Once, they shared a house. That’s how Remus remembers it. That’s the easiest way for Remus to remember it. Once, he and Sirius shared a house, and they were very much in love, thank you, and that was the end of it. Except that wasn’t the end of it, really. The complexity comes from the fact that there was never really an end at all. There were lots of little ones. Lots of times when there may potentially have been an end to it all. But none of them ever really materialised.
What happened to that roommate of yours? Asks Dorothy from the cafe.
Where did your lovely companion disappear to? Asks Mary from the church.
Didn’t you have a bloke helping you with the bills? Asks Tom from the shop Remus works in.
Car accident, is what Remus says. It’s easier. It’s always been easier. Even if he had the time, they wouldn’t understand. Even if he wanted to tell the whole story, he wouldn’t be able to let them remember, and if Remus is being perfectly honest with himself he’s never been the best with Obliviate. Always James’s speciality.
Best not to think about James. Thinking about James means thinking about Sirius and Remus doesn’t want to follow that path at all. No, no Remus is on his own now. Remus is on his own in a quiet little cottage with his quiet little furry problem and his not-so-quiet little Harry. Such is the way of things. Such is the way of complication.
Harry is a sweet child, two years old now. Harry laughs with his whole body, tiny limbs shaking with mirth, cheeks round and eyes crinkled at the corners like his mum’s. Harry cries at night when he wants, desperately, for someone who isn’t Remus, far too young to understand that they’re gone, far too young for Remus to explain to him that no, really, mummy and daddy loved you so much but they can’t come and it’s complicated, it’s not their fault and it’s not yours either and really, honestly, your dad thought he knew what he was doing when he decided who your godfather would be but actually –
Actually, Harry, your godfather is the reason your parents are dead, and the reason one of your uncles is dead, and the reason that your godfather’s cousin has to visit one weekend of the month to make sure you’re taken care of while your third best uncle sorts out his furry little problem and no, no Andy, honestly it’s fine just a bit sore I’ll be able to look after him really –
The car crash is easier. For everyone else it’s easier.
Most of the time, anyway. Right now, Remus’ ears are ringing from the way Harry’s been crying endlessly, and the village is close but not that close and Remus is thinking about maybe apparating the both of them to the bottom of the ocean when there’s a quiet noise at the door. Almost inaudible, especially with Harry’s attempts to drown out the rest of the world, but Remus knows better. Remus has always known better, and he puts Harry down without thinking, the boy’s fists and face still squashed up as he screams. A simple protection charm that Remus knows, selfishly, will only leave him to starve or worse if Remus is killed, and then he’s approaching the front door.
It’s like a dream. Maybe a nightmare, Remus hasn’t decided yet. The problem is he would recognise Padfoot anywhere. The dog is muddy-pawed and thinner than Rems likes to think about, but he knows. Of course he does - you don’t spend the better part of your life with someone and not know .
He raises his wand; Padfoot whimpers. Impasse. Padfoot was always his weakness - always the wolf’s weakness too. His wand wavers, and between one blink and the next Padfoot is gone, and Sirius is kneeling before him, forehead pressed to the doormat and Remus can’t think about when he got over the doorstep, too much going on to put into order. His wand hand steadies, and Remus doesn’t let himself contemplate why it’s easier when Sirius looks like himself.
“You must have a fucking death wish.” are the first words out of his mouth, and Remus would like to pretend he doesn’t recognise himself but he knows exactly who he is. Sixth year and freshly released from the hospital wing wishing he’d never met Sirius-fucking-Black in his life.
The silence stretches for so long that Remus is halfway to wondering if Azkaban made Sirius deaf before - “You know me, Moony. Never did value well-being all that much.”
Remus wants to laugh. Remus wants to light himself on fire and make Sirius watch. In the other room, Harry wails loud enough to be heard and Sirius’ head raises - Remus’ wand arm goes stiff. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you fucking dare, after everything you’ve done.”
This, at least, causes Sirius to still. “I’m not what you think I am.”
As steady as Sirius’ voice is, Remus doesn’t waver. “You’ve always been good with your words, Sirius, but I can’t imagine you’re able to talk your way out of this. James? Lily? Fucking Peter? I should summon the Aurors now.”
