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Usually, one would be over the moon for their best friend getting married. Especially if they were then asked between a drag of smoke in the young morning if they would like to be the best man. That they were important, their friendship was appreciated and something tangible.
Remus would understand; he’d been James’ best man a couple of years ago when he married Regulus. There was something special about it, seconding wedding planning ideas and choosing the right suit. He’d had a blast organising the bachelor party too.
Now, he was getting married. It was an exciting thought. A fact so certain that nothing could change it. Nothing would change the fact that he was to be wed tomorrow to someone he loved.
Until he found his own best man with the blunt of a cigarette between his fingertips and pressing it into the dark wood of the balcony railing. He was making a pile of them by the looks of things. Remus’ frown was difficult to hold after hours of a soft jaw and carefree smiles.
‘You’re going to leave marks,’ he said, letting the words travel through the summer breeze. He shivered despite it all.
The man turned. Even in clouded moonlight, he had effortless charm—sharp-featured and handsome. Pale skin against black curls. His hair fell just enough to form soft, well-shaped curls that hung past his shoulders. Despite the harsh lines of his frown and the tension in his jaw, there was a softness to his silver eyes, rich in both their colour and the quiet expressiveness that Remus had never quite seen in several years of knowing this man. There was always that lively spark of starlight trapped in them.
‘I doubt it’ll matter.’ Sirius' smile didn’t reach his eyes. ‘What are you doing out here?’
‘Bit hard to enjoy the party if I’m only worrying about you out here,’ Remus’ voice was quiet, raspier than it would’ve been had he not been laughing and shouting all night with friends new and old. ‘You’ve been missing the party for ages.’ He couldn’t help the quiet desperation that fell through his words. How he tried to straighten out his disappointment by inhaling deeply and rolling his shoulders back to stand tall. Why must it be that his best man was out here chain-smoking rather than enjoying himself inside?
‘Oh.’ Sirius' eyes brightened under the fairy lights as he turned into them. ‘Just needed a smoke.’
Remus eyed the five cigarette buds on the railing. ‘A smoke?’
‘Shut up,’ he scoffed. ‘Anyway, you should be inside. The night isn’t about me. It’s about celebrating your last taste of freedom.’ The laugh between Sirius' lips died in the air between them.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing.’ Sirius' brown eyes diverted, a second-long twitch in between his thick, dark eyebrows. As if Remus wasn’t well-attuned to his best friend’s tells of when he was lying.
Remus stepped forward, slow, long strides until he stood next to Sirius. His left hand was already digging around inside the pocket of Sirius' pants. Sirius' laugh was exactly what it should have always sounded like—spoiled by warmth and sunlight despite its current lack of appearance right now.
Remus felt for the small paper box between his fingertips immediately and dragged it out of the pocket. He thumbed the packet of Marlboro open and clicked his tongue at the five cigarettes left. ‘Is this the same pack you bought yesterday?’
‘I’ve had good reasons.’
Remus smirked. ‘It’s my wedding tomorrow and you’re telling me that over the last two days you’ve had good reason to smoke? Am I the problem?’
Sirius nudged his shoulder with his own. ‘You said you were quitting, and now you’re taking what’s mine.’
‘Would you like one?’ Remus raised his brows, extending the packet out. Sirius had the fantastic luck of being able to raise one eyebrow for comedic effect. As he did so, Remus shook the box. ‘Grab me your lighter, too.’
‘Oh, only if you insist.’ Sirius rolled his eyes and plucked a cigarette from the packet, his other hand fishing for the hot pink lighter than Remus had bedazzled him for his last birthday. Remus fitted the cigarette between his lips and looked down at Sirius as he lit the flame for him before lighting his own.
For the first drag in, they looked at one another. Sirius’ features had softened, and he leaned against the wooden barrier on his side to face Remus. There was a lick of smudged eyeliner in the outer corners of his eyes, making the silver of them flicker to life under the flame he repeatedly lit.
‘I never quite knew how to quit.’ Remus breathed out plumes of smoke between parted lips. Those words died between them, no end or start.
Years later, Remus might look back on this moment and wonder what he was really referring to. Because never once had he really tried to quit smoking, he was just as bad, if not worse, than Sirius regarding that. It’d almost been a deal-breaker with his fiancee.
