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angelgazing) wrote2004-09-15 11:25 pm
so it goes with faith - sirius/remus
author: me
rating: NC-17ish
words: 5000 and change
summary: Remus, Sirius, faith and lack thereof.
notes: Written for the book quotes challenge at
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lunar_fics with The Picture of Dorian Grey quote, but I'm not entirely sure if it even works for it so... I have no idea where to post Remus/Sirius fic, so if you got any ideas let me hear 'em, please.1. Faith
He is sitting on the ripped bed in the shack the morning after the full
moon—bones replaced with fire and muscles screaming and arms bleeding through
the white shirt he's trying to button with tired, numb-clumsy fingers—when
Sirius, in his spot across the room, on the dust dirty floor, lifts his head from his hands.
"It's getting worse," he says, as though it is an absolute truth of life that he knows first hand. He peels at a strip of faded, yellowing wallpaper falling from the wall he's leaning against restlessly.
Remus silently wishes for James to burst through the door with his arrogance and grace and ability to handle Sirius and save the day once again. Even Peter would do because Sirius would shut up then, at least, instead of offering one more empty apology. With an apparent lack of a forthcoming savior, he chooses to once more hold his tongue.
Sirius, of course, does nothing of the sort.
"You won't let me near you."
The sun is just over the horizon outside the grimy window, but Remus can't see it for the rain clouds that spread across to leave the sky grey.
"Sirius," he begins, then stops because it's just too much to speak right now. His throat is raw and his limbs feel like lead and he's just so bloody tired of all of this. His hands fall into his lap and he missed a button somewhere along the way.
Something in Sirius' face softens then, and he crawls across the small and broken room on hands and knees to kneel in front of Remus. He gets a splinter in his palm and the smell of his blood fills the room and makes Remus' stomach turn. "You don't understand," he says, but softly, hushed and scared and nearly as tired as Remus. "If I could do anything I would-"
"Join The Clash," he finishes for him—before he gets a chance. "No, Sirius, I can't say that I understand that at all, but I've certainly heard enough about it to."
"No, you bloody git," Sirius whispers, his fingers sliding along the outside of Remus' thighs until they reach the fabric of his shirt, "if I could do anything in the world I would take back what I did." He looks thoughtful, for just a second, as he begins undoing the buttons that Remus worked so hard on with a ridiculous amount of ease. "Then I'd join The Clash," he adds like an afterthought.
The absurdity of it would make Remus laugh if he didn't think laughing would kill him.
"I'm not making excuses anymore."
With the last button undone, he slides his fingers lightly just beneath the edge of the shirt. Remus hisses when he touches a spot that's still too sore. Sirius winces when his fingers come away damp with blood.
"If you would just tell me… Moony, I'll do anything, I swear it. If you would just tell me so this can stop. You wouldn't let me near you last night and look at you now. It hasn't been this bad in over a year and you know it."
Sirius wipes his fingertips on his blue jeans and then, starting at the bottom begins redoing the buttons. "We need to let Pomfrey have a look at you," he says, when the shirt is buttoned, save for the top one that Remus never leaves undone.
His fingers flutter at the peak of the scar that the loose button reveals. Remus hisses again and closes his eyes; his head falls back just a little.
Leaning forward, Sirius nuzzles his neck as though he were still Padfoot. "Moony," he whispers against the column of Remus' throat, "Moony, I swear I'll do anything. I swear… Please, Moony, just forgive me."
Remus, with his fingers clenching tight against the ripped and bloodied bed sheets, groans out a laugh. "Begging on your knees, Padfoot?"
"If that's what it takes," he answers, nuzzling just a little higher.
He raises his hands to push Sirius away, but they end up resting on his shoulders. He tilts his head down and opens his eyes. "How am I supposed to trust you?" he asks, fingers tightening and pushing back finally.
"Moony," Sirius whines in the back of his throat—always a hint of puppy and dog even with boy arms that hold Remus in place, "come on, Moony, have a little faith."
Remus isn't quite sure how his fingers come to be catching a tangle in Sirius' too long hair that makes his breath hitch. "Tell me why I should."
