Fic: To Admit What Is Not More Illegal
Apr. 20th, 2020 09:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
paulamcgThis is my other fic at Remus Lupin Fest, the less fluffy one. The one I was afraid wouldn't qualify because Remus stayed asleep for a big part of the story. Thank you for the kudos I got after yesterday's post!
Title: To Admit What Is Not More Illegal
Author:paulamcg
Pairing: Sirius/Remus
Characters: Sirius, Remus, James
Word Count: 3900
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Sirius and his friends won’t help me make any money.
Notes: Thank you once again, my wonderful betaliseuse!
Summary: On Valentine’s Day in their seventh year at Hogwarts, Sirius tries to offer what Remus needs, and starts figuring out if he's ashamed of something, and if he is, what it is.
Read here on AO3
or right here.
To Admit What Is Not More Illegal
I wouldn’t be Sirius Fucking Black if it were easy for me to stay still, and it’s hard even now on Remus’s comfortable four poster. I should be better at this, completely relaxed, leaning against the pillows, and therefore a fully soothing presence for my Moony when he’s laid a tired head on my shoulder.
Closing the heavy NEWT textbook, I draw a deep breath and glance at the softly rattling windowpane – at the reflection of the candle, and at the small circle of whirling snowflakes illuminated by the flame. The storm raging outside of the Gryffindor tower beckons to me. And here’s the urge for freedom again.
The wild, wintry wind has brought it back, together with a memory of the night when I fled. Now the memory is finally not too vivid, or perhaps it has transformed to include only the boldness of my act and the beauty of the welcome at Godric’s Hollow.
This past Christmas, on my escape’s second anniversary, I still couldn’t face attending the same charity event where back then I’d ended up just like… I could hardly mention it so as to explain to Moony why I’d stayed in my new flat in London and come to the Potters’ only for the Christmas dinner, too late to join him in helping Mum Potter with the charity for the needy, homeless half-humans. Tonight I enjoy remembering how I got away from the Ignoble and Impure prison of a house, and manage to forget what was done to me in there. What makes closeness like this so hard and so precious.
Now I’m looking forward to more freedom, to living on my own, and offering to Remus what he needs so as to reach the same goal. We’ll both be independent.
But I’m still not good enough at what my Moony needs tonight. Behind the snow clouds, the waxing moon has risen almost completely round, and he’s squeezed his eyes shut while listening to the boring theories of Ancient Rune interpretation, which I’ve tried to read aloud in my most expressive diction.
Now the sound of his even breathing in sleep is a relief. Not only because I can stop reading and don’t have to wonder if I should make more progress in intimacy of caresses. Also because I’ve failed in watching that he dress warmly enough, and caused… No, it was Peter who’d insisted on the snowball fight yesterday and caused him to catch a cold, and all day his breathing was ragged, interrupted by coughing, and I had to pretend I didn’t want to go to Hogsmeade or even for a private stroll in the woods.
The dog in me, perhaps, yearns for the woods, and can hardly wait for tomorrow night’s shenanigans. But I fear the transformations will be harder for Remus when he’s ill. Now it’s particularly important to… do what I’ve learnt to also want to do.
Moving most cautiously, I allow the book to slide to the floor and point my wand at the candle, then at the bed hangings, pulling them closed. I desire the privacy, but it’s Remus who prefers that I touch without looking, whereas I’d love caressing my Moony with my eyes, too.
Without light, and immobile, I feel unreal, also cold. I fumble to cup a palm around Remus’s jaw and cheek, and shudder immediately, as I can’t help trying to imagine how much the transformation of the face must hurt. No, I need to focus on the permanence of these human features. Perhaps sensing my touch now, albeit in sleep, can help Remus feel secure in regaining his body, and this might even ease the pain at least at moonset.
I reach my index finger to draw the line of an eyebrow. This was one of the first caresses he correctly guessed I was able to receive, so perhaps this is what has comforted him since he was…
He was a little boy, and he was bitten, and he must keep going through it in nightmares.
Now he moans in his sleep. And here it is again! The beast, attacking, as if in front of my eyes. A canine, with a snout, too much like Padfoot’s own, strong jaws opening, snapping closed next to the child’s neck. Just… breathe! It’s only an image, only an imagined nightmare, because Remus never agrees to share the real ones.
I’ve bitten my lip so as not to moan, too, and slid my hand down onto Remus’s shoulder, as if I could offer any protection now, twelve years too late. Wriggling my fingers under the soft fabric of his robes – too worn, thin – I start stroking the skin on the shoulder, right where the scar of the fatal wound… is not.
That’s what Remus has said, with a playful smirk, trying to make light of it. When someone touches the skin of his chest lovingly, without looking, without seeing those other oldest scars, marks left by the claws when just before the bite they tore… But that’s been left for me to imagine. And unimagine, so that when I trail those long scars with my fingers, Remus can believe for a moment that they are not there, that the skin is as beautiful as anyone’s and worth… Of course it is worth as much as anyone’s, and more.