‘Same,’ Sirius said after a moment. ‘Wouldn’t know how to. It’s all I’ve ever known how to do.’
Realistically, that didn’t make sense. Remus frowned, inhaling sharply and letting the familiar burn in his throat shape his words.
‘The cigarettes?’ Smoke carried in the air, his empty right hand tightened around the wood, curls flying over warm eyes and a hearty laugh full of saccharine. Remus wondered where the joke in his words were, an undercurrent of sarcasm existed but Sirius never found him that funny.
‘Sure,’ Sirius said, humming afterwards.
A moment of pure silence passed between them that Remus didn’t think he'd ever had from Sirius at all. Loose ties and rolled-up sleeves; blunt breathes and smoke settling between them; hazy, warm conversations curated from every thought they’ve ever had until now.
This was the end of the line. After Remus was married tomorrow, things would change for them. Changes had already happened since he met his now-fiancee. No more hands tangled in hair, smoking in each other’s laps and the world falling away from them. That only existed in their youth. It would stay there, nostalgia in the early years of their friendship.
‘What are you thinking about?’ Remus brought his shaking hand back to his mouth where he invited the cigarette back between his lips, a familiar weight and texture pressed on the curve of his bottom lip. It burned the back of his throat, he closed his eyes, exhaled, and opened them again. Sirius was looking up at him; his fingers flicking ash absent-mindedly.
‘Just can’t believe you’re getting married,’ he chuckled, shaking his head. He shifted to lean his full weight on the railing, his arms now crossed over them as he stared at him side-on. The void of the night existed just beyond them. The breeze carried the clouds along until the sky had cleared fully to reveal the stars. Waves crashed somewhere, Remus could squint to see but he’d need his glasses anyway, and he had better views in front of him where Sirius smiled up at him— Oh fuck, he thought, looking away quickly.
‘Still can’t believe it, really.’ Remus feared that he was at the end of the world; he was in limbo here. ‘I never thought this day would come.’ Or if he had thought this day would come, it’d be a different outcome—something that lived in his dreams from now on.
If he could take a chance on being brave, he’d drop right off the edge and take the opportunity that lay flat at his feet. Or, he could turn with his tail between his legs and make a dash for whatever awaited on the other side of those french doors. His kind partner, with her swaying limbs and gentle smile, never loud or over-exertive. His three best friends in their varying stages of being drunk: James singing at the top of his lungs, Peter trying to find a gullible fool he can lure with tricks and taunts, and Regulus wrapped around the aforementioned singing bastard.
He would go inside eventually, after this cigarette and when Sirius would stop looking at him long enough for Remus to break from the spell.
‘You still haven’t told me what you’re thinking, it’s making me worry,’ Remus said, watching the way Sirius' eyes became distant and the lines of his frown morphing like an unsettled ripple in calm oceans.
‘It’s just a funny story. Well, more of a secret.’
‘How many do you have left that I don’t know about?’ Remus elbowed his side.
‘This might be the last one.’ He looked down, Remus followed his gaze to his own left hand. His silver engagement ring flashed in the light. Cool metal burning against every fibre of his body by conversation, cigarettes and cold, distant stares.
‘I’m terrified to hear it.’ Pursed lips—curiosity. ‘How old is it?’
‘Oh, it’s an oldie. From Year Eleven.’ A quick breath out through full, parted lips in the efforts of lightening his mood. Remus could see the wrinkle in his sad smile, the dip of his head, the laugh that died on his tongue quicker than it took the smoke to travel out of their eyes. Remus wondered if Sirius was going to blame the smoke for his glazed eyes.
‘You’ve managed to keep a secret from me since high school? Sirius, we’re thirty— it’s been fourteen years.’
‘I know right.’ Sirius smirked, looking at him side-on.
‘Impossible,’ Remus scoffed.
‘Maybe. Definitely,’ Sirius said, nodding.
‘I don’t believe you, I’m sure I do know and—’
‘No, you don’t— you never could. I never let you figure this one out.’ Sirius' tone shifted the air. It was the same one Remus walked out into: violent and soul-crushing. ‘I had a crush on you.’
