Work Text:
Sirius should have known that coming back here was a bad idea. He should have known from the moment he got the invitation that showing up was the shittiest idea he'd had in a long time. He'd left for a reason, for several reasons, really, and all of them were good.
There were his parents, the bastards. There was his brother, whom he loved but found insufferable either way. And then there was Remus Lupin.
The worst fucking breakup of his life.
So, when he got the invitation to James and Lily's wedding, he knew that he really shouldn't go because, if James was the kind of sentimental old fool to invite Sirius, whom he hadn't seen in five years, he was absolutely the kind of sentimental old fool to invite the whole gang. It wasn't as if Remus had gone anywhere anyway. He was always going to be living in that shut-in, backwards town until he was old and grey with grandchildren running around in groups like litters of kittens: adorable and just as likely to scratch you as Remus was.
It wasn't as if Sirius's family were still alive. His parents passed of old age last year, one week after the other, and Regulus passed two years ago in a diving accident. That meant that the only thing actually holding him back from going to the wedding was memories and Remus.
Apparently, that wasn't enough to keep him away.
He regretted it from the moment he pulled up in his car into the parking lot, wearing a suit that was as casual as formal suits go with his hair up in a half-bun and his heart thudding in his chest like a jackrabbit.
It wasn't as though he wasn't likely to bump into Remus. Knowing James, he'd probably seated them at the same table. The man had no tact whatsoever. All the old pals put together once again, all of them prepared to pretend to ignore the last half a decade of silence.
Not one text.
Sirius had caught up with Peter and James a few times, both together and separately, before the distance became too much to overcome and they both got on with their own lives, but Remus had stubbornly ignored him since the day he'd left.
Not a call, not a text, not a letter, not even a 'hello' passed through Peter or James. What a twat.
Sirius sighed. Time to face the music. He checked his fake smile in the car wing mirror. It looked suitably real, if a little forced in the way that the corners of his eyes stayed perfectly smooth and crisp.
He headed inside.
The wedding was being done at the town's meeting building but it was anything but modest. It was decorated with an array of flowers, lilies the most common amongst them with a few daisies, tulips and petunias scattered about, gold and white and red balloons and delicately placed tablecloths made of what looked like something similar to silk.
Thankfully, Sirius hadn't been invited to the ceremony, just to the after-party and dinner, so he didn't have to sit through hoards of elderly relatives blowing their noses and dabbing their eyes with hankies as two relative strangers to him, at least these days, exchanged their no doubt handwritten vows.
No, he just had to sit through a few awkward speeches, dance a little and go home. If he was lucky, he wouldn't even see any of his old friends.
"Sirius!"
Sirius inwardly groaned, turning around to see Peter. Peter looked much the same as before, although a little fuller in his age in contrast to his gaunt youth, with the same dirty blond hair and slight hesitation in his voice as though he was constantly scared of being rejected from a simple conversation.
"Peter," Sirius returned, hoping not to make a spectacle. "How are you?"
"Great!" Peter said happily. "I run a book-club now in the local library. Peter's Poetry Picks. It's open on Mondays at six if you ever want to pop by. Gosh, I haven't seen you in ages."
He came forward and hugged Sirius in a stiff way that reminded Sirius of hugging a wooden plank, splinters and all. Sirius patted him on the back and stepped back as soon as he thought would be deemed polite.
"It has been a while," Sirius admitted, staring at Peter's bow tie, which, with his black and white suit, made him rather resemble a penguin, so as not to have to look him the eyes.
"Goodness me, yes! How long? Four years?"
"Five."
"Five! Time does fly. What are you up to nowadays?"
Sirius smiled tightly. "I'm a photographer now. After the modelling contract, I fell in love with it. Spent a lot of time with the right people through modelling and I landed myself a job pretty quickly. I've been doing it for about two years now."
"Oh, so about since…" Peter trailed off stiltedly.
Sirius took pity on him. "You can say his name."
"Regulus," Peter let out in a huff of air, "passed. I was so sorry to hear about it, truly. Just tragic."
Sirius nodded sharply. "Yes, well. How's Sybill?"
"She's good," Peter said, welcoming the change in subject. "We've been together for seven years in February. I think she's expecting a ring."
"I would too after seven years," Sirius replied, which was clearly not what Peter wanted to hear as he suddenly became quite earnestly nervous.
"I keep telling her that marriage just isn't for everyone," Peter said. "And that level of commitment is just so much, you know? I love her with all my heart but it's complicated."
Sirius was a little surprised. Peter had always daydreamed about marriage as a young teenager but, ever since he actually got into a relationship, the thought seemed to give him a heart attack.
