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They were at it again. It had started in third year, Sirius had noticed. Remus and Lily would talk, which of course was completely normal, but there was something different about these conversations. They would be somewhere that everyone could hear them: in the common room, the Great Hall, or even in the classrooms, and they would just talk. The problem was, Remus would often glance in Sirius’ direction, confirming his suspicions that they were talking about him, but Sirius couldn’t understand a word that they were saying. It wasn’t as much of an issue at first. In third year, of course Remus and Sirius were good friends, but they were nowhere near as close as they were three years later. In third year, despite James’ constant pining, Sirius didn’t really think much of Lily Evans, and what she said or thought was the least of Sirius’ worries. But now, Lily had finally agreed to go out with James, and was a regular member of any group discussions, and Sirius had some feelings towards Remus that were more than platonic. To be fair, ‘some’ was probably an understatement. Therefore, whatever they were saying about him was more of an issue.
If only they weren't speaking a different language.
He decided to voice his problems to James, one day in the library as they were both struggling over Charms essays.
“Come on, Pads,” James said, “You know a few languages.”
“Well I doubt they’re speaking Latin or Ancient Greek, and they’re not speaking French,” Sirius grumbled.
“How do you know that they’re not speaking French?” James asked, flipping through a library book and scribbling something down on his parchment. Sirius looked up at him in disbelief, rolling his eyes.
“If they were speaking French,” Sirius laughed, “I would be able to understand them, and I wouldn’t be in this position.” James thought about this for a while, before shrugging.
“Fair point, mate.” They sat in silence for a bit, occasionally stopping to share notes, until James spoke up again. “Why don’t you ask other people if they know what language they’re speaking? There must be someone else who speaks more than just English.” Sirius had to admit, it was an excellent idea.
“James, I love you,” he said, jumping out of his seat.
“Yeah I know.”
Sirius burst into the common room, and sure enough, Remus and Lily were mid-conversation, but Sirius still couldn’t work out a word of it. Remus stopped to wave to him from across the room, his amber eyes lighting up, and Sirius tried desperately not to blush. He spotted a head of blonde hair on one of the couches, and managed to get the girl’s attention by yelling, “McKinnon!”
He flopped down next to Marlene, who was sat next to Dorcas. Dorcas was braiding her girlfriend’s hair, and looked up to smile at Sirius as he turned to them.
“Marlene!”
“Black,” she groaned, but there was a hint of a smile on her face.
“I have a question.”
“Be my guest,” she said, allowing him to speak, resting her head on Dorcas’ shoulder as the other girl tied an hair band around the bottom of her hair.
“Okay. I’m trying to work out what Lily and Remus are saying, but they’re speaking a different language, so I need to know if you can understand them.” Marlene seemed to consider this for a few moments.
“Well, I speak Portuguese, apart from English, and they’re definitely not speaking Portuguese, so I can’t help you.” Dorcas also shook her head.
“Sorry, Sirius. I don’t speak an other languages.”
Sirius thanked them both, before disappearing to his dorm. He just wanted to know what Remus was saying about him! Was that too much to ask? He couldn't help but feel upset. Ever since realising his feelings towards Remus, he'd been more concerned about what Remus thought of him, and he's be lying if he said that he had never gone out of his way to impress the other boy. If he was speaking to Lily Evans of all people, instead of the Marauders, then surely that must mean that they were talking about one of the other three. Sirius caught the glances that Remus threw him, making it obvious that whatever they were saying was about him. He just hoped that it wasn't anything bad.
After a while of him lying face-down on his bead with his face in a pillow, Sirius heard the door open.
“You okay, Pads?” said a familiar voice. Sirius rolled over to see Remus leaning against the doorframe, looking as perfect as ever.
“I’m fine,” Sirius smiled. It was difficult not to smile when Remus was around. The boy in question came to sit next to Sirius in his bed, and Sirius had to resist reaching up to move a stray curl from in front of Remus’ eyes.
“Are you sure?”
“I’m just tired,” Sirius told him. Yeah, tired of wanting to know what you’re saying about me! “Thanks, Moony.” Remus smiled down at him, an unreadable expression on his features.
"Remus? Are you okay?" Sirius asked, concerned, lightly resting a hand on Remus' arm. He tried to ignore the butterflies that he got at the contact. Something in Remus seemed to wake up when he heard Sirius' voice, and he snapped out of whatever trance he was in and smiled at Sirius.
