Patterns We Repeat

Remus stared up at the ceiling, unable to sleep.

He would have counted the cracks as he had often found himself doing at Hogwarts whenever he was feeling too restless to sleep but too tired to do anything more engaging, but he was shocked to realise that there wasn't a single one. Not one. How had he never noticed this before? What sort of flat didn't have at least one crack in the ceiling? Clearly, he couldn't be expected to be content in such conditions, and perhaps this was why he heard himself say, "I'm going to move out. I've decided."

There was no answer. Sirius was probably asleep, and he should probably let it go.

Probably should, anyway. A little louder, he said, "Get my own flat, like. What d'you think?" He was satisfied to feel Sirius shift beside him, waited while an arm was thrown stubbornly across his waist . . . did not resist when Sirius pulled Remus back against him.

"I thought you got one -- what? Two months ago, I think," Sirius said sleepily into Remus' hair. "You told me you were going to, anyway."

This was true. Remus had mentioned his intention of moving out a few months ago when he'd found out that Sirius was dog-earing his favourite books and had been doing so for quite some time -- an absolutely appalling discovery from which Remus would never entirely recover. He considered. "I'm getting another, then."

Long fingers began to trace lazy designs across Remus' belly. "You don't have to. If you must know, I bought you new copies and switched them when you weren't looking. So there's absolutely nothing to be upset about." Remus had noticed, and he'd been very pleased but also very embarrassed; he had actually been planning on returning them because really, that was just silly, and the only reason he hadn't was because then Sirius would find out and start to sulk -- it would be just like him to think Remus was rejecting him by returning books he already owned -- and then Remus would feel guilty and allow Sirius to buy the books back, and they'd be right back where they started, so why go to the trouble?

Perhaps realising that Remus wasn't going to say anything, Sirius continued teasingly, "I bet you own a dozen flats. There was the one two months ago, and then one you told me about a couple months before that, and -- I think once you were thinking of New Zealand, weren't you? Can't imagine why. And there was another time before that and -- hell. How many places do you have?"

The first one was Ara, Remus thought, and he could see it clearly if he closed his eyes and concentrated on the rough pads of Sirius's fingers as they played a game of connect-the-dots where his belly was the sky and every fading scar a star, and the second had been Centaurus, definitely, and then Lupus and then Sagitta, and was this one going to be Cygnus?

Sirius always did this, had since that Christmas break in their seventh year when Sirius up and decided to kiss him in the middle of the empty common room -- traced constellations along Remus' thigh when they were sitting on the sofa, down his back if they were in the shower, once across his face when Sirius probably thought he was sleeping and maybe, now that he's thinking of how fuzzy the memory is, he had been sleeping and had only dreamt it.

They were difficult patterns, a lot of them. Remus didn't know under what circumstances they had been ingrained so deeply into Sirius' subconscious, only that he traced them so carelessly that it was doubtful he was ever fully aware of what he was doing.

"Moony?"

If you had wanted an answer quickly, Remus thought, only dimly recalling that a question had even been asked, then you should've chosen a different canvas. This is what happens when you don't think things through, Mr Padfoot. Reluctantly wrenching his mind from those fingers -- he was right, it was Cygnus -- he said quietly, distractedly, "Just this one."

"I know," Sirius said, and Remus would have been annoyed at the smugness in his voice if he hadn't started to silently count the subtle ridges on Sirius' fingertips.

~*~

The first time Remus had mentioned he was moving out had been not too long after he had moved in. When he'd said it -- offhandedly, trying out the phrase to see if it sounded as sensible out loud as it did in his head -- Sirius had stilled completely, eyes wide and pizza halfway to his mouth. Then he had slowly lowered his arm and stared, silently and blankly, at Remus. There existed no other reaction that Remus had been less prepared to deal with.

~*~

"Er . . . Sirius?" Remus ventured hesitantly, when it became clear that Sirius was not going to blink.

They did not have a table -- or much in the way of furniture, for that matter. It had just never seemed important, especially when they had a perfectly good carpeted floor to sprawl on. Remus had never before felt such an irrational longing for there to be a table between them (although he would've settled for a few countries between them, if a table was too difficult to come by).

Sirius continued to stare. Remus wondered if perhaps there was a more tactful way he could've broached the subject -- perhaps he could've led up to it, somehow, so that the words didn't echo so loudly against the empty walls of their flat, didn't juxtapose so awkwardly with the Quidditch announcer on the Wizarding Wireless Network.

They listened as the Tutshill Tornados scored (although the Ballycastle Bats still led by 40 points).

Something finally flickered behind Sirius' eyes. "You're moving out," he said, voice flat. "That's -- this was something you just suddenly decided, was it? Sounds like you've already bought a place. Is it even in England?"

Remus frowned. "I haven't --"

"Then you've been looking. Big difference. Were you going to tell me or was I just going to wake up one morning with a note on your pillow telling me you've left? Maybe it will even have your new address on it. If you can be bothered."

"I -- Sirius, really --"

"Tired of me already, I suppose?"

" Sirius. I --"

"Christ, you can't even afford your own flat!"

Remus' mouth snapped shut. For a moment, Sirius looked just as stunned as Remus felt, and then his eyes narrowed again. He tossed his plate to the side, stood up, and disappeared into the bedroom without another word.

