grey
“Hi.”
You stand behind Remus at your normal spot in the library. He's sitting in his usual chair, back to you, head bowed, nothing on the table in front of him. He spins around, eyes catching yours before he leaps out of his seat and quickly gathers you into a bone-cracking hug.
“Whoa, hey-” you start, slowly wrapping your arms around him.
He just squeezes you even tighter, lifting you off of your feet for a moment.
“Rem. Can’t breathe,” you wheeze, and he laughs before letting you down, hands still on your back. When he meets your gaze, you notice how bloodshot his eyes are- your stomach aches with guilt.
“I’m so sorry,” he says, worrying his lip. You shake your head, brow furrowed. You pull away from him.
“No, no, don’t be daft, it has nothing to do with you. It’s not your fault at all. I’m sorry, I just wanted some time alone, I guess,” you say, looking down at your shoes. “In hindsight, it was a pretty dramatic reaction.”
His eyes are too intense right now, too emotional. You hear him scoff. “You’re not dramatic, and I’m still sorry. It was at least partially my fault- I should have told Sirius off sooner.”
Your head shoots up, “‘Sooner’? You told off Sirius?”
He nods gravely, and you bite back a pleased smile.
“Did he cry?” you tease. He tries to hide a grin.
“Shut up. He deserved it. He seems actually really sorry, though- he’s been moping with the rest of us.”
“Oh,” you say, “the rest of you?”
“I just-” he runs a hand through his hair, and then glances around the library. It’s deserted, but it still feels too stuffy for this conversation. “Want to go on a walk?”
You both swing on your cloaks once you get outside, rubbing your arms for warmth, the hems gently gliding over yellow grass behind you. You meander across the autumn grounds together, shoulders brushing occasionally. Remus catches you up- after James told him that Sirius had upset you, and he got onto Sirius, it’s been weird since.
“What did Sirius even say?” Remus asks after a moment of quiet, and your brow furrows.
“You didn’t know? And you still told him off?”
“He’s been enough of a dick to you before for me to, anyway. But all James said is that you overheard something and probably misunderstood.”
“I have no clue how I could have misunderstood that,” you say, eyebrow raised.
“Well, whatever it was, it upset you, and pissed James off, so…”
“It pissed James off?”
Remus stays quiet, looking at you curiously.
“What?” you ask, giving him a questioning look. His eyes are dangerously sincere.
“I know you don’t realize it, and I know we don’t talk about it, but we really do care about you.”
Your throat seems to close, autumn wind biting through your clothes, shocked silent. Remus stares at you. You break his gaze, continuing to stare ahead, and he continues to stare at you.
“What did he say?” Remus repeats.
“Fuck, I didn’t mean for this to be such a big deal,” you groan, feeling guilt begin to ache and creep its way through your chest.
“It would’ve been even if you didn’t hide away. It’s not your fault.”
You stay quiet. Remus raises his eyebrows at you expectantly. You swallow, and your mouth opens without your permission, “Sirius said that you didn’t like me, and I was throwing myself at you, and I was annoying, and that I need to stop getting in the way, or whatever. Just a bunch of rubbish- we said junk like that all the time to each other when we were kids. It means nothing, he’s just a dick. He probably wasn’t thinking, even if it is true. I was just being sensitive, I’m done with it.”
There’s a pause, filled by the crunching of partially dead grass under your feet.
“God,” Remus slides a hand down his taught face, “You’re the farthest thing from sensitive.”
“Don’t know how to take that one,” you quip, and he rolls his eyes.
“You know what I mean. And don’t avoid the subject- you have to know I love you. You’re my best mate.” Remus says, grabbing your hand gently. You smile up at him, squeezing tightly.
“Yeah, I realize that now.”
“Now?"
You wince, giving him an awkward shrug and dropping his hand. He scrapes it over his face.
“God, you’re so dense sometimes-”
“Come on, I never claimed I was quick when it comes to this stuff-”
“We’ve been best mates for, like, four years-”
“We’ve been best mates for, like, four years-” you mimic him in a high-pitched voice, grinning at him.
