though. Look, I know Dumbledore sort of sprang me on you –”
“It’s fine –”
“– and I really do appreciate it –”
“– Sirius, really, you don’t have to –”
“– and I know you probably don’t have the money to –”
“It’s not always about money, Sirius!” Remus snapped. “Anyway, I have most of my wages from Hogwarts last year saved. And even if I didn’t, I’d happily let you stay here for as long as you need or want to.”
Sirius was silent for a while, his large grey eyes staring up at Remus. He found that he couldn’t meet Sirius’s gaze, however, and stared instead into the fire. The guilt he felt at believing that Sirius could have betrayed his friends had welled up inside him again and tightened his throat. There was no way he could ever make up for that, but he could try; putting Sirius up was the least he could do. He swallowed hard and waited. Eventually, Sirius patted his knee as he moved back and said, “I’m still buying you a massive hamper of Honeydukes chocolate.”
Remus’s lips turned up into a small smile. “I suppose I could allow that.”
He glanced at Sirius and saw him grin before taking another bite out of the chocolate. He bent to pick up his book from the floor and flipped to the right page again, settling back in his chair.
“Don’t hog the chocolate,” he said softly. Sirius rose to his feet and came over to sit on the arm of the chair, holding the bar close to Remus’s face. He glanced up with raised eyebrows and Sirius wiggled the bar slightly. Remus took the bait and bit a chunk out of the bar.
“What are you reading?”
“Sherlock Holmes,” Remus replied, closing the book around his thumb to keep his place while he showed Sirius the cover. “It’s by a Muggle, I don’t think you’d like it.”
“You calling me anti-Muggle?” Sirius teased, giving Remus a nudge. The other man chuckled and shook his head.
“No. I’m just saying that you’d complain that they weren’t using spells to make their lives easier all the way through,” he replied. “You remember when I leant you The Wizard of Oz?”
“Well, it was stupid,” Sirius snapped as he broke off another piece of chocolate and held it out for Remus to eat. “As if anyone would believe he was a wizard! He didn’t even do any magic!”
“This is why you and Muggle literature don’t get on, Sirius,” Remus said, but before he could open the book again, Sirius looked down at the cover and frowned.
“Huh. Looks like Padfoot,” he said with a huff of laughter, peering at the black dog that took up much of the cover alongside the two men, one wearing a deerstalker and the other a bowler hat. Remus smiled.
“That’s the Hound of the Baskervilles,” he said. He glanced up at Sirius’s curious expression and smiled, holding out the book. “Here. Have a look, if you want. I’ve read it before, I don’t mind.”
Sirius took the book but didn’t move from the arm of the chair as he flicked to the front and started to read. Remus smiled as his friend leaned a bony elbow on his shoulder to prop up the book in front of him. He reached across and grabbed the forgotten bar of chocolate, breaking off another piece and eating it.
*
It was the middle of the night. Remus couldn’t quite put his finger on what had woken him. The cottage was silent and dark around him, and even the wind was quiet. He sat up and ran a hand over his face, reaching for the clock on the bedside to check the time.
His hand froze over the clock as a low moan reached his ears. He grabbed his wand instinctively and got out of bed, padding out into the hall and along the corridor, lighting his wand as he went. As he approached the door to his own bedroom, where Sirius was sleeping, he could hear a soft, dog-like whimpering on the other side. He frowned and knocked softly on the door.
“Sirius?”
There was no answer. He opened the door anyway and stepped inside.
Sirius was lying on the bed, the blankets tangled around his body. He was shivering, his face crumpled into an expression that mixed fear with anger. He was whimpering low in his throat, obviously trapped in a nightmare. Remus strode across the room and sat down on the edge of the bed, putting his wand down on the bedside table before he reached out for Sirius’s shoulder.
The moment he touched his skin, Sirius convulsed, letting out a frightened yell. “No,” he sobbed, wrenching his shoulder out of Remus’s grip. “No, please –”
“Sirius,” Remus said as gently as he could, reaching out for him again. “Sirius, wake up.”
This time he caught Sirius by both the shoulders and shook him gently. Sirius flinched, scrabbling at his arms in an attempt to dislodge him, pleas tumbling from between his lips.
“Sirius!” Remus shouted, and finally the other man’s eyes snapped open. He gave another yell and struggled harder. Remus squeezed his shoulders and said loudly, “Sirius, it’s me, calm down.”
In the dim light still cast by Remus’s wand, Sirius’s eyes scanned over Remus’s face and finally he relaxed. He was breathing fast and hard and his eyes skittered towards the dark corners of the room. He gave Remus a much gentler shove and he finally released him so that Sirius could sit up.
