Teenage Petulance
The only reason Sirius went back to Edgar’s that night was the knowledge that going home would almost certainly mean seeing Remus and Barty fucking Crouch together. Mary, he could cope with. Davey, he hadn’t seen it in person, he could… probably cope with it. Emmeline, Well, yeah that was awkward and it was only a little kiss. Benjy, even more awkward to the point he’d been staring at the smoke Remus exhaled wistfully in the middle of a fucking pub.
But the way he’d felt when he saw Remus kissing Barty, and very clearly enjoying it, was debilitating. The bar around him had gone silent. He couldn’t hear Led Zeppelin. He couldn’t hear Edgar calling his name. He could only hear the sound of his heartbeat in his head. His lungs felt full of water and his stomach was full of lead. How could he have fucked up this badly?
Edgar hadn’t spoken to him since they apparated back, much drunker than they should have been apparating, and immediately stormed off and shut the bedroom door behind him, leaving Sirius the choice to sleep on the sofa or go home. He apparated home just after five am, hoping that would be enough time for Remus and Barty to do… whatever they’d left to do, and thankfully Remus’ door was closed and the flat seemed to be silent.
He hadn’t anticipated Barty still being there the next morning, but when he entered the kitchen for as much coffee as he could drink before leaving for lunch with Marlene and Dorcas, there he was, leaning against the counter, drinking coffee from Sirius’ favourite mug.
“Morning.” Barty said with a grin on his face, “Didn’t expect to see you here.”
“I live here, dick,” Sirius muttered.
“Thought you’d be with Bonio.”
“Shut up, Crouch.” Remus filled the kettle and flicked it on.
“Aw, are you grumpy?” Barty cackled. “Trouble in paradise?”
“I said shut up!” He glared at Barty, fists balled next to his hips. “Fuck off.”
“Can’t I’m afraid. I’m waiting for Remus to get out of the shower. We have plans.” Sirius wanted to smack that smile off his face.
Remus, luckily, chose that moment to return to the kitchen, shirtless and with damp hair. He looked from one to the other and sighed. “Morning, Pads.”
“Alright?” Sirius asked tightly, trying to keep his eyes on Remus' face.
“I think he’s grumpy, Remus,” Barty said. Remus shot him a warning look. “Why do you think that is?”
“Barty,” Remus said in a low voice.
“No, go on. Let him say it.” Sirius said, crossing his arm.
“Alright. You’re pissed off because I’ve fucked both your brother and the bloke you wish was your boyfriend.” Barty set down Sirius’ mug. “It’s understandable. I think I’d be grumpy too.”
Remus’ eyebrows shot up, his eyes were wide as he stared into space, hoping he’d misheard everything that Barty had just said. His mouth twisted awkwardly, “Go back to my room, Barty. I’ll be there in a sec.” He said quietly, then under his breath, “Fuck my entire life.” **
“You’re not even going to kick him out after that? For fucks sake Remus.” He looked at Barty, who had made no attempt to leave the room, as Remus stepped between them. “You seem perfectly comfortable fucking a half-blood werewolf for someone who’s a member of PAAPR!”
Remus’ face creased with hurt as he looked at Sirius, then turned to look at Barty, whose mouth had dropped open.
“Are you?” He asked.
“Not anymore." He frowned, "I was when I was sixteen. Reg’s parents made him join after Sirius refused, and I thought I’d join to piss my dad off. It sounds worse than it is. Ok, no, it’s exactly as bad as it sounds. It was pretty horrific.” He glowered at Sirius. “Reg and I left after a few months. I’m not proud that it took us that long, but we left. We were kids and we were stupid. Do you know who didn’t leave though, Sirius? Who’s not only still a member, but the current head of the PAAPR committee in opposition of dark creatures?” He looked at Remus, “No offence Lupin, it’s what the committee’s called.” Then back to Sirius. “Bonio didn’t tell you why he’s never free on Sunday evenings?”
“He goes to a duelling club,” Sirius tried to sound confident but didn’t fully succeed.
“Sure he does.” Barty looked between them. “Well, this was certainly not as wonderful as last night was, Remus. Drop me an owl if you want to do it again sometime. Maybe not here, though, eh?” He pulled Remus into a hug and mumbled into his ear. “Sorry.” Before moving his hand to Remus’ neck and kissing him, teasing Remus’ bottom lip between his teeth for a moment.
Remus sensed movement behind him and after pressing one last kiss to Barty’s lips, he spun around and put his hands on Sirius’ shoulders and pushed him back as Barty snapped his teeth at Sirius.
“I’ll see myself out,” Barty said with a grin before apparating.
