Chapter 3
It was the end of the semester and Gryffindor was throwing an ‘end of year party’. Honestly Remus would rather die than go to it, but Lily being Lily ended up convincing him so here he was, sitting in the girls’ dorm sighing, loudly. At first, he tried to convince the girls he was too tired after the exams and that they would let him stay in their room and read a book or something. But that didn’t work. So now he was trying his best to annoy them just enough with his fake/non fake sadness.
“Will you shut up?” Marlene said, sounding like she was any moment away from slapping him. Remus knew when to pick his fights with her, so he ended up doing what she said.
“Do my eyeliner, will you Rems?” Remus glared at Lily, “What? I know you used to do it on ‘you know who’.” Lily continued dramatically, while Mary snorted at the nickname.
With another groan he rose from Mary’s bed and took the pencil out of her hand with a bit of force. He considered poking her eye on ‘accident’ but decided against it. When he was done Mary also wanted hers done and when he was done with her, Marlene, of course, wanted it too.
So, the party had started a good 10 minutes before he was done with Marlene and surprisingly, he couldn’t wait to get to the party now. Marlene was talking about some girl from her hometown she couldn’t wait to see when Mary interrupted her, “Remus, let me do you now!”
“Do me…?”
“Your eyeliner honey. Sorry, someone would kill me if I ‘did you’.” Remus chose to ignore the last part and just stared at her a little dumbly. So, she took it as a yes and placed her hand on his forehead delicately, while she was looking very concentrated.
When she was finally done, Remus looked in the mirror and was taken aback. He actually looked… good?
“If I wasn’t into girls, I would totally jump your bones.”
The other girls just laughed while nodding Remus just looked stunned at her. “What the fuck, Marlene.” They started laughing even harder at that.
“Come on, let’s get drunk!”
“Don’t need to tell me twice.”
-
The first thing Remus saw when he walked into the common room was of course Sirius. His hair was up, framing his beautiful features, and he was wearing a basic white t-shirt and, oh. He was wearing muggle jeans.
Yeah, Remus needed alcohol. Right now. Some girls, a year above him, offered him a half-empty bottle of firewhiskey which he took gracefully.
It was about an hour later when a drunk James came stumbling into him, “Moony I’m sorry okay? I can’t stand not being able to send you letters over the summer. Please, forgive me.”
He was clearly drunk off his mind and Remus, who was quite drunk himself, started to feel guilty again. But he really didn’t know how to make it right. James was staring at him with big doe eyes, either drunk or about to let a few tears lose. “Come on, let’s get you to bed.”
At that James beamed and jumped into Remus’ arms. A bit unexpected and very awkward hug, but it was nice. Remus had missed him, and- No. He couldn’t start thinking that way. So, instead he placed an arm around his waist and started to guide him up the stairs.
It was difficult, to say at least, James kept taking nonsense and he could not multitask. He was also a very clumsy drunk, so that didn’t help either.
When they finally reached their dorm Remus made him brush his teeth and drink some water, he would definitely thank him later. And when James was finally in his bed Remus considered his options.
He didn’t want to go back to the party, but he also did not want to meet a drunk Sirius when he went to bed.
Party it was.
When Remus walked down the stairs, with much more elegance this time, he noticed the pretty platinum dreadlocks that belonged to Pandora. She was talking to Lily. Lily Evans of all people. Lily was touching her arm and Pandora smiled softly at her.
“Uh, Panda, what are you doing here?”
Snapping out of their little world, they turned to him, “Remus, wow, You look lovely.” She smiled, not as sweetly as she did at Lily but her radiant smile still upon her features. “I came to get you, Regulus said ‘my brother and Crouch were driving him mad, and he needed someone normal’.”
“Oh, yeah, I’ll go save him.” A she was about to follow him, he just said, “Stay here Panda, have fun.” Sending a wink Lily’s way, he walked out.
-
At this point he had gotten used to all the stares when he walked into Slytherin’s common room, and they had also started to get used to see him in their house.
He was about 10 steps away from their dorm when Regulus stormed out, looking ready to kill someone, “Remus you need to control them.” That was followed by Barty’s ‘Remus!' and them running into each other, and the door, while trying to get to him. Regulus seemed to get even more irritable at that and walked back into his dorm, shutting the door forcefully.
“Remus, my love, why do I smell alcohol?” Evan said, a smirk forming on his face, “Have you been drinking without us?” He then went on with a pout.
“I already told you, my love, Gryffindor is holding an end of the year party.” The boys started grinning as he played along with the ‘my love’.
“Merlin, I love drunk Remus.” Evan agreeing.
“So, you don’t love regular Remus?” They started grinning even harder at his fake sadness. Was it fake?
“Of course, my love, but we especially love drunk Remus.”
“Will you shut up?! I am literally going to kill myself if you don’t.” Regulus dramatically shouted from the dorm.
“He’s in a mood.”
“Want to join me at the party? I’m not nearly as drunk as I planned.” Remus said, the others nodding, while Evan placed an arm on his shoulders and Barty’s around his waist.
-
The party was crowded so no one didn’t really notice Remus and the Slytherins entering the Gryffindor common room, and those who did were too drunk to care.
“Merlin, and I thought we threw loud parties.”
Remus snorted and guided them over to a table with some firewhiskey bottles. Evan had let go of him for a while, but Barty’s hand was still at his waist. After taking a swig of the bottle he passed it on.
Because of his ‘little problem’ his senses were heightened more than any normal person so when he felt his neck hair rose, he looked around the room and caught Sirius staring at him. Or more like the hand on his waist. When he finally looked up Sirius saw he was caught staring, he didn’t do anything. He just looked at Remus with a sad almost hurt expression.
A part of Remus wanted to walk over to him and hug all the hurt away from him. To never let go of him. Evan seemed to sense it, so he took hold of Remus’ hand and let him to the dancefloor. He wanted to have fun; he really did. He wanted to enjoy the warm hands on his waist, wanted to fall for the people who were holding him. But deep down, a part of him knew he couldn’t. Instead of pushing them away, he welcomed them. He let them in. Let them take control of his body. Let them take control of his mind.
While they were dancing, he just couldn’t forget the look on Sirius’ face. He couldn’t forget all his tries to make things right and he couldn’t forget his warm smile. His stupid, stupid, stupid beautiful smile.
Remus felt like crying but when Barty started to kiss at his neck, he tried to let out a laugh. He laughed loudly, it sounded like someone else had control of him, and maybe someone did, because when he felt Evan pull him away again, he let him. He let him even though all he ever wanted was at the party.
He felt like a ghost.
They were walking somewhere; Remus didn’t know where. Evan kept squeezing his hand, and when Remus finally felt like he was back in his body, he saw he was back in the Slytherin dorm. He saw Regulus looking up from his book, a questioning look on his face. That’s when he broke down. Barty and Evan caught him before he hit the ground, Regulus jumped up from his bed towards him.
Remus felt weak, but for the first time in his life, he didn’t know how to hide it. He let out the first sob. A broken weak sob.
He felt a hand in his hair, one on his lower back and one on his cheek.
He didn’t know how long he was crying, it felt like an eternity and yet only a second.
Remus didn't know what to do. So, he just cried, and let himself be held.