"I won't fuck up again, I swear I won't. I can't stand this." He leans forward when Remus tries to lean back, stands just enough to put a knee on the mattress between Remus' thighs. Sirius presses his nose just below Remus' jaw and his lips against his throat. "I can't stand not getting to touch you. I can't stand not getting to run beside you at the full moon. Maybe I deserve it, but I know that you don't. I won't fuck up again. Please, Moony, just have a little faith,
would you?"
Because he's tired, (exhausted to the bones that were broken and reshaped and broken and reshaped again and it hurts to breathe and he feels too heavy to move) because the only thing harder than loving Sirius Black is hating him, he turns his face into Sirius' hair and says, "I'll kill you if you do."
Sirius grins with relief against his neck. "I'll let you," he says, and then presses his mouth to Remus' before he can reply.
2. Will
Sirius got a letter from home.
Remus knows because he was sitting next to him at the breakfast table when the owl dropped the letter onto Sirius' plate and his eggs suddenly lost their flavour. He is wearing bruises on his thigh from suddenly clenching fingers.
It is a universally known fact that when Sirius gets a letter from his mother you should duck and cover and cower because the only thing more dangerous than
Sirius Black when he's pissed off is James Potter trying to cheer up or entertain or impress Sirius Black.
Together the combination has always been nearly lethal. If not for the Slytherins, then certainly for them when the Slytherins calm down enough to reach for their wands. Which he supposes is a good thing, as it is most likely the only reason they haven't all been expelled yet.
The thing that worries him isn't that Sirius might be plotting something, because that, at least, he would know how to handle. This, though, this is Sirius randomly smiling and picking up the books of a third year Slytherin girl and practically skipping down the halls.
And even James is beginning to look a bit concerned.
Sirius, who is grinning widely, flops down beside him in the armchair next to
the fire. The chair isn't actually big enough for both of them, so he's mostly
in Remus' lap, but at this point no one pays any attention to the antics of Sirius for fear of encouraging him. He presses a very wet kiss against Remus' cheek.
Peter looks absolutely terrified.
Remus understands completely.
He wraps an arm around Sirius' waist anyway as he asks, "What have you done?"
"Cursed every Slytherin in the school?" James guesses.
"Been disowned again?" Remus asks, weary.
"Worked out a way to never again have to attend History of Magic?" Peter chimes
in.
"Got Snape expelled?" Lily asks, with a great amount of dread.
"Learned that your mother spontaneously combusted after hearing about you and
Moony?" "Gotten a letter of apology from your mother for the idiocy of the
Black world view and a great amount of begging for your return as the heir and
favourite son? A position you then refused just to hear her anguished cries?"
"Finally figured out a way to rid the world of Snape without nearly killing all
your friends in the process?"
"No," Sirius answers finally, when the questions stop, with a smile just as bright as before, "but don't think I'm not still working on those. I haven't actually done anything… Yet."
Remus, who feels as though he has far more reason for concern, closes his eyes. "Do I even want to know what you're planning?" he asks, even though it sort of pains him.
That just seems to make Sirius grin wider. He nips at Remus' neck and whispers into his ear, loud enough for every person inside of Hogwarts to hear, "Come up stairs and I'll tell you exactly what I'm planning, Moony."
He doesn't groan just because it will be so widely misinterpreted. He opens his eyes.
When Sirius stands and holds out his hand, he takes it and allows himself to be hauled to his feet.
Peter is purple and shifting with discomfort.
James claps his shoulder and says, "Wormtail and I will continue to pretend we're not going upstairs for a reason other than fear of what we'll walk in on again."
That, Remus feels, is a distinctly unfair statement, as it was only that one time and they'd been wearing far more clothing than when they'd walked in on James and Lily, and it was really much less mortifying than the time Peter forgot to cast a silencing charm and accidentally blurted out-
"You're a good man, James Potter," Sirius says, walking away and dragging Remus behind him.
They all pretend not to notice Lily trying to hide her smile.
It isn't, of course, any surprise when Sirius pushes Remus onto his bed. "What," he says, and then is stopped from going further by Sirius kissing him.
He's been on edge since breakfast and no longer has the will to refuse anything Sirius is going to offer. Even if he wanted to.
