Somewhere Only We Know

Disclaimer: Harry Potter universe is the property of JK Rowling. I, sadly, make no money from fanfiction.


I came across a fallen tree
I felt the branches of it looking at me
Is this the place we used to love?
Is this the place that I\'ve been dreaming of?
-Keane, “Somewhere Only We Know”


He never used to dream. He would toss and turn, as he does now, and bury his face in the pillow. It would take him hours to drift off into a sea of black nothingness. He never slept long, for no sooner would his breathing shallow and the darkness encompass him than the sunlight would begin to stream in through the windows and his body would stir.

During those days – no, years - of dreamless sleep, Remus longed to dream. He wanted colours to paint his nights as thought they were the most marvellous canvas ever constructed. Black was devoid of the very things Remus craved. It was bleak and heavy and Remus wanted no part of that. He wanted to be reminded of why life was worth living. He wanted visions of hope and lightness, something so rare and nearly unheard of in his own life, to permeate his nights.

He never used to dream until the evening that Sirius fell through the veil.

He never used to dream until the evening that Sirius fell through the veil and now he can’t stop the dreams from coming. He tosses and turns and buries his face in the pillow. It takes him hours to drift off into a sea raging with colour. He never sleeps long because as soon as he starts to dream he forces himself awake.

Remus longs to go back to the days where he did not dream. He wants to be rid of these dreams – these memories - of events that have lost past.

Remus dreams of the dead.

Remus dreams of the dead and these dreams are not so much dreams as they are vivid recollections of things that Remus had experienced at various points throughout his life. Occasionally he dreams of Lily or of the Prewett brothers or of his parents. More often than not, though, he dreams of James and Sirius.

He remembers them.

He remembers them as adults and he remembers them as schoolboys. Some memories are more pleasant than others and some memories are clearer than other in his dreams. He has dreamt of James and Lily’s wedding, of a rather nasty row between himself and Sirius over whether or not Remus was loyal to James and Lily, of late night Butterbeers and Bertie Botts in Gryffindor Tower, of pulling pranks and making masks, of stolen kisses and a wild tree.

Sometimes he dreams and it isn’t a memory. It’s a nightmare; at least, he hopes it is. Every so often nightmares plague him and they are always of the same thing – that wild tree fallen, split near the base of its grand trunk with enormous splinters of wood jutting this way and that, its once-vibrant branches laying lifelessly on the ground. Dead.

Dead just like them.

Occasionally, when he is taking his afternoon tea and staring blindly out the grimy window next to the tattered, dingy chair that is his favourite, he feels himself slip away. He never takes any pains to stop himself. He feels himself slip away and it is always to the same time and same place without fail.

He does not know why this time and place in particular resurfaces time and again in his mind. Perhaps, though, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that he lived it and he will continue to relive it over and over again as long as his subconscious, Merlin, or what-or-whomever is in charge of what memory he dwells on continues to show it to him.

********

It had been an exceptionally difficult transformation during that Full Moon. When he thought back on things, Remus decided that what he had seen just before giving over to the wolf completely likely had something to do with that.

When moon sank and the sun rose the next morning, Remus hadn’t been certain that he had seen what he thought he had. Surely he hadn’t really seen Snivellus at the other end of the tunnel being pulled back out by Prongs? It had seemed so very real but it was quite possible that he had been imagining things at the height of the transformation. It would not have been the first time that he had done so, although he had to admit that what he thought he had witnessed the previous night had pulled at the feral nature of the wolf more so than any other image had.

Blinking blearily against the thin beams of sunlight streaming through the cracks of the shack’s boarded up windows, Remus groaned and rolled over on his side. He ached, as he always did after the full moon. Every last centimetre of him felt as though it had been stretched out, set on fire, and then forced back into its original place again.

“Moony,” whispered a familiar voice.

He rolled onto his back and slowly opened his eyes, squinting against the odd combination of darkness, light, and dust in the small, run-down room. He didn’t have to turn his head this way or that; he knew exactly who was keeping him company.

“Yes Sirius?” he returned quietly.

“All right? Prongs and I were worried.”

“I’m all right,” allowed Remus quietly.

“Sure about that?” James’ head popped into view as he stood over Remus, dark hair messy and falling into his eyes as he looked down at Remus.

“Yes,” said Remus, who then closed his eyes briefly and shook his head. “No.”

In what had probably been what could be classified as ‘an instant’, Sirius was crouching by his side. “What’s wrong, mate?”

Remus smiled wryly at that question. What was wrong? A lot. He was a werewolf, for starters. That was no secret. For another thing, he had a rather unhealthy attachment to his friends… Not, of course, that he could come right out and tell them so.

Somehow, though, Remus was certain these two thoughts weren’t what Sirius was looking for.

“Where’s Wormtail?”

“He has detention with Flitwick this morning,” James replied, exchanging a glance with Sirius that gave Remus cause to think that he might be lying.