One of the Bats' beaters was vehemently insisting that he had slammed the bludger into the Tornados' chaser's head long before the call for time-out. The Tornados' coach was screaming about foul plays, the Bats' coach was matching him decibel for decibel, and in the background were thousands of voices, laughing, cheering, and screeching the occasional obscenity.

Remus slowly finished eating his own pizza, though he was having trouble properly relishing the grease oozing off the slice. He told himself that Sirius had had no right to say something like that, even if it was true, and tried to ignore the childish voice reminding Remus that he had, after all, started it.

"And the Tornado's SCORE!" the announcer screamed.

Bastards, Remus thought, because it seemed an easier thing to deal with at the moment. And he owed Peter five galleons if Ballycastle lost.

Remus knew when Sirius had suggested they get a flat together that he should never have agreed, and that, more importantly, Sirius should never have asked in the first place. There were so many reasons not to that he would list and had in fact listed to himself, but he could never manage to list them to Sirius because whenever he was the focus of those too-grey eyes, he found himself composing a much longer list of reasons he should, in fact, stay.

Two minutes into the next play, the Tornados' seeker caught the snitch.

"Fuck," Remus muttered.

He reached over to turn the WWN radio off. With no clear way to procrastinate further, he headed for the bedroom and found Sirius slouched on the edge of the bed and staring out the window. His brow was furrowed deeply, a look he only adopted when he was truly upset -- usually after a particularly bad day at St Mungo's or when James did something particularly daft, like propose to Lily Evans. It made Remus feel ill that he should ever be the cause.

This is probably why, instead of following through on what he knew was right, Remus walked over to the bed.

"Sirius," he said softly. Sirius turned to look at him, wary and wounded, not quite sullen but eyes dark with the promise that it would not take him long to get there, should the need arise.

"Who won?" he asked petulantly.

Remus did not answer; instead, he leaned down, cradled Sirius' face in his hands, and kissed him slowly and deeply -- trying to say that he does not want to leave, which is why he has to, and that he does not regret this knowledge, only that he voiced it. Sirius, after a moment's hesitation, wrapped his arms around Remus' hips and pulled him onto his lap -- and perhaps what he was saying was that Remus was wrong and stupid to even suggest such a thing, but that he would go ahead and keep Remus, anyway (he was just that generous of a person). As Sirius fell back, pulling Remus with him, he ran his hands up Remus' sides, along his back, his chest -- mapping rough constellations that Remus did not bother to identify, because the only star that mattered was the one in his arms.

Remus supposed, later, that Sirius had simply forgot to ask Remus what he was thinking, and Remus, in turn, supposed that he had simply forgot to explain.

Unfortunately, Sirius did not forget to ask Remus again who won the game, resulting in a week-long sulk which took several outrageous sexual favours to shake him out of (not that Remus had really minded).

~*~

Between Christmas break of their seventh year and their final week at Hogwarts, Sirius did something completely unforgivable.

Although they had never actually discussed this in so many words, Remus had thought it understood that despite how much he cared for Sirius, Sirius was careless and not to be trusted with the really important things and that no matter how much Sirius supposedly cared for him, Remus was cautious and did not hold with things like chains or promises made under the moon's fickle light.

But Sirius, being Sirius, completely disregarded this understanding. So during that very last week of school, Sirius paused from throwing up that stupid sneakoscope of his and said, "Let's get a flat together."

~*~

"You've already got a flat," Remus felt he should point out. He was sitting cross-legged in front of his trunk and studiously crunching another of his shirts into a tight ball. Last night had been a full moon, he was feeling decidedly under par, and "Let's disregard all of our prior understandings and get a flat together" was not what he needed to hear right then. Not to mention that he was still trying to figure out how all of his stuff was going to fit in his trunk for the final return trip home. Sirius, who had not had this problem because whatever didn't fit in his own trunk he had thrown into Remus', was lying on his bed and repeatedly throwing a sneakoscope up into the air and then catching it.

"No, I don't. I've got a little shitty hole that's probably collapsed in on itself while I've been here. We should get a new flat. A real one." Which was a very odd thing for him to say. Upon first seeing it, Remus had called it a little shitty hole -- and felt he'd been very generous with this description -- and it was Remus who, during the year, had frequently wondered aloud about the chances that the place would still be standing when Sirius got back to it. It was Sirius who had somehow mistaken the hole for a flat, and then somehow mistaken the flat for some sort of grand palace of freedom.

There was a sudden lack of cursing in the air. Across the room, James, quite ominously, took off his glasses and cleaned them on his shirt. He usually did this to mean that several Slytherins were shortly going to die, right after he'd gotten rid of this little smudge right here, but in this case, it probably meant that several things he owned were going to fit in that trunk or burn. James put his glasses back on and resumed cursing, most of it directed towards stupid sodding Sirius and his goddamn sneakoscope.

The sneakoscope was shrieking. It had started to shriek when Sirius originally bought it two years ago, and from time to time they would take it out from one of Sirius' socks so that they could confirm that it had not stopped since. Remus' ears had been ringing for so long that he barely noticed it anymore.

Meanwhile, Peter, always the only one of them to have the sense to bring an extra suitcase back with him from the break -- or perhaps the only one of them with a parental figure wise enough to always make their child do so -- was quite contentedly sitting on his bed, watching all of them and occasionally snickering.