“Shut up,” Remus laughs, “I’m trying to be serious.”
You look at his face, really look. It’s warm and open, and the breeze makes his cheeks flush, white scars made prominent by contrast. You love him. Not romantically. Something stronger and slower and chosen.
“You don’t get in the way. You don’t throw yourself at me. You’re not annoying. I wish you hung out with us more, to be honest. Sirius is just… stubborn, and possessive, and stupid, and all of those things get even worse when he’s hungover. He needs to apologize.”
“Alright,” you sigh, kicking at a pebble in your path. “But I’m still confused on how I could have misinterpreted what he said. It feels pretty straightforward.”
“I’m not sure,” Remus says. There’s that lilt in his tone he gets when he’s lying; you take note of it, but don’t press him. You’ve already started enough. You prefer ignorant bliss right now. The two of you walk around the grounds for a while longer, chatting and listening to the distant call of birds from the Forbidden Forest. You end up skipping stones on the lake, Remus sitting against a nearby tree.
“I read that muggle novel. It’s ass," you say, tossing a stone and watching it fly.
Remus gasps, and you can imagine his scandalized face perfectly. You pick up another.
“How could you? That book is amazing!”
“Remus, it was totally predictable,” a stone sinks with a sad thunk, “and the characters were annoying.”
“Well, you’re annoying, and it being predictable is the whole point! It’s comforting-”
“Hey!”
You spin around. Sirius is jogging towards you, cloak billowing behind him. His hair somehow manages to look windswept in a handsomely ruggish way, his cheeks flushed from activity and the biting cold; your stomach clenches. Freezing, eyes wide, you glance over at Remus, who looks as surprised as you feel. Sirius comes to a stop in front of you, breathing heavily.
“James told me he saw you go out here- can I- can we talk? Is that okay? Do you have a second? Merlin, I need to run more,” he exhales, running a hand through his hair. He looks even more disheveled close up; his eyes are tinged with red around the edges and his eyebrows are pinched.
“Yeah, that’s- uhm, sure,” you stutter, turning a stone over in your palm. You look back over at Remus, who quickly stands, wiping off his trousers.
“I’ll see you both later.”
“Bye, Rem,” you say, and he shoots you one last we-will-definitely-talk-about-this-later look before striding off. You turn to Sirius expectantly. There’s a second of just eye contact, of staring into a light grey tunnel. He finally breaks it, looking away and clearing his throat. He takes a breath and looks back at you.
“I’m sorry. I’m really fucking sorry, for everything,” he says, swallowing hard. You turn back to the lake and take a few steps away from him, not wanting to meet his eyes, and skip the stone. It bounces a few times, sailing through the air, slowly sinking, sending ripples across a smoky mirror.
“It’s not a big deal, Sirius. We just never got along. It’s whatever,” you dismiss, kicking at pebbles in search of another; you can’t focus on the search and end up staring at your feet instead. What you want, what you really want, is to put all of this behind you. You had your moment to cry and bitch and moan, and now you’re over it. Sirius is a prick; always has been, always will be. You can’t take what he said personally, even if it was personal. He doesn’t like you. You don’t like him. It’s not anything you didn’t know before.
You try to ignore the tiny, minuscule part of you that aches at seeing him so downtrodden- and, Godric, he ran all the way down here for you- you’re confused and overwhelmed and almost flattered. But what are you even thinking? Why do you hate seeing him so upset? He is the one who’s been a dick. He should feel sorry, even if it was blown out of proportion.
“No, it is a big deal,” he says firmly. You keep your eyes on the pebbled shore as he continues, “I’ve been a prick, ever since we were kids. I was mean to you, and ignored you, and was just awful to you-”
“We were awful to each other,” you cut in,
“-and I blamed you for rubbish that wasn’t even true, and I’ve been such an ass to you-”
“It’s gone both ways,” you say, rubbing your eyes.
“We both know I’ve been so much worse to you. I always have been. I guess I was jealous, I dunno, your family just always… but that’s not an excuse.”