“Dementors,” he croaked by way of an explanation, rubbing at his face with both hands. Remus could see his hands shaking as he pressed his fingers into his eyes. Remus recognised the gesture from their school days: Sirius only did that when he was trying not to let his emotions get the better of him. He swung his legs up onto the bed and wrapped an arm around his friend’s back, rubbing gently. Sirius leaned into him, turning his face into Remus’s shoulder as if to hide there. Remus rested his chin against Sirius’s forehead.
“It was just a dream, Sirius,” he murmured. “You’re safe here.”
Sirius laughed humourlessly and shook his head. “No – I’m just endangering you. If I’m found –”
“You won’t be,” Remus reassured him. He stroked Sirius’s hair with his free hand, running his fingers into the strands. Sirius slid his arms around his waist and snuggled a little closer, sniffing against his shoulder. Remus ignored the damp patch he was leaving on his t-shirt.
Sirius took a shaky breath and said quietly, “They were trying to kiss me.”
“I won’t let that happen,” Remus said, tightening his arm around Sirius for a moment. He felt Sirius shiver against him and stroked his hair again.
“Normally, I sleep as Padfoot – I don’t dream as much when I’m in dog form – they’re never as bad, anyway,” he said. Remus heard him swallow hard. “I didn’t want to mess up your bed.”
“Come on,” Remus murmured, his throat tight. He hated to see Sirius like this, haunted by nightmare echoes of his time in Azkaban; he hated even more the admission that such dreams were frequent. “Lie back down.”
Sirius clutched at his t-shirt suddenly, pressing his face into Remus’s neck and whispering, “Don’t go.”
His voice sounded so urgent and his grip was so desperate that Remus couldn’t refuse. He ran his fingers through Sirius’s hair again. “Shh, I won’t go anywhere. Come on …”
He gently laid Sirius back against the pillows and disentangled himself from his arms for long enough to slip between the covers. He grabbed his wand and extinguished the light at the end before he lay back. In the darkness close by, he heard Sirius sniffle.
“You remember at Hogwarts?” he asked, trying to remind his friend of happier times. “We’d stay up all night plotting, and somehow you’d end up falling asleep in somebody else’s bed – usually mine.”
Sirius gave a watery laugh. “You didn’t mind.” There was a pause, then Sirius added, “We didn’t have so much room back then, though.” Remus heard a rustle of blankets and suddenly felt Sirius’s body close against his. The end of Sirius’s nose pressed against his. “It was more like this, remember?”
He felt Sirius’s arm snake around his waist and stilled instantly, unsure what to expect. Sirius ducked his head, pressing close into the hollow beneath Remus’s chin. After a moment of squirming that pressed them close from chest to knees, he settled. Remus let his arm hover in the air above the covers, unsure whether to dare wrapping it around Sirius’s back to hold him. At school, this had been somehow acceptable – perhaps, as they grew up, because the beds in Gryffindor Tower weren’t really big enough for two boys – but now, when there was space and they were grown men, it felt strange to have Sirius so close, especially after twelve years of estrangement. When he didn’t move, Sirius took a sharp breath.
“You can tell me to piss off, if you want,” he said hoarsely. The vulnerability in his tone made Remus’s decision for him. He dropped his arm, curling it around Sirius and tangling his fingers in the hair at the base of his skull.
“Good night, Sirius,” he murmured, closing his eyes. He felt rather than heard Sirius sigh and relax against him. Remus sighed and let the tension dissipate from his muscles, allowed his chin to rest on the top of Sirius’s head. He felt Sirius’s breathing slowly even out into the slow rhythm of sleep, but it took him much longer to drift off into dreams.
*
Remus woke when sunlight shone through the crack in his curtains into his eyes. He could feel a warm body against his own, soft breaths against his collarbones. Sirius was still lying peacefully against him, though they had shifted in the night so that he was half on top of Remus. He smiled and stroked the other man’s dark hair.
Sirius squirmed against him, humming softly. Remus smiled and murmured, “Good morning.”
“Shh,” Sirius replied. “You smell the same.”
Remus laughed in confusion, frowning. “What?”
“You smell the same as you did at Hogwarts,” Sirius elaborated. Remus could feel his lips moving against the exposed skin of his neck. “If I keep my eyes closed, I can pretend we’re still in the dormitory, and in a minute James is going to get back from early-morning Quidditch practice and drag us down to breakfast …”
Sirius’s voice caught on the words. Remus couldn’t help the lump that sprang to his own throat at the thought. He still had one arm looped loosely around Sirius’s body, which he tightened. “You have to open them some time.”