"Huh? I'm fine!" Remus said, "Now budge up, I want to lie down." Sirius moved a bit, allowing Remus to lie down next to him. It was weird. Sirius did things like this all the time with James, and even Peter sometimes. However there was something about the other body being Remus' that made Sirius feel all funny inside, even though he knew that it was just another display of platonic affection. He pulled himself out of his spiralling thoughts to feel Remus' head on his chest. The other boy was already fast asleep, their legs intertwined, snoring softly. Remus was clearly exhausted. The full moon had been the day before, and he'd been let out of the hospital wing due to his lack of serious injuries, but you'd have to be blind to miss how his joints creaked when he moved and how he winced after any large movements. There was only so much that the animagi could do to help. Sirius smiled to himself, but he couldn't help but feel sad for Remus. He would swap places with him in an instant, so that Remus didn't have to endure all the pain and suffering that came from being a werewolf, but then he realised that Remus would then have to entail Sirius' psychotic parents and lunatic family, and that was the last thing he would wish upon anyone, especially Remus. Sirius watched the sleeping boy on his chest and sighed. He would do anything at all to help him, to lessen the stress and agony. No, it was more than that. Sirius felt in that moment, like he did every moment, that Remus Lupin deserved the world.
For the second time that week, James Potter had a genius idea. Sirius was once again complaining to him about Remus an Lily's secret conversations. Sirius had his face in a pillow once again, and James was reading a Quidditch magazine that his father had mailed to him, occasionally reading bits of it out loud, but for the most part, they sat in companionable silence.
"What if," James began, immediately getting Sirius' attention, "You speak about him in a different language until he's so annoyed that he has no choice but to tell you."
"Pfft, what am I going to do? Walk around the common room, talking to myself in French and looking like an idiot? Yeah, no thanks."
"Or, you could find someone else who speaks French."
"James, no one else speaks French. If they did, they wouldn't wait until sixth year to tell me."
"I wasn't meaning one of our friends," James continued, giving Sirius a look that said 'How Stupid Can You Be?' Realisation hit Sirius and he stood up and bolted out of the room.
"Thanks Prongs! Genius!" he yelled on his way out, earning him some odd looks from the other Gryffindors in the common room.
Regulus wasn’t difficult to spot in the hallway.
“Brother!” Sirius yelled, earning him an eye roll as the younger boy turned to face him.
“Sirius,” Regulus sighed, but he was laughing.
“I need your help.”
"Merlin, what now? Don't you have somewhere to be? Or some random girl to make out with?" Sirius pretended not to hear the last bit, but Regulus seemed to notice that he'd said something wrong. "I'm kidding, don't worry." Sirius sighed and grabbed his arm.
Sirius took him into a small corridor and explained his plan.
“I need us to talk about Remus in French while he’s within earshot.”
“Why the hell would we do that?”
“Because, he’s talking about me in a language that I don’t understand, and I’ve decided to retaliate.”
"Why do I feel like this is actually James' idea that you've just gone along with because you couldn't thing of anything better on your own."
"No comment," Sirius muttered.
"Ah, well done James," Regulus smiled, a strange look on his face, which made no sense, because it was a similar look that James would have when he was talking about Lily.
"That's besides the point. Are you in?" Regulus just shrugged, before replying in French.
“Alright then.”
They headed down the corridor and Sirius spotted a tall figure and a head of red hair stood together.
“Remus is very handsome,” Sirius proclaimed in French, looking deliberately at the other boy. Remus looked up at Sirius when he heard the noise, but just looked confused and shook his head, before turning back to Lily. The plan was working. Regulus raised an eyebrow at his brother, but didn’t question any of it.
“I really like him,” Sirius continued. “In fact, I’m hopelessly in love with him!” Again, Remus gave him an odd look, but Sirius just smiled and continued to walk down the hall, Regulus at his side.
“Do you really?” asked the younger boy, still in French.
“Do I really what?”
“Love him,” Regulus said, turning to Sirius. Ah. He hadn’t considered that minor detail. Regulus didn’t know. He was completely and utterly screwed, but there was no use in lying now.
“I do,” Sirius whispered, giving him a small smile. Regulus nodded, and grinned, before patting him on the shoulder.
“Good for you,” he said. "If it makes you feel any better, you're not the only one," before nodding and walking over to a classroom and standing next to a blonde boy that Sirius didn't recognise.