This happened every year when it became clear that someone -- probably those damn house elves -- had either stolen their trunks and replaced them with much smaller ones or had instead filled their dresser shelves with much more junk than any of them could recall buying. This is the last time, Remus thought, something he knew but which had yet to fully register.

"So how 'bout it?"

"Not London," Remus said, instead of Are you drunk? which was the only explanation he could think of. "Definitely not London." I know we ran out of firewhiskey. How could you possibly be sober and suggesting this? I'm too tired for this, Sirius, and you know it.

"Obviously," Sirius replied, and Remus glanced at him and saw Sirius cross off a few items from his mental checklist. "How about Somerset?" Remus shrugged. "Lancaster . . . Blackpool . . . Cambridge? Durham? England. Do you want to live in England?"

"I was thinking somewhere in Azerbaijan."

Remus could feel Sirius staring at him bewilderedly, but sometimes drastic measures were required. "You want to live in--"

"Of course I don't. I don't even know where Azerbaijan is. England is perfect. Durham. Whatever. You pick." He did not say that it didn't matter where he lived because no one anywhere knowingly housed or employed werewolves.

"You'll really move in with me, Moony?"

There was a pause as Sirius caught the sneakoscope and didn't immediately throw it back up, and then he did, and Remus wasn't sure if he had really paused or if it was Remus' heart that had skipped a beat.

"Yeah, why not?"

Sirius opened his mouth, presumably to tell Remus exactly why not, when James slammed down the lid of his trunk, turned around, and leapt onto Sirius. He grabbed the sneakoscope and threw it into a wall -- narrowly missing Peter who had finally learned, through cruel trial and error, exactly when to duck. Then he attempted to kill Sirius with a pillow.

Above the screams, Remus asked, "So when're you starting work at the Ministry, Wormtail?"

"Hmm? Oh, uh, end of June, I think," Peter said. "A galleon says James wins, but Sirius hexes 'im stupid while he does his victory dance."

"I didn't realise there was any other way it could end," Remus said.

Peter rolled his eyes. They both watched as Sirius, who had been desperately feeling around for his wand, shouted, "Ah-ha!" and triumphantly brandished a wand which was not so much made of wood and magic as it was made of liquorice. They didn't even notice when, after about two minutes of silence, the sneakoscope made a sound like a very wet sneeze and then began to shriek again.

~*~

Remus' rather unimpressive ventures into the land of heterosexual love had both started and ended with one Rhona Weir. It was towards the beginning of fifth year that Remus had started to notice her at the prefect meetings, although he'd been rather taken aback to find out that when she later asked him to study with her in the library, she did not mean so that they could surreptitiously throw spitwads at the Slytherins but so they could actually study. He had nevertheless spent several months with a horrible knot in his stomach wondering why telling a girl he fancied her was something Sirius could easily tell three girls in one day but which Remus hadn't been able to choke out once.

When Remus had stumbled towards the lake (where he had finally found James, Sirius, and Peter) after failing once again to work up the nerve to ask Rhona to go to Hogsmeade with him, James had asked him why he looked like shit. It was a testament to what an alarming and dreadful experience love could be that Remus had unthinkingly told James the truth.

~*~

"You're not in love," James said solemnly, as Remus collapsed miserably onto the grass. "Trust me on this, mate."

"I don't trust you. I have never trusted you. Why should I trust you? When have I ever said, 'Prongs, I trust you utter -- what the hell're you guys doing?"

"Ritually sacrificing our old Divination stuff to the giant squid. James said, y'know, we all dropped the class, so what good's it going to do us?" Peter said. "I already finished mine," he added, as if this explained matters fully. "If you get your books, you can have a go, too."

A few yards away near the water's edge, Sirius fell to his knees, held a textbook over his head, and cried out to the heavenly depths, "O Great Squid, Undisputed King of Hogwarts Lake! May you live for all eternity, and may your disgustingly slimy tentacles forever wrap around and strangle heathen Slytherins, although one is very slimy already, so you'd probably get on smashingly, but perhaps you could, you know, see him as a challenge and drown him just for me, and may your bulbous eyes swell to the size of castles so that you may watch over us devout worshippers and be . . . be . . . crap. James, help me out here--"

"Benevolent!" James shouted at the same time that Peter called out, "Compassionate!"

"Compassionate?" James repeated incredulously. "We only spent an entire afternoon trying to please the squid, and you go and call it compassionate. Merlin, everyone knows squids are benevolent."

"They actually mean the same--" Remus began.

Unperturbed, Sirius continued. "Right, may you be benevolent but under no circumstances compassionate. So I bequeath to you another of my crappy textbooks, that you may learn of the mystic ways of -- of seeing into the future, yeah, as if any of that bullshit works, and sorry about all the porn I drew in the margins but that class was dead boring, and, er -- blesséd be the squid!"

"Blesséd be the squid!" James and Peter yelled. Sirius dramatically flung the textbook, and several seconds later, it landed with a very loud splash.

"You see how far it went?" Sirius said smugly. "Beat that, Potter."

"Are you kidding? That wasn't even halfway across. Mine practically touched the other end!"

