We could slip away
Wouldn't that be better
Me with nothing to say
And you in your autumn sweater
“Moony, look,” Sirius prompted as Remus pulled himself out of bed amidst a chorus of soft groans and aching bones. With his eyes half-closed, he looked over to Sirius’ bed.
And immediately went still. Sirius was wearing Remus’ favorite jumper. The faded one, with the elbow patches, that used to be Gryffindor red with gold stripes but was now sort of a rust color because of how many times it had been stretched over Remus’ head, how many times it had been through the wash. Sirius was wearing it. Sirius was wearing it. With no trousers.
A breath slipped through Remus’ teeth as he calculated a response. He needed to recover from this quickly, to wipe the admiration from his face. He wasn’t ready to let Sirius know he was in love with him. Not yet. Not while Sirius was wearing his jumper.
How could he make this ratty piece of fabric look that good? The collar was all stretched out, but it displayed his taut collarbone. The sleeves were too long, but his fingertips stuck out in an adorable way, like a first year in their new robes. The waist was too long, but it hit right at his bare thighs, making his muscles look sharp and defined against the threadbare jumper.
“Very cute, Pads,” Remus corrected with a clearing of his throat, turning so that Sirius wouldn’t notice the blushing of his cheeks. It was an effort in vain.
“Moony, are you blushing?” Sirius asked in a suddenly sultry voice and Remus could hear the pounding of his feet on the hardwood as he stomped over to Remus’ bed.
“I am not blushing,” Remus argued, through his blushing. As Sirius tried twisting around Remus to get a good look at his face, Remus twisted right back, keeping him away from it.
“Oh, it’s too late, Moons,” he whispered, holding himself still at Remus’ back as he let his finger draw painfully slowly down Remus’ spine. “You’re pink all over. I love this color on you.”
A shiver rushed down Remus’ skin, despite how hard he tried to stifle it. This was why he was such a mess around Sirius. Because Sirius did this all the time. As he sat behind Remus in class, he would run his fingers through Remus’ curls. When Gryffindor won a game, Sirius would grab Remus by the face and kiss him hard on the cheek. Sometimes, he would whisper wildly suggestive things into Remus’ ear just to see him stiffen in response.
Sirius continued his teasing, but his voice was low and purposeful. “Does that mean you like the way I look in your jumper?” As he let his fingers brush over the indentations in the small of Remus’ back, Remus realized, quite sharply, he could tease Sirius right back.
James and Peter had gone off early to spy on the Slytherin Quidditch practice. He and Sirius were alone in the dorms. He could say things to Sirius that he might not say otherwise.
He tried it out. “I’d like the way you’d look without it a lot more,” Remus said, bravely lowering his tone of voice, finally turning to face Sirius without widening the distance between them. There was an immediate rise in Sirius’ brow, a curious tilt of Sirius’ head, a silent parting of his pale lips. And a surging red blush that splashed over his high-born cheekbones.
“Oh,” Sirius replied, momentarily stunned, until he saw the exaggerated, impudent expression on Remus’ face. At first, he rolled his eyes at how easily he’d walked into this set-up, but a mischievous glint returned to his expression. “Oh, Moony,” he growled, his bravado returned in full as he leapt from his place on the floor, wrapping his thighs around Remus’ hips and playfully biting at all the bare skin of Remus’ shoulder suddenly underneath his teeth.
With his hands around Sirius’ thighs to hold him up, Remus dissolved into laughter, his shoulder to his ear in an effort to keep Sirius’ ticklish lips from worsening his blush. But before he could even spiritedly admonish Sirius, before he could return Sirius to the floor, Sirius went still, resting his forehead to Remus’ shoulder and letting his cheek nuzzle gently to Remus’ throat.
He spoke, his low voice driving another shiver into Remus’ bones. “If it’s alright with you, Moony, maybe I can just … borrow your jumper for a bit. Just for today.”
Residual laughter trickled from Remus’ lips. “I don’t know why you’d want to, it’s falling apart at the seams, Sirius.” The breath that Sirius let out rolled down the back of Remus’ collar.
“It … it smells like you,” Sirius admitted softly. While Remus blushed again, there was decisiveness in his tone as he replied, tightening his hold on the boy in his arms.
“You can keep it as long as you like, Padfoot,” Remus replied, bracing for the caveat he was about to request. “As long as you let me hold you like this every now and then.”
The sound of a sudden breath rushed across Remus’ ear, the squeeze of Sirius’ arm increasing around his neck. “Say the magic words and I’ll think about it.”
Remus smirked. “Sirius?”
“Hmm?” Sirius acknowledged casually.
“Be my boyfriend.” He could feel Sirius smile from against his throat.
“It’s about damn time, Moony.”