“This part of your body is beautiful, too,” I whisper, even though the jagged bite scar feels raw, as if still fresh.
Startling me, a hand presses down on mine. “On this spot, it doesn’t work now,” Remus says hoarsely.
“I didn’t mean to wake you. Sorry.” Completely still again, I’m lost in the darkness.
Remus draws in a shuddering breath. There is something I should apologise for properly, and once again I’ve blurted out that word and given the impression that it was what I’ve thought suffices.
“I mean sorry if I woke you up. But you mean you don’t want me to touch… ” Yet, I’m not moving my hand away…
Because Remus doesn’t push it aside, but, on the contrary, holds it there. “It’s all right.”
“Was it not me but a nightmare?”
He sighs. “No.” Now he moves our hands onto the dip between his collarbones.
This is one of my favourite spots on my Moony’s body to look at, and I leave my hand there when he withdraws his.
“How late is it?”
“Not late.” I succeed in adopting the same casual tone. “You can sleep some more before… it’s time to go to sleep.”
He chuckles softly, and tries to repress a cough. “I was supposed to learn to explain those runes. But when I only listen, I just fall asleep.”
“You must rest, not look at the book or take notes. I tried to make it not sound boring.”
“I bet you yourself have now learnt it all. Now just tell me, don’t read. And draw the runes on my skin.” He shifts to lie on his back next to me. “Come on!”
The demand, a strong one, albeit expressed in a playful tone, warms me. Literally warms me, and I’m now happy about the darkness, which hides my flush. He’s so cautious with me, understands that I can only slowly learn to enjoy touching and being touched, and usually asks if I want it. He hardly ever asks for anything for himself. Only this close to the full moon does he need the touch on his skin so badly that he’s tempted to ask for it. And I’m thrilled that he feels free to do it – that his Padfoot is now trusted to be willing and able to fill the need.
Settling on my side so close that I can sense a heat like fire between the two of us, I decide to quote the book in simple fragments, not covering all of it, and to focus on covering, instead, all of my Moony’s body with my caresses. In the darkness my fingers begin a slow journey across his feverish skin.
I’m jerked awake by heavy footfalls.
“Pads!” It’s James, and he’s getting louder. “Aren’t you here?”
“No,” I say under my breath, lifting my arm cautiously from Remus’s chest.
I slide my legs over the side of the bed, and when I slip out between the hangings, I manage to check by the glow of James’s Lumos that Remus’s eyes are still closed. The breathing sounds even, too.
“There you are!” James says in a cheerful but not terribly loud voice, having registered the finger across my lips. “Peter’s snoring in his bed. I bet he passed out. Got ratted with other seventh-year blokes who couldn’t get a date.”
I decide that I’m able to hide all embarrassment. James doesn’t tease me, which is actually unnerving after all the jokes his chase for Lily generated among his fellow Marauders over the years. The benevolent acceptance of my intimacy with Remus is perhaps like some people’s exaggeratedly reverent references to pets or babies, or like the way we all discussed Remus’s condition at the beginning, before we were comfortable enough with it to make jokes and name it his furry problem. The pretence that this relationship is as unproblematic as James and Lily’s disturbs me no less than Peter’s poorly-hidden resentment or warning glances. But I’m happy to ignore those, unless I realise that there’s a real reason for caution, someone else watching.
Tiptoeing over to James, I whisper, “We were revising Ancient Runes, but we both fell asleep.”
It’s all right that James smirks and elbows me. “I’ve done some revision with Lily, first at Puddifoot’s, then upstairs of the Hog’s Head.”
“What? You took a room?”
Flashes of warm light colour James’s face, reflecting from his spectacles and his wide grin, as he’s pointed his wand at the candle. He tosses the wand onto his four poster and goes to sit there, patting the place beside him.
I’m hardly settled on the edge of the bed when James falls down on his back with a deep sigh of contentment, breathing out, “Yes!”
“I thought you planned only a romantic evening at the tea shop.” I can’t help smiling, as if James’s mood were contagious.
It still feels like a miracle that I’ve regained James’s trust and our easy, brotherly closeness. Even after he had accepted my invitation to share the flat, we still needed a proper fight about the Willow Incident when we’d arrived in London to move in for our last summer holiday. Now he no longer makes snide remarks referring to my irresponsibility and lack of understanding of how grave the situation was that full moon even though the worst did not happen. But sometimes I wonder if James has agreed to be my flat mate after Hogwarts only because I’m not worthy of living with Remus instead. No, I don’t want to think about that. James is my brother and we’ll move from the Potters to live together at Lincoln’s Inn Fields because Lily won’t marry him immediately after school.
“Lily had made some plans, too.” With his legs still over the edge of the bed, James shifts to support his head on a hand, so as to look up at me.