He hadn't pegged Peter down as cowardly until it came to relationships.
"Is she here?" Sirius asked.
Peter shook his head. "No. She had a vision that something would go wrong and, you know how she is, she was very upset and had to stay home."
Ah, yes. Sirius was intimately familiar with Sybill's visions. She'd sprout off some nonsense about the end of the world every few months and then tell everyone that the spirits had intentionally misled her when nothing happened. It was Sirius's private thought that she needed some kind of professional help. Of course, he would never shame her for it and he would certainly never voice it to Peter, who believed in Sybill's visions in the same way you might believe a politician if you happened to not be involved in politics in the slightest.
"I hope she feels better soon," Sirius said sincerely. "Do you know who else is here?"
"Mary," Peter said. "She came with her new boyfriend. Marlene and Dorcas came, of course. Emmeline Vance showed up, of all people, and Gilderoy Lockhart, though I've no idea why Lily and James invited him. I think they thought half the people here wouldn't attend."
Including Sirius, presumably.
Sirius struggled to believe that even James could be so hopelessly optimistic as to think for even a second that he'd shown up. Then again, he had, hadn't he?
"I'm just going to go get a drink," Sirius said, excusing himself from the conversation, which had grown stagnant.
"I'll see you around," Peter said. "How long are you in town?"
"Just for tonight."
"Ah, well, maybe not then."
Sirius offered a weak smile and hurried off to get a glass, or, hopefully, a bottle of sherry.
He got his drink and hadn't been at the bar for more than three minutes when he felt a tap on his shoulder.
"Sirius Black."
He turned around slowly, holding his hands in the air.
"Mary," he said evenly.
Mary raised her eyebrows in that way that was just as devastating as it was five years ago.
"You haven't aged a day," Sirius said.
"Flattery will get you nowhere. What are you doing here?"
Sirius shrugged, tipping the last of his sherry down his throat and motioning to the bartender for a refill.
"I was invited."
Mary groaned, eyes going to the ceiling. "Of course he invited you."
"Hey, I thought you'd be pleased to see me."
Mary made a small yet exaggerated choking noise. "Seriously? Not a call nor a text, Black. Five years."
Sirius winced. "Life got busy."
"You still a pretty boy, then? On the covers and whatnot?"
Sirius shook his head, offering Mary a sip of his sherry but she declined.
"I'm a photographer now. Found my calling."
"Glad one of us did," Mary said bitterly. "I'm still in finance. It's a shit-hole. Got a new boyfriend though. Number nine since you left."
"Peter mentioned," Sirius said. "Though not about the ninth part."
Mary let out a slow breath. "Well, I'm not getting any younger. Don't want to be wasting my time."
"Are you wasting your time with this one?"
"No," Mary said quickly, too quickly. "But that's what I said about the last eight. He's fit though, want to meet him?"
"God, no," Sirius said and Mary laughed.
"Go, escape from this conversation before I make you," she said amusedly. "I can see that you're dying to."
Sirius winked and took his sherry out with him towards the dance floor. He stopped immediately when he saw familiar golden curls, the ones belonging to Gilderoy Lockhart, who happened to be the most obnoxious man he'd ever met, and made a beeline for the exit at the back of the building, where he used to go to smoke as a kid.
It was a blind spot for the CCTV so it was ideal for his seventeen year old rebellious self. The only downside was that many days, such as today, it was absolutely freezing.
He made it out through the exit and leaned against the railing of the small jutting out bit of building that extended from the main building. It was like a mini platform. It was where he and James and Remus and Peter used to perform their small concerts as teenagers with the Gryffindor folks watching and drinking copious amounts of alcohol. You could say what you could about Gryffindors but they always knew how to party.
Sirius dug out a packet of cigarettes from his pocket and fumbled with his lighter. His fingers were going numb but he didn't let that stop him lighting it and taking a drag.
"I should have known."
Sirius nearly jumped a foot in the air. He should have looked around because, when he looked to his left, there was Remus Lupin with a half-drunk bottle of beer, raising it towards him.
Sirius blinked but Remus was still there.
"I'm real," Remus said dryly. "You're not that insane."
"I could be," Sirius said, unsure of what else there was to say.
"True," Remus said, looking out towards the car park and leaning his elbows on the railings. Sirius did the same. He would be damned if he was the one walking away from this conversation. He wouldn't give Remus the satisfaction.
"What are you doing here?" he asked instead.
"Same as you," Remus said. "Couldn't stand the party."
