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Remus loves his friends. Truly, undeniably loves them all to bits. He loves seeing them, talking to them, drinking with them. That’s what he was doing now, actually, nursing a bottle of Firewhiskey that James, or maybe Sirius managed to sneak into the castle.
They were all sitting around the fire. Lily, Mary and Marlene lying cozy on the couch, already in their pyjamas but laughing around their own glasses of some kind of alcohol they brought down from their stash in their dorm.
James was lying on the floor, head pressed up against the bottom of the couch, arms straight up into the air as he used his hands to show Marlene a new Quidditch manoeuvre he was thinking of trying out. In the morning. Because James can drink for hours at night and still manage to wake up with the sun and hop on a broomstick, and not fall off.
Remus falls off a broomstick stone cold sober, in the afternoon. 3 feet off the ground, even. But he doesn’t want to talk about that.
Peter is sitting in the armchair closest to the fire, and Remus is jealous. He’s freezing actually, and that armchair is always his favourite place to curl up with a book and relax. But Peter beat him to it today, and Remus has resigned himself to sitting cross- legged on the floor next to James’ feet.
Remus isn’t exactly sure where Sirius went. The boy had gotten up some 15 minutes ago claiming he needed to ‘get something from the dorm’ and hasn’t come back down to the common room since. Not exactly weird territory for Sirius, but it’s unlike him to leave his alcohol behind when there’s always the risk of James or Marlene capitalising on his absence and stealing it.
Remus eyes Sirius’ cup. There’s some kind of pink liquid in it, and Remus is captivated for a moment watching the spirals swirl around. It looks fruity, and Remus would much rather be drinking that than taking what are practically shots of Firewhiskey right from the bottle. They’d run out of cups and Remus had gotten the short end of the stick. He’d grumbled about it at the time but no one really paid him much mind, and Peter just stuck his tongue out at him from where he’d taken the last cup. Remus was getting increasingly exasperated with Peter tonight, apparently.
The problem is that Remus doesn’t even like Firewhiskey, hearing too many stories of people getting up to some crazy stuff after having too much. But, the full moon was just two nights ago, and Remus missed his friends. Sue him for being a little more flexible.
“Alright, this is getting boring,” James declares, clapping his hands together and sitting up from the floor, “plus I’m getting headspins from lying down.” He points at Mary, who’s chipping away at her purple nail polish. “Truth or dare, Macdonald?”
Mary immediately rises to the bait, which Remus knew she would because it’s Mary. And she’s drunk.
“Dare, Potter. Start us off strong here.” Remus snickers at her immediate response. Mary Macdonald, ever the confident one.
James smirks from his place on the floor. “I dare you to send an owl to Slughorn, anonymously asking him for private potions tutoring.” He finishes the last bit with air quotes and a wink.
The common room explodes in giggles, and Mary flips James off before running upstairs to grab some parchment.
It’s just as she’s left the room that Sirius decides to join, raising a questioning eyebrow at the laughs of his friends.
“Nice of you to finally join us, Black.” Lily slurs, and Remus notes the cup in her hand is growing suspiciously empty. He so kindly and generously takes it upon himself to pour her a refill from his own bottle, thankful to have less to drink.
Sirius sits down next to her in Mary’s vacant spot, holding his own new cup. “Sorry, sorry. Business to attend to.” He ominously waves the cup in his hand. “Where’d Mary run off to?”
So there were other cups, then. Remus thinks agitatedly. Wanker.
“She went up to grab some parchment and write Sluggy a letter,” Peter answers. “Prongs started a game of truth or dare.”
“Perfect! That makes this next part a whole lot easier,” Sirius muses as Mary returns with a glare shot in his direction at losing her seat. She settles on the arm of Peter’s chair. “Everybody, behold.” He holds out the cup for everyone to look at.
No one really seems to know what exactly they’re looking at, but Sirius seems incredibly proud of himself, so Remus pretends to look amazed. Not that he cares that much. Whatever.
“It’s Veritaserum, you twats. Just finished brewing.” Sirius clarifies, noting that everyone had given him varying levels of blank expressions.
“Veritaserum?” Marlene questions, “what are we possibly using that for?”
“For making sure our truths are truthful of course,” James catches on and starts grinning, looking at Sirius. “Padfoot, you bloody legend.” Sirius laughs back at James, a twinkle in his eye that Remus recognises as a sign of mischief. Remus gets that twinkle mimicked in his own eye when they’re out performing some kind of prank, even though he’ll groan and moan and pretend to be above pranks. What can he say, Remus loves his friends.
What he doesn’t love is that James’ grin is starting to turn into a smirk, and he seems to have a wordless conversation with Sirius in a matter of seconds.
