Love Affair

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter...I wish I did but I don‘t. I’m only playing with the characters. Please do not sue me. I don‘t own any money so it will just be a waste of everyone‘s time.
Pairing: Remus/Sirius
Author: Catium
Rating: NC-13
Word Count: 2224
Genre: Romance, drama.
Status: In progress
Warnings: Fluffy feelings, drama.
Summary: The story of Remus and Sirius’s friendship and love affair.
Note: This story is kind of a prequel to There Is a Thin Line Between Hate and Love. In chapter 13 of There Is a Thin Line... Harry comes to Remus for an advice because he thinks he has feelings for Draco. Remus tells Harry that he and Sirius were a couple and after Harry runs out to talk to Draco, Remus starts to think about how he and Sirius became friend and later lovers. This story traces Remus and Sirius story of friendship and later love affair.

Chapter 11. – Firecalls

Months past.

Remus tried to get on with his life. Try to pretend that the events last spring hadn’t changed anything, tried to act like he wasn’t hoping that he would see Sirius again.

He almost managed to fool himself. So much that it surprised him when he received a letter from Sirius one late evening in October.

Remus stared at the letter the colourful paradise bird had just handed to him. It was definitely Sirius’s handwriting. He couldn’t forget that handwriting no more than he could forget anything else about Sirius. He turned the letter around to rip the seal open and saw, when he had trouble grabbing the edge of the letter, that his hands were shaking.

“Calm down Remus, it’s just a letter. Now stop shaking like a scared puppy and open it.” He ordered himself.
He then broke the seal and opened the parchment. He turned it around and read.

M

I’m wondering if it would be all right for me to firecall you soon? To talk. We didn’t have a lot of time to talk the last time we met. Where do you live?

P

Remus looked at the letter for, what felt like, ever. He’d been expecting, not any of this really, but maybe a longer letter. And he sure hadn’t been expecting Sirius to ask him if he could firecall. How was Sirius going to firecall him? He was a fugitive. On the run. He couldn’t get access to a fireplace to call him. Was he going to walk up to next wizard he saw and ask him “Excuse me mind if I use your fireplace to call me werewolf ex-best friend and lover?” No, that seemed a little to foolhardy, even for Sirius.

And did Remus want Sirius to firecall him? Did he want to talk to him? He knew what Sirius would want to talk about. Was he ready for that talk? Was he ready to meet Sirius alone, face to face? Even if it was through a fireplace?

“There is only one way to find out.” Remus said to himself. He found a new parchment and wrote simply.

P

“Yes you can firecall. You know where I live, you used to live there too.”

M

He sealed it and wrote Sirius name on the front. He then handed the paradise bird the letter, which had been waiting patiently for the two hours it took Remus to open, read and reply to it. The bird took off and Remus prepared for the long and difficult wait that would be the wait for Sirius’s firecall.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The call came two weeks later. Late on a rainy evening. Remus was sitting in the living room reading, his back turned to the fireplace, when he heard someone call.

“Remus?”

“He’s here. Oh shit.” Remus thought panicking a bit. “I could just sit very still and maybe he’ll go, thinking I’m not home. No, no I can’t do that.” He put his book away and stood up from his armchair putting himself in sight to the fireplace. He looked at Sirius head floating in the green flames. His hair was shorter and cleaner than when he’d seen him in the shack, his skin wasn’t this sickly yellowish colour anymore and his face looked fuller, like he’d had at least a few good meals since he saw him last. His eyes weren’t as hollow anymore as they scanned the room looking for him. When Sirius saw him, his face lit up in a smile and he looked years younger, almost like the young handsome man he’d once been.

“Remus.” He said happily.

Remus couldn’t help it. The dread he’d been feeling faded away and he smiled back at Sirius. Happy to see that his friend could still look like his old self and not just like the skeleton Azkaban had turned him into.

“Sirius.” He greeted him back and kneeled at the fireplace.