Sirius pulls back grinning, and straddles his waist. "My uncle Alphard died."
"I'm sorry," Remus offers slowly, uncertainly. "Or… congratulations?"
"He was one of the few decent ones," Sirius tells him, nuzzling his neck. "Completely off his nut, though."
"A common trait among the decent Blacks, it seems."
Sirius nips his ear. "He changed his will, waited a day to die and when he
didn't he'd change it again. He's been saying every other day for as long as I
can remember that tomorrow would be the day that he'd die. He swore he'd leave
me his flat in London when he finally bit it, as I was the only one in the lot
that wouldn't turn my nose up at it being in a Muggle building."
"And… did he?" he asks, fingers buried in Sirius' hair to keep him from pulling
away.
"As a matter of fact he did," Sirius answers. "Bit of gold as well, but the
focus here is the flat. The nice, comfortable flat in Muggle London that
probably smells of Uncle Alphard, but you have amazing talent at removing
offending odours from the air."
"Well, if you wouldn't come in smelling of wet dog so often…"
"Moony," he whines, "you're missing the point on purpose."
"Am I?" Remus cocks an eyebrow and then shifts his hips. "Care to get on with
your point then, Mr. Padfoot?"
"We're out of Hogwarts in a few months, Moony, and then it's just… James and
Lily are getting married, I don't see why you and I can't share a flat."
Remus uses his grip on Sirius' hair to pull his face from where it is nosing at
Remus' open collar. "Is that what this is about, Padfoot? You want me to move
in with you?"
"Just think of it. We wouldn't have to worry about silencing charms or locking
spells or James and Wormtail busting in at every turn…"
Remus shifts his hips again restlessly when Sirius runs his tongue across the
scar on his collarbone. "That… That would be nice."
"So, how 'bout it?"
His fingers tighten in Sirius' hair. "It's unfair that you ask all the hard
questions with your mouth on some part of my anatomy when I have no hope of
rational thought, or will to say no to anything you want from me."
Undoing buttons slowly, Sirius smiles. "Well, in that case-"
"No, Padfoot, I will absolutely not do the thing with the honey and the quill.
It can't be physically possible and anyway the charm doesn't seem—Oh." Remus
gasps at the scrape of stubble against the scars that cover his ribs, then bites his lip against a moan when stubble is replaced with teeth.
"Move in with me and I'll never ask you again."
"I think," Remus says, arching up against skilled fingers, "that you should
convince me."
3. Always
He and Peter had tried every spell and short notice potion they knew of and
still hadn't been able to rid James and Sirius of their hangovers. Remus
couldn't take the bet with Peter that they wouldn't make it through the
ceremony without being sick on Lily's shoes. He didn't feel it was sporting, at
any rate.
Lily, for the most part, took it with more amusement than anyone suspected she
would and finally paused in the middle of her vows to cast a charm that
actually worked.
Mostly, the wedding went off exceedingly well.
Sirius even managed to get through it only showing a little jealousy around his
eyes.
One required dance with Lily's wretched shrew of a sister and then one with
everyone else at the reception—including, against his wishes, Peter and, to
everyone's amusement, Dumbledore—and Sirius was pulling up a chair beside him
exhausted.
And eyeing Remus' glass with a small amount of envy.
"You know, Padfoot," Remus murmurs, "it's a good thing you didn't end up in
Slytherin after all; green doesn't suit you." Giving up, he hands over his
punch.
"Everything suits me," Sirius replies airily before emptying the glass and
sitting it on the table with a little too much force. He rests his head on
Remus' shoulder.
"Hmm." Remus squeezes his fingers, then lets them go. "It's not that we're
losing a friend, it's that we're gaining… well, another friend. Except Lily
really doesn't care for you, does she?"
"Lily adores me. Matter of fact, she thinks I'm dashing, a right handsome lad,
I am. She also thinks that together you and I are darling."
"Strange woman, she is."
"Have to be, wouldn't she? Honestly, pledging to spend her life with Prongs, why would anyone…" Sirius sighs into his shoulder. "I don't much care for weddings. All soppy declarations of lifelong love that make all the birds sob into their hankies, like the words mean so bloody much when we aren't even allowed to-"
Remus sits up just a little straighter and turns his face to Sirius' hair.