“Let me guess… The pink frills and cherubs’ bows were not our amazing Amazon Marauder’s cup of tea?” Amused, and more relaxed now, I fold my hands over my heart and tilt my head.
And James slaps me, with a limp wrist, reaching my chest and touching my thigh, too, when withdrawing his hand. Taken unawares, I catch my heart racing, but is it because I still hate being touched, at least when it’s without a warning?
No, I feel ever more pleased about how my best friend’s treating me. In a way everything’s easier, more casual with James than with… James doesn’t know why it’s so hard with Remus, not even that it is hard – that it’s all so much about healing each other. After the fist fight in June, James seems to have avoided physical contact, but I’ve assured myself that, of course, our relationship has changed in this respect because he’s now got his girlfriend.
“Wrong!” he says triumphantly. “My lovely Lily laughed aloud and kissed me before we even sat down. And she got ever happier when I revealed to her that I didn’t take her there only because of Valentine’s Day.”
“She liked the idea of celebrating your anniversary… today?” I’m not sure I want to hear what they said about that.
“Yes! And she had thought about it, too. Great minds… you know!”
I know. Not only that he’s happy and proud that Lily has turned out to have so much in common with him in brilliance and boldness. Also that they both would find it inappropriate to celebrate the first anniversary of their dating on the actual day, 27th of February, exactly one year – well, almost exactly, one year and one day after the Incident. My great mind has come up with an argument that they might not have started dating at all, if Lily hadn’t seen James as the hero or rather – although she hasn’t spelled it out – as the caring and conscientious friend torn by conflicting emotions, all thanks to the awful thing I had done.
“All right.” I swallow, pushing down the thought of how our first anniversary must have passed while Remus, still unable to hold a book in his mauled hands, refused to pet the dog curled up at the foot of his bed. “Another guess. She had reserved a room from her old friend Aberforth.”
“A table, she said. So at Puddifoot’s we just fed our pink Battenberg cakes to each other. You know, traditional royal wedding cake. And I proposed.”
“What?”
“Asked her to marry me, of course. And she asked me to ask her again later. So that was a success, right?”
“Of course.” I roll my eyes, enjoying the story again. “And then you went to have a gourmet dinner in the Hog’s Head.”
“Exactly, and the table turned out to be in a private room upstairs, next to quite a comfortable bed on which we…”
“Revised the shagging you practised in our London flat and here in the woods. No details, thank you!”
“Don’t worry!” James sits up and starts rubbing my tense back, making me shiver. “I know what you don’t want. But I do recommend arranging something special for your anniversary.”
I bite my lip, strangely tempted to relax and lean against my friend. There’s a silence, perhaps a loaded one, perhaps a companionable one, and Peter’s rhythmic snores make me smile, until between them I hear a fit of coughing. At least Remus must be still asleep, because otherwise he would have repressed the cough and even announced that he was hearing the conversation.
“Seriously, I mean yours,” James adds. “Padfoot and Moony’s.”
“You mean…?”
“We both know exactly what I mean. The date’s marked in the records of our Ratty Project. The day, I mean. But I guess it was a date in the other sense, too – your first one! I’ve checked which day it was. The 8th of March, and you couldn’t celebrate it last year, but now on your second anniversary… It’ll be a week and a day before the full moon, the one after tomorrow’s.”
“What makes you think I want to celebrate?”
“Nothing. But Remus wishes you wanted to.”
I don’t feel like asking if he’s said as much to James. Admittedly, in the past few days, and actually weeks before, Remus agreed, even offered to help James prepare surprise treats for Lily. Was he not only indulging his loyal Prongs, but truly enjoying himself, in a poorly-hidden wistful mood? He spent hours painting a double portrait for a card, which James charmed to whisper endearments.
“I know it was important,” I manage, “an important occasion for him when we became Animagi, but the project was completed later…”
“Yes, Wormtail learnt to remain a rat for more than a moment only later. And it took Prongs longer… just because of the size, mind! But that doesn’t count. I know…”
I still haven’t been willing or able to talk about it, but James knows me too well. He must have known ever since that night when I changed for the first time and forced him and Peter to let me in to offer my company to the wolf. James waited in the tunnel and found me beside Remus after moonset. Remus’s beautiful voice as such revealed that the dog had stopped him even from howling, and I blushed, realising that we were holding hands. I guess I do want us to finally celebrate an anniversary.
“All right.” Perhaps if I agree about this, James will drop the topic. “The eighth of March is when we can celebrate Padfoot’s birthday.”
“Not only that. You could say it’s only that formally, legally…”
“Hardly formally and legally! My mutt form’s illegal.” I turn to face him and grin.
“The more reason to admit… what is not more illegal.” His grin wipes away mine. “The two of you together.”
Why does he insist? If I agreed to arrange a birthday party for myself, that wouldn’t satisfy James. Or a shared birthday party – Remus’s eighteenth, too. James must know also him too well and understand that what he wants is the relationship acknowledged.