“What the fuck are you playing at?” Sirius roared.
Remus removed his hands and stepped back slowly. “What am I playing at? What are you playing at?”
“Trying to make coffee in my fucking kitchen.”
“Sirius.”
“I can’t believe you slept with someone like Crouch.”
“Someone like Crouch? Do elaborate.”
“A… Pureblood supremacist.” Sirius shrugged, the irony of this statement was not lost on him.
Remus laughed, but there was no mirth in it. “Out of the three people I know, apparently, who have been part of PAAPR, only one of them has ever repeatedly made shitty comments about me and to me and looked at me like I was shit on his shoe, and it wasn’t Barty Fucking Crouch, Sirius. You’ve got some nerve to expect me to chuck him out after saying something you didn’t like when you bring Edgar around all the fucking time and I’ve never said a word. It’s not like what he said wasn’t true either, was it?” Remus looked angrier than Sirius had ever seen him, “You also seem to forget that you are the one with a boyfriend. I can do whatever the fuck I want.”
“And what do you want?” Sirius asked tersely.
“You!” Remus shouted, turning to lean on the counter and covering his face. “Jesus fucking Christ. I want you, you utter wanker!”
Sirius froze, he had no idea how to react to that short of pinning Remus against the counter and kissing him stupid, which he suspected wasn’t the right reaction given the crackling magical tension in the room. “You never said.” He said quietly.
“You still knew. Don’t pretend you didn’t.” Remus said from behind his hands. “James told me everything last week.”
“Everything?”
“How you decided that instead of giving me any say or opinion in what happened between us, good or bad, you’d rather I date other people for reasons I genuinely don’t understand. Because fuck giving me any agency in my own life, right? If you didn't feel the same, I could have handled it. So you agreed to go out with Bonio.” He paused, pressing his lips together. “Sorry. With Bones, and then, even after he was a complete bastard to the person you were claiming to be protecting with this whole thing, you did nothing. You didn’t say a fucking thing. You stayed with him. You brought him here, to the pub, to Birmingham! And then it turns out that he wants people like me dead or imprisoned, and… I don’t even know if you’re surprised.”
“I don’t want to believe it’s true.” Sirius said in a small voice, “If I brought someone like that into your life I’ll never forgive myself, Moons.”
“It should never have come to this.” Remus sighed. “Why didn’t you talk to me about any of it?”
“And ask why you were turning down dates when our friends were heavily implying that it was because you were, I don’t know, waiting for me, or something? How exactly should I have asked you that in a way that wouldn’t fuck up our friendship, Remus?”
“For someone so concerned about our friendship, you’ve done a bang-up job of shitting on it, and me, at every turn for the last six weeks, love.” Remus turned and left the kitchen. Sirius heard his bedroom door slam, then the pop of apparation a minute later.
He didn’t know how long he stood in the kitchen, staring at the spot where Remus had stood, willing himself to move, but suddenly the floo whooshed and Marlene stepped out, quickly followed by Dorcas. They looked in the kitchen and Marlene’s angry expression softened instantly.
“What’s wrong?” She asked as Dorcas ushered him to a chair. She filled the kettle and tapped it with her wand. “Remus not here?”
“No.”
“Have you spoken to him today?” Marlene asked, surprisingly gently.
“Uh, yeah, kind of.” They stared at him, “Barty was still here when I got up.”
“Oh.”
“I don’t know how much the two of you know about why Eddie and I got together…”
“Oh, we know the whole stupid story, babe.” Dorcas chuckled, “Respectfully, not your finest moment.”
“Well, uh, buckle up, it’s about to get worse.”
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Hope Lupin jumped up from the sofa when Remus appeared in front of the TV. She’d never get used to Remus and Lyall being able to pop in and out as they wanted. It unnerved her, and both of them tended to use the Floo around her, at least that gave her a moment’s warning and could be closed off. For Remus to have apparated in, something must be wrong.
When she saw his face, her heart broke for him. She wrapped her arms around him as best she could, he was almost a foot taller than her now, and reassured him that he was alright.
When she moved them to the sofa, she took another look at him. “What’s wrong Blodyn Tatws? What’s happened?”
“Sirius.” He murmured. “It’s all such a mess.”
“Alright, you sit right here. I’ll put the kettle on and you can tell me all about it.” She bustled off to the kitchen and Remus looked around at his childhood home, suddenly feeling like a child again.
Remus didn’t know how to start explaining things to his mum. He knew that she had suspected, much like anyone else who’d ever met the two of them, that something was going on between them, but Remus had been clear that they were just friends.