“Five minutes?” Sirius pleaded, but Remus pulled away from him and rolled onto his side to face him. Sirius had his eyes screwed tightly shut as if in defiance of reality. Remus stroked his hair off his face.
“Sirius,” he murmured, threading his fingers into the other man’s hair and scratching his fingertips against his scalp. Sirius hummed in pleasure, his eyes relaxing slightly. “Sirius, please …”
Slowly, and with great reluctance, Sirius cracked open his eyes. For a long moment, they simply stared at each other. Finally, Sirius said, “That was the first good night’s sleep I’ve had as a human since before Azkaban.”
The admission made Remus’s stomach turn over. The thought of Sirius suffering from nightmares so consistently made him feel sick. He stroked through his hair again, compulsively.
“Thank you for staying with me,” Sirius added. The end of his nose bumped against Remus’s and he pulled back a little, laughing softly, and looked down at the pillows. “Sorry.”
“You never did have any concept of personal space,” Remus murmured. It was part of the reason why Sirius had been so happy to invade other people’s beds and sprawl himself all over them for the night throughout their schooldays. Sirius smiled and glanced up at him. Remus tightened his fingers against his scalp, drawing him closer again. “I’m used to it.” He could feel Sirius’s breath against his lips. “And if it helps you sleep, I don’t mind.”
He saw Sirius’s eyes flick down towards his mouth and felt his heart clench, not entirely unpleasantly. He licked his lips and tried to ignore that Sirius’s nose was brushing against his own.
“Moony?” Sirius murmured. “Remus?”
“Yeah?” Remus replied, licking his lips again. He felt suddenly very aware of Sirius’s fingers at the hem of his t-shirt, drawing tiny circles on the strip of bare flesh between it and the waist of his pyjama bottoms.
“You can tell me to piss off, if you want,” Sirius murmured, his voice low and his eyes no longer locked with Remus’s but instead fixed on his mouth. Before Remus could reply, he closed his eyes and pressed their lips together in a brief kiss. He pulled back only a fraction and let out a shaky breath that Remus instinctively gasped into his own lungs.
“Sirius,” Remus said softly, tangling his fingers in the other man’s hair. “Don’t piss off, all right?”
He felt Sirius grin as he leaned into another kiss, this one longer and deeper. Sirius’s teeth scraped over his bottom lip, and then he found himself on his back, Sirius’s body pressing him down into the mattress and the pillows. He sighed as they broke apart and stared up into Sirius’s sparkling grey eyes.
“I missed you,” Remus admitted quietly. He wanted to apologise again for believing Sirius to be a traitor, but the words caught in his throat. Instead, he drew Sirius into another languid kiss and sighed into his mouth, catching Sirius’s answering sob of pleasure between his lips and swallowing it thickly.
After a few moments, Sirius pulled back and looked down at him. “Is this OK?”
“Are you OK?” Remus asked quietly. He knew where he stood on kissing Sirius, but he hadn’t expected to ever be allowed. In the past, Sirius had never shown any interest – but now his cheeks were flushed and his breathing heavy, his eyes lidded with pleasure. Remus licked his lips and watched as Sirius’s gaze followed the drag of his tongue.
“Yeah,” Sirius breathed. “I just – Remus.” He looked back up into Remus’s face, frowning slightly as though he couldn’t quite think of the right words. “Remus, I …”
“Sirius,” Remus said calmly, “Are you OK with this? Really OK?”
“Yes,” Sirius replied. He raised a hand and stroked the knuckles down his cheek, then pushed his fingers under the neck of Remus’s t-shirt to find the series of puncture scars that Padfoot’s teeth had left in the flesh of his shoulder in their seventh year. He laughed softly. “You know, it nearly killed me, thinking you were a traitor. James never thought you were, but once I had it in my head, I just …”
“James had more sense than the both of us put together,” Remus said quietly. He removed his hands from Sirius’s hair and slid them onto his bare shoulders, then around to skim down the sides of his chest.
Sirius shifted to one side and lay down again, tugging on Remus’s shoulder until he rolled over and they were face to face again. He nuzzled into a series of fresh kisses, each one deeper than the last. Remus gave in to the urge to touch him and let his fingers explore every inch of exposed skin, lingering at the places that made Sirius gasp or squirm against his body. Finally, he pulled back and Sirius whimpered in displeasure.
“Breakfast?” he suggested.
“Later,” Sirius growled as he rolled onto his back, pulling Remus on top of him and threading his fingers into his hair to drag him into a deep kiss. Remus chuckled against his mouth and gave in to the warm body beneath him and the lips insistent against his own.