Lily, who Remus would consider the best potions student in their year, if not the whole of Hogwarts at the moment, takes the potion sceptically. “You brewed this?” She asks Sirius, clear suspicion in her tone. “Like actually brewed this?”
Sirius scoffs with mocked offence. “Yes Evans, I brewed it,” he pauses, grinning. “I’ve actually been hiding my secret potions powers to give you an inflated ego, all along.”
Lily huffs at his words. Remus hides a smile at her reaction. It’s a known fact amongst their friends that Sirius is naturally gifted in most subjects, but Lily has had Sirius beat for potions since their first year. Only narrowly, as it turns out, and she gives a final glance of approval to the Veritaserum before setting the cup back down in the centre of the group.
Remus is starting to feel drunk, he realises. The thought of taking a sip from the Veritaserum cup makes him have to choke back a gag, whether that be the concept of drinking more liquid, or the idea of sharing some unwanted secrets. He coughs instead and immediately feels his head rush. Definitely drunk, Merlin.
He tunes back in to everyone laughing at something he didn’t hear, and Peter’s accusatory tone.
“Wait, hold on. Did Mary ever send that letter?” Peter questions, looking suspiciously at Mary.
She flushes, caught, and holds out the letter that she’d been hiding in her pocket. “Do I really have to send it?” She asks, wincing as she rereads it.
“Yes, Mar. Do you really wanna pussy-out on the first dare?” Marlene asks, jumping up from the couch and snatching it out of Mary’s hands. She ignores Mary’s shouts of disapproval, taking a second to read it. Everyone watches her with expectation to read it out loud, but she simply folds it back up when she’s done. “It’s good,” she says instead. “Really good. Like he’s gonna actually believe that a student is trying to seduce him, good.” She laughs, calling for her owl to send it off.
Mary grumbles in annoyance but Remus manages to spot a small smile as Marlene ties the letter to the leg of the owl and sends him on his way. Mary Macdonald could never really be mad at Marlene McKinnon. Some girl thing they’ve got going on.
“Right, time for the next dare then,” Sirius holds his hands out to Mary in a ‘go ahead’ motion. “M’lady, take your pick.”
Mary lights up, looking around for her victim. Remus starts to feel a little nervous. Mary can be brutal when she wants to be, and he thinks she has quite a bit of dirt on him.
Luckily, she picks a less stressful (for him at least) target. “Lily, my love. Truth or dare?”
Lily scowls at her with no heat. “Truth, if I must.”
“Tell us about that boy you kissed in fourth year and swore you’d never tell us anything about.” Mary answers quickly, clearly already hoping that Lily would pick truth.
“But wait! Take a sip out of the magic cup first please, Evans.” Sirius holds the cup of Veritaserum out menacingly, and Lily looks at it with slight fear in her eyes. “Bit of incentive not to choose truth next time, huh?” Sirius taunts.
Lily grabs the cup, taking a tiny but effective sip, and winces slightly at the taste. Mary repeats her question.
“His name is Hugo. He’s a shepherd’s kid from my neighbours farm. He’s very nice.” She closes her mouth quickly, trying to stop the words from coming out. Fails. “He’s also very cute. All we did was kiss behind a hay bale, maybe 3 times.” She hangs her head low. “I’ll get you for that Mary.”
Mary hums, pleased with her findings and looks at Marlene, clearly the same question had been lingering amongst both girls. Remus glances towards James, looking for even a hint of a reaction.
“Next!” James calls instead.
Lily looks at Remus for a long minute, contemplating, before switching her sights to Sirius. “Black. Truth or dare?”
“Dare, obviously.” Sirius is appearing very confident that Lily couldn’t come up with a crazy enough dare. But, to be fair, there’s not much that Sirius wouldn’t do, Remus knows that from personal experience.
“I dare you to give Peter either a foot or a back rub, whichever he would prefer, for a whole minute.” Lily says, challengingly.
They all look to Peter, who looks very unhappy to have found himself involved in a dare that wasn’t even his. “Um, back please. I don’t want you anywhere near my feet.” Peter obliges, and Sirius makes his way over to him.
“Y’know, Wormy I’m a little offended at that. My hands are very clean.” Sirius shoots back, standing behind Peter and grabbing his shoulders in what Remus can already tell is a horrible attempt at a back massage. Peter doesn’t look too pleased.
He looks even less pleased about half way through the minute of the massage. Actually, based on the noises Peter’s making, Remus would probably use the word ‘assault’ instead. Sirius is clearly taking the piss out of it now, and Peter doesn’t seem to be enjoying it much anymore.