A beat, before, “But you haven’t,” and what is Remus meant to say to that? No, he hasn’t. Of course he hasn’t - but there’s no reason he shouldn’t. Sirius betrayed James and Lily. Sirius killed Peter. Remus hasn’t summoned Aurors. His wand is still raised and he hasn’t summoned Aurors, why hasn’t he -
“You know I couldn’t have done it.” Two years and Sirius’ self-assurance is as infuriating as it’s always been. Two years, and Sirius has put into seven simple words the only thought that has been running through Remus’ mind since he learned the news.
Growing up, even as a half-blood, there are unavoidable truths to the Wizarding World. Hogwarts is where you go if you’re born into wizarding blood in the UK. The Ministry of Magic will be pushed as the most ideal place to work only because the elites expect you to aspire to their jobs. Professor McGonagall will always like her counterpart in Slytherin the least. The Black family values loyalty and the dark arts above all else.
Looking back, Remus can’t be sure he ever made it clear to Sirius how much awareness he had of the Black family before their first meeting. In truth, it wasn’t much past a vague warning. His father, in the dead of night after a particularly bad full moon and before a particularly frightening first day of school had whispered all the names of the Pureblood families to him, had made Remus repeat them all back to ensure that they were memorised, had made him promise that if he was going to make friends it couldn’t be with those families, because they would be the first to report him for what he was if they found out.
Black wasn’t quite the top of the list, but it wasn’t far off. And so Remus Lupin, skinny and tall for his eleven years, had found himself trembling with fear as James Potter shook his limp hand, Sirius Black grinning behind him. But James had insisted he sit down and Sirius had pushed a chocolate frog into his hand and said ‘ my brother always nicks the card off me ’ and that had been it.
But his father’s fear hadn’t been unfounded. Remus had discovered that in the scars on Sirius’ back and the brand on Regulus’ arm. It’s hard to ignore that type of suspicion. Even through dinner times and shared homework and fumbling first kisses and the thrill of a home of their own, something in Remus had whispered told you so when the news had come.
Ironically there’s a different voice whispering the same thing at the sight of Sirius Black bent over his doormat, telling Remus it can’t be true.
“You were the only one who could have done it, Sirius. You were the secret keeper.” Behind him, Harry’s volume rises. Remus’ jaw tightens. Sirius doesn’t move.
“I wasn’t, Remus. We wanted you to believe it, but I wasn’t.”
“Then who -” Harry’s voice reaches a fever pitch and Remus jolts. Whisper Petrificus Totalus and Sirius solidifies, held in place where he was bent already. Remus turns away, then turns back just for a moment, stupid, to say, “One minute you twat,” before he makes his way back through the house.
And doesn’t that just epitomise the problem? Here it is - Remus Lupin, red-faced two-year-old Chosen One Harry Potter clutched in his arms; mass murdering killer of his parents Sirius Black bent double over the doorway. Except you know I couldn’t have done it keeps ringing through his head. Remus closes his eyes, presses his lips to Harry’s head and makes what might be the stupidest decision of his life.
He goes back down the corridor, Harry still in his arms. He raises his wand and whispers Rennevate . He keeps his wand raised. Except where he expects Sirius to rise - at least onto his knees - with fury, he falls forwards instead. He folds completely, forehead pressed to stone, dirty hair covering his face entirely.
Remus stays where he is, one arm holding Harry close, one arm holding his wand steady. A moment passes - another. “Sirius?” And his voice is quiet but not unkind, curious more than it is anything else.
Another moment, long enough that Remus contemplates asking again before Sirius, quietly, says “Will you hex me if I sit up?”
It takes Remus by surprise. The question seems almost comical, closer to parody than anything else. His wand jerks, then lowers, before he puts it down on the kitchen table. There’s no reason he should put it down. There’s no reason he should trust Sirius. “I won’t.” and that’s all there is to it. Blind trust.
Sirius rises slowly. Like this, with a bit of distance, Remus can see what Azkaban’s done to him. Sirius’ hair is unkempt, in a way he only let it get during his fifth year, towards the end when things were getting bad at home, the Howlers arriving almost daily. The clothes he wears are a thousand miles away from what he would have been seen caught dead in, and they hang from his frame in a way that’s almost obscene for the suffering it suggests. Sirius rises like a corpse reanimated and sits back on his heels, eyes that used to shine now regarding Remus dully.
It frightens him, for a moment, far more than anything else could.
They stay like that, even Harry seeming to understand the gravity of the situation, still and clinging in Remus’ arms. When Sirius speaks again there’s a rasp Remus hadn’t noticed the first time, dragging at this throat like a reminder of its disuse. “Can I plead my case?”