“Give me a break. I can show him that it means a lot to me, too, but… He’s more than human, and now that I’m Pads, I am, too. It’s all between Moony and Pads. And the two of us can celebrate privately.”
“I think he’d like you to show that you’re not ashamed of it.”
“Ashamed? I’m proud of becoming the dog for him.”
James sighs. “Think about it. You can make that day special and let him know that you don’t hide it from me and Peter.”
There isn’t much time.
My paws are stomping against the uneven floor of the tunnel, and I’m leaving Wormtail to scurry behind. Like always, the wolf and the dog will join the rat down here after the transformation, while James must wait as the stag at the edge of the forest. But has he ever found out that another Animagus doesn’t get near when Remus changes, and for another reason – because of feeling scared or disgusted? Our Moony has more than one reason not to complain about Wormy. He’s always too kind, and he doesn’t want us to watch, and perhaps he wants to be alone with… At least it’s all right for him that the two of us are alone together, as long as I’ve already changed my shape to welcome the wolf.
Now I hasten to chant my silent incantation backwards, and my human form returns, sweating in the thick winter robes and cloak, with shaking hands but enough ability to remove the bolt and flick my wand in a voiceless Alohomora. The need to be a dog for Moony changes me back before I’m aware of focusing on my dimensions and on losing them, or of wording the unique animal magic in my mind.
It’s none of Peter’s business or James’s that I go all the way, into the room where Pomfrey has escorted Remus and left him without his clothes. Pads leaps up the staircase, panting.
Moony’s sitting on the floor in the darkest corner of the darkness, next to the fireplace. Pads can smell him and has rushed to him before registering any movement in the huddled shape. I poke my snout against a knee and barely manage to turn an angry bark into soft whining.
Winter after winter they keep doing this. As if bloody Dumbledore weren’t able to make the conditions humane! My Moony’s leaning against the tiles, which radiate the remains of Pomfrey’s heating charm, wrapped in the hideous torn coverlet and with his knees pulled up to his chest.
“Oh, Pads!” I can hear it’s hard for him to catch his breath, as if he’d been climbing stairs, too. “You’re the best. I…”
Raising my snout, with my tongue still lolling out due to the running, I lick Moony’s face and feel the curve of a smile and a dimple on the cheek, and taste the salt of a tear. And his head jerks back, hits the wall, as a convulsion makes his neck rigid for a moment. I press against his side, and scratch with a paw to push the coverlet down so as to let him feel my fur against his skin, instead.
Now his muscles are relaxed again. He’s just shivering, while his skin feels hotter than the fireplace tiles. An arm snakes around me, but I must take my human shape without delay, for a moment more.
Here I am, a man again. I have become also a man for him, because that, too, is what he needs. I hug him tight, squeezing my eyes shut, although it’s too dark to see his nakedness, let alone any blemish on his skin, and bending my head so as to press it on his… No, he can’t bear me touching the bite scar on his shoulder now. My cheek brushes his chest, instead, and I can feel the erratic rhythms of his heart, and his lungs struggling to fill and empty, constrained by the change, which has started deep inside.
“I…” I can find the words to say, just as I found the ones I dictated to record what was inspired by and done for someone who’s more than human. He liked that. I could see it in the flourishes of his best handwriting, although he snorted. And now he must hear, “You… are always my Moony. Beautiful.”
He sighs. He must be in too much pain to talk. And he’s both burning in fever and freezing. There’s isn’t much time, but…
I shift to wrap my cloak around him, too, and wave my wand at the side of the fireplace against his back, casting a heating charm, unhelpfully, perhaps, as it takes away some of my body heat, which he’d probably rather share directly with me. Rather with Pads. If he could talk, he’d tell me to change now, and not to look at him with my eyes, which will remain the same silvery grey, uncanny in the dog’s black face.
There isn’t too much time. Now it’s time to tell him. “Soon, I’ll be the dog soon, and you can hold your Pads all through. And soon it’s over. You’ll run with us. You won’t be weak or ill. And we’ll take care that you’ll be kind and peaceful. Your dog will be there all through your… way back. Then… your man. I am… proud of… us, together. Two years on the eighth of March. I want to celebrate us.”
His shaking body turns rigid again. The arm around me stiffens, and he moans. The clasp of his hand tightens around my wrist, perhaps involuntarily, perhaps as his only remaining way to communicate to me that I must change. Yes, the hand tries to push me away, and that’s when I feel how the nails are growing into claws.
Ashamed. Yes, I’m ashamed of how easily I transform, without any pain. But this is what I can do – ask him to come and join this dog. Welcome him. If only… I wish he, too, could welcome the wolf.
The prompt was: (Canon setting, seventh year) Sirius throws the most amazing date for Remus for their “anniversary”. However, these events take place a few weeks before the anniversary. This story can be read as completely canon compliant. However, it also doesn’t contradict any of my other fanfiction, which follows only Rowling’s first five novels. All the dates are based on the Marauders’ leaving Hogwarts in 1976, when February’s full moon fell on the 15th.