“Oh? He didn’t say anything about that yesterday,” said Remus.

Sirius snorted. “Wormtail never says lots of things, Moony.” Waving a hand dismissively, he then shifted to sit behind Remus and placed his hands beneath Remus’ arms before pulling him to a seated position.

He did it a little too quickly and Remus felt light-headed. Slumping against Sirius’ chest, his cheeks tinged red and he mumbled an apology.

“Don’t apologise, Moony,” Sirius chastised. Judging from the grin Remus could see on James’ face, Sirius must have been wearing a rather broad smile himself.

“Fine,” he said slowly while his eyes threatened to flutter shut again. “I take it back.”

“That’s a good boy,” James said lightly, then burst out into laughter.

Cocking his head in James’ direction, Remus gave him an injured look. “I thought you were clever, Prongs. Padfoot here is the sort of canine that fetches and needs to hear ‘good boy’ to feel rewarded. We wolves don’t need that sort of childish reassurance.”

While James burst out laughing, Sirius tightened his grip on the underside of Remus’ biceps.

“Oy!” he exclaimed, feigning being put out.

“Oh, come off it,” James teased.

Remus twisted a bit in Sirius’ grip and couldn’t fight the smile from forming on his face when James leaned in and patted Sirius on the head and told Sirius he was a ‘good boy.’

“Oy!” Sirius exclaimed again, ducking his head a bit to ward off more pats. James and Remus promptly burst out laughing, which only served to make Sirius more indignant. He released his hold on Remus and scooted back a bit.

Inhaling deeply, feeling winded from that bit of raucous laughter, Remus placed his hands on his thighs and placed his weight there, leaning forward.

And just like that the energy in the room changed.

Remus could feel it just as surely as he could feel a dull ache in his bones and skin from the previous night’s transformation.

“Moony?”

This time it was James who called his name. His voice had lowered a few octaves and Remus could detect more than a hint of worry in his tone.

“Yes James?” Remus asked softly.

“Nothing. I—“

“It’s not nothing,” said Remus suddenly, raising his head and meeting James’ hazel eyes dead on. “Did I see you last night?”

“Me?”

“Yes, you, James.”

“James--” Sirius started, but Remus cut him off.

“Hang on a mo, Padfoot. Prongs has something to tell me, don’t you, Prongs?”

James tipped his head down, averting his eyes. Remus felt a flash of something…triumph? He wasn’t sure what it was, only that it gave him a small bit of satisfaction to see James bow his head as he considered what to say or not to say to Remus. It was almost as though he were ashamed, although Remus didn’t know what James had to feel ashamed about, really…unless he’d planned what Remus had seen and backed out at the last minute…

After a long moment of silence, James lifted his eyes to Remus’. “You did, mate,” he confirmed.

“Who was with you?”

James’ jaw twitched. “C’mon, Moony, don’t put me—“

“It was my fault, all right?!” Sirius interjected, clamouring to his feet.

“Your fault?” Remus asked curiously.

“I thought it’d be brilliant to tell Snivellus how to get in here but James here--” he shot James an annoyed look – “overheard me and for some Merlin-forsaken reason came and--”

Remus held up a hand. “Enough,” he said sharply, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Where’s Peter?”

“I told you already, Moony,” James said slowly. “He’s--”

“Oh, sod it all!” Sirius cursed, whirling around and giving James a sharp look. “He lied to you, all right? He’s not got detention with Flitwick. He’s got a revising date with Evans.”

“Evans?!” James exclaimed incredulously.

Remus was quite sure that, were it possible, James’ eyebrows would have jumped right off of his forehead.

“MY Evans?!”

Trying to keep the peace, Remus gingerly got to his feet and stood between the two boys. “James, Lily is a person, not a piece of property. She doesn’t belong to you in any sense of the understanding of ownership in the slightest. Peter knows you’re quite mad about her, he wouldn’t try to take her away from--”

“As if he could!” James protested loudly, which earned a derisive snort from Sirius.

“Think a bloody lot of yourself there, Prongs,” he said with amusement.

“You’re one to talk, Padfoot!” James countered, taking a step closer.

Remus was beginning to feel a bit crowded.

“Come off it now,” he said sensibly, placing a hand on each of his friends’ shoulders. “Peter just needs help with revising is all, Prongs.” Turning to Sirius, he added, “I’m too spent to lay into it now, but we’re going to have a conversation about Snivellus yesterday, mates.”

“Moony, I--”

“He saw me, Padfoot. He SAW ME. Do you know what that--”

Remus never had a chance to finish his sentence. He had just been working up to grand combination of a lecture and a rant and in one fell swoop Sirius cut him off in the most curious (curious only because he never would have thought in a million zodiacs coming and going that Sirius Black would do such a thing) of ways:

He kissed him.

Remus saw stars and he was quite certain that he would either pass out or topple over from the strong case of jelly-legs he had just developed. Although he had been wondering for a good number of months now what it would be like to snog Sirius Black, he was so shocked by the turn of events that he could not return the snog.