You sigh deeply, biting at your lip, remembering the dread that used to sit in your gut at the thought of going to another pureblood gathering as a kid. The sickly feeling of slathering on a face, of dealing with Sirius’s comments. Looking back, you know he felt the same. You were just kids, and old habits die hard.
“I’m so sorry about it, and I don’t even know how to explain why I’ve still been acting like that, and I know there’s nothing I can do to change the past, but-”
“Black,” you cut him off abruptly, looking up to face him, “forget it. Please. We were both just tired of… everything, and we took it out on each other. I was jealous of you, too,” you smile weakly as he flushes even further and glances away, laughing in disbelief. He has a slightly crooked bottom tooth that you’ve never noticed before.
“Jealous of me?”
You scoff, “Obviously. You have… confidence. You could at least talk, and even if all of our families and families’ friends didn’t approve of you, you still had other people. You’ve always had friends of your own.”
Sirius’s eyebrows furrow. “But you… you’re the L/Ns, not the Blacks. Being a Gryffindor in a line of Ravenclaws is better than Slytherins- it has to be. Your family seems so much less… severe, I guess.”
You snort, “You should see them at home. Yours is just louder about being awful.”
His mouth hangs open for a moment before he says, “I’m sorry. I didn’t… Godric, I’m so sorry.” His jaw clenches as his eyes search your face- you have to look away.
“Stop it. I don’t need your pity. We both have shitty families, and we were just angry little kids; you were shittier, sure, whatever. Just leave it.”
“That’s no excuse for how I-”
You turn back to him, “Sirius, just… please. Let’s just start over, or go back to how we were. If I have to hear you be sincere for one more second I’m going to toss myself to the squid.”
He blinks at you disbelievingly, lips parted. The corner of your mouth twitches up: an olive branch. His face morphs from a guilt-ridden expression to a small smile; you swear his whole body relaxes.
“I… thanks. But I’m still sorry.”
“I accept your apology. Now go back to being irritating, and I’ll go back to putting up with it.”
Sirius chuckles, gazing off at the lake. “Speaking of irritating, I’m still finding orange gunk in my hair.”
“You looked better ginger,” you drawl, and he scoffs.
“I’ll get you back for that, one day.”
“I’d like to see you try.”
“How’d you do it?” he asks, lithely leaning over to pick up a stone. He inspects it as he rises, tossing it from hand to hand, “You weren't holding your wand. I saw you.”
“Wasn’t me,” you lie, shrugging. He hands the stone to you, and you manage to skip it farther than usual. The gentle lapping of water against the shore becomes ever-so-slightly more apparent from your toss.
“Wait,” Sirius starts, his voice slow, “you… you were the one fucking with me that one summer, weren’t you?”
Your stomach twists in an unpleasant way, but you keep your face away from him to hide the slightly proud smirk rising from your lips. “I don’t know what you’re on about.”
“You were the one that put itching powder in my swim trunks- I knew it wasn’t Regulus! And everything else- Godric!”
The summer after your first year at Hogwarts, your family invited the Blacks to your remote lake house in America; your father had purchased it on a whim, and wanted to flaunt the estate. Sirius had been horrible the first week, never giving you a break from his teasing. A particularly nasty comment on your looks sent you over the edge- you’d been saving some Itchywog's long-lasting itching powder you sneakily bought on a shopping trip a few weeks prior. Sirius was too busy whining about “Regulus’s” prank to spare you another glance for the rest of the trip. Trying not to grin at him wiggling in his chair uncomfortably for the next few days was almost torturous. The dung bombs under his pillow and frog spawn soap in his shower were just the cherry on top.
“Maybe I did.”
Sirius’s face comes into view as he stands closer beside you, his eyes alight with wonder and disbelief.
“Bloody hell, I thought you were lame.”
You scoff, clicking your tongue and stepping forward so the water laps at the tips of your shoes, “Thanks.”
“No offense, I just didn’t expect you to be the pranking type.”
