Front Row

do you go to the dungeon to find out how to make peace with your days in the dungeon writing a letter to you didn't make me feel anymore peaceful than how I felt when we weren't speaking because I didn't cop to what I did I can't love you because we're supposed to have professional boundaries. I'd like you to be schooled and in awe as though you were kissed by god full on the lips .



Personally, I can't believe you'd ever set foot anywhere near Azkaban ever again, after what they did to you. I've never been there and I still avoid it with all the strength in my body. I can't imagine working there - you know, those poor guards who sit in the front desk, away from the Dementors and the screaming inmates, all day and all night.

But you - you've always been brave. Or maybe just stubborn. Or stupid. Sirius Black, always trying to prove himself. You did it in school, time and time again, tried to show everyone that you were brave or maybe just fearless, and you're doing it now. I know that's why you took the Auror job with the Ministry. Our few remaining friends keep tabs on you, you know, just to look out for you because they feel guilty about putting you away all those years before. Bella Figg was here the other day, dropping by our little makeshift office with some papers to look at, and she came over to me to give me some news about you.

I wasn't sure I wanted to hear it, but I didn't want to hurt her feelings. You - if you didn't want to hear about me, you would have just blown her off, right, Sirius? You're braver than I ever was. Maybe I just found out what consequences were at a younger age, what with Mother Nature being such a bitch to me and all. I met with consequences at the age of five when I accidentally played a little too close to the edge of the forest on a full moon night; you met with consequences when you bet your trust on the wrong friend.

Anyway, I let her drag me around the corner, and she smiled sort of sympathetically and said, "The Aurors are going to Azkaban tomorrow for an investigation."

"All of them?" I asked, surprised.

"Yes. Sirius Black, too."

"What...what are they investigating?"

"Questioning the Lestranges. We doubt there's anything they'll be able to learn from those two...they've been in there nearly twenty years now, it's a wonder they're not dead yet. But the Aurors are all going anyway. Moody insisted." She looked at me with some measure of concern. "Am I the only one who thinks perhaps Sirius Black shouldn't be going there, or do you agree with me? You know him best, Remus."

Correction, Bella - I knew him best. Or maybe I didn't really know him that well at all, maybe everything between us was just passing fancy, and James knew him the best of all. But I didn't say that, I said, "Sirius is stronger now...he knows what he's doing, I suppose. Anyway, if he wants to go back there, no one's going to stop him."

"I know. I just...I don't think it's quite right. The Dementors will affect him stronger than any of the others, you know, and he looks tired enough already - trying to make up for lost time and do too much at one time." She shook her head, motherly. "Well, you're right about one thing. No one would be able to change his mind."

"No." I shook my head, and somehow managed to fondly recall your stubbornness. Even thought the Ministry of Magic had screwed you over and left you to rot in Azkaban, you went to work for them after they caught Peter last year - why? To prove that you could? To help save Harry? To make it up to Lily and James? I suppose my guess is as good as any.

People give me the news on you because we're friends - because it's safe for them to know now that I kept you at my house after Voldemort rose again, that we were best friends and still supposedly remain on close terms. But it's not safe for them to know that we were lovers. People would be screaming about how I was bound to defend you because 'werewolves mate for life', and everyone knows I was the star character witness at your second trial, when we proved that Peter was guilty and you were not. Some particularly brilliant Ministry worker would decide I was 'bewitched by the nature of my inner-Dark Creature' and find a way to stick it to us all again. I wouldn't want to risk that - I couldn't risk that. The truth is, you are good, and you're certainly an asset to Dumbledore and the other Aurors.

I've written you letters - I'm always pleased to hear back from you. But somehow when I write, I never say what I mean to say, never ask what I've always wanted to know; and now so much time has passed it would be silly of me to ask those questions. It would look like I spent all those years pining away for you while you were in prison. And I don't think I was pining. But these days...writing you letters just doesn't settle things. I want to see you, I want to talk to you like I did when we were Marauders, when we were packmates, and we all shared everything with each other. I miss those days, because they were the only days when I wasn't confused about you. When we were friends, and the first year or so when we were lovers, things were wonderful between us. Then, when we grew up, and things went wrong, and we weren't speaking - when we weren't sure who the spy was, when you were in Azkaban and I was so alone - things were confusing. Things are confusing now, though they shouldn't be. I guess they should just be put to rest now.