"Wait," Sirius said, not yet switching back to English, spinning on his heels to face Regulus again from the other side of the hallway. "What the hell does that mean? Because if you're after my man, I swear to Godric I will drown you." Regulus just shrugged as his brother took off down the hall. Maybe, if Sirius wasn't too busy waving at Remus, he would have noticed Regulus and the blonde boy holding hands in the folds of their robes, and all of his questions would have been answered.
It was a Friday, and for the sixth years of Gryffindor Tower, that only meant one thing: Truth or Dare, and a hell of a lot of firewhiskey. So far, poor Peter had run down the corridor screaming David Bowie lyrics at the top of his lungs, earning him a detention from McGonagall, who seemed to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Additionally, Marlene and Mary had both shared embarrassing stories from their childhoods, and James had improvised a love poem for Lily. When it was Remus' turn, and he selected truth, Sirius had a genius idea of his own.
"Okay Moony. How many languages can you speak?" he asked smugly, earning him a discreet thumbs-up from James and a nod from Dorcas.
"Easy," Remus said, "Three. Damn, Sirius, I thought you'd give me something more scandalous." Sirius shook his head.
"I just want to know what language you and Lily speak together." As soon as the words left his mouth, he regretted them, certain that Remus would be on to him. But much to his surprise, Remus shrugged.
"Welsh."
"Welsh?!" Sirius almost screeched, "How did I not think of that!?"
"I don't know," Remus laughed, shaking his head and looking at Sirius through his fringe in the way that always made Sirius' stomach flip over, "What else would I be speaking? Latin?!" James downed the rest of his drink triumphantly, giving Sirius another look that said 'I Told You So, You Complete Idiot.'
"Look, I knew that you and Lily were Welsh, but I didn't know that you actually spoke it!" Sirius said, trying to defend himself.
"Why didn't you ask?" Lily queried, her accent thicker with the alcohol.
"For this exact reason," Sirius replied, "In case it was something really obvious and I looked like an idiot!" But that wasn't really the case. He just didn't want Remus to know that he cared about what was being said.
"Too late for that, Pads," Remus laughed, ruffling Sirius' hair affectionately from where he sat next to him.
"I think Remus should get another go, since the last one wasn't exciting enough," James declared, and a few others agreed. Remus chuckled, but he accepted.
"Right then," Dorcas piped up, "Truth or dare?"
"Dare," Remus decided. Sirius grinned as he finished his bottle of firewhiskey just as Dorcas reached over to pry it from his grasp.
"Hey! What's that for?" Dorcas placed the bottle in the middle of the circle.
"I dare you to kiss whoever this bottle lands on," Dorcas decided, looking Remus right in the eye.
"This isn't spin the bottle, Cas," Marlene said.
"I know," her girlfriend replied, "But its still a dare." Dorcas smiled wickedly.
"Fine," Remus huffed, but he couldn't help but laugh. All Sirius needed was for it to not land on one person in particular. But of course, since Sirius had spent his whole life having appallingly bad luck, when Dorcas span the empty bottle, it slowed down and landed on him.
Brilliant.
Great.
Just goddamn amazing.
James raised an eyebrow at him, and then whispered something to Lily, who was looking at Remus. Sirius just turned to Remus and let out a nervous laugh, trying to hide the fact that his hands were visibly shaking. It wasn't that he didn't want to kiss Remus, of course, he just didn't want to kiss him in this scenario, but he supposed that he'd have to deal with it. Before he could say or do anything, Remus leant over and placed a quick kiss on his cheek, before pulling away and giving Sirius that lopsided grin that he loved so much.
"Come on!" Marlene groaned, "That doesn't count!"
"It does! You didn't specify where I had to kiss him," Remus pointed out. There was more mock-arguing, but Sirius couldn't hear any of it. Instead, he stood up and announced:
"I'm going to bed," before giving the group a small smile, and not letting his eyes linger on Remus for too long like he usually would. Remus gave him a concerned glance.
"Are you okay?" Remus mouthed, but he looked confused. James gave him another weird look, this one saying, 'Do You Want Me To Come With You?' but Sirius just shot one back that said 'Leave It Please.' He retreated to the dormitory, before burying his face in his pillow. Again. It seemed that Remus was making him do that a lot more than necessary.