"Are you blind? More than usual, I mean. Anyway," he said, before James could interrupt, "As much as I hate to break your fragile delusions, we all know you throw like a bloody girl. Yours barely went a yard."

" I throw like a girl? Me? Who, exactly -- can't believe this has slipped my mind -- but who won the last Quidditch match because of a brilliant throw that people are still talking about, hmmm? Was it a sad, floppy little puppy dog? I'm sorry, what's this? Is this the sound of you having nothing to say?"

"Of course, brilliant chaser, my mistake completely," Sirius said in a light tone of voice which was the verbal equivalent of unsheathing a sword, and then, instead of impaling everyone in reach, leaning on it idly as if it were a cane which was only incidentally very sharp and very deadly. What, this old thing? No, just you keep going, don't you mind me at all . . . "Now -- and correct me if I'm wrong -- but we are talking about the same bloke who --"

"It's just possible that you're hitting the squid with those textbooks," Remus interrupted. "And pissing it off."

Sirius fell silent, and he, James, and Peter all turned to stare at Remus. Then Sirius gestured graciously towards James as if they had not been at each other's throat thirty seconds earlier. Your turn to set him right, the flourish of his arm said. It's sad, really, but there's just no helping some people, James' answering nod said. James grabbed another book and went to the edge of the water. "O Holy Demon of Hogwarts," he intoned. "May all of Hogwarts drown in the blood of the unworthy and so on and so forth. Seriously, between you and me we both know that that prefect over there doesn't know what he's on about, but anyway, here's another sacrifice, just in case, you know, that you may forgive us for hitting you with the other ones! Blesséd be the squid!"

"You really think -- Blesséd be the squid! -- you really think you're in love?" Peter asked Remus as Sirius started to throw teacups into the lake.

"I guess," Remus said. Liar, Remus thought, You are in love. Maybe. Possibly. There's a very decent chance, anyway. You're just still in shock that you actually said you were out loud, and you don't know how to take the words back without making this any more embarrassing than it undoubtedly is going to become.

James flopped onto the ground next to Remus and said, "Listen to me. I know about this, okay? There is no such thing as love. It's all just a bunch of rubbish girls conjured up to give 'em something to do. S'not like they're good for anything else. Why they're called the inferior sex. Absolutely useless. So just grow up already; I want you to forget whoever you're sulking about, go get your Divination stuff, and chuck it into the lake."

There was a pause, during which Remus restrained himself from sacrificing James to the giant squid. "So Evans turned you down again."

"That's -- that's -- well, okay, maybe, but that's not the point. The point is that it'll all end in tears, which is very unmanly and which I will not stand by and see you reduced to. So up to the dormit'ry with you."

"Actually," Peter said hesitantly, glancing uncertainly between them. "Now that I think about it, I think Sirius already took your stuff."

"I already took what?" Sirius demanded, joining them after having run out of teacups.

"Moony's Divination stuff. You already sacrificed it."

"Oh, yeah. You don't mind, d'you? I mean, you dropped the class, too. Just taking up room in your trunk. I was going to ask you," he said, now soundly vaguely resentful, "but you seemed pretty busy talking to what's-her-name in the library."

You did what? Remus' mind screamed, all thoughts of romantic confessions scattering away. "Nah. It's okay," he said calmly.

"Right, then. I've got a few lunar calendars left," James said. "What d'you say, Remus?"

Three faces watched him expectantly. With a theatrical sigh, Remus grabbed one of the proffered calendars and walked until he was right up to the water. "O Giant Squid, Emperor of the Water!" he shouted, after a moment's thought to compose a proper prayer. "As a token of my undying loyalty to you in all your grand squidliness, I give to you this lunar calendar that you may rip it to shreds and then, if you've time, rip up the real moon to shreds too, right? Blesséd be the squid!"

"Blesséd be the squid!" Peter, James, and Sirius chorused behind him, as the calendar landed with a satisfying splash. Remus would not sleep that night, stomach twisting and heart pounding, once he realised what he had shouted for all of Hogwarts to hear. How was it that the three of them made him so reckless?

At that moment, a monstrosity of grey skin, seaweed-green hair, and wild, yellow eyes burst up from the depths and angrily waved its spear about, managing to convey through its mad flailing that there would be dire consequences if all the garbage they kept throwing into the lake wasn't picked up right now. It did not, in short, give off the impression that it would be amused to hear about their rituals.

As it screeched furiously at them, James slowly felt behind him until his fingers closed around the last textbook yet to be sacrificed. He licked his lips, glanced meaningfully at the three of them, and then with an air of doomed finality, chucked it at the merman's head. By the time it had fully sunk below the water, expression dazed and spear slipping from its lax fingers, the four of them were through the castle's doors. Panting and laughing, pushing and tripping and cursing, they sprinted for the safety of the Gryffindor common room.

The unsettling thought crossed Remus' mind that he would rather be here and about to be shoved into a wall by a grinning Sirius Black than back in the library and kissed on the lips by Rhona Weir.

~*~

Remus had finally grown accustomed to the idea of sharing a flat with Sirius after they'd been living together for over half a year. Not a week after this realisation, Sirius -- more than slightly drunk from their night out with James and Peter and half-asleep on his feet -- told Remus that he was very much in love with him and that he did not know what he would do if he ever didn't have a Moony. Remus had panicked, Sirius had passed out on the sofa, and two days later, Remus had asked him what he thought of New Zealand.