Title: To Admit What Is Not More Illegal
Author:
paulamcgPairing: Sirius/Remus
Characters: Sirius, Remus, James
Word Count: 3900
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Sirius and his friends won’t help me make any money.
Notes: Thank you once again, my wonderful beta
liseuse!Summary: On Valentine’s Day in their seventh year at Hogwarts, Sirius tries to offer what Remus needs, and starts figuring out if he's ashamed of something, and if he is, what it is.
Read here on AO3
or right here.
To Admit What Is Not More Illegal
I wouldn’t be Sirius Fucking Black if it were easy for me to stay still, and it’s hard even now on Remus’s comfortable four poster. I should be better at this, completely relaxed, leaning against the pillows, and therefore a fully soothing presence for my Moony when he’s laid a tired head on my shoulder.
Closing the heavy NEWT textbook, I draw a deep breath and glance at the softly rattling windowpane – at the reflection of the candle, and at the small circle of whirling snowflakes illuminated by the flame. The storm raging outside of the Gryffindor tower beckons to me. And here’s the urge for freedom again.
The wild, wintry wind has brought it back, together with a memory of the night when I fled. Now the memory is finally not too vivid, or perhaps it has transformed to include only the boldness of my act and the beauty of the welcome at Godric’s Hollow.
This past Christmas, on my escape’s second anniversary, I still couldn’t face attending the same charity event where back then I’d ended up just like… I could hardly mention it so as to explain to Moony why I’d stayed in my new flat in London and come to the Potters’ only for the Christmas dinner, too late to join him in helping Mum Potter with the charity for the needy, homeless half-humans. Tonight I enjoy remembering how I got away from the Ignoble and Impure prison of a house, and manage to forget what was done to me in there. What makes closeness like this so hard and so precious.
Now I’m looking forward to more freedom, to living on my own, and offering to Remus what he needs so as to reach the same goal. We’ll both be independent.
But I’m still not good enough at what my Moony needs tonight. Behind the snow clouds, the waxing moon has risen almost completely round, and he’s squeezed his eyes shut while listening to the boring theories of Ancient Rune interpretation, which I’ve tried to read aloud in my most expressive diction.
Now the sound of his even breathing in sleep is a relief. Not only because I can stop reading and don’t have to wonder if I should make more progress in intimacy of caresses. Also because I’ve failed in watching that he dress warmly enough, and caused… No, it was Peter who’d insisted on the snowball fight yesterday and caused him to catch a cold, and all day his breathing was ragged, interrupted by coughing, and I had to pretend I didn’t want to go to Hogsmeade or even for a private stroll in the woods.
The dog in me, perhaps, yearns for the woods, and can hardly wait for tomorrow night’s shenanigans. But I fear the transformations will be harder for Remus when he’s ill. Now it’s particularly important to… do what I’ve learnt to also want to do.
Moving most cautiously, I allow the book to slide to the floor and point my wand at the candle, then at the bed hangings, pulling them closed. I desire the privacy, but it’s Remus who prefers that I touch without looking, whereas I’d love caressing my Moony with my eyes, too.
Without light, and immobile, I feel unreal, also cold. I fumble to cup a palm around Remus’s jaw and cheek, and shudder immediately, as I can’t help trying to imagine how much the transformation of the face must hurt. No, I need to focus on the permanence of these human features. Perhaps sensing my touch now, albeit in sleep, can help Remus feel secure in regaining his body, and this might even ease the pain at least at moonset.
I reach my index finger to draw the line of an eyebrow. This was one of the first caresses he correctly guessed I was able to receive, so perhaps this is what has comforted him since he was…
He was a little boy, and he was bitten, and he must keep going through it in nightmares.
Now he moans in his sleep. And here it is again! The beast, attacking, as if in front of my eyes. A canine, with a snout, too much like Padfoot’s own, strong jaws opening, snapping closed next to the child’s neck. Just… breathe! It’s only an image, only an imagined nightmare, because Remus never agrees to share the real ones.
I’ve bitten my lip so as not to moan, too, and slid my hand down onto Remus’s shoulder, as if I could offer any protection now, twelve years too late. Wriggling my fingers under the soft fabric of his robes – too worn, thin – I start stroking the skin on the shoulder, right where the scar of the fatal wound… is not.
That’s what Remus has said, with a playful smirk, trying to make light of it. When someone touches the skin of his chest lovingly, without looking, without seeing those other oldest scars, marks left by the claws when just before the bite they tore… But that’s been left for me to imagine. And unimagine, so that when I trail those long scars with my fingers, Remus can believe for a moment that they are not there, that the skin is as beautiful as anyone’s and worth… Of course it is worth as much as anyone’s, and more.
“This part of your body is beautiful, too,” I whisper, even though the jagged bite scar feels raw, as if still fresh.
