Wildest Dreams
“How long now?” Harry tugged on the sleeve of Remus’ jumper.
Remus knelt down on the cold tiles to get closer to Harry’s height and pointed at a button on the oven. “Press this.” As Harry pushed the button he pointed at the little LCD screen and asked “What does it say?”
“Three!” Harry said excitedly.
“That's right! So that’s three minutes until our cookies are done. Then we’ll leave them to cool for ten minutes so none of us burn our mouths, and then… it’s cookie time!”
“Cookie time!” Harry wrapped his little arms around Remus, who instantly hugged him back. “I like it when you and Padfoot babysit.”
“Yeah? Is that mostly because we always seem to end up making cookies?” Remus asked with a laugh.
“I do like the cookies, but you also read the best bedtime stories, and you’re funny! You do all the voices in the stories and Padfoot tries to do the voices but he’s not very good at it really.” Harry said. "But he's good at lego and at painting."
“He's very good at painting, you're right." Remus smiled at him, "You know, we love coming over to babysit. We love spending time with you and Mia.”
“Remus? Are you and Uncle Padfoot married like my mum and dad?” Harry asked suddenly, pulling a face. “I saw you kiss earlier. On the mouth!”
“No, Harry, we’re not married,” Remus said with a chuckle. “He’s my boyfriend. I'm his boyfriend.”
“Are you going to get married? To each other?”
“I hope so,” Remus said honestly. “Do you think we should?”
“Yeah!” Harry grinned, “Can I be a bridesmaid? My friend Hermione got to be a bridesmaid last month and she said it was really fun.”
“I don’t see why not, Harry.” Remus smiled at him as the timer went off on the oven.
Later that evening, Sirius looked over at his boyfriend on the sofa and smiled softly. Harry was sandwiched between the two of them, alternating whose arm he wanted to lean against every few minutes and Mia on Remus’ knee as the four of them watched Nativity together. Mia’s eyes were drooping and as she snuggled into Remus’ chest, he looked over at Sirius with big eyes and a wobbly smile.
Sirius would later cite this as the moment he knew with absolute certainty that he wanted to marry Remus and spend the rest of their lives together, and the first time he actually thought about ever having kids of his own. Their own, even.
After they’d put both children to bed, which included reading Harry three stories before he’d agree to settle down and sleep, they crashed on the sofa, Remus curled into Sirius’s side.
“Harry asked if he could be a bridesmaid at our wedding earlier,” Remus said with a smile.
Sirius snorted, “He did? And what did you say?”
“I told him of course he could.” Remus shrugged. “I wasn’t about to crush the poor kid’s dreams just after I told him he’d have to wait at least ten minutes for cookies.”
“So you’re planning our wedding now?” Sirius said with a soft smirk.
“A man can dream.” Remus shrugged. “That’s where I see this going, though. Just to put it out there.”
Sirius looked down at him, taking in the honesty and vulnerability written across Remus’ face. The way that despite his shrug, he was worrying his lower lip with his teeth, not quite able to meet Sirius’ eye.
“Yeah, me too,” Sirius said gently. “Which honestly, is something I never thought I’d say, but that’s both where I see this going with us, and it’s also what I want. I didn’t think I’d ever find someone who would understand me, let alone love me the way you do. Of course, I want to spend the rest of my life with you, Remus, if you’ll have me?”
“I love you so much.” Remus whispered, “I absolutely want that”
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“I can get the 11:54 flight from Nice, or there's one a little earlier from Cannes,” Antonia said, scrolling through the flight booking page. “For last minute, the prices are actually fairly reasonable.”
“Consider that you’re also rich as fuck. These prices are absolutely not ‘reasonable’ if you’re not used to flying business class everywhere. Or was it a private jet?” Sirius laughed. “Please prepare yourself to sleep in a tiny flat with three other people. I think your bathroom at home is bigger than the room you’ll be staying in here. It used to be my room and—”
“Used to be?” Antonia asked, “Where do you sleep now?”
“Oh, well I…” Sirius felt his face flush, “I sleep in Remus’ room. Our room now I suppose.”
“The angry friend of Regulus’? The one who shouted at you on the doorstep?” She laughed, “Oh Sirius, you’ve gone all pink. How adorable.”
“Shut up, Toni.” He grumbled, “Yeah, the angry friend, only now he’s my… boyfriend, possibly fiancé, I don’t really know what we’re labelling it as yet, I haven’t technically bought a ring yet. Well I have, but it’s still being made. But anyway, we’re planning to get married next year. And he’s not angry anymore.”
“Oh, Sirius!” She beamed at him through the tiny screen. “That’s amazing. Oh, I can’t wait to meet him! Congratulations!”
“Thanks.” He smiled, “He’s incredible, you’ll really like him. I know he’s excited to meet you too, the cousin who smuggled me out of the country.”
“Yes, I made this all possible!” She chuckled, “I hope I get a special thank you at your wedding.”
“Yeah, maybe. We’ll see.” He grinned at her before flopping down on the bed he shared with Remus. “Proud of you for getting out too, you know.”
“It took me a while to see how bad things were. I saw what they did to you, but it wasn’t until you’d gone that I saw what they were doing to me, Alex and Artur. I tried to convince them to come with me but they’re not there yet. Maybe once I’ve left the country. Maybe we’re all destined to leave one at a time, sneaking away like children at bedtime.”
“Where have you been staying since they found out what you did?” Sirius asked.