You shrug, “I get bored.” Before you can think twice, you say, “Do you remember when Severus got stuck in those unpoppable-”
“-giant bubbles in the seventh floor bathroom? He floated down the entire hallway, Godric, it was magnificent- holy shit, that was you?”
You turn to look at him, a shit-eating grin on your face. His jaw is gaping. “Yeah. Sorry you took the heat on that one,” you say sheepishly, remembering McGonagall’s furious face when she yelled at Sirius and James, who were still doubled over in laughter.
“The detention was worth seeing Snape flipping around the corridor. I always thought it was Remus pulling one over on us,” Sirius grins, and gives you an unreadable look, something curious and distant. He averts his gaze back to the expanse of the lake.
“I’ve always been rubbish at skipping rocks,” Sirius comments, staring at the decaying waves. You pick up another stone.
“Has anyone ever taught you?” you ask, and he shakes his head; at least, you think he does, because you can only really see him out of your peripheral vision. You’re pretending to inspect the rock, feeling its smoothness in your hands. You feel like looking him in the eye while you’re talking would make your mouth stop working.
“Not really. James tried, once, but he’s not a great teacher.”
“Seems like most of your friends aren’t.”
You glance up to see Sirius furrow his brow questioningly.
“Remus? Transfiguration?” you try.
“Huh? Oh, yeah, I guess he hasn’t been able to- how do you know about that?”
“Did he seriously not mention it to you?” you groan, and Sirius quirks his previously furrowed brow. “Remus has been trying to get me to tutor you. That’s what we were arguing about before potions.”
“Ah, I thought you were discussing my rugged good looks,” Sirius breaks into a grin, all shining teeth and deep dimples and clear eyes. You quickly look back to the stone before you can hate him and his effortless charisma even more.
“You wish.”
“You should,” he says. You shoot him a look, and he corrects, “tutor me, I mean.”
You blink, then exhale a laugh. “I wasn’t offering. Just because we’re fine now doesn’t mean I have to like you.”
You almost grimace at your own harshness. It's true, though- you're not interested in spending any more time around him. Sirius’s face flashes with hurt for less than a second before going back to his usual easy confidence. “Oh, come on, give me a chance. Plus, you’re great at Transfiguration- you’d be a perfect tutor.”
“Thanks, but I’m not a good teacher, and you wouldn’t…” you dismiss, trying to steer clear from the compliment. You feel the weight of the stone in your palm and run your thumb over a smooth divot in it. He wouldn't like you, just like you wouldn't like him.
“Wouldn’t what?” he asks. You roll your eyes.
“Listen to me. You’re too fuckin’ stubborn.”
“I would listen! Really!” he cries, ducking into your line of sight, determined to catch your eye. His grin stuns you for a moment, his body close enough beside yours that you can feel his warmth. He tilts his head teasingly, “Hey, teach me how to skip stones. I’ll show you I can listen.”
“I can’t skip stones,” you deadpan, sidestepping him and sending the rock flying. It lands with a loud splash, sinking immediately. You gesture between the lake and him, eyebrows up. “See?”
“Oh, fuck off, you did that on purpose. Just teach me,” he says through a teasing smile. Glancing up at the sky, you consider it for a moment before looking back at his eyes. They’re shining, full of bright, optimistic, youthful mischief. Something aches in you like an old scar.
“Fine, alright- look for a good one, and I’ll try.”
Sirius lets out a whoop of victory and ecstatically starts searching for a smooth stone. It's hard to suppress a grin.
“Here,” he says, tossing one to you. It’s a perfect skipping stone, flat and thin and smooth, and fits snugly into your palm. He finds another, looking at you expectantly.
You spend the next half hour teaching Sirius how to skip stones; it’s mostly trial and error full of sarcastic comments, but he eventually manages to get one to skip twice. He cheers, arms in the air, immediately looking at you, eyes alight and proud. You can’t help but smile back.
“Told you I’m a good student,” he brags airily, standing a bit taller.
“Don’t get cocky.”
“Me? Never- but I bet I can skip one farther than you,” he challenges, grinning.
“You’re on.”