So, aside from us, there's not a soul alive on earth who knows what passed between us. I could easily put it to rest, forget what happened, forget that we were lovers and I often questioned whether I might have been falling in love with you. I should forget it - we're two grown up, semi-respectable men who are employed in the let's-save-the-world business. There are professional boundaries we must respect, and it's not like you left me recently - it was more than fifteen years ago that things soured between us and we stopped getting along, both in and out of bed.

People just thought our friendship had gone bad, being so heavily entrenched with the Order of the Phoenix and all our let's-save-the-world business. They never guessed we were lovers. I'd kind of like to keep it that way, just to keep things simple for both of us. Besides, you've suffered enough without having a werewolf mooning over you (get it? mooning?) and messing things up. I don't think you'd want a lover now, anyway. I've seen what Azkaban did to your body and mind, saw it when you stayed with me after the Triwizard Tournament. You'll have to take your time, getting used to intimacy and love and relationships like that again; but I've no doubt you will have all that again one day. Some man or woman to complete you, following your return to society and noble work as an Auror. Do I sound bitter? I'm not, really - I want good things for you. I still care about you. I always have.



I'm in the front row the front row with popcorn I get to see you see you close up (I'm too tired to recount the unpleasantries one by one one minute I want to banish you the next I want to be on a deserted island with you and my three favorite cd's ambivalent yet in your bed we've yet to acknowledge what really happened)



Ambivalent - that's a good word for how I feel about you. It means that I have "two simultaneous, conflicting feelings" about you. Goes right along with the confusion, that I can't make up my mind just how I feel about you. I've always been right there, front and center, to see your life in all its roller coaster ups and downs, and it's been quite a show, Sirius. We go back farther than I care to remember; but when I do remember, I think of only the same things, over and over.

Sometimes I think I hate your wretched memory, hate that we ever became lovers, that I ever let myself even dream that I felt more for you than friendship. It was a mistake, I think, to let myself get that close. No, I don't mate for life, but a relationship for that long had to mean something, didn't it? It did to me, anyway. We were lovers for five years; that means something. Exactly what it means, I'm not sure...

And then, when I remember those five years and the good times we had, I want them back - I want to feel that way about you again, to let you crawl into my body and mind, take me over, make me young and strong and whole again. I want to live with you, just you, and be happy as we were when we were younger.

Ambivalent. When we first began to flirt with the idea of being more than friends, I was ambivalent - I wanted it more than anything, yet I feared it more than anything. But I became your lover anyway. Ambivalent, yet in your bed. And we've yet to acknowledge what really happened.



slid into the ditch I have this overwhelming loss of ambition we said let's name thirty good reasons why we shouldn't be together I started by saying things like "you smoke" "you'd like to live in London (too far)" you started saying things like "you belong to the world" all of which could have been easily refuted but the conversation was hypothetical I am totally short of breath for you why can't you shut your stuff off.....



I remember when we were falling for each other - I won't say falling in love, but falling rather inevitably towards being together. We got closer because James, your best friend, was suddenly spending all of his time with Lily. Which we all loved, we just adored Lily and thought they made a perfect couple, but you always felt kind of shafted because he didn't have as much time for you any longer, and you had no one you were in love with.

We were sixth years, had been friends and packmates for years upon years, but it was then that we really started to grow closer. We took midnight journeys together because James would be sneaking around with Lily and Peter was asleep...Peter was always simply Peter, he was never part of the deeper, more intimate entanglings we trapped ourselves in.

I know the exact night that it all began between us, too. I remember it. Do you? Did you retain the memory, or did you lose that to the Dementors? I find it hard to imagine that something so important - at least, I think it was/is important - could be held within a Dementor rather than you, but I suppose that's a possibility.