~*~

Sirius did not even look up from the Daily Prophet. "Don't know much about it." With his free hand, he was throwing up and then catching a sneakoscope.

"I don't ei -- didn't James break that?"

"Break what?" Remus gestured towards the sneakoscope. "I don't think -- oh, when he threw it, you mean? James throws like a girl. He couldn't break a glass cup. I thought you knew that."

"That's the same sneakoscope? You still have it?"

"Yup. Found it in one of the trunks in the closet. Which I knocked over. And which, incidentally, was mostly your stuff, and I'll buy you a new ink jar, so don't get your knickers in a twist." Remus sighed and was only surprised that it had taken Sirius this long to break something of his. "This is quality craftsmanship, anyway. Worth every knut. Hasn't stopped once since I bought it."

"No . . . it did stop, once. When James threw it."

"It did not! It sneezed. That doesn't count."

"It -- what? What're you talking about?"

"Here, watch." Putting aside the Prophet, Sirius cocked his arm and threw the sneakoscope into the nearest wall. It left a considerable dent and then was silent as it fell to the floor.

"I don't hear --"

"Shh. Wait for it," Sirius said, watching it intently.

There was silence and then -- the sneakoscope sneezed, loudly and wetly, before starting up again.

"Bless my sneakoscope," Sirius commanded.

"Er . . . bless you," Remus said. He walked over and kneeled down, picking up the sneakoscope and inspecting it carefully. "Is it supposed to do that? Huh. I always thought it would be easy to take one apart and see how it works." He tapped it. "A good look at the inside, bet we could figure out the charms. Outside's only plastic, I think. Do we have a screwdriver, d'you know? A knife would work in a pinch."

"Take it apart? Give it back! Murderer. Kill your own sneakoscope."

"I could put it back together when we were done. Honestly, kill --"

"Do inanimate things sneeze, I ask you? Give it back. It's like an old friend to me. Taking it apart would be like kicking a puppy, and you know how I feel about people kicking puppies. Are you a closet puppy-kicker?"

"Didn't you tell me I kick in the night?" Remus said dryly, tossing the sneakoscope back to him.

"A murderer and a puppy-kicker," Sirius tsked, catching it neatly and carefully setting it down next to him. He picked up the discarded Daily Prophet. The ringing, as it usually did, melted into the background. "Now what's this about New Zealand?"

"About -- oh. Right. D'you think it would be a nice place to live?"

"Sure. Want me to help you pack?"

Remus blinked and had the creeping feeling that Sirius suddenly knew too much. "I didn't say that I was moving there."

"I heard what you said."

"I was just commenting on the possibility of living there."

"Of course." He turned the page and then calmly asked, "What d'you want as a housewarming gift?"

"Very funny."

"Am I laughing? No, I'm not. I'm merely being encouraging. Don't you feel encouraged, Remus?"

Too-grey eyes glanced at him, said mischievously, I know. You can't fool me for long, Moony. You never could, and then returned to the paper.

Feeling very exposed, Remus said, "I'm not moving. Just -- if I did, ever, er, move, you know . . . I thought New Zealand would be nice."

Grinning, Sirius put down the paper and said, "Remus, do it. Right now. Leave me. I'll sit right here and I won't say one goddamn word. My housewarming present'll be a house in New Zealand. What d'you say?"

Remus, flustered by Sirius' knowing grin, stalled a bit by studying the dent in the wall.

"Okay," he said finally, so that he could have the satisfaction of seeing Sirius' face freeze as it always did on those rare occasions when one of his plans turned in a direction he had completely failed to anticipate. "Do I get to pick it out, or is it a surprise?"

After a few moments of silence, during which they both regarded the other warily, Sirius said, "You're not moving out."

"No," Remus agreed. "I guess I'm not."

"Okay. Right, then. Would you like a house, anyway?"

Smiling, Remus said, "Maybe. Would you come with me?"

Sirius gave him a look which conveyed quite clearly that Remus must be an idiot. "Anywhere but Azerbaijan," he said.

"Azerbaijan?" Remus repeated, puzzled.

Sirius didn't answer, and so Remus watched him absently trace Andromeda on the carpet with his free hand.

~*~

Remus was not possessive, and he felt his hackles rise every time Sirius suggested otherwise. As if Sirius was one to talk -- Sirius, who had been known to go ballistic with jealously if someone so much as tapped the shoulder of whichever girl he was currently dating. So what if Remus got a little resentful if someone borrowed something of his without asking? So what if Remus got a little upset if Sirius traced constellations on anything or anyone other than him?

Once, Sirius had caught him sitting on the dormitory steps, glaring at a boy who was sitting in the armchair by the fireplace that Remus just happened to like a lot. Sirius had taken a seat on the step above Remus and grinned in a way which had made Remus very uncomfortable. "What?" he had asked irritably, to which Sirius had replied, "You're sulking." Crossing his arms over his chest, Remus had sniffed and said that one, he most certainly did not sulk, and two, he didn't have any idea what Sirius was talking about, anyway. Sirius had just ruffled Remus' hair -- Remus had smacked his hand away -- and said, in a curiously affectionate tone of voice, "You're such a wolf, Moony."