Startling me, a hand presses down on mine. “On this spot, it doesn’t work now,” Remus says hoarsely.
“I didn’t mean to wake you. Sorry.” Completely still again, I’m lost in the darkness.
Remus draws in a shuddering breath. There is something I should apologise for properly, and once again I’ve blurted out that word and given the impression that it was what I’ve thought suffices.
“I mean sorry if I woke you up. But you mean you don’t want me to touch… ” Yet, I’m not moving my hand away…
Because Remus doesn’t push it aside, but, on the contrary, holds it there. “It’s all right.”
“Was it not me but a nightmare?”
He sighs. “No.” Now he moves our hands onto the dip between his collarbones.
This is one of my favourite spots on my Moony’s body to look at, and I leave my hand there when he withdraws his.
“How late is it?”
“Not late.” I succeed in adopting the same casual tone. “You can sleep some more before… it’s time to go to sleep.”
He chuckles softly, and tries to repress a cough. “I was supposed to learn to explain those runes. But when I only listen, I just fall asleep.”
“You must rest, not look at the book or take notes. I tried to make it not sound boring.”
“I bet you yourself have now learnt it all. Now just tell me, don’t read. And draw the runes on my skin.” He shifts to lie on his back next to me. “Come on!”
The demand, a strong one, albeit expressed in a playful tone, warms me. Literally warms me, and I’m now happy about the darkness, which hides my flush. He’s so cautious with me, understands that I can only slowly learn to enjoy touching and being touched, and usually asks if I want it. He hardly ever asks for anything for himself. Only this close to the full moon does he need the touch on his skin so badly that he’s tempted to ask for it. And I’m thrilled that he feels free to do it – that his Padfoot is now trusted to be willing and able to fill the need.
Settling on my side so close that I can sense a heat like fire between the two of us, I decide to quote the book in simple fragments, not covering all of it, and to focus on covering, instead, all of my Moony’s body with my caresses. In the darkness my fingers begin a slow journey across his feverish skin.
I’m jerked awake by heavy footfalls.
“Pads!” It’s James, and he’s getting louder. “Aren’t you here?”
“No,” I say under my breath, lifting my arm cautiously from Remus’s chest.
I slide my legs over the side of the bed, and when I slip out between the hangings, I manage to check by the glow of James’s Lumos that Remus’s eyes are still closed. The breathing sounds even, too.
“There you are!” James says in a cheerful but not terribly loud voice, having registered the finger across my lips. “Peter’s snoring in his bed. I bet he passed out. Got ratted with other seventh-year blokes who couldn’t get a date.”
I decide that I’m able to hide all embarrassment. James doesn’t tease me, which is actually unnerving after all the jokes his chase for Lily generated among his fellow Marauders over the years. The benevolent acceptance of my intimacy with Remus is perhaps like some people’s exaggeratedly reverent references to pets or babies, or like the way we all discussed Remus’s condition at the beginning, before we were comfortable enough with it to make jokes and name it his furry problem. The pretence that this relationship is as unproblematic as James and Lily’s disturbs me no less than Peter’s poorly-hidden resentment or warning glances. But I’m happy to ignore those, unless I realise that there’s a real reason for caution, someone else watching.
Tiptoeing over to James, I whisper, “We were revising Ancient Runes, but we both fell asleep.”
It’s all right that James smirks and elbows me. “I’ve done some revision with Lily, first at Puddifoot’s, then upstairs of the Hog’s Head.”
“What? You took a room?”
Flashes of warm light colour James’s face, reflecting from his spectacles and his wide grin, as he’s pointed his wand at the candle. He tosses the wand onto his four poster and goes to sit there, patting the place beside him.
I’m hardly settled on the edge of the bed when James falls down on his back with a deep sigh of contentment, breathing out, “Yes!”
“I thought you planned only a romantic evening at the tea shop.” I can’t help smiling, as if James’s mood were contagious.
It still feels like a miracle that I’ve regained James’s trust and our easy, brotherly closeness. Even after he had accepted my invitation to share the flat, we still needed a proper fight about the Willow Incident when we’d arrived in London to move in for our last summer holiday. Now he no longer makes snide remarks referring to my irresponsibility and lack of understanding of how grave the situation was that full moon even though the worst did not happen. But sometimes I wonder if James has agreed to be my flat mate after Hogwarts only because I’m not worthy of living with Remus instead. No, I don’t want to think about that. James is my brother and we’ll move from the Potters to live together at Lincoln’s Inn Fields because Lily won’t marry him immediately after school.
“Lily had made some plans, too.” With his legs still over the edge of the bed, James shifts to support his head on a hand, so as to look up at me.
“Let me guess… The pink frills and cherubs’ bows were not our amazing Amazon Marauder’s cup of tea?” Amused, and more relaxed now, I fold my hands over my heart and tilt my head.