“Ow- okay stop!” He pushes Sirius’ hands away. “Don’t ever give me a massage again, you menace.”
Sirius slaps him on the shoulder good naturedly, “Sorry Wormtail,” he looks towards James, the unspoken ‘game master’, “my turn?”
“Go for it, Pads.” Remus is starting to get very scared now. There’s very few people in this room that know enough about him to actually cause him some psychological damage, and Sirius is one of them. And, because of course, he’s aware of that. His heart is beating a concerningly faster beat than it should, and Remus looks at Sirius and just knows . He knows, so he isn’t at all surprised when Sirius smirks and says “Moony.”
Remus glares at him to hide his very clear nerves and contemplates his options. The absolute last thing he wants is to be dared to send a letter to Professor McGonagall that implies he wants to have sex with her, but he also can’t trust that Sirius won’t use his best friend privileges to get some scary shit out of Remus. He’s fucked, basically.
“Truth.” He picks and then immediately regrets ever sitting down and playing. He’s not even on a seat, still sitting on the cobbled floor and feeling more uncomfortable than ever. Remus wants his bed. He’s very drunk.
Sirius gestures to the cup of absolute poison sitting in the centre, and Remus feels his heart drop. No escaping whatever it is he’s about to be asked, because fighting against Veritaserum is a feat only few have managed to master, and sixth year Remus is definitely not one of them.
He grumbles a bit as he grabs the cup, inspecting the liquid inside. It’s shiny and silver and makes him want to vomit on the spot. Unfortunately, he signed up for this, so he takes a small sip and prepares for what he’s sure will be a torture session.
Sirius looks at him, a long glance, contemplating. He breaks eye contact to look toward James, who gives him the smallest, minuscule nod that probably would’ve gone unnoticed if Remus wasn’t looking for evidence that he’s about to shit himself.
“Have you ever been in love, Remus?” Sirius asks, and if Remus wanted to leave before, that’s absolutely nothing compared to his now urge to smack the bottle over Sirius’ head and run away to hide under the covers of his bed. The use of his name alone is absolutely terrifying to Remus, Sirius always preferring to call him Moony. It’s serious to Sirius, (urgh stupid pun), and Remus wants to cry with how perceived he feels.
“Yes,” He says, because he’s cold, and sitting on the floor, and drinking Firewhiskey out of a bottle because there were ‘no cups left’. He’s already very pliant, so he’s not even trying to fight the Veritaserum. “I have. Once.” He continues, because Veritaserum is a killer and wants him to suffer, clearly.
Sirius is looking at him, but Remus feels as though he’s looking through him, seeing stuff that Remus can’t even see. The room goes silent, everyone watching Sirius watch Remus and Remus watch back. It’s scary, and tense but Remus isn’t sure what’s going on, not really. He sees Sirius look toward James again, another unspoken bloody conversation that Remus is getting increasingly sick of. He’s anxious, feeling very left out of a conversation that he’s still the focus of, and he just wants everyone to be clear with him. He sees something pass between them and wants nothing more than to shout out and finally ask what the fuck they think they’re playing at.
He doesn’t. Obviously.
He’s about to take his very well earned turn, when Sirius speaks again. He’s still addressing Remus and Remus feels caught in his gaze. “When?”
“Fourth year I worked it out, but I think since always.” Remus clamps his mouth shut, feeling the Veritaserum coursing through his body, leaving him at Sirius’ mercy.
He hears Lily behind say “One question only, Black.” But neither he nor Sirius pay her any mind. It’s starting to feel like it’s just them two in the room, everyone else fading out to background static. He somehow simultaneously wants Sirius to fuck off, and wants him to ask him. Dares him to ask him what it is he’s really interested in asking. He looks at him defiantly.
Sirius gets down off the couch and moves closer to Remus. Not too close, but close enough that Remus feels captured by him. “Still?” Remus feels the words come out of his throat before he has any say, but finds himself wanting to say them anyway. “Yes, still. Always.”
Sirius looks at him, a mixture of hopeful and serious. “Moony?” Remus looks at him, practically begging him to ask him.
Sirius takes a deep breath, Remus watching his chest rise and fall with the motion of it. He doesn’t dare to meet Sirius’ eyes, scared at what else he’ll find there. Instead of asking another question like Remus expected, he stands up and heads towards the centre of the group.
He grabs the cup of Veritaserum, admires his handiwork for a second before taking a considerably large mouthful.
He looks at James, their unspoken conversation becoming aloud. “Prongs.” James looks back and forth between Sirius who looks fairly confident with a side of nauseous, and Remus who's sure he just looks entirely nauseous. He stops his gaze at Sirius.