Shall I remind you of it? It begins that November night in our sixth year, when we were on the common room couch, unwilling to sleep but having no pranks to play. The fire was burning brightly; Peter was asleep; James and Lily were out; and you looked at me and said,

~~~

"Damn, but I could do with a good snog tonight."

I looked back at you and laughed. "So go wake up one of your girlfriends. Or boyfriends. There's a dozen of them waiting at your beck and call, right?"

You grinned mischievously at me - your silver eyes caught the fire's glow. "Yeah, but where's the fun in that?"

"Listen, you're lucky to have people at your beck and call at all, Sirius. You could be like me - utterly snogless." I gestured to myself for effect. I was positively scrawny in those days, not as tall as you and James, thin and unable to gain weight, with a vivid array of scars from my moonlit sojourns.

"Snogless? Get off it, Remus, you're not that ugly, and some people really get off on fur." He winked at me. "Just because you're not as sought after as I am," he added in a haughty voice, joking, "doesn't mean you have to be snogless."

"I'm serious!"

"No, I'm Sirius."

We both laughed at the old joke. "Okay, then, I'm being honest. Snogless. I mean, Peter gets more action than me!"

"Peter? With that little blond Hufflepuff?" he asked, interested.

"The very same."

"Wow! Go Pete!"

"Shh, you'll wake them up. I don't feel like having a common room party tonight, Sirius."

"Yeah...me neither, now that you mention it." We were sitting side by side on the couch - you leaned back and stretched your long legs out in front of you, laying your head back but not closing your eyes. You had tossed off the robe and had your tie undone, your shirt unbuttoned a little at the top but still done at the wrists. I remember - it is this perfectly vivid image in my head. "Yeah, but - snogless?" you asked, returning to the question at hand.

"Yes," I answered, not at all happily. "I'm the enigma, remember? 'Where does he disappear to once a month?' 'Where'd he get all those scars from?' Plus I'm skinny. No one would want to snog me."

"You've never been kissed?!" you exclaimed, shocked. I nodded and you jumped out of your seat, rearranging yourself so you sat cross-legged, facing me in a combination of horror and sympathy. I expected the horror-and-sympathy reaction for being a werewolf, not for having never been kissed. I wasn't fond of either label.

"Never," I admitted glumly.

"Aw, Re..." You put your arm around me sympathetically, and I didn't shrug it off. I liked the way you felt. "You'll get some one day. Some girl-"

I raised my eyebrows, and you took the hint.

"-or guy will be crazy for you. I mean it."

I rolled my eyes. "Thanks, Sirius. You've really reassured me."

"No, really! You're not at all bad-looking, you know...your eyes are beautiful. And, well, so is the rest of you. Plus you're just a nice guy all around," you added...shyly? Was Sirius Black growing shy?

"Thanks," I said, a little more sincerely this time.

"I mean it."

There was a pause and we just looked at each other - I remember looking into your eyes. We always said that our eyes were a matched pair, that mine were golden like the sun and yours were silver like the moon; which was ironic, considering I was ruled by the moon, and you were such a sunny, outdoorsy guy.

Then you said, slowly, with a grin, "But never been kissed? We'll have to do something about that, Remus."

"Oh?" I asked, taking the bait. "Like what?"

"Oh, I don't know..." We moved closer together. I could feel what was going to happen, felt it in my bones, and my whole body was tingling. I wanted you to kiss me, wanted it so badly...like I'd never wanted anything before.

And you did kiss me. Softly and slowly and chastely at first; then you pulled back and looked at me, scared, but I smiled at you. Then you smiled back and kissed me again. I was nervous, initially, that I might not be good at it, or that you'd stop and laugh at me like this was all a joke, but you didn't. It was easy to kiss you, and fun, and somehow wonderful and intoxicating and thrilling all at the same time. You pulled me onto your lap and I was kneeling on you, my legs spread over your hips, dipping my head to kiss you in front of the firelight. It was...beautiful.

When we stopped we just stayed where we were, your hands around my waist, mine on your shoulders. "Snogless no longer," you finally whispered, never taking your eyes off me, and we laughed and embraced tightly, quickly. We walked each other up to the dorm but didn't really say anything else or kiss again. We didn't need words.

The next day was only a little awkward, but not really. We didn't say anything about our kissing, of course; we were silent about the entire previous evening. But that night, when James and Peter were raiding the kitchen and I had just finished helping you study for the next day's Transfiguration quiz, you grinned at me again in that same way.

We were on my bed this time, our books spread between us, and you looked up at me from where you were curled up at the foot of the bed. "How can I thank you for helping me study, Remus?"

I instantly knew what you were playing at - and I played along. "Oh, I don't know, Sirius. I could ask you to do my Divination homework, but you'd just make up answers..."

"True."

"Or I could ask you to do something incredibly embarrassing in front of the whole school, but you're bound to do that on your own anyway..."

"Right. I'll just embarrass myself," you agreed eagerly.

"So I guess...you'll just have to kiss me again."

"Oh, are you sure?" You were smiling like a Cheshire Cat.

"Absolutely."

You leaned forward on your hands and knees to where I sat cross-legged, and this time you were on my lap as we kissed. The second time was easier, more exciting, more thrilling somehow - probably because I'd already kissed you once, so I knew what I was doing now. This time you used your tongue, and it took me a moment to figure out what to do, but once I did it was even better than the night before. It was shorter, though - we broke away because we were nervous about James and Peter walking in on us. But we laughed and found excuses to touch each other that night, and the next day. It began a kind of fling, or a ritual of physical expression, between us.