Sirius must have sensed that for he pulled back after a moment or two, breathing heavily and looking strangely from James to Remus and back again.

James, to Remus’ great surprise, said nothing. He did utter a word.

“What--” Remus gasped, pressing his fingers to his lips.

James took a step closer to Remus.

“Prongs?” he questioned when it became apparent that Sirius wasn’t about to speak up either.

Sirius took a step closer to Remus.

Remus screwed his eyes shut, concentrating very hard on getting rid of the mad cacophony of thoughts vying for his attention. Maybe he was still asleep. He had to be. No way in Merlin’s Beard would Sirius Black have snogged him or—

Was that James’ hand resting low on his hip?

Remus cracked one eye open and quickly shut it again, more confused and out of sorts than ever.

He shuffled back a few steps and croaked, “Sorry, I’m not under--”

He wasn’t sure who it was that first pulled half the tail of his shirt out of his trousers--They always dress me after a transformation. Never want me to feel out of place. Always looking after me…--but it didn’t matter because his shirt was gone before he could even process that there were two sets of hands tugging this way and that on his shirt.

There were hands and there were mouths and Remus gave up trying to question, trying to reason why all of this was happening. He’d been pining for them—the both of them—for so long and now it was happening and did it really matter how or why?

Both of them were aggressive, something that Remus would have expected from them. James’s small frame fits against his front well and Sirius’ chest molds right up against his back. Remus can feel both their hardnesses—James’ against his hip and Sirius’ against his backside-through the layers of fabric between them and it is enough to make his already-drained body feel that much more boneless.

His knees did indeed give out when James whispered a dirty thing or two in his ear after promising to take care of him. Sirius laughed his loud barking laugh and grabbed Remus’ arse, running his tongue slowly down Remus’ spine. His free hand settled at Remus’ waist and steadied him between his two mates.

Remus had to close his eyes again and the stars returned, brighter and bigger than ever before. Both of them were kissing him, one taking his mouth while the other would nibble on his neck and then their lips were everywhere, all over at once and his body no longer felt as though it had been stretched, burnt, and forced back into place. His body felt warm and tingling and he couldn’t quite figure out what to do with his hands. All he knew was that he wanted to touch them, both of them. He had thought about this for so very long and now, like a bizarre dream, he had the opportunity to do just that. His hands run all over them but he soon finds that it interferes with the kissing and gives up on that. Instead, he slowly manoeuvres them to the broken bed in the corner and they pile on in a heap, ending up in a tangle of arms and legs that wouldn’t have gotten them an approving look from their handful of other Gryffindor dorm-mates one bit.

He didn’t know how the rest of their clothes got shucked so quickly but he wasn’t going to dwell on it. How could he when there were no longer layers of fabric between them and they were skin to skin to skin? Remus whimpered as James’ hands wrapped around his cock and the whimper turned into something of a moan when Sirius placed two slick fingers inside him. He didn’t remember hearing any sort of lubrication charm being uttered but, then again, he wasn’t paying attention to anything other than James’ and Sirius’ bodies pressed up against his.

In the back of his mind he wondered if they had done this before. He hadn’t known either of them to be interested in blokes (and he had never told them that he himself was) and, as far as he had known, they were virgins. He didn’t think that of them anymore, not the way they were rubbing on him and against him. Were they lovers? Were they? Had they been shagging in secret and holding out on Remus and Peter?

Irrationally, as James’ mouth took the entire length of his cock and he felt Sirius’ head nudge against his entrance, Remus felt a stab of jealousy. They kept secrets from him and that wasn’t—

He couldn’t think on that. He tried but with James running his tongue along his slit and his hands squeezing Remus’ balls while Sirius buried himself to the hilt in Remus’ arse it was difficult.

Later. Think about it later.

It wasn’t long before Remus felt himself fall over the edge, taking Sirius and James with him and he was glad. Glad, glad, glad because he wouldn’t want to experience an adventure like this without James and Sirius. They were his best friends, his mates, and it was all for one and one for all and oh Merlin—

********

Slowly he opened his eyes and found that he was still seated in that chair, the window was still grimy, and his tea was cold. Picking up his wand, he tapped the cuppa and gave it a quick Warming Charm before depositing the wand back on the table once more.

He was tired, perhaps more tired than he was when he slipped away in the first place. He called this moving in and out of consciousness while awake ‘slipping’ because he did not want to call them daydreams. He already was vexed by dreams and nightmares filled with visions and colours and recollections of things; he didn’t need his daylight hours filled with the same.

Deep down he knew that it didn’t matter whether or not he called it a daydream or a slipping. It was one in the same and just as what filled his nights.

When would this end? He lived these things once and he did not know if he would be able to cope with reliving them until Merlin only knew when.

He tried to tell himself that he could take it but perhaps that was the biggest lie out of all of them.

He didn’t want to remember anymore.