~*~

When Remus walked into the library, he immediately set to work on not noticing Sirius chatting up some Hufflepuff girl who had probably been studying but was now blushing furiously and probably hadn't even noticed when Sirius had closed her textbook and inched it away from them.

After getting his own books -- and taking care not to attract their notice -- Remus sat down at a table at the other end of the library. He tried to pretend that he had not positioned himself so that he could, if he wanted, look up and pretend that he did not care when Sirius leaned even closer to the girl.

It was not as if Sirius was cheating on him, which did not even seem like the appropriate word to use seeing as Remus was not sure they had ever had a proper relationship to begin with. It had just been a lot of messing about during the break, really, messing about which had seemed very weird to continue once the castle was full again and James and Peter had returned. So they'd both agreed that it had just been a bit of fun, and that was that.

This had been over a month ago -- and clearly Sirius had already moved on -- so Remus should stop thinking about it and concentrate on not failing his next Arithmancy exam.

Right.

When Remus finally admitted to himself that he may have read the same paragraph four times without registering a single word, he sighed and glanced up. Sirius' hand was covering hers, and his fingers were moving, tracing her skin -- mapping a very familiar design . . .

Remus' mind blanked. He could not remember ever feeling so suddenly empty.

Several days later, Remus walked into their dormitory and to his relief, finally found Sirius alone. He was sleeping, collapsed onto his bed fully clothed and apparently exhausted -- which was not surprising considering he and James had been up the entire night planning something which Remus had not yet managed to bring himself to ask about. Remus locked the door behind him, went to Sirius' bed, and said loudly, "Sirius, are you sleeping?"

Sirius frowned, blinked a few times, and then looked up at Remus. He muttered something which could have been "Hello, Remus, how delightful to see you" but was probably closer to "Goddamn fucking hell, what'd you wake me for?"

Remus wordlessly climbed onto the bed and on top of Sirius, who was now looking distinctly awake. Supporting himself by his elbows, he kissed Sirius' jaw, then his neck, then his collarbone . . . a leisurely trail of open-mouthed kisses down Sirius' body, and when Sirius arched his hips and was frantically grabbing Remus tighter against him and bringing him up so that they could kiss properly, Remus hoped that Sirius understood that the stars were bloody well his and that they did not belong to some silly Hufflepuff girl.

~*~

There are many interesting things which, according to Sirius, Remus says when still recovering from the full moon. Sirius often mentioned his suspicion that Remus was forgetting these things on purpose, like how Remus had woken up one time and Sirius had said, softly and unexpectedly, "I didn't know," and Remus had replied, "Didn't know what?", and Sirius had given him a funny look and then not mentioned it again. Remus maintained the suspicion that Sirius made things up to suit his own evil ends as he knew Remus had little recollection of the day before and could not contradict him.

~*~

Unfortunately, he regained consciousness -- although fortunately he was on a bed as opposed to a wooden floor in a dusty old shack. Ah, the novelty of it, still . . .

"Morning," Sirius said. He sat next to the bed, steadily cleaning fresh cuts along Remus' arms and chest and gently pushing Remus back down whenever he tried to sit up.

Remus grunted in response, winced as Sirius brushed his hand over a particularly sensitive bruise, and tried to ignore the restless howl in his blood that told him he should be so lucky, that the wolf backed down as it did when the full moon fell.

"Hungry?" Remus saw the usual tray by the bedside, overflowing with enough food to feed three Quidditch teams. It was takeout from almost every restaurant in a half-mile radius because Remus was indecisive when all of his limbs were bleeding and his insides felt like cotton, and Sirius had come to the conclusion that if he just ordered one of absolutely everything, it was bound to save a lot of time. By now, most of the restaurant workers recognised Sirius on sight and were already preparing his order as he stepped through the front door.

It always seemed like far too much until he ate every bit of it, and then it turned out that it still hadn't been enough to drown out the taste of fur in his mouth.

"Maybe," Remus said, voice sandpaper-rough. Sirius helped Remus sit up and then patiently fed him. He considered initiating the argument in which he informed Sirius that he was perfectly capable of feeding himself, thank you very much, and in which Sirius countered that Remus was not exactly a licensed Healer, now was he, so what did he know about an injured person's capacity for lifting a fork, after which Remus would remind him Healer in training and would stick out his tongue if strength permitted. But it seemed like it would take too much effort at the moment, especially since Sirius had very grey eyes and so always won this one, anyway, and thus he decided to allow it silently and with a minimal amount of glaring.

Remus did not remember falling asleep, but he woke to find that it was already dark. Sirius was curled around him, his breath tickling Remus' neck.

For a few minutes, Remus just listened to the sound of steady breathing. Then he said, "You did that one wrong."

"Did what wrong?" Sirius asked. He sounded wide-awake, which meant that he had not been sleeping but had merely been watching Remus sleep.

If Remus was thinking straight, he would have said "nothing" and left it at that, but he was still very tired and not thinking straight at all, and so he said, "Scorpius. You missed a point. Now do it over."

There was a confused silence, during which Sirius did not cease moving his fingers but had in fact moved on to what felt like Orion -- which was infuriating as he needed to redo Scorpius first because how was Remus to fall back asleep if he knew that Sirius was messing up constellations like that?

"I . . . the stars, you mean? Maybe you should go back to sleep."