And oh. ‘That’s all?’ Remus’ mouth split open into a smile. ‘A small crush? I would’ve been chuffed to know back then. You saw how appalling my self-esteem was.’
‘Why do you think I was trying to tell you as much back then?’ Sirius rolled his eyes. ‘And anyway, I knew you’d never liked me back so I haven’t done anything about it.’
‘Wouldn’t do,’ Remus corrected, elbowing Sirius' arm, skin on skin, goosed flesh and the sleeves of their shirts riding higher. ‘Still to this day, you’d fail English.’
‘Ah, thank you, Prof.’ The smile didn’t quite reach his eyes again.
‘So, why tell me now?’
Sirius paused, pursing his lips and stubbing out his cigarette before working another one out of the packet. ‘Because you asked.’
‘Have I never asked what’s on your mind before?’ Remus frowned, dropping his own bud into Sirius' absurd pile. He saw it now. This was the reason he’d smoked so much.
‘Well, I’ve always wondered, and trust me, I’ve had time to think about this, about what would’ve happened had I said something. I never pictured it like this, though.’
‘Would you have ever told me if you didn’t tonight?’
Sirius' stare felt like he was looking straight into him. As if he could see through clouded judgement and frown lines. ‘Probably not. Would you rather me not have said anything?’
Remus shook his head. ‘I’m glad you said something,’ he said thoughtfully.
Sirius' eyes flicked across his face, back down to his hand, and then into the sky as he drew out a breath of smoke. ‘Okay. I just always figured that it was normal, at first. And then you kissed me on your sixteenth during Spin the Bottle. It fucked with me, the idea of—’ Sirius spoke mindlessly as he tried lighting the end of his cigarette. Failure met his lips every time until Remus cupped his hands over the lick of the flame to shelter it. Finally, it lit with ease, and Sirius hummed a quiet thank you as his words settled around them like thick fog. It clouded Remus’ head.
Remus wanted to know the end of his sentence. He was desperate for what lay unearthed in the conversation. Sirius, silent next to him, had one hand holding the cigarette and the other cupping his chin so he could look out. Despite the terrible lighting, Remus could see it. A faint pink dusted his freckled cheeks. Remus gasped quietly, making Sirius turn to look at him.
‘You liked me,’ he said, exhaling, ‘it was more than just a crush.’ This was a fact, something so certain that nothing could change it. It excited him. Made him grin wider than he’d done all night as his heart pounded at the thrill.
‘Well, it was a silly, teenage crush,’ Sirius said, laughing despite the fact he’d just told an absolute lie. This time, Remus wished he’d never seen the tells, like how he never saw the particular signs of Sirius liking him.
‘Okay.’
‘And well, you’re you,’—a soft shove from shoulder to shoulder—‘I think everyone had a crush or loved you at some point,’ Sirius said, snorting gently. Remus scoffed and shoved back. That was untrue.
‘Did you?’
‘Did I…What?’ Sirius' frown deepened: his bottom lip jutted out and his eyes crinkled, making his long, dark eyelashes flutter.
‘Love me?’
A lower lip caught between teeth, fingers flicking to drop ash from the cigarette, shifting feet. ‘Enough.’
Enough…Enough what? Loved you enough? Enough talking about this? Remus was struck dumb. He inhaled shakily, gripping the railing, his fingertips pressing into the cold wood harshly. Wind travelled towards them straight-on, Remus resisted the urge to pull his sleeves down and he shivered nonetheless.
‘This doesn’t worry you? Your best mate—’
‘It was just a silly, teenage crush, right?’
Sirius blinked up at him then smiled gently. ‘Yeah.’
‘Then that doesn’t matter. I don’t care. And you came out to me years ago, Sirius. I never cared back then, and I don’t care now if you happened to like me for a bit. I’m flattered if anything.’ Remus smirked.
Sirius grinned. ‘Fuck off.’
Remus laughed. Sirius finished his cigarette quicker this time. Remus waited with him, refraining from asking why he was facing the opposite direction now. He was shaking, maybe shivering from the cold. But in the split second he used to wipe his cheeks with the heel of his hand, Remus realised he had it all wrong.
The doors creaked open, time continued to pass, Remus could drop off into the end of the world and let fate carry him. He wasn’t ready to let go of this moment.