The issue was, even though Sirius wasn't totally keen on the idea of Remus kissing him in front of that many people, the fact that Remus didn't even want to kiss him at all had shaken him a little. Okay, a lot. Was it that Remus fancied someone else in the group? It wasn't that Remus was closeted, so that couldn't have been a problem, and Sirius was out to that group as well. Was it that Remus didn't want to mess up their friendship? Although that thought saddened Sirius, it made perfect sense. Or was it that Remus was so disgusted at the prospect of kissing Sirius? Sirius hoped it wasn't the last option, but to be honest, he wouldn't be surprised. He sighed and blinked back tears.
No one brought up the incident, but Sirius couldn't help but notice the looks that Remus gave him: across the dining table, from a couch in the common room. The most irritating part was that Sirius couldn't work out what the looks meant. It was like Remus was speaking a different language again. That was until a few days after.
The two boys were sat alone in the dorm one evening. Remus was reading, and Sirius was levitating one of James’ socks to fly around the room. Sirius was about to ask him what the other language that he spoke was, just in case Welsh wasn't complicated enough and he needed to be prepared. Yet somehow, it was if Remus could read his thoughts, and answered before Sirius coould even ask the question.
"Je parle français, by the way,” Remus said carefully. Sirius sat up immediately, choking on air. There was no way he had just heard Remus Lupin speaking perfect French.
“You what?!”
“Speak French,” Remus continued, flipping the pages of his book and refusing to meet Sirius' eye, “My grandma is from France so she taught me.”
“Why didn’t you say anything!” Sirius squeaked. Remus shrugged, but it was clear that he was trying to hold in a laugh.
“It was funny watching you yell at us and thinking that we couldn’t understand you,” he laughed, “You are very creative with your insults.” Sirius buried his face in his hands. For six years, Remus had spoken Sirius’ first language, and he hadn’t said anything?!
“I hate you,” Sirius grumbled into his hands.
“Well you certainly told Regulus otherwise.” Sirius’ head shot up. He’d forgotten about that. This was very, very bad.
“Oh Merlin,” Sirius groaned, his face heating up, “I’m so sorry. I can explain.”
“It’s fine,” Remus said casually, “Dwi'n meddwl bod dwi'n mewn cariad efo fo .” Sirius recognised it as something he’d said to Lily at one point. He couldn't understand it, so it must have been Welsh.
“You said that to Lily,” he accused. Remus nodded softly.
“Do you know what it means?” he asked Sirius. Sirius shook his head.
“Of course I don’t know what it means!”
“It means, ‘I think I’m in love with him’,” Remus translated. Sirius turned to look at him. This was new.
“You think you’re in love with who?” Sirius asked, his voice barely a whisper. Remus looked at him in shock, before throwing his head back and laughing.
“You, you idiot.”
“Me?” Sirius said, still unsure. His heart was beating out of his chest, so loud that he was certain Remus could hear it.
“Yes,” Remus smiled, “You.” There were so many emotions flooding Sirius' brain that he could barely think. Remus was in love with him? Somehow, though he only had one question.
"If you like me, why didn't you kiss me in Truth or Dare?" Remus just smiled his familiar lazy smile.
"Simple. Because I didn't want the first time I properly kissed you to be a dare. I wanted it to be real." Remus spoke Sirius' exact thoughts, but of course he wasn't going to tell him that.
"Are you saying that you want to kiss me again?" Sirius smirked, winking at Remus. Remus blushed and laughed.
"That is exactly what I'm saying," he said. He stood up and walked over to Sirius' bed, pulling him up, and straight away pressed their lips together. Sirius could have sworn that he was in heaven, as he ran his hands through Remus' curls like he'd wanted to do for so long. They broke apart, and the first thing either of them did was laugh, pressing their foreheads together as Remus wrapped his arms around Sirius' waist. It was at that moment that the door opened, and James was stood looking incredibly smug.
"Lily!" he bellowed down the stairs, "I was right!" And then he winked dramatically at the pair and disappeared again. Sirius laughed into Remus shoulder. Remus picked up his wand and charmed the door shut again, locking it this time as well, before kissing Sirius again.
"Remus?" Sirius asked as they were lying together on his bed.
"Hmm?"
"Does this mean that we can speak to each other in French now?" Remus laughed and planted another kiss to Sirius' lips.
"Sure."
"It can be like a secret language!"
"Well," Remus pointed out," Its not exactly secret. Its French, for Merlin's sake."
"Yeah, but we can annoy James and Peter with it!"
"That's true."
"We'll just have to avoid Reg, otherwise he'll understand us."
"Again," Remus laughed, "Very true."
They lay in silence for a while, until Sirius broke it again.
"Hey Moony?"
"Yeah?"
"Je t'aime."