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“Fucking hell. Why do you fucking hate me so much, what a piece of shit!”
“Need help?”
Sirius turned with a start and froze when he saw who had spoken to him. There was a gorgeous man standing beside him, a small smile on his lips. He looked in his early twenties, about Sirius’ age. The man was quite tall, and really, really beautiful.
“Hello?”
“Oh. Oh, no, thanks, I can.” He said facing the door again. “It’s just that this door hates me and takes me forever to open it.” As he was struggling to open the door, he thought he could just call James through the intercom, after all, he’d already made a fool of himself.
“D’you want me to try?” The man said after a while, no longer trying to hide his amused smile.
Sirius yanked at the door one last time and stepped away to let him open it himself.
“Um. I don’t have the key, I don’t live here. Can you…?” He motioned to Sirius’ hand to give him the keys.
Sirius handed them over, but they dropped them before the man could take them.
“Fuck. Shit, sorry.”
“Don’t worry.” The man chuckled as he was grabbing the keys from the floor.
He introduced the key in the keyhole and opened the door with such ease it seemed impossible. He held the door open for Sirius and gave him his keys back once they were both inside. The man pushed the elevator button, and Sirius decided to take the stairs, not wanting to ridicule himself any more in front of the man. So after muttering a “Thanks” and “Have a good day” He opened the stairs door and fled upstairs.
He was already huffing and puffing when he reached the fifth floor. Damn James and Lily for living on the ninth floor. However, Sirius didn’t dare to take the elevator in case he stumbled into that man again.
When he -finally- arrived to the ninth floor, he sat on the stairs for a couple of minutes to catch his breath and not look like he just ran for his life. He then got up, opened the stairs door and walked towards his friends’ house. He took his keys out (Lily and James had given a spare key to their apartment as he already spent so much time there) and opened the door, this one without half the struggle.
“I just met the most stunningly beautiful human on Earth and I made a total fool of myself in front of him!” He said as a way of greeting as he was taking his coat and shoes off . “I swear, your door hates me or something, cause that-'' Sirius froze in his tracks.
There, sitting in the living room, holding a cup of coffee and grinning at him, was the man he was just talking about.
“Pads, you alright?” James spoke from the kitchen.
Sirius immediately turned and went there. “Who’s that in the living room?” he inquired in a hushed voice.
“Friend of Lily’s. And mine, actually. Comes from time to time, you’ve never met him before?”
“No.” He replied, maybe a bit too fast.
“That’s weird, considering you practically live here.”
“Where’s Lily, anyway?”
“Bathroom. C’mon, it’s rude to leave him alone.”
They went to the living room and James flopped down on the armchair. Just as Sirius was going to say something, Lily came into the living room.
“Sirius, hi.” he frowned at him, as he was still standing awkwardly in front of the door. “What’s wrong?”
“No, nothing.” he then tried to put on one of his best smiles (he kinda failed) and walked towards the stranger. “Hi. I don’t think we’ve met before, I’m Sirius.”
The man shook his hand and Sirius felt as if he was about to melt, or go flying through the window, or both at the same time.
“Remus.” The man smiled. “You seem kinda familiar, though, you sure we’ve never met?” His tone was innocent, but Sirius could see a mischievous glint in his eyes.
“Nope, I’m sure. Hundred percent. Could’ve been my brother, blood brother, not James.”
The man, Remus, nodded and finally let go of his hand. Sirius sat down on the same couch as him, as both armchairs were occupied by James and Lily. “Okay, then. I’ve heard a lot about you, Sirius. Nice to finally meet you.”
“What’ve you said about me?” Unsurprisingly, it was easier to talk to James than to Remus.
“What were you saying about meeting some angelic human downstairs?” Lily said, ignoring his previous question.
Fuck.
“You heard me?”
“Of course I heard you, you basically yelled that.”
“So?” James said when Sirius didn’t speak.
“‘So’ what?”
“So tell us about him.”
“Oh, there’s no need, really.” Sirius could feel his face grow hotter.
“There’s no need for you to shy away!” Lily insisted.
“Is it because of Remus? Don’t worry about him, he’s a really nice guy.” James looked at Remus for some kind of confirmation, and he held his hands up.
“I’m not going to judge you, I promise!”
Still, Sirius wasn’t talking.
After a good five minutes of insistence, he gave in.
“Fine, I saw a cute guy downstairs and I made a total fool of myself in front of him. Happy?”
“Cute?” Remus said at the same time that James was saying “Pretty sure you said gorgeous.”
Sirius exhaled loudly. “Okay, yeah, he is gorgeous, and cute, and has a really sweet voice, but he must think I’m stupid and clumsy as fuck and he’s probably internally laughing at me or something.”