~~~

Those two nights did begin everything between us. From there we did little, secretive, exhilarating things to feed our growing attraction without letting anyone else in on it. We would hold hands or rub each other's feet and legs beneath the table in the Great Hall during meals. We would sneak off to kiss, daring anyone to notice us. But neither of us thought it was anything serious.

Then you made the terrible mistake of telling Severus Snape about the Whomping Willow, and that nearly destroyed us all. When we found that we had all survived physically, it put a real damper on our friendships. But I found the strangest thing - I missed you. I missed your friendship, I missed your kisses - I just missed you. We did make up, eventually, and then our 'fling' only grew in intensity. You stopped dating other people, claiming you wanted to live the 'crazy single life'; I never dated anyone else anyway, but I made it clear I wasn't interested in any of the few who were interested in me. And physically, we got more involved as well.

We would go a little farther each time, testing the limits, trying to see how much we could turn each other on without jumping on one another and actually having sex. We used our hands once before we had to have The Talk - The Talk about where our relationship was going, what we were doing, what would happen to us, and so on. We never said that we were in love, or that we wanted a monogamous relationship, or that we were exclusively interested in each other. But we decided that if we felt ready to go all the way, we would.

I was scared, and you knew it. I'd never had sex before; you were practically an expert by then. Girls and boys alike threw themselves on you, of course you were more experienced than me. We didn't do it that year. Then we were separated that summer, because my parents dragged me off to France and the werewolf sciences front, and you stayed home, playing Quidditch with James and Peter all summer.

And when we came back to school that fall, for our seventh year, we were ready. Well, perhaps not ready; maybe we just knew that we wanted it then. We talked about it, first, though; we locked ourselves in the seventh year boys' dorm one sunny afternoon, while James and Peter were busy doing other things, and sat apart from each other my bed and talked. We tried to come up with reasons that we shouldn't be together.

I came up with arguments such as "You smoke" (which I considered a filthy habit, but you only did once in a while) and "You want to live in London" (and I wasn't sure I could live in London, being a werewolf - where would I go to transform?). And you said I belonged to the world - that I was young and pure and had more to do than waste my time with a long-haired punk like yourself. This only made me laugh, and then you laughed, and then we were in each other's arms, kissing harder than ever before, undressing each other.

I remember that afternoon just as vividly as the first night we kissed. It was perfect, awkward enough to be sweet, sweet enough to make up for awkwardness or clumsiness on my virginal behalf. But I loved making love to you. You were patient and tender and oh-so-good, teaching me to make love. You spent the entire afternoon and most of the evening with me in my narrow bed, trying different ways, showing me the Lubricus spell, kissing me and making me feel reborn. We didn't tell anyone, but we were lovers from that moment on. I loved it. I think you did.