“I’ve had feelings for Sirius for a long time now, and I suspect Sirius has felt the same way for at least most of that time. I really liked the way we were. I’d have liked it more if we… you know, kissed and stuff, but spending time with him has always been so easy and— I assumed that we were both happy with where things were going, and just enjoying the journey. I had been turning people down when they asked me out.”
“Oh, Remus.” Hope said, pouring the tea, “I think I know where this is going.”
“Perhaps. Probably.” He nodded, “James, Lily, Pete, Dorcas and Marlene had been getting more… impatient I guess, and James told him that I’d been turning down dates to try and prompt him to make a move. He didn’t anticipate that it would push Sirius in the opposite direction and he’d panic about me not living my life because of him, so he decided to go on a date with someone to show me that it was ok for me to do the same.”
Hope shook her head slowly, “Imagine if the two of you talked to each other about it, instead of assuming and letting everyone else dictate your relationship.”
“I know mam, I’m not done though.” She stared at him in surprise. “So Sirius goes on a date with a lad from school called Edgar. Around the same time, one of our friends asked me out and I accepted, because, well, honestly, I was feeling a bit self-destructive. Sirius saw us right before his date and based on what James told me, that further proved to Sirius that he’d done the right thing. Ok, the next part you’re not going to like. Well, no, you’re not going to like any of this, but the next bit is probably the worst. So. Sorry, in advance. My boss asked me out.”
“How old is your boss?” Hope frowned.
“Twenty-seven, and he’s a good guy, genuinely. He made sure that I didn’t feel like he’d taken advantage of me and we talked a lot about the whole thing. If he was younger and not my boss, we’d probably be having a different conversation. Maybe. Anyway! Sirius found out about that and for some reason when Edgar asked him to be his boyfriend, Sirius said yes. I don’t understand that at all, but there’s a lot I don’t understand when it comes to Sirius, apparently.” He paused. “Edgar has never been my biggest fan. There have been more than a few times when he’s said stuff that bordered on… once we were talking about my sexuality, and he asked if I had a preference or if it was the thrill of the hunt for me. A few similar comments, not so much that most people would recognise what he was saying, but enough that I would, and Sirius would too, but if I reacted, he could label me unstable easily.”
“What did Sirius say?” Hope asked.
“While I was there, nothing.” Remus sighed as Hope’s frown deepened, “I know. I assume he talked to him in private but it was my assumptions that led us here so who knows. Well, things generally spiralled out of control a little bit. Last night we all went to a bar in Birmingham and I came home with Sirius’ brother’s flatmate, Barty. Sirius has been snippy to anyone I’ve been with, but I walked into the kitchen this morning, and they just kicked off. Sirius said that Barty was a member of some pure blood organisation and Barty said that he had been when he was sixteen for a few months but left because it was awful, but then he revealed that not only is Edgar a member, but he’s head of the committee against dark creatures and it all fell into place I suppose.”
“So, let me make sure I’m with you, not only does Sirius have a boyfriend, but he’s some kind of wizard supremacist?”
“Exactly.” He nodded.
“And how did you leave things with Sirius?”
“Badly. I told him that if this whole charade had been an attempt to preserve our friendship, he’d done a pretty good job of negating that for the last six weeks.” Remus said evenly, “I have no idea what to do, mam.”
“Do you think Sirius will break up with this arsehole?” The biscuit she was dunking in her tea snapped in half, “Cachu ar dân!”
Remus smiled at his mum, her foul mouth had often gotten Remus into trouble as a little kid when he had no idea he wasn’t supposed to say things like ‘shit on fire’ in Welsh and just assumed it was part of everyday conversation. Hearing her swear in Welsh was so comforting.
“Almost definitely. He seemed genuinely distressed that he’d potentially brought someone like that around me.” Remus knew that counted for something, but how much, he wasn’t sure.
“Do you think you can be friends again? Like before?” She tried to fish the biscuit out with her teaspoon but it dissolved more with her frantic scooping. “Ffycin bisged! Sorry.”
He laughed, “I don’t know. I don’t know what was friendship and what was hope for more. The two have been tangled up for me for a couple of years now and I don’t know how easy it will be to navigate that. Does friend Sirius play with my hair when we’re at the pub, or was that just hopefully flirty Sirius? Does friend me cook dinner after he’s had a long shift? I also keep finding his shirts in my room, and I have no idea why. Is that a hopefully flirty thing? Or a friendship thing? Or just a weird Sirius thing?” Remus groaned. “Sometimes I really just miss being a kid. When the biggest problem I had was—”
“Counting down the days until the next time your tiny body would rearrange itself and cause you excruciating pain while both of your parents stood by helplessly?” Hope chuckled at Remus’ pained expression. “Do you want to know what I would do in your shoes?” He nodded, “Let him in, as a friend. See what just being his friend is like. To lose him completely without giving it a try seems impossibly difficult.”