Antonia had reached out to him last week to let him know that her parents had discovered the way she had helped Sirius escape back to the UK and that she’d be in touch once she was far enough away from Marseilles to be safe. He’d broached the idea of her staying with them initially with Remus and Regulus, who were both surprisingly all for it. They’d already started moving the last bits of Sirius’ stuff into the room he now shared with Remus, and the two of them had briefly talked about the possibility of moving out the next time the lease came up for renewal.
“I have a friend in Grasse who is letting me stay with him as long as I need to. I think you’d like him. He’s very… artistic.”
“Sorry Toni, I’m thoroughly spoken for.” He grinned at her musical laughter.
“Then perhaps Regulus.” She suggested.
“Oh, I didn’t tell you!” Sirius rolled onto his front and kicked his legs up behind him like he was in a 90’s teen movie “Baby Brother got himself a boyfriend.”
“Tell me everything! I didn’t know he dated, but also in my head, he's still twelve.”
“Well, that’s just it. Apparently he never really has! According to Remus, anyway. But now he has this boyfriend called Barty, and... he’s decent looking to be fair, and he likes talking about books with Remus, which is nice, but wow is he weird. I’ll leave it for you to see when you meet him next week. I can’t even put it into words. I’m sure he’s a nice guy, and Reg seems to really like him. He’s just…”
“Weird?” Antonia laughed. “I don’t think anyone in our family has ever dated anyone who couldn’t be considered ‘weird’.”
“I’d be offended by that if it wasn’t absolutely true,” Remus said from the doorway, leaning casually against the frame in a way that made Sirius’ heart speed up.
“Is that your boyfriend, Sirius?” Antonia cooed, teasing him in a way only family can. “Hello, mysterious boyfriend!”
“Hello, mysterious cousin!” Remus appeared over Sirius’ shoulder and waved into the phone camera.
“Toni, this is Remus. Remus this is Toni.” Sirius said with a grin.
“Oh Sirius, you didn’t tell me how pretty he is!” Toni scolded him with a laugh.
“Now, Sirius. How could you fail to tell her that?” Remus lay down next to Sirius. It was clear he was part of this conversation now. “You should be shouting it from the rooftops!”
“You deserve better, Remus. I have a friend who lives here in Grasse, I think you’d like him very much! He is very creative and is much more agreeable than Sirius has ever been.”
“Tell me more!” Remus laughed uncontrollably as Sirius pushed him out of the shot until he rolled off the edge of the bed and landed with a soft thunk on the floor. “It’s fine Toni, you can tell me all about him when you get here!” He smiled as he heard Antonia laugh on the other end of the call.
“I look forward to it!” She said loudly, before turning her attention back to Sirius and nodded in approval. “Yes, I like him very much.”
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“Five years ago, I’d just finished uni.” Remus started, picking at the edge of the cue cards in his hands. “I had some fairly traumatic stuff happen to me in the... well, the decade before that, honestly, and I’d thrown myself wholeheartedly into my education to distract myself. GCSEs, A-Levels, a degree. I was a model student, but I didn’t look after myself, especially at uni, and as soon as I finished, before I’d even graduated, I began to spiral. I stopped caring for myself. I barely left the house. If it hadn’t been for my horrendously stubborn best friend, I wouldn’t have eaten or showered. I went days without sleep. And I didn’t mind, because, in my head, I didn’t deserve to feel good. I didn't deserve nice things. I didn't deserve to be happy.” He paused and looked down at the front row where Sirius, Regulus, Antonia, Barty, James and Lily were grinning up at him, supportively.
“I’d been working on The Moon’s Calling when I started to get worse. I’d had most of it drafted out already as the end to the series as I wrote the other books, but as I spiralled, I doubted myself. I made changes that, frankly, made no sense and I cut out parts that felt too raw to me at that time in my life, I completely changed almost every character’s ending. Among many other things I regret about that book, was that I never spoke to my agent or publisher about what I was going through. I don’t know if it would have made a difference, but the bottom line is… I was struggling and I put out a book that nobody was happy with so I wouldn’t breach my publishing contract.” He took another deep breath.
“Over the last year, I got inspired again for the first time since I graduated. I'm much happier and healthier, and I wanted to finish this story the way that I had planned and give the characters the ending they should have had all along. I know that re-releasing a book while completely changing the story, the words… the ending isn’t really something anyone has done before, but, if I can make someone happy by… oh, wait, no I’m not going to spoil it. I already did that to one of my friends and she was furious.” The audience laughed, and Lily rolled her eyes at him fondly.
“I hope that at least a few people who read the series in the past will give me another chance to put things right, and I hope that maybe this will bring some new readers into the Moon-iverse. Either way, yeah, I couldn’t have done this without the support of Regulus, Sirius, James and Lily. For varying levels of success when it came to motivating and inspiring me, and also leaving me alone to write in peace, Sirius. Also need to mention the gorgeous cover art by Sirius Black. Also, my agent Poppy and the people at Flourish and Blotts who decided to give me a second chance.” Remus said with a pointed smile.
“Also I’d like to dedicate this book to Hope and Lyall Lupin, and Minerva and Douglas McGonagall, who I wish could have read it. I really hope you enjoy it, and... please ignore whatever it was I wrote five years ago.”
The audience clapped as Remus sat down. Cheers erupted from the front row and his cheeks flushed slightly as the compere of the event opened up the floor for questions.
He looked over at his friends. His fiancé. His family. All looking on at him so full of pride. And he was happy.