Entry into the house is impossible. Remus explains as much, in halting terms, and Sirius accepts with as much grace as Remus thinks he can. So they sit like this - Sirius outside, cross-legged on the doormat; Remus inside, cross-legged on the threshold. Harry sits in the gap of Remus’ crossed legs, subdued for the moment but regarding Sirius with a solemn, green-eyed gaze, a barrier of magic between them.
Remus knows what that sort of look can do to a man.
“I didn’t betray them.” Are the first words Sirius speaks with real conviction, and Remus feels his spine stiffen at the assertion. “Moony - Remus, please. Whatever else you might think of me, you know that I couldn’t betray James. Not ever.”
Except Remus doesn’t know. He suspects, certainly. He hopes - but he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know, because the Black family is cruel, and volatile, and the children are as bad as their parents except Sirius’ cousin babysits Harry once a month when Remus can’t look after him. That’s different though, isn’t it? It must be, or Remus had to reevaluate everything he’s ever known, and he’s not entirely sure he’s in a position to do that right now.
He doesn’t speak. Not yet.
“James asked me to be secret keeper. It made sense - he knows…knew,” for the first time, the expression on Sirius’ face changes. For the first time, Remus sees grief cross his expression. Is there room for grieving, in Azkaban? He can’t imagine there is. “He knew that I would die before I let anything happen to him or Lily. Or Harry,” Once more his expression shifts as he regards Harry. Remus thinks this might be Sirius’ best approximation of a smile.
Harry shrinks back. Sirius wilts.
When he speaks again, his voice is flat. “I thought it was too obvious. My family knew that the Potters took me in, when I left. They knew that James was more important to me than anyone else,” Remus doesn’t take offence to this, though he could. “So I convinced him it was the wrong choice. Peter, I told him. Peter would be better.”
Remus doesn’t realise he’s holding his breath until his lungs start to burn. He hides an exhale in Harry’s hair, watches the boy’s chubby fists swing. Easier to confront than Sirius’ dull gaze. “I didn’t trust you, then. I wish I had, Moony, but with everything we were being asked to do, with all the secrets we were keeping from one another I thought - well we knew there was a traitor. You were just as likely to be guilty as I was.”
This, too, Remus doesn’t take offence to. He remembers those last few weeks navigating the house together. He remembers how they fucked more than they talked, because talking meant they had to dance around one another, and neither of them were doing a very good job with it. They were like ships in the night, with cannons armed but unwilling to fire. Remus can’t be offended that Sirius had suspected him, because he’d suspected Sirius.
The only difference is that Remus had thought he had proof he was right.
“I went, that night. Found them both. James was by the stairs. He didn’t even have his wand with him,” As he speaks, Sirius’ face collapses. His voice goes thick, and tears cut clean lines through the dirt on his cheeks. “Fuck, Moony. He must have thought he could hold Voldemort off on his own, must have thought that he could buy them enough time. I can’t forget what he looked like, I can’t -” Sirius’ breaths grow heavy, and for a moment Remus’ fingers ache with the need to reach out. But the moment passes, and Sirius is whole again.
As whole as anyone can be, Remus supposes.
“Lily was upstairs. The only way she would have left James was if she thought she could give Harry a chance. She did - the two of them did. You’ve seen the scar,” and Remus can imagine it. James and Lily, the desperation of their love enough to save their son from the worst fate. “I tried to take him, but Hagrid - Hagrid said Dumbledore had other plans.”
This part Remus knows. He knows he’d come off a bad moon, and McGonagall’s voice had spoken from a silvery patronus of a cat, asked him to come to a Muggle neighbourhood. Remus had been forced to fight his corner, to prove he could keep Harry safe, but finally Dumbledore - with a not insignificant nudge from Minnie - had relented.
And here they are. Here they are, on either side of a barrier, with the son of their dead best friends between them. Remus takes a breath, watches Sirius’ face.
Then he rises. He rises, turns away. Behind him, he hears the catch of a breath, the suppression of a sob. When he raises his wand, the breaths stop altogether - Remus has spent a lot of the night avoiding offence. This is no different.
For a moment, after he waves his wand, there’s only silence. Then, the quiet press of a bare foot to stone. When Remus turns, Harry in his arms, Sirius stands in the doorway to his kitchen, face pale and eyes red-rimmed, and the moment hangs suspended, unknowable. Except Remus has always known just the right thing to say, hasn’t he?
“Come in, Padfoot.”