“Yeah, I think you’re right.” He sighed. “Thank you. I think just getting it all out there to someone who hasn’t been part of the whole thing was helpful for me to figure out how I feel about it all.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” She smiled. “Remus?”
“Yes, mam?”
“Don’t go out with your boss again.” She said with a smile, “You love that job.”
“I do.” He smiled. “Alright, I won’t. I wish you were wrong sometimes.”
“Oh, Blodyn, I’m wrong frequently. I’m only human. But it’s nice that you think so.” She smiled as he stood up. “You’ve got this, Remus. You deserve no less than the world, pay no mind to anyone who suggests otherwise.”
“Thanks, mam. Love you.” He hugged her.
“Love you too. Come round for dinner soon, alright? Bring Sirius if he pulls his head out of his arse.” He nodded before grabbing some floo powder and disappearing into the fire.
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After a hefty pep talk from Marlene and Dorcas, Sirius knew what he had to do. He apparated back to Edgar’s flat and found him in the kitchen.
“Piss off.” He said, not turning around.
“PAAPR? Really?” Sirius said, voice shaking. “You’re a member of PAAPR?”
“One of them told you, then.” Sirius could tell he was rolling his eyes despite staring at his back.
“Yeah,” Sirius said shortly. “You should have been the one to tell me.”
“And you’d have stayed with me once you knew?” He finally turned around.
“Of course, I wouldn’t. You know that. It’s why you didn’t tell me. Did you think I’d get so attached to you that eventually it wouldn’t matter?” Edgar was beginning to worry about how calm Sirius seemed. “And you’re head of the committee in opposition of dark creatures? That’s why you’ve been such a prick to Remus?”
“I don’t understand why you all humour him.” Edgar huffed out a laugh, “He’s literally a vicious creature and you all act like it’s no big deal. Precious Lupin and his soft jumpers and his books, never mind that he’s a child-killing monster every full moon. He couldn’t even have the decency to be a pureblooded werewolf either, just a dirty—”
Sirius had his wand out instantly, pointing it at Edgar. “Don’t you ever fucking talk about him like that. He’s never hurt anyone.”
“See, this is what I don’t get, Siri. If you’re hell-bent on shagging the creature, you could have done it at any time in the last few years as far as I can tell. So why date me unless you hate yourself so much for being attracted to it.”
“It?” Sirius inhaled sharply. “I didn’t know you were a fucking bigot when we got together!”
“But you didn’t say anything when I’d say shit to him. You’d just try and talk to me about it when we were alone, and you thought that made a difference.” Edgar smirked. “Some friend you are.”
“I assumed you were jealous!” Sirius snapped. “Which wouldn’t be unfounded, honestly. I overcompensated and—”
“Jealous of Lupin?” He laughed, “Not a chance. I just hated how close he was with you. You deserve better than that, Sirius. You must know that.”
Sirius shook his head, “Does Ollivander know what you are?” Edgar’s smirk dropped, “I thought as much.”
“Sirius, let’s not be hasty.” He took a step towards Sirius, who raised his wand again, aiming it at Edgar’s throat. “This all seems like a miscommunication.”
“No.” Sirius said, “You’re a piece of shit. You think you’re better than anyone else because you were born into ‘the right’ family? Bullshit. I can tell you that much from experience.” He paused, “Wait. Is that why you asked me out? Because of my family.”
Bones looked sheepish. “It did a lot for my standing, yes. Anyway, I’m sure your parents would love to hear just how much you love the werewolf.”
“If you think they don’t already know, you’re stupider than you look.” Sirius shook his head, “I’m sure it’ll do wonders for your social standing once your friends learn that I dumped you for refusing to be a decent human being, too, right?”
“That thought had crossed my mind. I’m so committed to the cause that even the eldest Black son found it to be too much.” The smirk was back and Sirius felt sick.
“You’re disgusting.” He snarled. “I can’t believe I ever fell for this.”
“You were so concerned with protecting your little pet, that I barely had to do anything.”
Sirius slid his wand back into his pocket and Edgar thought that maybe he’d misjudged him. That was, until Sirius’ left fist made contact with his nose, sending pain shooting through his body. He got in a few more decent hits before Edgar curled up on the ground, covering his face.
“Remus is a hundred times the man you are.” Sirius spat. “He is more human in every way than anything people like you stand for.”
“And yet you still chose me, over and over.” Gurgled Edgar.
Sirius turned on the spot and apparated home.