"Well, now I can't," Remus said crossly. "Who's to know what you'll mess up next if I'm not paying attention?"

"What did I mess up? Tell me and I'll fix it, Moony."

" Scorp'us," Remus said, feeling himself reluctantly drift back to sleep. "You've got to do it right."

In the morning, Sirius asked Remus if he was still upset over Scorpius. When Remus stared at him blankly, he just shrugged and said, "Never mind."

~*~

Remus knew it had been stupid, but for a very long time he had told Sirius (roughly once every three months) that he was going to move out. Things probably wouldn't have ever changed if Lily had not gotten so fed up with their dining habits. It had apparently been bothering her deeply that Sirius and Remus ate sitting on the floor because when she had finally asked, "When are you going to get a table?" it had been in the voice of one who had had quite enough.

Remus had tried to explain to her that they were very comfortable with how things were, at which point James had grinned and said (proving once again that while he had matured considerably since Hogwarts he would always be, underneath, James Potter), "Don't worry about it, Lily. Canines have to be trained to stay off the furniture at an early age. S'not their fault they're such good little doggies." Although the next few minutes had been slightly confusing, suffice it to say that the only reason James was not in a full body-bind to this day was that Lily always gave in to him when his eyes were so large and pathetically pleading.

A week later they had shown up again and with them was a mahogany zataku dining table, no more than a foot high. Remus had gaped, and Lily had cut off any protests by explaining that they had never gotten Remus and Sirius a proper flat-warming gift, anyway. There'd been a moment of stunned silence, and then Remus had carefully placed the WWN radio on top of it.

~*~

Remus was usually home first, although it depended heavily on which job he was currently trying to keep for longer than a week. Today, however, he found Sirius' shoes by the front door and Padfoot curled up on the sofa. There was a covered dish of takeout on the counter which meant -- yes, there was Sirius' latest attempt at cooking in the trashcan. He was improving, which is to say that Remus could just about envision his results as being edible before they were fifty, instead of never, which had been Remus' original prediction.

Quietly, Remus kicked off his shoes and took off his coat. He tossed his keys onto the dining table, as he did more or less every day, and the click of metal against wood made him pause, as it did more or less every time.

It was a very nice table. While he certainly liked it, he felt equally certain that Lily and James had not realised what it meant to bring this into the flat. They were married now -- expecting a child, even; things were different for them, and Remus doubted that they could ever entirely understand.

Eyeing the table thoughtfully, Remus tried not to dwell too much on why Sirius would be home before him. Sirius was very happy at St Mungo's. No one was suggesting otherwise. Although when he'd initially become a full Healer he had fervently denied it to Remus, he obviously basked in the attention of what seemed a very large number of women who were suspiciously careless with their potions and charms, and who, despite the no doubt intense pain they were in, assured the receptionist that no, it was okay, they could wait until that nice Mr Black was available.

And yet . . .

When he came home early, it was generally because there had been more gruesome injuries than even Sirius could deal with unscathed, and generally the next day's Daily Prophet would have the Dark Mark on the front page and underneath it, a list of names. These days were, generally, increasing in frequency.

Sirius did not transform when Remus settled down next to him, and so he simply ran his fingers through the thick black fur, occasionally scratching him behind his ears. "Bad day, I guess?" Remus asked; Padfoot whined softly, shifting so that he could lay his head in Remus' lap.

It had been at least three months since Remus had said that he was going to move out, and he had been going to today if only for the sake of the thing. But . . .

But it all came back to that stupid table, didn't it? Everything had changed once they had a table in their flat.

For one thing, it was no longer their flat. Their flat did not have a table or posters and pictures on the walls; it did not have Sirius' failed attempts at cooking in the trashcan or a desk covered with the parts of half a dozen sneakoscopes (which Sirius had said he'd only bought in order to protect his own, cherished one from Remus' evil, puppy-kicking tendencies. Remus had just grinned.)

Flats were too temporary to have these things; no, this was their home.

It was horribly maudlin, which is why Remus had never been able to actually voice this revelation to Sirius. Although, one morning he had said on a whim, "I've got to stop at the Registry so I'll probably be home late." That night when Remus returned Sirius had wrapped his arms around Remus, kissed him soundly, and murmured "Welcome home" in his ear; Sirius' voice had choked on the word, almost imperceptibly, and Remus had realised that he had never, ever heard Sirius refer to anywhere as his home before.

And if that night things had gotten a little sentimental, what of it? It was their home. They could do what they damn well pleased in it.

It took Remus a moment to register that the ears he was scratching behind were no longer furry. "Hey," he said softly. Sirius just nuzzled his cheek against Remus' thigh and curled closer, and if he was shaking slightly it was most likely because it was rather cold.

"Moony?" Sirius said.

"Hm?"

There was a pause. Then, "You knew Dorcas, right? Meadows?"

"Yes," Remus said cautiously.

"She, uh . . . earlier t'day. On Order business. I wasn't there during the actual -- but Dumbledore had me and Shacklebolt go see what happened, just . . . well, it was way too late, yeah? Took a few with her, mind, but, I mean, one look around and it was clear there wasn't a chance in hell."

Remus' chest tightened. "I -- Oh, God."