“I was so happy when you agreed to letting me call you.” Sirius told him. “I wasn’t sure you would. It took me days to write this letter. Nearly a week to muster up the courage to send it.”

“Why wouldn’t I want to talk to you Sirius?” Remus asked him.

“I thought that after you’d gotten some time to think about that maybe you didn’t believe me after all.”

Remus’s face became serious when Sirius said that.

“Why would I change my mind Sirius?” He asked him. “Now everything makes perfect sense about that night.” Neither one of them needed to say what night Remus was talking about. “Before the night in the Shack I didn’t understand how you could’ve... you know. Despite all the evidence, despite how it seemed to make perfect sense, I just felt it in my gut that there wasn’t something right about it. But everyone told me it did. So I believed them. Just like despite my gut telling me all those years ago that I shouldn’t trust Peter, I pushed it away because you and James told me he was all right.”

“Yeah and see how you’ve always been right and everyone else been wrong. Clearly your gut instinct works for you. Your only flaw is that you like being liked so much that you allow other people to change your mind.”

“My only flaw. If only.” Remus snorted. “But anyway Sirius. I haven’t changed my mind. I believe you and as far as I’m concerned I would like for us to become friends again. I know what I said in the Shack sounded like we were friends again just like before no problem but after what happened... We need to build up trust again, something we lost completely during those last months and we’ve changed. It’s over been twelve years. We need to get to know each other again in order to become friends again. Would you like that? For us to be friends again” Remus asked Sirius a little fear creeping up on him about Sirius’s answer

Sirius looked at him, his expression a little weird.

“I would love that Remus. Can I maybe...” He started to say then paused. “No, no never mind.”

“What Sirius?”

“Nothing forget it.” Sirius said looking embarrassed.

“We used to tell each other everything. And you never started to say something and then backed out of it. It’s not your style Sirius. What...is...it?” Remus asked him again.

“Can I come through? The fireplace I mean. Can I come in?”

Remus now understood Sirius’s hesitation. That was quite the question. Talking to him via firecall. Sirius himself thousands a miles away was a little different from him standing in his living room.

“That used to be our living room.” Remus thought and nodded his head.

Sirius head disappeared for a while, the fire’s colour became normal again. Then it blazed up in emerald flames, blinding Remus, when it reduced, Sirius was standing in the living room dusting soot of his tattered, old and ripped cloak.

Remus looked up and down Sirius’s body.

“Merlin he’s so thin.” Was all he could think and before he could stop himself he asked.

“Want something to eat? I’ve got some left over soup from dinner. Or I can cook something for you.” He said in a fast voice.

Sirius chuckled and looked at himself.

“I look that bad hey?”

Remus blushed a little and stuttered.

“I...I didn’t...”

“It’s ok Remus I know I do. Wouldn’t mind a shower either but not tonight, I broke into some wizards family house and they’re coming back in the afternoon. I can only stay for a half an hour more. Maybe if you wouldn’t mind letting me take some food with me?”

“No problem I will get some food and... You broke into somebody’s house?” Remus asked when he really heard what Sirius had said.

“Yeah.” Sirius said having the good conscience to look guilty. “Don’t really have a fireplace in the forest where I’ve been staying in.”

“Forest. Was wondering where you’d been staying but more in the line of what country.”

“Not sure exactly. I just picked someplace far south from here. Somewhere warm, blue sky, ocean. Think I’m on a Pacific Island but not sure.”

“That’s nice.” Remus said

“Sure beats Azkaban.” Sirius said and just the mention of the name gave his face this full on hunted expression he’d been sporting in the Shack. It was like he’d gone back to Azkaban in his head.

Remus didn’t know what to do about this. He didn’t think Sirius would like to talk about it so he decided distraction would be the best course of action.

“Sirius.” He said and Sirius tore himself from whatever dark place he’d been in and his eyes focused on Remus.

“Yes.”

“Can you forgive me? For believing you were the traitor? I know we went through this in the Shack but maybe when you got time to think about it...”