That wasn't what Sirius had meant and Remus damn well knew it but Sirius didn't push. He'd learnt not to a long time ago, in another life.
"Have you even seen Lily and James?" Sirius asked.
"Nope," Remus replied. "Didn't go to the ceremony and they've been busy all party."
Sirius frowned. "Why not?"
"Why what?"
"Why didn't you go to the ceremony?"
Remus took a swig of his beer. "Wasn't invited."
"What? But you're James's best friend."
Remus laughed sharply. "That was always you. Besides, I haven't seen him in four years."
Sirius didn't even try to contain his shock. "You what?"
"Yeah, I moved a year after you did. Couldn't take it, I guess. Haven't been back since."
"But your parents," Sirius said, furrowing his brow.
"Dead. Both of them."
It hit Sirius like a dagger to the heart. Lyall, he'd never been so keen on, but Hope? She was the kindest woman Sirius had ever met, matched only by James's mother.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
Remus scoffed. "Are you serious?"
"Yes I'm fucking serious. I should have known."
Remus's eyes flashed. "No, you lost every right to know. You don't get to know things about my life anymore."
The silence that fell between them was tense with a thousand things said and a million never spoken.
"That's not fair," Sirius managed. "I didn't do anything. It was you who went off with Benjy Flitwick and—"
"Oh here we fucking go," Remus snapped. "Benjy Flitwick. It's always about Benjy fucking Flitwick. I did not go off with him. There was never anything there. You were just looking for an excuse to leave."
"I asked you to come with me! I wanted a life with you."
"No, you gave me an impossible choice because you knew what the answer would have to be in the end and you didn't want to have to say it yourself."
The biting wind howled in anguish.
"I wanted," Sirius spat. "I wanted so many things. You were the one who decided to stay and it turns out you didn't even do that in the end so maybe it was just me who wasn't worth leaving for."
"Don't do that. Don't patronise me by pretending this was anything other than what it was."
Sirius shook his head. "You don't even know what it was, what it is. You just make these big assumptions that everyone's off abandoning you and you don't even think about how to make decisions for yourself."
Remus barked out a laugh. "Look who's talking! You make up your imaginary scenarios where I went off with Benjy Flitwick or where I rejected you and none of it is rooted in reality. My mother was dying and you asked me to move away with you."
"I offered to take your parents with us."
"You knew I could never do that to her."
Sirius dug his nails into the palms of his hands. "I couldn't stay here. I couldn't do that to me. You knew that."
"I'm not sure what I knew."
Sirius could feel the tears pricking the corners of his eyes but he refused to cry. He couldn't humiliate himself like that.
"It doesn't matter now anyway," he said, sniffing. "We've both moved on."
Remus downed the last of his beer and a quietness hung over the pair of them for a few seconds until Remus wiped his mouth and said, "I don't think anyone moves on from Sirius Black."
Sirius's breath caught in his throat. He took a drag from his cigarette to steady himself, exhaling a ring of smoke.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Don't."
"No, I'm serious. What does that mean?"
Remus shook his head, fiddling with the empty beer bottle in his hands. "Don't be a dickhead."
Sirius took a step closer, putting out the cigarette on the railing and pocketing it to dispose of later.
"I can't know what you mean if you don't tell me," he said. Remus snorted.
"Can't you? You could always read my mind."
"Do you mean it?" Sirius asked and he was well aware of his heart rate spiking at the softly spoken words. "After five years?"
Remus smiled ruefully. "Always."
Sirius had never imagined them having a reunion, not after the first couple of years, but, when he had imagined it in the early days, it was always him begging Remus to come back, to choose him and there would be a big hug like in the movies and everyone would cheer because they were made to be.
This wasn't like that.
This was a quiet moment overlooking a parking lot with bruised egos and five years of wasted time. They'd lost five years.
And yet, Sirius thought it might have been necessary. Perhaps they needed the time and the distance and the loss. Perhaps they'd needed to be careless and young to be adults now, adults who finally knew what they wanted and who were finally free to have it.
"I won't move back here," Sirius said. "I can't."
"I know," Remus said gently. "I never expected you to. But I can't live in the city. I think we need a fresh start."
Sirius bit his lip and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, okay."
Remus finally straightened up and turned to face Sirius, bottle dropping with a clank on the floor. It was a miracle it didn't smash.
It didn't happen quickly, not a rush of emotion and passion, but it happened slowly with them swaying towards each other, eyes meeting and hands touching in the simplest of reassurances. And when they kissed, it wasn't a roaring fire. It was the fireplace in your living room wishing you a warm stay and a welcome home.