Work Text:
1. A Folded Note (Never Sent)
June 14, 1976
R—
It is a terrible thing to want someone in every way a person can be wanted and still not be sure if you are allowed.
Your collar was askew at breakfast. You smelled like that damn juniper soap you favor, and I wanted to lean in and bite the space between your shoulder and your throat.
Instead, I hexed Snivellus' cauldron into exploding.
I think you knew why.
I think you always do.
Sometimes, I wonder if you are playing a game with me.
Other times, I know you are not.
—S
2. Overheard, Scrawled in the Margins of a Textbook
Location Unknown, Date Unknown
JAMES POTTER: Why don’t you just tell him?
SIRIUS BLACK: And say what, exactly? “Hello, Moony, I know we’ve been friends for five years, but I’d really like to shove you against a bookshelf and put my hands under your sweater”?
JAMES POTTER:
SIRIUS BLACK:
JAMES POTTER: Okay, so maybe not exactly like that.
SIRIUS BLACK: He wouldn’t want me.
JAMES POTTER: You’re daft.
3. A Diary Entry, Written in Small, Careful Script
Remus Lupin’s Journal, November 1976
I think Sirius is made of stardust and recklessness.
I think he belongs to nothing and no one, except when he looks at me in that particular way, and then, I wonder.
I wonder.
I wonder.
He is a firework and I am a book of damp matches, and yet—
And yet—
I want him.
God help me.
4. A Letter from Sirius to Remus, Never Delivered
December 25, 1977
Moony,
Christmas at the House of Black is as unbearable as ever. My mother screamed at me for an hour over breakfast, my dear brother wouldn't look me in the eye, and I spent most of the day locked in my room, staring at the ceiling, wishing I were anywhere else.
Wishing I were with you.
What are you doing right now? Did you get the book I left on your bed before break? The first edition of Wolfsbane & Moonlight. I know you’ve been wanting it.
I would have stayed at Hogwarts if I could have. Stayed with you.
Last Christmas, I woke up in the dormitory to find you asleep in the chair by the window. The firelight was touching your hair, and I thought: I am doomed.
I think I have always been doomed.
—S
5. An Excerpt from "The Daily Prophet"
November 1, 1981
…Authorities confirm that Sirius Black, close friend to James and Lily Potter, has been arrested for treason and the murder of Peter Pettigrew, as well as the deaths of twelve Muggle bystanders. Witnesses claim that Black was seen laughing at the scene…
6. The Things That Do Not Fit Into an Official Report
Written in Shaky Handwriting on the Back of an Old Photograph
They say Sirius Black killed them.
They say he was always dangerous.
They say they always knew.
(They did not always know. I always knew. And I loved him anyway.)
His hands trembled when he lit cigarettes, and he had the laugh of someone who had never been safe.
He called me “Moony” like it was a prayer, and I let him say my name in the dark.
Once, in fifth year, he kissed my wrist absentmindedly in the library, and my whole body became something new.
These are not things you put in a report.
These are not things anyone asks for.
I do not believe he did it.
I do not believe he did it.
I do not believe he did it.
(But believing and knowing are not the same thing.)
7. A Cell Wall, Scratched with Fingernails
Azkaban, Year Unknown
Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony Moony
8. A Paper Clipped to a Copy of The Quibbler
1995
Remus,
If I make it out of this, I will tell you everything.
I will tell you about the way you taste like salt and copper and first snow, about how I once woke up with my nose pressed against your spine and wanted to stay there forever, about how I wanted you before I had words for wanting.
I will tell you that I was never sorry.
Not for us.
Not even once.
If I make it out of this.
—S
9. A Memory Extracted in a Pensieve
Replayed in Silver Mist
A boy in a dormitory, skin illuminated by moonlight. Another boy beside him, exhaling slow.
“You smell like firewhiskey.”
“You smell like—”
“Like what?”
“Like something I’ll miss.”
A pause. A hesitation. A kiss, quiet, reverent.
(Then, later: a door slamming. Silence. Regret, sharp as teeth.)
10. A Letter Never Opened
Dated the Day Before the Battle
Remus,
It’s going to happen soon. I can feel it in my bones. The way we used to feel the full moon, even before we saw it.
I need you to know that I have loved you across every version of myself. The arrogant boy. The reckless man. The prisoner. The ghost of the boy I used to be. You were the only thing that ever made any of it feel real.
If you read this, and I am gone—
(And I will be gone. You know that, don’t you?)—
Know that I would have chosen you. Again and again and again.
Moony, my Moony.
Goodnight.
—S
11. An Obituary, Clipped and Pressed Between the Pages of an Old Book
Sirius Black, falsely accused and recently exonerated, has been killed in battle.
Remus Lupin has no comment.
12. A Page from an Unfinished Journal
I have lived too long.
I have lost too much.
I do not know how to hold grief without breaking beneath it.
And yet, the other night, I woke up reaching for him.
I thought I heard him laughing.
13. The Last Entry
A Note, Tucked in a Pocket Before the Final Stand
I am coming.
Wait for me.
[End of Archive]
This is a love story, but it is also a tragedy, but it is also a history of two people who never got to have enough time.
This is the way memory works.
This is the way love endures.