"Yeah," Sirius repeated, and there wasn't really anything more to say. Even so, what each of them left unspoken -- the oh-so-guilty, It wasn't you. I'm so, so sorry for her, but thank every God it was her and it wasn't you -- was painfully loud.

Still running his fingers through Sirius' hair, Remus thought he was far too young for all of this. Too young to be speaking of friends in the past tense, too young to be domesticated and living in a flat with actual furniture . . . but he felt so damn old and broken when the full moon ripped him apart; he felt so aged when his eyes caught on the glint of silver in his hair in the bathroom mirror; and he felt so bleeding mature when he smiled politely (if fixedly) to an employer who had just fired him with an explanation to the affect of "We don't employ your kind here" instead of caving their face in with his fist, which he just knew would be so satisfying. (But he could never bring himself to actually do it. He couldn't ascertain if it was the boy or the wolf who wanted to see the blood, and he worried that for once the two entities might be in agreement.)

No, it was impossible for him to be too young to do or to feel anything.

"D'you know," Remus said, after a long silence, "That we've finally unpacked all our boxes? I dunno -- I was looking for something, and I glanced in the closet, and it just kinda occurred to me."

"Only took us three years," Sirius said, with a faint trace of his normal humour. "Are we getting medals, maybe? Is that where you're going with this?"

Remus smiled, even though Sirius couldn't see, and said, "I was just thinking . . . I mean, before, everything was all packed and ready so it would've been easy, see? But now . . . well, I mean, moving now would be such an effort and you know I'm getting lazy in my old age." He felt Sirius grin against his leg. "So I've decided not to move out, Pads. Too set in my ways, eh? Just . . . I thought you might like to know."

Sirius lifted his head. Pale, grey eyes looked up at him, and for a peculiar moment, there was no regret in Remus John Lupin.

Which made it all the more surprising when, about a year later, Remus did get around to moving out. But as they were barely talking to one another by then, he did so without mentioning it to Sirius at all.

~*~

It had taken Remus almost two weeks to figure it out.

~*~

Remus stared up at the ceiling over his four-poster bed at Hogwarts and silently counted the cracks.

Next to him, Sirius lay on his belly, one arm curled behind his head and the other around Remus' hip, his long, graceful fingers restless against Remus' skin.

It was still surprising to Remus how easily it had all happened. It's just that a couple of weeks ago when everyone left for the break and it felt like Sirius and he had the entire castle to themselves . . . it's just that they had been alone in the common room and Sirius had been looking at him strangely . . . it's just that he should have left the room, but he hadn't because this was Sirius, after all.

"Moony?"

"What?"

"This . . . this is all right, yeah?"

Remus was not exactly sure what this meant, if it meant anything, but he knew that it was not something boys conventionally did and that it had probably already lasted too long. Sirius was too much a dog, fickle with his affections, and Remus was too much a wolf, cautious with his. Sirius had a future and a place in the world once June rolled round because although he'd rejected his name, it still got him wherever he wanted to go, and Remus did not and probably would not because there were some things that were completely unforgivable in wizard society, even if they weren't his fault.

"Yeah, this is okay, Pads," he said.

"Good," Sirius said, yawning. "Now stop your damn thinking, will you?"

"Maybe, you know, if you attempted it now and then, it wouldn't seem like such a strange pastime."

"If I wasn't so comf'table," Sirius said, the warning in his voice dampened by the fact that he was now lazily kissing Remus in between the words, "I would hex you blind."

"But you are comfortable."

"Lucky for you, innit?"

Remus snorted, and he watched Sirius' eyes flutter closed. His fingers remained just as restless, and Remus wondered if they ever stopped -- not that he wanted them to, mind. It's just there was a repetition to the designs which had been bothering Remus for a while now, because he was curious as to what they were but could never concentrate on them long enough before he was lulled to complacency by the soothing feel of Sirius' fingers. But if he could just focus for one minute--

"Constellations," Remus said suddenly. "That was Virgo."

"Hmmm?" Sirius murmured, eyes still closed and breathing beginning to even.

"Oh. Uh, nothing. Sorry."

Virgo. It had better have been coincidental that that's what Sirius was tracing on his skin, otherwise it was most definitely not Remus who was in danger of a good hexing.

But Merlin -- had they all been constellations, this whole time? Each time they'd flung themselves into a corner to avoid Mrs. Norris and ended up pressed very close, each time they'd messed about on the common room couch . . .

And now! Sirius was practically sleeping! How was he drawing them so perfectly? Now that Remus knew what to look for he could tell . . . this was Corvus, it had to be. Why Corvus? Remus wondered. He was probably reading too much into it and there probably wasn't an actual pattern . . . but, on the other hand, Remus had been of the impression that he was excellent at keeping secrets until he'd caught a glimpse of how much Sirius hid.

What are you dreaming about, Sirius? Who are you pointing out the stars to? Remus wondered if it was him; he suspected it was not. He wondered why Sirius felt he could trust Remus, who was clumsy in most things, with something as fragile and secret as the heavens.

For a long time Remus lay quietly, staring at the ceiling and memorising the play of stars against his skin. He was waiting for Sirius to trace Canis Major (as it obviously contained the only star which actually mattered) but Sirius never did.

Oh, just stop thinking, will you? Remus instructed himself irritably. He did not remember falling asleep.