“Aww,” James and Lily said at the same time. “You’ve got a crush!”
“Shut up. No, shut up !” Sirius’ face was completely red by now.
He heard Remus chuckle beside him (he still refused to look at him) and James held his hands up in surrender.
The evening went by with normality, and Sirius found out Remus was a really snarky guy. He was fluent in sarcasm and made many jokes that had them all clutching at their stomachs. Sirius actually started to loosen up a bit and shot Remus back with equally witted responses. Sure, he was still embarrassed as hell about their first interaction, but Remus didn’t seem to judge him for it.
On one occasion, Lily asked him what he thought of Sirius, and he grinned and said “I think he’s pretty a- door -able! And he’s funny, too, you know that’s one of the many keys to open my heart!” and then he winked at him.
If Sirius hadn’t been so busy getting flustered, he would’ve noticed the earnestness in Remus' voice and his slight blush. James just aww-ed at that and the conversation went on.
“Shit.” Remus said after checking his phone. “I should get going.”
“Oh, no, you’re definitely staying for dinner!” “You can have dinner with us, Rem.” Lily and James said at the same time.
Remus just shrugged and sat back on the couch. “Thanks guys.”
When the couple got up a few minutes later, both Remus and Sirius got up as well, and their friends sat them back down and said “Nope. You’re our guests, you don’t help.”
“I practically live here!” Sirius complained at the same time that Remus was saying “But I always help when I come over!”
“Well,” James clasped his hands. “You are our guest, and you are going to keep him company.” He said, pointing at Remus and then at Sirius. “And don’t break anything.” He added, looking sternly at Sirius before following Lily to the kitchen.
Well, shit. He hadn’t been alone with Remus before (besides downstairs, of course) and he could already feel his heartbeat going faster.
“Wanna watch something while they make dinner?” If they were watching a movie, Sirius thought, then he couldn’t say something stupid.
“Sure.”
As Sirius was going through the movie titles, Remus left the living room and came back with a blanket that Sirius recognised as his own. Well, technically it was the guest room’s, but still. He sat on the couch and pulled the blanket over him, and when Sirius sat down next to him, Remus held a side of the blanket and offered it to him. He took it and covered his legs, not daring to get any closer to Remus.
“What d’you wanna watch?”
“Whatever. You choose.”
They ended up settling for the Neverending Story, and during the beginning song, Remus spoke.
“Hey,” he said softly. “What you said earlier, about me, did you mean it?”
Shit, shit, shit.
“Yeah.”
“Okay. I wasn’t internally laughing at you. Just so you know.”
“Thanks, I guess.”
The first ten minutes of the movie were spent in silence, and then, they started talking about the movie, comparing it to the book, talking about missing details or their favourite scenes. Sirius, surprisingly, didn’t stutter at all and conversation flowed without any struggles.
Halfway through the movie, Sirius made a joke about Engywook and Urgl, which made Remus laugh, and Sirius could’ve sworn the man had shuffled a bit closer to him. Just a little bit, though. The rest of the movie they spent in silence, and Sirius could hear James and Lily talking and laughing in the kitchen.
“What are you going to wish for? ” The Moonchild said through the screen.
Now, for real, Remus shuffled on his seat to face Sirius. “I wish,” he said softly and Sirius turned to look at him, his heart in his throat. “ That you’d go on a date with me because I like you and would really like to know you better.”
“Really?” Sirius said after a beat of silence.
Remus smiled softly and nodded. “If that’s alright with you?”
“Yeah. Sure, yeah. Whe-”
“Boys! We’re eating in the kitchen today, dinner’s ready!” Lily yelled across the apartment.
“I’d love to go on a date with you, Remus.” He said quickly, as if he’d miss his chance, which made the other man smile.
“Coming!” He yelled back at Lily. “Give me your number and we’ll talk about it, yeah?” He handed Sirius his phone and he typed his number in with shaky fingers. He noticed Remus’ smile when he saw he hadn’t written a contact name. “Well,” he smiled. “Dinner time.”
They walked into the kitchen, where a yummy smell filled the room and took a seat.
Sirius kept stealing glances at Remus, still not quite believing that he asked him out on a date.
Remus went home after dinner, and Sirius had to resist the urge to walk him home.
James kept throwing at him sly looks while doing the washing up, and he found it harder and harder to contain his smile and tell him everything, so he decided to go to bed right after finishing.
He got in his bed and smiled when noticed the blanket smelled faintly of Remus. He checked his phone before falling asleep and saw he had a message from an unknown number. He opened it and saw it was a selfie of Remus in front of the door downstairs. He replied with a rolling eyes emoji and finally fell asleep with a soft smile on his lips.
Fucking door.