“Haven’t changed my mind. Not anymore than you about believing me. But can you forgive me for believing you were the traitor just because you’re a werewolf?” Sirius asked him back and the force of this knowledge rendered Remus speechless. Throughout their friendship and relationship it had never mattered to Sirius, him being a werewolf. But suddenly during that time he had decided it did matter. Although it did make sence. Werewolves were dark creatures. It made sense they would be lured to a dark wizard. Remus understood why Sirius would have thought that.

“Yes I forgive you Sirius. I totally understand why you would’ve thought that.”

“You do?”

“Yes. Werewolves are dark creatures. Therefore should be easily drawn to a major dark wizard. But you understand why I thought...”

“My whole family was evil so why shouldn’t I be? Totally get it.”

“So it’s forgiveness all around then?”

“No question about it.” Sirius said giving him a smile. “But the half an hour’s up. Gotta go. Maybe I’ll firecall the next change I get?” He asked Remus clearly unsure about Remus’s answer.

“Do you really need to ask Sirius?” Remus asked him and Sirius’s eyes flashed.

“Yes...I do but... Thank you Remus.” Sirius said and pulled out some floo powder form his pocket. He tossed it into the fireplace and the flames turned green. When he was about to step in he took a look around the living room.

“I’m not sure I like the changes you’ve done to the place.” He told Remus.

“What do you mean?” Remus asked confused.

“Our pictures.” Sirius said simply and Remus knew what he was talking about. They’d had a lot of pictures. Of them...their friends, all of them together. After he’d come back from visiting Sirius in Azkaban and decided he needed to stop thinking about what’d happened, to let go of the past, he’d taken them down and packed them down along with all of Sirius’s stuff. Unable to look at picture’s that reminded him so firmly of the past he’d been trying to forget.

“They reminded me of the past Sirius. I didn’t want to remember.” Remus told him and felt tears welling up in his eyes.

Sirius looked at him and Remus saw tears in Sirius’s eyes as well. “Sometimes remembering the past isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Neither is mourning over it.”

“I mourned for a year Sirius. A whole year it was all I did. Ask Dumbledore, it really was all I did. I even lost my job, I didn’t clean the house, I hardly eat or slept. I couldn’t do it anymore. I needed to move on completely. I packed all the pictures, all of your stuff, even some stuff of mine that reminded me too strongly of you. Can you blame me? I lost everything. Everything. In a matter of hours. Everyone I loved. I just wanted to forget.”

“You won’t be able to forget everything now. Not with me coming around. The Dementors...” Sirius hesitated just the word of the Azkaban prison guards giving him that haunted expression. “They made me forget a lot of stuff. I would like to remember it again, bits and pieces have been coming back to me, but to get the whole picture I’ll have to talk to you. Will you be fine with that?”

Would he be? Remus thought. Talking about things, remembering stuff he’d spent the better part of twelve
years forgetting. With Sirius around?

“Yes. I’ll be fine. As long as you’re around, I’ll be fine.” Remus told him for the first time admitting how much he still needed him.

Sirius expression changed to that of hopefulness. Clearly this had been something he’d been waiting to hear.

“That’s good to hear Remus. But I really got to go now. And Sirius stepped into the fireplace, saying some name Remus didn’t catch and disappearing in a flame of green.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Throughout the next months Sirius firecalled Remus whenever he could get to a fireplace. Sometimes coming through if he had enough time. They would talk about everything and nothing, the old times, the future, Quidditch, news, the weather, everything but what both of them really wanted to talk about. Which was if their relationship could become something more than friendship again. But despite that big, bright yellow elephant in the room they managed to start building on the ruins of their old friendship. Slowly building up their new friendship.

TBC

Only 2 chapters to go. Sorry about this short chapter. Have said it before, have an outline for each chapter and the outline for this one just happened to be short. Sorry. But review anyway? Pretty please? *Puppy dog eyes.*