‘Remus?’ In that lovely, sweet voice. ‘Love, you’re supposed to be the main event.’
‘Sorry,’ Remus called, he squeezed his eyes shut. Not ready to face the music. Everything he’d blocked out since he’d first shut himself out here was becoming ten-fold. The music; chanters and laughter was deafening; the moon was impossibly bright; the world was no longer fading out to only revolve around the person next to him. He could hear Peter’s laughter, James singing—most probably trying to embarrass his husband—and Regulus complaining.
Remus opened his eyes, the waves broke on the shoreline, illuminated under streetlight and a distant bonfire. Conversation had broken out between Sirius and his fiancee as she greeted him kindly. But she stayed at the door, she knew better than to move. She knew Remus would make his way back to her. After all, he was marrying her, wasn’t he?
‘Go,’ Sirius whispered, lost between them, his fingertips freezing on Remus’ arm when he pushed against him. ‘You need to go back inside.’
‘Sirius?’
Sirius hummed, the heat in his eyes trapping Remus where he stood. He listened to his fiancee retreat inside, unworried and relenting.
‘It has always just been a crush, right?’
Sirius flinched, inhaling deep and sharp; his fingertips sliding down Remus’ arm. Remus resisted the shiver this time. The touch was gone before he could’ve ever warmed to it, let it become something familiar like the burn in his throat or little expression changes.
‘Yeah, enough of one.’ Sirius smiled. Remus immediately recognised it as the same as every other that he’d been offered tonight. Like a punch to the gut, he held onto the railing.
‘I—’
The doors opened again. ‘Honey?’ she called.
‘Just a moment,’ Remus shouted back, watching her nod and retreat inside again. He turned to face Sirius again. ‘Before, you told me what would’ve happened if you said something and—’
‘And I don’t want to know,’ Sirius said, breathing sharp air through his nostrils.
‘Are you sure?’ Remus sounded as uncertain as he felt.
‘Not anymore. I have no use for the ‘what if’s’ and even if I did, I don’t want you to say anything that I wish would have sounded more realistic to what I want. You can’t give me that, Remus. You can’t love me back. And I never want to know if you could have.’ Sirius smiled softly, squeezing his bicep. God, he looked so sad. So different from the boy Remus grew up beside. Always buzzing with excitement, familiar in every way from his grin to his touch, and if he knew one thing it was how to sing. God, Remus used to get sick of him but all he wanted at that moment was to go inside and have Sirius sing and dance, drink and have fun.
Remus sucked in a breath.
You can’t love me back. And time continued to pass.
‘I would’ve never made James or Peter my best man. Only you, Sirius.’
‘Good.’ He smirked. And when Remus gave him a pointed stare, he nodded solemnly and said, ‘I know.’
Remus gripped his shoulders and held him in front of him. ‘You’re my best friend,’—my soulmate—‘I love you and I need you to know that if you fold in on yourself and disappear from my life I wouldn’t know what to do with myself. You’re the only person who steals my cigarettes because I let you. Don’t quit on me now.’ After proposing, rehearsals, quiet love embraced in the late night and speeches he had prepared for tomorrow, Remus was one-hundred percent sure this was the most heartfelt thing he had ever said in his life. He was a man of few and spare words, and still, they poured out like a confession—they were alive and burning, and he’d dropped them, and then himself, into a bottomless void.
He was saved by unmistakable warmth when Sirius looked up to face him.
‘You’re my best friend, too. Above all,’ Sirius said, through the cracks of his smile and the dark pools of his eyes, Remus could see that it meant more.
Remus liked that, above all. Then he squeezed his eyes shut, and removed his hands from Sirius. It was intimate, words that meant something else than what they actually were. He had someone waiting for him. He had someone to put first and he owed her that.
‘Come inside with me.’
Sirius shook his head, silent when loud and bashful banter reached their ears. ‘Later, I’ll have one more.’ He waved the box around lazily.
‘Don’t burn yourself bare.’ Remus grinned, stepping backward.
‘I have enough love to burn myself bare anyway,’ Sirius said, quiet and steady. With that, he opened the flame.
Remus felt the truth of it settle between them, a slow ache. Then he turned, and walked inside, leaving the door ajar, for when Sirius changed his mind.