Picture in Reverse

This: play it back. Elegy. Requiem. A searing memory

(the memory of searing.)

The slide and the thud, the rough rustle of curtains, the slight sink of his body toward the weight that has suddenly pressed into the mattress beside him. He's waiting for it even in his sleep, his dreams full of the tingling spreading warmth of anticipation, and when it comes he rolls into it while he still has the excuse of a sleep-addled mind that is in reality fully ready and not addled in the least. An arm, heavy and smooth with rounded muscle, hooks over him automatically and there is a puff of hot breath at his ear, the ticklish brush of thick hair along his jawbone- sensations he memorizes helplessly, galleons for a dreambank that will never be full- before the whisper comes.

-Moony. Wake up.

And then there's no delaying, because they all know that he wakes at the smallest noise and if he pretends to sleep on Sirius will know he's been pretending all along.

-Why? What? he grumbles, his part in this play of theirs, expertly memorized and requiring no understudy. And though he doesn't know what's coming next- complaints of cold, orders to provide escort to the kitchens for a two am snack, childish pleas for a bedtime story- he knows his cues and lines, the verse of rejection, the meter of giving in.

-Moony.

And now he is meant to open his eyes. If it had been, come on, he would have rolled over. Remus, and he would have burrowed his head beneath his pillow. Moony and he looks into the silver eyes, bright enough somehow to glow in the night-dark of a curtained bed. Maybe that's his own werewolf's sight, easily highlighting that which matters; maybe he'd be able to see Sirius's eyes in the pitch-black dark even if he'd never been bitten.

-What is it?

-Let's go swimming.

He's unprepared for this. The lake is not foreign, hasn't been since Sirius shoved Peter into it the second day of their first year, since James leapt after him in a show of solidarity and dragged Sirius along with him to the depths while Remus watched from the shore. What's foreign is the dark sky, the thought of the water inky and impenetrable around them, the October frost riming the mud and their bodies and their breath.

-The others?

-They're sleeping. Come on, Moony.

It's foreign too, more than all the frost in the arctic- the expanse of the water holding only the two of them, an ocean around them, endless seas. That's how it will feel, he knows, and the longing makes him break character, forget what line is supposed to come next, stare helplessly at his friend's eyes in the dark.

But Sirius is Sirius, and he doesn't notice. His fingers, lithe and delicate, lace through Remus's and he tugs as he slides off the bed again. There is a reassuring rhythm to the way their feet hit the floor, one by one, a dull and heavy staccato.

He lets himself be pulled to the door as he always lets himself be swept along by Sirius's whims, as if he's the dog and something- the husky quality to Sirius's voice, perhaps, or the calluses on the middle pads of his fingers from gripping the beater's bat- that emanates from the other boy is a leash and collar around his throat or the tender part of his wrist.

Out of the bedroom, then, with its warm heavy scent of sleepy boy-breath. Through the Common room where the pale embers of the fire throw strange gold highlights into Sirius's dark hair. They race each other down the steps of the tower, tumbling and tangling at the bottom, a heap of legs and skin and half-dreaming bone on the harsh stone floor, both used to bruises and unconcerned at the blood pooling in their knees, the scraped skin of their elbows.

(skin grows back again

will never be the same)

The Great Hall is a wasteland in the night, its vast open space as fraught with danger as any tundra; no place to hide should Filch prowl by (they have tried, memorably, to take refuge under a table, were found by crimson cat-eyes, she attracted by the pumpkin juice scent on their breath. Three nights of lines. I will not steal from the kitchens. Lies come so easily in ink.) They cross it on tiptoe with giggles just behind their lips,

and Remus feels young.

They are wet before they ever reach the lake, the water sheeting from the sky as cold as the frost it will grow into

(the chill rain begins at shut of eve, he says, sing-songing to the mud shoreline and Sirius's limbs pallid and wet-sheened,)

sliding its trembling way between their palms, because not even their palms can seal watertight and perfect. The sky is light with the heavy clouds, a blanket so thick that no star finds a space

(well, except for those that walk the earth, he does not say, poor substitute for Keats that he is.)

Sirius, Adonis that he is, cannot worship water properly with British schoolboy clothing covering his Grecian body, and even as they run the shorts slide down his legs

-It's freezing out here. You're mad.

-Yes.

The silver eyes turn back toward him, their glow echoed by the straight white teeth that show in the madman's grin, and in that split second of imbalance with his ankles tangled in his underthings Sirius goes down, into the mud, pulling Remus with him and they roll and tangle and the sand gets in their teeth as they laugh right into the water and it swallows them

together and whole

and when they kiss it gets into their lungs.

When you drown it is a black heaviness, white around the edges, a weight and a fight, desperation and the peace of surrender. Rest in arms that never loosen grip.

And so nothing has changed.

They do not break the surface as they come up. They do not part it, do not stir the glassy waves. Nothing shatters, nothing comes apart. One moment they are below, a tangle of legs and skin and salted water

(freshwater lake, salt tears. Nobody is weeping

But all the same.)

And the next they are above, sealed together with their shivering.

-I didn't know you wanted

-Of course I do.

-I didn't know you felt

-Well you're just dense.

-I can still shut you up if I want to, Black.

-I'd like to see you try.

He does, and effectively. In this kiss there are teeth, though no skin is ever broken.

They slide together, in and up, toes clasping like fingers, breath interrupted by hitches and water. It does not matter who is where and who

Loses

What.

They'll never tell.

Back back back it is less a dance and more a race, less a race and more a waltz, and though they take no care they are not caught. Sometimes, small miracles are offered with no option to save them up for later

a less rainy day.

No towels. Sheets too starched and slick to dry them. They slide together in between, curl together, a cradle and a child, ribs and skin and arms and all.

A reverent kiss on the crown of a head

(king for the moment, sharing a throne,)

-I love you.

Two voices at once.

In the morning, the bed is soaked through but the boys, they are dry.