And James slaps me, with a limp wrist, reaching my chest and touching my thigh, too, when withdrawing his hand. Taken unawares, I catch my heart racing, but is it because I still hate being touched, at least when it’s without a warning?
No, I feel ever more pleased about how my best friend’s treating me. In a way everything’s easier, more casual with James than with… James doesn’t know why it’s so hard with Remus, not even that it is hard – that it’s all so much about healing each other. After the fist fight in June, James seems to have avoided physical contact, but I’ve assured myself that, of course, our relationship has changed in this respect because he’s now got his girlfriend.
“Wrong!” he says triumphantly. “My lovely Lily laughed aloud and kissed me before we even sat down. And she got ever happier when I revealed to her that I didn’t take her there only because of Valentine’s Day.”
“She liked the idea of celebrating your anniversary… today?” I’m not sure I want to hear what they said about that.
“Yes! And she had thought about it, too. Great minds… you know!”
I know. Not only that he’s happy and proud that Lily has turned out to have so much in common with him in brilliance and boldness. Also that they both would find it inappropriate to celebrate the first anniversary of their dating on the actual day, 27th of February, exactly one year – well, almost exactly, one year and one day after the Incident. My great mind has come up with an argument that they might not have started dating at all, if Lily hadn’t seen James as the hero or rather – although she hasn’t spelled it out – as the caring and conscientious friend torn by conflicting emotions, all thanks to the awful thing I had done.
“All right.” I swallow, pushing down the thought of how our first anniversary must have passed while Remus, still unable to hold a book in his mauled hands, refused to pet the dog curled up at the foot of his bed. “Another guess. She had reserved a room from her old friend Aberforth.”
“A table, she said. So at Puddifoot’s we just fed our pink Battenberg cakes to each other. You know, traditional royal wedding cake. And I proposed.”
“What?”
“Asked her to marry me, of course. And she asked me to ask her again later. So that was a success, right?”
“Of course.” I roll my eyes, enjoying the story again. “And then you went to have a gourmet dinner in the Hog’s Head.”
“Exactly, and the table turned out to be in a private room upstairs, next to quite a comfortable bed on which we…”
“Revised the shagging you practised in our London flat and here in the woods. No details, thank you!”
“Don’t worry!” James sits up and starts rubbing my tense back, making me shiver. “I know what you don’t want. But I do recommend arranging something special for your anniversary.”
I bite my lip, strangely tempted to relax and lean against my friend. There’s a silence, perhaps a loaded one, perhaps a companionable one, and Peter’s rhythmic snores make me smile, until between them I hear a fit of coughing. At least Remus must be still asleep, because otherwise he would have repressed the cough and even announced that he was hearing the conversation.
“Seriously, I mean yours,” James adds. “Padfoot and Moony’s.”
“You mean…?”
“We both know exactly what I mean. The date’s marked in the records of our Ratty Project. The day, I mean. But I guess it was a date in the other sense, too – your first one! I’ve checked which day it was. The 8th of March, and you couldn’t celebrate it last year, but now on your second anniversary… It’ll be a week and a day before the full moon, the one after tomorrow’s.”
“What makes you think I want to celebrate?”
“Nothing. But Remus wishes you wanted to.”
I don’t feel like asking if he’s said as much to James. Admittedly, in the past few days, and actually weeks before, Remus agreed, even offered to help James prepare surprise treats for Lily. Was he not only indulging his loyal Prongs, but truly enjoying himself, in a poorly-hidden wistful mood? He spent hours painting a double portrait for a card, which James charmed to whisper endearments.
“I know it was important,” I manage, “an important occasion for him when we became Animagi, but the project was completed later…”
“Yes, Wormtail learnt to remain a rat for more than a moment only later. And it took Prongs longer… just because of the size, mind! But that doesn’t count. I know…”
I still haven’t been willing or able to talk about it, but James knows me too well. He must have known ever since that night when I changed for the first time and forced him and Peter to let me in to offer my company to the wolf. James waited in the tunnel and found me beside Remus after moonset. Remus’s beautiful voice as such revealed that the dog had stopped him even from howling, and I blushed, realising that we were holding hands. I guess I do want us to finally celebrate an anniversary.
“All right.” Perhaps if I agree about this, James will drop the topic. “The eighth of March is when we can celebrate Padfoot’s birthday.”
“Not only that. You could say it’s only that formally, legally…”
“Hardly formally and legally! My mutt form’s illegal.” I turn to face him and grin.
“The more reason to admit… what is not more illegal.” His grin wipes away mine. “The two of you together.”
Why does he insist? If I agreed to arrange a birthday party for myself, that wouldn’t satisfy James. Or a shared birthday party – Remus’s eighteenth, too. James must know also him too well and understand that what he wants is the relationship acknowledged.
“Give me a break. I can show him that it means a lot to me, too, but… He’s more than human, and now that I’m Pads, I am, too. It’s all between Moony and Pads. And the two of us can celebrate privately.”
