Just Maybe
Sirius had assumed that when Remus said “calls” plural that he actually meant one single call. Most likely to his mother, telling her that he had arrived alive and well at the Potter’s house. When the two boys arrived at the phone booth, Remus had reached into one of his pockets and pulled out a pack of cigarettes and offered Sirius as many as he wanted. Sirius only took one, he didn’t want to go back home spelling too much like cigarettes. Remus also pulled out a lighter which he promptly handed over to Sirius and went into the booth, leaving the lighter and cigarettes with Sirius.
Remus did indeed call his mum and the conversation, on Remus’ end at least because that was all Sirius could hear, went something like this:
“Morning, mum.”
“Mrs. Potter let me in.”
“It’s good.”
“I’m fine.”
“They're good.”
Or something along the lines of that. Sirius drowned out Remus’ bland responses and took the time to light the cigarette, taking a hit and blowing it out. All while leaning against the side of the booth. His eyes began to drop, he really was exhausted.
Sirius was roused from his stupor by the sound of the phone being returned to the receiver. Sirius readied himself to leave, but he stopped himself once noticing that Remus was already dialing another number.
“Hey, Lils,” Remus sounded loads more cheerful talking to Lily than his mother. Nonetheless, Sirius sucked in a breath from the shock of hearing Remus call Lily so soon, and that gasp caused him to start coughing.
Remus gave him a look that said, “I’m on the phone. Please keep it down.”
Which caused Sirius to give him a look that said, “Fuck off.” But he wandered away a bit to inspect the terrain. There was a fence on the opposite side of the road and perched on it was a bird, a pretty ugly bird if he did say so himself. He briefly considered turning into Padfoot to chase the bird down the street but, as Remus already seemed a bit on edge this morning, he refrained.
Sirius wandered back towards the telephone booth. Remus was leaning casually leaning up against one side of the inside of the booth, his shirt sleeves were rolled up showing off his forearms. The sun was lighting up the new natural highlights in Remus’ hair. The normally dark, honey blond-ish, brown-ish color looks lighter than it had weeks ago. But that could’ve just been from the way the sun was hitting him.
Sirius was jolted from his thoughts by the sound of Remus’ voice.
“Uh-huh.”
“Uh, huh.”
The conversation was terribly boring to listen to when he could only hear Remus talking, just like it had been when Remus was talking to his mum. Although Sirius admitted that Remus’ mother’s call would have still been boring even if he had heard the whole thing.
“Oh, yeah. He got it.” Remus must have been referring to the letter. Sirius hoped that she wasn’t exposing him, but he seriously had some doubts about that. This was only confirmed when Remus‘ eyes moved from staring off at nothing while listening to Lily to Sirius’ face. Remus’ eyes narrowed in suspicion, Sirius' eyes widened at being caught.
“Is that so?” Remus said into the phone.
“Lily, it's okay.”He went on. “Of course he is. He’s been telling everyone he was in love with you since he was eleven. No, no don’t worry. It’ll be okay.”
There was a great pause on Remus’ end and Sirius could only imagine what Lily was saying.
“I understand, try to get some rest, okay? Bye, Lily.” Lily not Lils, Remus must have been more on edge than before.
Remus slowly put the phone back in the receiver and ever so slowly turned to face Sirius.
“You,” He said, “You told her to write how she felt about James in a letter. A fucking letter! ”
Sirius shrugged.
“I mean, Merlin Sirius, I didn’t know you were that invested in James’ lovelife. I suppose I have some credit to give you, I didn't know you even liked Lily enough to calm her down if she were crying, let alone help her confess her feelings for James and help them get together.”
“So she told you all of it.”
“Yup, I can only begin to imagine what you were thinking.”
“What do you mean?”
“Sirius, she’s freaking out.” There was a pause, then Remus said. “Maybe it's a good thing that James and her are having very similar reactions to this revelation that their feelings for each other are requited.” He seemed very contemplative.
Remus was talking very fast and Sirius barely knew when he would be able to get a word in, so instead of waiting he just went right ahead and interrupted Remus, “The jig is up.” Sirius said, “You caught me. I’ve been caught.” He put the back of his hand to his forehead in a dramatic flourish.
Remus just stared at him.
“Now you don’t have anything to say?”