I'm in the front row the front row with popcorn I get to see you see you close up (and I laughed until my lungs hurt I love how you bust my chops you don't always feel seen sometimes you feel erasable unfortunately I cannot reciprocate in my current state I think we should be careful of how much time we spend together)



I loved being with you, I loved the secrecy and the thrill, I loved how we would sneak into each other's beds or steal away from classes. All of it was so wonderful for me. And part of me was actually glad that we didn't tell anyone else. I didn't have to announce that I was gay, we didn't have to tell James and Peter that we were lovers, we didn't have to invite the school and the world the judge us. It was easier that way.

I was so happy. My best friend, my lover - that was you, Sirius. And even though you were a dreamer hell-bent on making your mark on the world, worried that you would be erased, that your life would never matter, I couldn't share that hunger or ambition with you. Because I was happy where I was: in your arms. And we both knew it. And that unnerved us to some degree, I think.



.......for a while while I'm speaking you know how much you hate to be interrupted maybe spend some time alone fill up your proverbial cup so that it doesn't always have to be about you I've been wanting your undivided attention I like the fact that you're nothing like me are you not burdened by the lack of perspective people have of your charmed life (seemingly)?



After we graduated, we kept up the pretense of just being friends. We had our own flats - yours, of course, was in London. Mine was a little farther out of the way, but we both Apparated to work anyway, so it didn't matter. We were all in the Order, you and me and James and Peter and Lily, until she got pregnant. Dumbledore's personal task force, defeating the Dark Side. You especially felt good about it - you were making your mark on the world at last, killing or capturing Death Eaters, saving the innocents.

Actually, if you want to know the truth (and you've been hearing it from me this whole time now), you got a little wrapped up in it. It was your entire life. I know you did other things - we went clubbing plenty of nights, you picked up those pretty Muggle girls once in a while and took them back to your flat. Other times it was me you took back to your flat, and we'd spend the night much as we'd spent those nights back in our seventh year. I loved being with you; I certainly wasn't crazy about you and those Muggle girls. But you were never close to them, it never extended beyond the night, and it wasn't my business; we weren't exclusive or anything.

Although I kind of wished we were. I wanted your undivided attention, exclusive rights to your Quidditch-muscled body and moon-silver eyes and silken black hair, exclusive rights to your daring, mischievous mind and heart and soul. It wasn't like some schoolboy infatuation. I saw the good and the bad. I knew you had faults, you had imperfections, but I loved them about you as well. I thought we were quite compatible together. I liked that we were unalike in so many ways; like the colors of our eyes, I thought that made us a matched pair.

You did have faults - you thought people didn't value you, didn't see how much you could be. I wanted to tell you that I saw it, I saw you in all your potential glory, but maybe that didn't matter, or maybe you just already knew that. You thought you had to prove yourself. You still think that, I see. But you had (have?) many good qualities as well. The first time I saw you hold Harry - we were in Lily's hospital room at St. Mungo's, you and me and Peter, and I watched James hand you his son. You cradled him close to your body; your hands were nearly shaking with nervousness, your eyes were misted over with tears. I knew you'd held him before, right after he was born, when James had asked you to be the godfather - you'd told me all about it - but you still got teary-eyed then. You didn't speak, didn't say anything to the little black-haired bundle, but you placed the softest, most tender kiss on his little forehead, and it touched my heart. You were - are - a good man, Sirius Black.

Then everything went to hell after that.



I'm in the front row the front row with popcorn I get to see you see you close up (you never meant to be ungrateful nor held up to be whipped or wept for certainly not analysed prodded at more ways than one apparently you've been misrepresented dealing with the concept of arrows being slung towards your outrageous fortune)



I was there for the entire show, I saw everything that happened to us, though I never put it all together til that night thirteen years later in the Shrieking Shack. I had known all along that there would be those who suspected me of being a spy for Voldemort, simply because I was a Dark Creature. But I never guessed you would be one of them. I know Peter had something to do with that, so I can forgive you - I think - but it still hurt. There I was, thinking that perhaps I'd like to be with you and only you, forever, and we stopped speaking. We made love less and less. We were friendly enough, but things just weren't right between us, and I saw you take home Muggle girls (and boys, too, sometimes) more than you took me.

I know you never meant to hurt me, or James, or Lily, or Harry. You never meant for any of this to happen when you suggested that Peter be made Secret-Keeper. I know you wanted glory and fame and a place in history, but it certainly wasn't under the title of 'formerly known as Voldemort's right hand' or even 'only person in history to ever escape from Azkaban'. But you were set up to take the fall, dear Padfoot, and you were misrepresented on more than one occasion.