"That what this is about then?"
"No," Sirius answers, scoffs really—the very definition of defiance. It only
lasts a moment though, before his shoulders slump and he turns just slightly
pink in the cheeks. "Maybe."
"Don't be such a girl, Sirius," Remus orders softly, fondly. He wraps his arm
around Sirius' shoulders. "Why would you and I need soppy declarations in front
of God and everyone we've ever met? And that it would give your mother a heart
condition is not an acceptable reason."
"S'not like she has a heart anyway." Sirius shifts just a little closer, buries
his face just a little deeper into Remus' shoulder where he can't be seen.
"Just be nice to have something that says this won't all end is all. I mean, I
know it won't… not tomorrow or tonight or when the clock strikes twelve
midnight next Thursday." He hunches his shoulders for a second in an almost
shrug. "Just be nice to have it on paper is all."
Remus laughs softly and kisses the top of his head. "Well," he says, "if that's
all you want." On the back of a white paper napkin with James and Lily's names
written in gold, he writes—with a blue ballpoint pen Lily had given him to record the names of anyone who might have ruined any part of her wedding day—'I, Remus Lupin, do solemnly swear to love you, Sirius Black, for the rest of my life. I further swear to never leave you, especially not at midnight next Thursday, no matter how much sugar you insist upon putting in your tea, or how tired you eventually grow of my face. I swear that I will always be your friend and the man who loves you with all of his heart.'
Sirius takes the napkin, when it's offered, with trembling fingers, then barks
out an almost shaky laugh.
"It's not official, of course," Remus says, "so you'll just have to trust me."
He thinks on it for a moment, and Remus can almost see him calculating 'werewolf' against 'Remus' like he always seems to do these days.
"I do," Sirius whispers, grinning, before pulling Remus down for a kiss.
They break apart when the scowling cameraman takes their picture, with Lily at
his elbow pointing at them and demanding another.
"What's that then?" Lily asks, beaming at them both.
Remus suspects it might not be entirely because this is her wedding day.
"Soppy declarations," Sirius tells her, still grinning.
4. Leave
He walks in through the front door and promptly trips over two packed duffle bags.
Sirius is sitting on the sofa with his muddy trainers on the coffee table,
careless of the notes from Dumbledore's latest top secret inside source littered across it. He's got a glass with the cheap Muggle whiskey he's been favouring tight and almost empty in his hand, balanced on his
thigh.
"You going somewhere?" Remus asks, suddenly tired. He toes off his shoes before
sitting down next to Sirius and putting his feet up on the table as well.
Sirius absently plucks at a gold thread coming loose from the sofa. He shrugs
and then asks with just a little too much hostility, "Where were you?"
Leaning his head against the battered back of the sofa, Remus snatches Sirius' glass and finishes it off. "Another pointless meeting on Dumbledore's orders." He wrinkles his nose and hands back the glass. "It isn't really worth talking about."
"They think there's an inside leak from our side; someone feeding them information about Prongs and Lily and Harry."
"Bugger." Remus counts the cracks in the dirty, grimy ceiling above his head
and then closes his eyes to block them out. "I've been saying it for a month
now; it's the only way they could know half of what they do."
Sirius sighs then, and it sounds just a little too defeated. "Yeah, yeah, I know."
"Lily was," Remus begins and then stops himself quickly. He opens his eyes and turns his head to watch Sirius' profile. "Did Dumbledore let you in on who he
suspects?"
"No," he says, after a pause. He swallows hard, then refills his glass and
takes a long drink. "Not really. Hints here and there. You know Dumbledore,
never bloody likely to just spell it out, that one."
"No, no, he isn't at that, is he?" Remus closes his eyes again. "Where's Mad
Eye sending you off to now? Any place I'm allowed to know about?"
"Top secret and all that rot. Mad Eye the Paranoid wouldn't have it any other
way." Sirius touches the top of his hand and then pulls away quickly. Absently,
he runs his fingertips across the tight blue denim of his trousers to wipe away
the wetness from his sweating glass. "Not sure I even know where I'm going, to
be honest with you."
"Know when you're coming back?"