“Well…” Remus touched the back of his neck. “I know your intentions were there but…there may be repercussions Sirius. I mean, James said that he was done with his feelings for Lily.”
“He didn’t mean that.”
“Yeah, but what if he thinks he did. What if he rejects Lily because he doesn’t realize that feelings don’t just go away when you tell them too.”
“I- I didn’t think about that.” Sirius knew he sounded a bit sad.
“I know, I know, you don’t pour over small decisions, weighing pros and cons. You’re not-”
“You?”
“Excuse me?” Remus raised a brow.
“You would do that, you would make a pros and cons list over expressing your feelings for someone.” Sirius gave a small grin, it was ridiculous but this remark showed just how well he knew Remus.
“So sorry,” Remus said, his voice dripping with sarcasm, “I don’t jump into situations headlong not caring what I crash into.”
“Remus,” Sirius said calmly, he didn’t want to start arguing not when Remus had just got here and would only be here for a week until who knew when. “I needed to do something. She was crying and I didn’t know what else to do besides tell her what I would have done.”
“You would have sent a letter over the summer about how you loved someone back?” His voice still had a twinge of sarcasm.
“Well, that was partly because I wanted to take the piss out of James, she told you didn’t she? About James’ unlove letter?” At this Remus nodded. “So I wanted to make it a get-a-letter-give-a-letter situation.”
“God, you’re insufferable.” But Remus smiled nonetheless.
“Is she doing okay?”
“I wouldn’t say she’s one hundred percent peachy, but she’ll be fine.” At that Remus turned back to the phone and pulled out a few more coins, put them in the coin slot and started typing out a number from memory. The Potter’s had a muggle phone but Sirius didn’t know the number to give out. Mary, Lily, and Remus all had muggle parents, well only Remus’ mum was a muggle but she raised him partly in the muggle world. Sirius was hit with the realization that the three of them, along with McKinnon, had probably already spoken to each other in the past weeks of this summer.
“Hey, Mary,” Remus said into the phone.
Sirius couldn’t listen to half a conversation again, so he went around the booth to sit down on the grassy side of the road. Faintly he could hear Remus’ voice as he laid down on the ground, folding his arms behind his head.
“No, no everythings fine here, I was actually calling about Lily…yeah, I think you should call her just to check in…she’ll know I sent you…” Remus' voice faded off as Sirius fell asleep under the morning sun.
***
“Oi, Sirius, wake up!” Something nudged Sirius awake.
Sirius slowly opened his eyes to see Remus standing above him, nudging Sirius’ arm with his foot. “You couldn’t have woken me up with your hand, you had to kick me you tosser.” said Sirius as he sat up. Remus leaned down and started brushing stray pieces of grass from Sirius’s arms. “How long was I out?”
“Only about fifteen minutes?”
“Fifteen minutes on the phone with Mary? She must really like you, are you gonna ask her to Hogmead next term?” Sirius spoke in a rush. The thought made Sirius feel uncomfortable, maybe it was because he had a crush on Mary. But that was way before he had started saying to Emmaline Vance, that relationship had been short-lived and after a messy break-up Sirius hadn’t dated anyone since. A dark thought crept into Sirius’ mind, with James beginning a maybe-relationship with Lily and Remus having a something-like-a-maybe-relationship with Mary and Peter doing whatever he was doing, Sirius would be all alone. That was a very, very depressing thought and not at all how he wanted to spend his last year at Hogwarts.
Remus blushed, “It's not like that. I called her because I know Lily, and Lily needs Mary to talk her down right now. Besides, let's say I did like someone, I would never tell the likes of you.”
“Ouch, Moony. I thought we were friends.” Sirius mocked chagrin and Remus looked away, in the direction of the house.
“We’ve barely been away for an hour. I don’t suppose you think James is done ‘needing to be alone’?”
“I don’t think so,” Sirius said. That left them with nothing to do, if they decided to do something fun the experience would be ruined by their worry for James. “What do you want to do now?” Sirius briefly considered flopping back down on the grass and asking Remus to join him.
“Let's just keep walking.” Remus turned to look in the opposite direction of the house.
That wasn’t exactly what Sirius had been thinking but he said, “Okay, Remus, lets keep walking.”
And so they did.