First Love

TITLE: First Love

AUTHOR: Lady Sirius

PAIRING: SB/RL

RATING: NC17

FEEDBACK: darklove_zorg@yahoo.com

DISCLAIMER: Of course all rights to Harry Potter belong to JK Rowling - I would claim Sirius if I could (but alas this is not meant to be!)


DEDICATION: To my glorious, talented, wondrous and everlastingly sexy inspiration - Gary Oldman

And it is also dedicated to my good friend Kitty - she is the Remus to my Sirius in our rpgs, and has inspired me to write about their love.




FIRST LOVE


When I first came to Hogwarts, I felt that I could never be loved by another human being.

But then Fate, in the guise of Remus J. Lupin, entered my life.

And I discovered how totally wrong I was.

We were both eleven, the year we met, in our first year at a new school. So very young. So very scared.

I had seen him on the Hogwarts train of course. A tall thin boy with an air of unspoken tragedy about him. We never exchanged a word - he sat by himself in a separate car. And as far as I could see, he talked to nobody else. Then we walked through those huge doors together - whether by coincidence or fate - and Hagrid herded the lot of us striplings to Professor McGonagall for sorting. I could feel this boy\'s eyes upon me - so deep and yet so haunted. There was something about him which intrigued me and scared me at the same time. I knew that I would talk to him at some point. And when we were both sorted into Gryffindor, surprisingly so as I had been brought up to expect that I also would end up a Slytherin, it was like a sign to me.

Once Professor Dumbledore had finished welcoming us all to Hogwarts, we were set free to settle into our respective houses. I found myself sharing a room with three other youths, one of whom was this mysterious fellow with the hooded eyes. It was then that I learned his name - Remus John Lupin - and never have I received more important information in my life.

He sat quietly on his bed, which was closest to my own, looking over his textbooks - which I could see were secondhand, as were his clothes. But I cared not for these things. He must have felt me looking at him, for he looked up, his smile was shy and reserved, but it took my breath away.

\"Hello,\" I said to him, wanting to hear what his voice sounded like. \"My name is Sirius. Sirius Black.\"

\"I\'m Remus. Remus Lupin.\" His voice was soft and low, almost hoarse, and spoke of tragedy concealed.

And thus it began.

Remus and I quickly became inseperable, the two of us, and then there was the four of us - Remus and I and James Potter and Peter Pettigrew. The Marauders as we became known. How I wish now that had never happened. But that is hindsight talking. None of us knew then what was to come, or I\'d have gladly killed Pettigrew before it started.

Collectively it was the four of us. But it was Remus whom I thought about all the time, and whose company I could not live without. I sought him out at every turn, made excuses to be with him. And he made every reason to be with me as well, although I think neither one of us could quite put a finger on why that was - we just knew that being together was the best, the most natural thing in the world.

And thus it was for four years. The only thing which cast even a slight cloud over our relationship was the mysterious way that Remus would disappear on me, once a month. Never a word of explanation. There one day, gone the next, as regular as clockwork. Which, if I had been a little more observant, I might have figured out sooner. By the time we were fifteen, the mystery had been revealed.

But before that secret was brought to light, so was something else. Something that changed both our lives forever.

My relationship with my family has never been good. I have always been the disgrace of the Black family, while my younger brother Regulus was always the darling. Regulus could do no wrong - ever - while Sirius was barely worth acknowledging in their eyes. Unfortunately for him, I was born first, therefore I was forced to be the heir apparent. Even though I was sorted into Gryffindor, not Slytherin, something unparalleled in the annals of Black family history.

Even going to Hogwarts could not still the sound of my mother\'s screeching demanding hideous voice. It haunted my dreams at night. I would wake up to find Remus sitting beside me on the bed, comforting me and shushing my fears. And talking to me until I went to sleep once more. And during the day she haunted me in howlers that arrived with the morning owls and that I would quickly snatch, running out of the Great Hall, so no one else was forced to hear her shrewish tones.

The message was always the same - you are a disgrace to the name of Black, you are good for nothing, you will never amount to anything, why were you born? A broken record of insults calculated to hurt. And whether or not I liked to admit it, they did hurt. Terribly.

It was one day in particular. I had been spending a lot of time in detention - well, actually, James and I had. We were the bad boys of the Marauders, the ones most likely to get into trouble. That was something Remus never did - get in trouble. He was too good for that. Remus was a prefect that year, and I think he bent over backwards not to report us, although we frankly weren\'t of much help in that department. But there were enough other prefects and teachers that did not mind - so James and I were in an almost constant state of trouble.

Which of course helped to set off Mother even more.

This particular howler was a nasty one. It contained everything but the kitchen sink. I took this one to the astronomy tower, regardless of the stormy weather which raged about me, where her nasty voice could echo to the skies and harm no one. No one but me, that is. Her words cut through me like a knife.

\"Sirius - you are no son of mine. Even your father is ashamed to say your name. Poor Regulus - he suffers because you are alive. It would have been better had I done something about you before you were even born. You\'re a poor excuse for a wizard, you are!\"

I sat on the parapet outside of the tower, and I felt the tears stream down my face, even as the fierce winds whipped my long hair about, almost blinding me. I hated her so much, hated them all. It was eating me up inside, though, like a cancer. How could your family not love you? Weren\'t parents supposed to love their children? But apparently it was quite possible that they didn\'t. Obviously. So oblivious was I to my surroundings that I failed to notice that I was no longer alone. A hand fell upon my shoulder, and I looked up to see Remus there.

Hastily, I brushed my hand across my cheeks. I didn\'t want Remus to know that I had been upset. And crying. But he knew, of course.

\"Sirius,\" he said, taking my hand, and squeezing it comfortingly. That\'s all, just my name. But it did something to me, and I started to shiver, not entirely due to the wild winds which blustered about us.

Remus reached out and pulled me to him, his arms going around me for reassurance. He felt so good, and I felt so distraught and confused - I glanced up at him at the same time he moved his head down toward me, and our lips just happened to brush together. The most electric sensation coursed through me at that moment. Like a switch that had been turned on. Like a revelation. Like until that moment, I had only existed and now I had begun to live.

I saw the same look mirrored in Remy\'s eyes. Right before he kissed me again. Yes, I knew that it was him, felt the strength inside of him as his lips claimed mine, and then I knew nothing else but him - I became lost in his touch, lost in his taste, lost in his feel - and somehow the world seemed right once more.

By the time we stopped kissing, my head was spinning with a host of new emotions that were new to me. I looked at Remus and smiled. He returned my smile, reaching out and stroking my cheek softly. \"My beautiful Sirius,\" he whispered softly.

And when I looked at him I knew. \"Remus, I love you,\" I said reverently.

\"I\'ve been waiting a long time for you to say so,\" he replied in his throaty voice, pushing back my hair, playing with my curls.

\"You- you knew?\"