Sirius shakes his head slightly and smiles even though it's wry and tired and
intoxicated. "Don't know that I am, Remus, don't know that I am."
"Suppose that means we should make the most of what could very well be our last
night together, then," Remus replies, falling easily into an old game that
doesn't make things easier anymore. Not when it could be true.
"Hmm," Sirius says slowly, "suppose so." He leans over and kisses Remus with
none of his usual grace. It's sloppy and rough and tired.
He tastes like cheap Muggle alcohol and stress and his fingers are shaking even
as they tug at the button of Remus' fly. "This isn't right," he whispers, and
Remus agrees but doesn't get to say so because Sirius bites on his bottom lip
just that bit too hard. "Fuck, Moony, this isn't right."
Remus is slow sliding his hands up Sirius' back, under his favourite black
t-shirt with a hole at the bottom, but they've been doing this long enough to
know how and Sirius is still muttering about it being wrong but not taking it
any easier. He gives up and scrapes his teeth along the exposed column of
Sirius' throat; bites the skin under the collar he wears where he smells just a
little too much like desperation.
They fall sideways inelegantly, and Remus supposes it's alright if they don't
make it to bed. He arches up into Sirius and pulls his nails too roughly down
his back and just under the waistband of his jeans.
He fumbles with Sirius' fly when Sirius wraps a hand too hard around his cock.
"Oh, fuck," he whispers, groans. "Sirius, oh, fuck."
It's graceless and not even close to the best they've ever done, but it's never
been bad. Sirius' jeans are stuck around the middle of his thighs, but he's
shaking because he wants and there are more important things than grace
sometimes.
It's all just a little too rough but when Remus runs his thumb over the head of
Sirius' cock he comes with an almost sob, his face buried in Remus' neck. He
says, somewhat sadly, "I love you." And it's only a few more strokes before
Remus comes too.
Sirius pulls back too quickly and mutters the spell to clean them sooner than he ever has—including that time they almost got caught in a cupboard at school
before anyone knew—and pulls up his jeans. He looks at Remus, still spread out
on the sofa, his leg pinned to the back by Sirius, and he looks desperate. "I
can't… I have to leave tonight."
He sighs and buttons up his fly. "Alright," Remus says softly. "When?"
Looking at his watch and then the clock on the wall that ticks somewhat out of
tune and then at the mud stains his trainers left on the worn sofa and then,
finally, at Remus again, Sirius sighs. And he doesn't meet his eyes. "Now, I
think. Now."
"Alright," Remus says again, though he's confused. "I guess I'll see you when
you get back."
"Right," Sirius answers, hesitantly. He bites his lip and then kisses Remus
again quickly before standing up. "I'll… see you."
He lies there on the sofa after he hears the front door close and Sirius hiss
out the locking charm. He can't quite manage to get up the energy to spell the
sofa clean, but eventually he gets up and heads to bed.
It's not until he's almost asleep with his face buried in Sirius' pillow that
he realizes the battered copy of The Picture of Dorian Grey Sirius
had been reading isn't on the night table.
It's not until a week later when Dumbledore shows up in the early hours before
dawn that he understands.
Mad Eye himself shows up later in the day with something in a small brown paper
sack. He says quietly, "We've got him. He killed twelve Muggles and Peter
Pettigrew besides, but we've got him. This was… He had this in his pocket, and
he won't be needing it where he's going, and I thought you should have it
back."
After Mad Eye shows himself out, he pulls a napkin from James and Lily's wedding with his handwriting on it out of the sack.
He thinks the only thing harder than hating Sirius Black is loving him.
5. You
"You thought," Remus starts, at least a dozen times in the first week after
Dumbledore sent Sirius to him, and then stops himself just as quickly.
"I thought," Sirius answers once. "And so did you."
"No," Remus corrects with a quick shake of his head and his fingers wrapped
tightly around a chipped white cup of rapidly cooling tea. "Lily told me
Dumbledore did and I told her there was no way, that you would never… I spent a
lot of years thinking I shouldn't have put so much blind faith in you just
because you asked."