“Truth or dare, Pads?” It’s very soft, very intentional and Remus feels like he’s watching some kind of climax moment in a movie.
“Truth.” Sirius looks at Remus, waiting. Watching.
“Have you ever been in love?” It’s the same question, but more intentional and Remus feels his breath catch.
“Yes,” Sirius says simply, staring directly at Remus, and as if that wasn’t a confession enough, Sirius continues. “Have been since third year actually. T’was a bit annoying honestly. Imagine trying to figure yourself out at thirteen - ha. No way.”
Sirius is still looking at him, and Remus is still not breathing. Not blinking. Not daring to look away. He feels his heart race, hears it too - a side effect of being a werewolf. It’s obvious and annoying to his own ears and he wills it to calm down and shut up.
“But it was easy to figure out, and it was obvious. Inevitable. I mean, he was just so him that it was hard not to fall in love. All sarcastic humour, even at thirteen, always protesting against me and James but caving anyway and doing what we do. I mean, it was only fitting that he got Prefect. I couldn’t think of anyone more perfect for it,” He stops and looks offhandedly towards Lily. “Except maybe you, Evans. You’ll get Head Girl next year for sure.” He chuckles lightly and redirects his gaze back to Remus.
Remus, in that short amount of time that it took for Sirius to give his little speech, has actually composed himself fairly well, he’d say. He’s breathing again, which is always a plus, and he’s able to calm his heartbeat down to an acceptable amount of racing. He’s still looking at Sirius, but that’s less out of fear now and more just because he wants to. He can read between the lines of what Sirius is saying. He’s not an idiot, so.
“Anyway,” Sirius speaks again, “He’s genuinely an incredible human being. Or- not human,” Sirius laughs softly, “but y’know. He’s an incredible guy, he actually listens when I have a tendency to never shut the fuck up. He deals with the most difficult parts of me, and still finds a way to make them seem easy. He complains all the time, but it’s cute, so I can forgive that.” He laughs again. Remus feels a bit offended actually, it was going so well.
“And, the craziest thing of them all. The one that I can’t really ever believe, but want to believe anyway, is that I think he might love me back.”
He looks towards Remus with a clear question posed in his eyes, some kind of reassurance that, yes Remus does love him back. And what else was Remus supposed to do? He gets up, walks the short distance to where Sirius is sitting on the floor, pulls him up by the arm and kisses him.
Like, actually kisses him.
It’s not a firework moment like he thought it may be, it doesn’t feel like drowning and gasping out for air.
It’s softer than that. It feels natural, like something he was missing but didn’t know, something he should’ve had his whole life.
It feels like home.
That doesn’t surprise Remus. Sirius has felt like home since he met him on the train in first year. Since he first smiled at Remus, since he figured out Remus was a werewolf and immediately hugged him.
He’s felt like home since he suggested, no, demanded that his fellow Marauders become Animagi for Remus, and told them that if they didn’t do it he’d ‘do it for Moony anyway’. He’s felt like home since he’d wake up in the morning after a full, and Sirius would be sitting next to his bed in the hospital wing, a stack of Remus’ books on his side table and napping softly.
Sirius has been home since Remus knew what home was, and he’s happy he finally gets to come back to it. He’s missed it ever since he knew it existed, and it feels indescribable to finally be able to kiss Sirius.
There’s a chorus of cheers and whoops that surround them, swirling through the air around them, not penetrating their little bubble. Sirius pulls away first, holding onto Remus’ cheeks with his hands, “This is real?” He asks, softly like he’s afraid if he asks it’ll reveal itself to be false.
“It’s real.” Remus says simply, looking at Sirius with what he hopes is all the love and adoration he’s felt since he was fourteen on his face. It clearly works, because Sirius smiles and gives him a final peck on the lips before turning back towards James.
“Prongs!” He shouts with excitement and James laughs at him and gives a little cheer.
Everyone’s looking at them softly, varied levels of surprise mixed with undeniable happiness and excitement.
“Bloody finally.” Peter murmurs and Sirius jumps up to give him a massive hug.
“Poor Wormy’s been hearing about my crush on Moony since third year, and never once complained,” he pauses, looking at Peter. “well not to my face at least.” he laughs and Peter chuckles softly, pushing Sirius away.
Remus looks around as everyone basks in the joy of the moment, Lily and Mary cuddling closer together and whispering something not even Remus can hear, smiling to each other with the same level of adoration Remus looks at Sirius with.
He looks at Lily questioningly, who simply sticks her tongue out at him and flips him off, still whispering to Mary and both laughing.
Remus laughs to himself lightly, thinking once again, that he absolutely loves his friends.