You had the most outrageous fortune - not money, but fortune in the sense of luck or fate. You began as brave and handsome and strong and ready to set the world on fire, and you were exiled as traitorous and insane and wicked. Then you made your triumphant return, proving to be the most loyal and perhaps the best of us all. You survived Azkaban for your friends' memory and honor. And I was there to watch it all take place.

I don't know if we would have fallen in or out of love, had things been different than they actually were, but that's rather inconsequential when you consider that we lost our three best friends and allowed poor Harry to be orphaned. I loved that boy well - maybe not as much as you, Sirius, but I did love him. I loved you as well. But things did go wrong between us then, and we have not righted them. We are friends now - we have fixed that much - but I doubt we can go back to the way we were. I'm not sure if I should be sad or angry or pleased about that. How do you feel?



hey I'm not mad at you guardian I'm mad at myself for spending so much time with you and your jeckyl and hydeness I'm glad I figuratively slapped you on the wrist you laughed a wicked laugh and said "come here let me clip your wings!" (I know he's blood but you can still turn him away you don't owe him anything) "raise the roof!" he yelled "yeah raise the roof!" I yelled back. (unfortunately you needed the big scare to reprioritize) no thanks to the soap box. having me rile against them won't make an ounce of difference........



No, I'm not mad at you, I'm still mad at myself for letting this happen. I always feel like I should have sensed that Peter had betrayed us, I should have known that it was impossible for you to ever turn on them (on us?), I should never have allowed myself to even think that I would fall for you because that only complicated things to new extremes. And to speak of ambivalence, there were always two sides to you, Sirius: who you were in public and who you were in private, with me; the old you, guilty of those terrible crimes, and the new you, innocent and reborn (like I was reborn when we were together); all your good and bad qualities.

Yes, I'm angry. I felt used, I still feel used, sometimes. Like we didn't tell anyone because I was just an easy lay, I was just your snogless friend who needed a good screw, and the relationship's trappings hung on for another five years or so. I'm so appalled that you ever suspected me as the traitor, when all I ever did was love you all. I know that because I'm a Dark Creature I was more likely to be the spy than little Peter, but still, I thought you knew me.

Do you remember that fight we had, before Lily and James died? It must have been early October when we finally had it out with each other. That can't be a good memory, so maybe you do still recall it. I dropped by your flat and you were upset, asking what I was doing there, why hadn't I called before I came over, and what-have-you. We ended up screaming at each other, you asking me where I was late nights, what I did away from the office, me accusing you of sleeping around, asking why you didn't just tell me you didn't want to be with me any more. Then when you ordered me to show you my arm, so you could look for the Dark Mark, I decked you. Do you remember that? I'd never hit anyone before, but I gave you a black eye.

I apologized right away, of course; helped you up, got you ice and used a Soothing Charm to take down the swelling, but things were dead between us from that moment on. We hardly spoke at work after that. We never went to clubs together, we certainly weren't friends any longer. It's almost a good thing that the whole fiasco happened on Halloween, because I don't think I could have lasted much longer knowing that we hated each other. After Lily and James died, and you were imprisoned, I had a reason to hate your memory and curse your name.

I know you're different now. You're a changed man, as much from reprioritizing your life as from your years in Azkaban. You're quieter, more reserved, more dedicated to the fighting but less childishly passionate, I suppose. You have personal reasons to fight now. You are responsible for the honor and vengeance of Lily and James. You're a better person now, no thanks to me - you did it all on your own. I wish I could get to know you now as I did in the past.



I'm in the front row the front row with popcorn I get to see you see you close up (oh the things I've done for you many a sitch a friend a man's been left for you oh the books I've read for you the tongues I've bitten for you many a new city for you many a risk taken for you (not a single regret))



And I've seen it all, I've known very nearly all the phases of your life, and you've changed, much as the moon changes. And oh, the things I've done for you, the things I would still do for you if you needed or wanted me - but love, let me tell you the truth (and you've been hearing it from me this whole time now): I have not a single regret.