Sirius puts too much sugar into his tea and taps the side of his cup with
jagged fingernails. "You kept disappearing. The Ministry kept adding one
regulation after another, so you had to do this but you couldn't do that, like
you were some sort of dangerous beast when we were in the middle of a war with
people who wanted to wipe out the greatest part of humanity. Peter kept
whispering every bloody time we were all in a room together, 'all the
werewolves are going to his side.' Don't think I haven't spent a lot of years
thinking I fucked up bigger than I've ever fucked up."
"And after you swore you never would," he says, lightly, with a wave of his
hand to try and make it less important than it always had been. "I kept
thinking that too."
Laughing as though it didn't break something in him, Sirius nodded. "Of course,
of course. Never could touch anything without it turning into a bloody cock up,
could I?"
"You could some things," Remus answers, after a while of looking out the dirty
window over the sink in the kitchen. There are children outside, waving their
arms excitedly and whispering frantically about ghosts and haunted houses and
dares. "Didn't matter if you did, most times you could fix it with sheer
arrogance."
"S'not what you thought in school." Sirius grins; it stretches his skin even
tighter. He scratches at his smooth cheek with fingernails that are cleaner
than they ever were at Hogwarts… After Hogwarts even, maybe.
"I've been told young love will do that to a person."
Just there, casual and careless, like it's nothing.
Sirius shivers at the thought that it might be and finishes his cool tea in one
swallow. "Is that," he starts, at least a dozen times in the first week alone,
but he stops himself every time when Remus finally looks over at him. The table
wobbles when he stands because one leg is shorter than the others.
"It was," Remus answers once. "And then it wasn't."
They put their cups into the sink, the charmed brush jumping up to wash them.
Sirius is careful not to pin him to the counter, no matter how he wants to. And
Remus is careful not to let him.
He'd laugh at how they tiptoe around each other if he didn't think it would
kill him.
6. Broken
"I'd promise you," Sirius whispers—rough and worn and sad—when Remus shoves him
against his bedroom door when everyone else is sleeping, "but you wouldn't
believe me."
The door is warped, rough from age, and the once thick, rich wood is brittle and splintering under his palms. Remus pushes himself a little closer. "Must you bring promises into everything?" he asks.
"Old habits and all that rot."
"Indeed," Remus replies absently. He nuzzles at the place just beneath Sirius'
jaw that makes his breath hitch every time.
Sirius tightens his fingers in the thin cotton of Remus' shirt and lays his
head back against the door. "You used to have faith in me once," he says. He
closes his eyes and breathes deep. "It was a long time ago, wasn't it?"
"Seems it," Remus answers, fumbling with the buttons of Sirius' shirt, "and
then it doesn't." He laughs, slow and breathless and lacking warmth. He thinks
he understands, every now and then, how Sirius could keep forgetting the time.
"God, sometimes it doesn't and I think I could again, and where would that get me?"
Sirius laughs with him, only a little more bitter for it. "Fuck you, Remus," he
says, but it's mostly lost on a groan when Remus traces tattoos with his
fingertips. "I know I should have trusted you, I know that. I've apologized-"
"You never apologized," he corrects, fingernails grazing the arc of his favourite mark on Sirius' skin. "It doesn't matter now."
"Just…" Sirius bites his lip and tightens his grip on Remus' shirt until his
knuckles are white. "I don't want to lose you again."
Remus pulls back to look down at him, to meet his eyes. He rests his forehead
against Sirius' and says, "Then don't leave me. It's the only way you've ever
gotten rid of me."
"I won't," he says, "I swear I won't." Sirius swallows hard before pressing a
kiss to Remus' bottom lip, to his cheek, his jaw, his neck. "I swear, Remus, I
won't leave you ever again, if you would just trust me."
Remus shuts him up by taking his mouth.
He thinks it makes things easier if he doesn't trust until he's proven wrong.
Until he's alone on Sirius' bed with his face buried in his pillow and not
crying because he's gone again. Not crying at all because he swore to himself
he wouldn't and he knew this time that it was coming.
There's a paper napkin that used to be white from James and Lily's wedding
lying on the uneven night table (Sirius had found it inside one of his old
books) along with the collar Sirius used to wear and a new copy of The
Picture of Dorian Grey that Sirius had been reading.
He turns over and still can't sleep.
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