“I think he’d like you to show that you’re not ashamed of it.”
“Ashamed? I’m proud of becoming the dog for him.”
James sighs. “Think about it. You can make that day special and let him know that you don’t hide it from me and Peter.”
There isn’t much time.
My paws are stomping against the uneven floor of the tunnel, and I’m leaving Wormtail to scurry behind. Like always, the wolf and the dog will join the rat down here after the transformation, while James must wait as the stag at the edge of the forest. But has he ever found out that another Animagus doesn’t get near when Remus changes, and for another reason – because of feeling scared or disgusted? Our Moony has more than one reason not to complain about Wormy. He’s always too kind, and he doesn’t want us to watch, and perhaps he wants to be alone with… At least it’s all right for him that the two of us are alone together, as long as I’ve already changed my shape to welcome the wolf.
Now I hasten to chant my silent incantation backwards, and my human form returns, sweating in the thick winter robes and cloak, with shaking hands but enough ability to remove the bolt and flick my wand in a voiceless Alohomora. The need to be a dog for Moony changes me back before I’m aware of focusing on my dimensions and on losing them, or of wording the unique animal magic in my mind.
It’s none of Peter’s business or James’s that I go all the way, into the room where Pomfrey has escorted Remus and left him without his clothes. Pads leaps up the staircase, panting.
Moony’s sitting on the floor in the darkest corner of the darkness, next to the fireplace. Pads can smell him and has rushed to him before registering any movement in the huddled shape. I poke my snout against a knee and barely manage to turn an angry bark into soft whining.
Winter after winter they keep doing this. As if bloody Dumbledore weren’t able to make the conditions humane! My Moony’s leaning against the tiles, which radiate the remains of Pomfrey’s heating charm, wrapped in the hideous torn coverlet and with his knees pulled up to his chest.
“Oh, Pads!” I can hear it’s hard for him to catch his breath, as if he’d been climbing stairs, too. “You’re the best. I…”
Raising my snout, with my tongue still lolling out due to the running, I lick Moony’s face and feel the curve of a smile and a dimple on the cheek, and taste the salt of a tear. And his head jerks back, hits the wall, as a convulsion makes his neck rigid for a moment. I press against his side, and scratch with a paw to push the coverlet down so as to let him feel my fur against his skin, instead.
Now his muscles are relaxed again. He’s just shivering, while his skin feels hotter than the fireplace tiles. An arm snakes around me, but I must take my human shape without delay, for a moment more.
Here I am, a man again. I have become also a man for him, because that, too, is what he needs. I hug him tight, squeezing my eyes shut, although it’s too dark to see his nakedness, let alone any blemish on his skin, and bending my head so as to press it on his… No, he can’t bear me touching the bite scar on his shoulder now. My cheek brushes his chest, instead, and I can feel the erratic rhythms of his heart, and his lungs struggling to fill and empty, constrained by the change, which has started deep inside.
“I…” I can find the words to say, just as I found the ones I dictated to record what was inspired by and done for someone who’s more than human. He liked that. I could see it in the flourishes of his best handwriting, although he snorted. And now he must hear, “You… are always my Moony. Beautiful.”
He sighs. He must be in too much pain to talk. And he’s both burning in fever and freezing. There’s isn’t much time, but…
I shift to wrap my cloak around him, too, and wave my wand at the side of the fireplace against his back, casting a heating charm, unhelpfully, perhaps, as it takes away some of my body heat, which he’d probably rather share directly with me. Rather with Pads. If he could talk, he’d tell me to change now, and not to look at him with my eyes, which will remain the same silvery grey, uncanny in the dog’s black face.
There isn’t too much time. Now it’s time to tell him. “Soon, I’ll be the dog soon, and you can hold your Pads all through. And soon it’s over. You’ll run with us. You won’t be weak or ill. And we’ll take care that you’ll be kind and peaceful. Your dog will be there all through your… way back. Then… your man. I am… proud of… us, together. Two years on the eighth of March. I want to celebrate us.”
His shaking body turns rigid again. The arm around me stiffens, and he moans. The clasp of his hand tightens around my wrist, perhaps involuntarily, perhaps as his only remaining way to communicate to me that I must change. Yes, the hand tries to push me away, and that’s when I feel how the nails are growing into claws.
Ashamed. Yes, I’m ashamed of how easily I transform, without any pain. But this is what I can do – ask him to come and join this dog. Welcome him. If only… I wish he, too, could welcome the wolf.
The prompt was: (Canon setting, seventh year) Sirius throws the most amazing date for Remus for their “anniversary”. However, these events take place a few weeks before the anniversary. This story can be read as completely canon compliant. However, it also doesn’t contradict any of my other fanfiction, which follows only Rowling’s first five novels. All the dates are based on the Marauders’ leaving Hogwarts in 1976, when February’s full moon fell on the 15th.
